Kate Wolf and Eric Newman are joined by the director and cinematographer, David Greaves, and his daughter, producer Liani Greaves, to speak about their new documentary, Once Upon a Time in Harlem. Originally conceived by David's father, the filmmaker William Greaves, Once Upon a Time in Harlem was shot in 1972 at a party that Willian engineered with the living luminaries of the Harlem Renaissance. During the span of a long afternoon, this extraordinary group reflected on – and argued about – their politics, aesthetics, ambitions, and history. Greaves captured a crucial moment when the Renaissance's cultural contributions were at risk of being overshadowed. But through interviews with the artists Romare Bearden and Aaron Douglas, the writers Arna Bontemps and Richard Bruce Nugent, and the activist Regina Andrews, among many others, he offered an intimate, firsthand account of the generation that transformed American art and literature at the beginning of the twentieth century. Unfinished at the time of Greaves death in 2014, David and Liani have since completed the film and recovered a vital chapter of American cultural history, which illuminates both the struggles and questions of the Harlem Renaissance and the way they continue to resonate today.

Eric Newman and Medaya Ocher are joined by Palestinian American poet, translator and physician Fady Joudah to discuss his latest book, Exhibit G. The collection, a nominee for the National Book Award in Poetry, brings together poetry, prose, and photographs on the ongoing genocide in Gaza. In this bold and illuminating work, Joudah wrestles with language, perspective, as well as the innate tensions within the writing itself: How to document a genocide in English, the language of the oppressor? How to resist what Joudah calls the "museumification" of the Palestinian people? And how can we challenge ourselves to confront immense suffering for what it is? Joudah discusses his work as a writer and a doctor, how he wants the book to be read, and the persistence of Palestinian poetry.

In this special chat episode, Medaya Ocher, Eric Newman, and Kate Wolf use Catherine Liu's new book Traumatized to dive into the political uses and pitfalls of trauma. Liu argues that the elite professional class has fully absorbed the trauma narrative; the story of an individual's suffering and recovery courses through the culture on social and mass media not as a tool for liberation, but as a means of keeping the status quo. In turning our gaze away from class struggle, the discourse of trauma on the mainstream left has largely remained deaf to questions of economic equality. Medaya, Eric, and Kate walk through Liu's argument, debating everything from the sins of Betty Frieidan and Oprah Winfrey to true crime and celebrity documentaries. Have we all become too traumatized to effectively resist in the present?