Reckon Interview
The Reckon Interview is the home for the best stories about the South. Each week, National Murrow Award-winning host John Hammontree examines American culture through a Southern lens by speaking with authors, entertainers, artists, leaders and thinkers to better understand the most interesting region of America and learn how we can each craft our own narratives about the South.
26
Alan Maimon on the origins of the opioid epidem...
The South has been hit hard over the last few decades by the opioid epidemic. 20 years ago, governments weren’t prepared. Police focused on shutting down marijuana growth, not the rapid spread of prescription drugs. Ground Zero for the spread of drugs ...
37 min
27
The hosts of Pantsuit Politics will help you ha...
From their Kentucky homes, Sarah Stewart Holland and Beth Silvers have helped tens of thousands of people process the past few years of national news and politics. Their podcast "Pantsuit Politics" offers audiences information and grace. They...
40 min
28
Sophie Santos on sorority rush, coming out and ...
Figuring out your identity is hard. Figuring it out while going through sorority rush? That's even harder. In her hilarious new memoir, "The One You Want to Marry (And Other Identities I've Had)" Sophie Santos offers a story of self...
38 min
29
Adam Harris on the inequalities baked into Amer...
In his new book "The State Must Provide," Adam Harris examines the systemic inequities baked into the American higher education system. In this episode, he joins the Reckon Interview to explain how America's colleges were created, the em...
48 min
30
Margaret Renkl on the everyday people building ...
Margaret Renkl's new book "Graceland, At Last" is a balm for anyone who has ever pushed back on Southern stereotypes. She has a true gift for finding unsung voices that push back on the stereotypes perpetuated by Southern politicians or ...
46 min
31
Why Saladin K. Patterson set the "Wonder Years"...
Most people probably wouldn't think to set a sitcom in Montgomery in Alabama in 1968, but when he was tasked with rebooting the "Wonder Years," Saladin K. Patterson drew on what he knew. He grew up in Alabama's capital city in the 1...
25 min
32
Ashley M. Jones on reparations, writing through...
"Reparations Now!" the latest collection of poetry from Ashley M. Jones is a stirring message from the heart of the Deep South. Jones was just named poet laureate of Alabama, the youngest person and first Black Alabamian to hold the title. On...
50 min
33
Stephen Deusner explores Southern culture with ...
In his new book, “Where the Devil Don’t Stay: Traveling the South with the Drive-By Truckers,” Stephen Deusner tells the story of the acclaimed band from either Muscle Shoals or Athens, depending on who you ask. The Truckers have, at various points, in...
46 min
34
Cedric Burnside on continuing the legacy of Hil...
Cedric Burnside started touring when he was just 13 years old. His grandfather, R.L. Burnside, helped create the unique sound of Mississippi Hill Country Blues and Cedric has embraced that legacy. He's been recognized as one of the best Blues musi...
39 min
35
Joshua Burford & Maigen Sullivan on the Invisib...
Joshua Burford and Maigen Sullivan, co-founders of the Invisible Histories Project, saw a gap in Southern history and the history of queer culture in America. There have always been Queer people in the South, and so many of them have been collecting an...
53 min
36
Jennifer K. N. Heinmiller on the stories contai...
Flipping through the pages of the new Dictionary of Southern Appalachian English, you’ll find the stories of thousands of words and phrases unique to the American South. This week, the dictionary's co-author, Jennifer K. N. Heinmiller joins the Re...
35 min
37
Don Heflin on Southerners abroad, careers in fo...
For three decades, Don Heflin has served his country abroad. Currently, he's the head of consul operations at the U.S. embassy in India. On the Reckon Interview, he discusses how the pandemic complicated that work, how the rest of the world percei...
33 min
38
Lawrence Wright on 'The Plague Year
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Lawrence Wright was in a unique position to chronicle the Covid-19 pandemic. As the coronavirus was beginning to spread through the United States, Wright had just published his prescient novel, "The End of October...
43 min
39
Dr. Carol Anderson on the hidden history of the...
Are Americans having the wrong debate about guns? Professor Carol Anderson's new book "The Second: Race and Guns in a Fatally Unequal America" presents the case that the common story we all know about the Second Amendment preserving our ...
50 min
40
Kiese Laymon on the art and power of revision a...
Right now, Kiese Laymon is revising and reclaiming his early work. After buying back the right to "How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America" and "Long Division," Laymon has updated those books to reflect the stories he orig...
35 min
41
Anjali Enjeti on making space for other Souther...
Anjali Enjeti is the author of two brilliant new Southern works, "Southbound," a collection of essays about identity, and "The Parted Earth," a novel multi-generational novel examining the impact of Indian partition on a woman livin...
46 min
42
Sarah Jarosz on the Texas roots of her newest a...
Sarah Jarosz is one of the most celebrated singer-songwriters in American music, first picking up a mandolin at age 9. She joins the Reckon Interview to discuss her albums, "Blue Heron Suite," and "World on the Ground," each of whic...
36 min
43
Rodney Scott shares the secrets of whole hog ba...
Barbecue was born out of the South. But it's hard to fine true masters of whole hog barbecue. Chef Rodney Scott is unmatched. The James Beard award-winning chef joins the Reckon Interview to share the secrets of his trade and why every day is a go...
34 min
44
Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson on truths and lies we...
Who do our stories about the South serve? Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson, co-executive director of the Highlander Research and Education Center, blows up many of America's misconceptions about the South and about Appalachia in the latest episode of the...
52 min
45
John Archibald and Wayne Flynt on the church's ...
In a live recording to celebrate the publication of John Archibald's new memoir "Shaking the Gates of Hell: A Search for Family and Truth in the Wake of the Civil Rights Revolution," we chat with Archibald, RL Nave and Dr. Wayne Flynt ab...
54 min
46
Minnie Bruce Pratt on the past, present and fut...
Minnie Bruce Pratt is a queer and feminist icon, renowned for her activism and art. With another spike in anti-LGBT legislation around the South, Minnie Bruce discusses what it’s like to be targeted by these laws. When she came out in the 1970s, the st...
55 min
47
Elizabeth Spiers on Gawker, Jared Kushner and g...
Elizabeth Spiers helped establish how we read and write on the internet. Elizabeth was the founding editor of Gawker, a website that maybe didn’t introduce the snarky, blogger voice that took over media, but certainly took it mainstream. She helped def...
34 min
48
Jason Kirk on the Bible stories Southern church...
Religion affects almost everything in the South. Even for nonbelievers. But so few people actually spend time understanding the stories they heard as children in Sunday School. Jason and Emily Kirk's podcast "Vacation Bible School," exam...
39 min
49
Connor Towne O'Neill on Nathan Bedford Forrest,...
Long before the Big Lie there was the Lost Cause, one of the most pervasive and damaging "stories" in American history. Connor Towne O'Neill is the author of "Down Along with That Devil's Bones" a book that examines the Lo...
39 min
50
Dr. Regina Bradley on the rise of the hip hop S...
Dr. Regina Bradley, author of the new book "Chronicling Stankonia" explains how the South’s hip hop generation used their music to respond to, remix and interpret their parents’ and grandparents’ civil rights struggles as well as the whole of...
43 min