Kqeds Forum

Rita Dove, winner of a Pulitzer Prize for poetry and the nation’s first Black poet laureate, has returned with a new volume of poems titled “Playlist for the Apocalypse.” It’s Dove’s first book in 12 years -- in part due to a health battle with multiple sclerosis that she reveals and poignantly reflects on in a sequence called “Little Book of Woe.” Both personal and political, Dove’s poems also meditate on American life today, in all its strife, uncertainty, complexity and beauty. Dove joins us to talk about the book and her return to writing.

When asked to name some of the Bay Area’s signature foods, many would jump to name Mission burritos, It’s-It ice cream sandwiches or — especially for tourists visiting San Francisco piers — clam chowder. KQED food editor Luke Tsai is adding another food to that list: garlic noodles. “Here in the Bay Area, Asian Americans love garlic noodles. Black and Latino folks love garlic noodles. Indeed, once you start looking for garlic noodles, it seems, you find them everywhere,” Tsai writes in his recent article. So what’s behind the love for this dish born in San Francisco’s Vietnamese community? We’ll talk to Tsai about how garlic noodles became one of the Bay Area’s most iconic foods.

Two California scientists, David Julius from UCSF and Ardem Patapoutian from San Diego's Scripps Research, have won the 2021 Nobel Prize for medicine. In their work, which focuses on the biology of our senses, Julius and Patapoutian identified receptors that allow the cells in your body to sense touch and temperature. Their findings hold potential medical applications for better treatment of chronic pain. We talk with the prize-winning researchers about their work.

As Sam Quinones was researching America's opiate epidemic for his award-winning 2015 book "Dreamland," he watched a troubling phenomenon emerge. As pain-pill prescribing fell, drug traffickers with unfettered access to the world's chemical markets began to fill the void with dangerous synthetic drugs. Opiate addicts began to switch to fentanyl and particularly potent forms of methamphetamine, ultimately driving overdose deaths to record levels in 2020. Quinones joins us to talk about the devastating impact of the synthetic drug era, as told in his new book "The Least of Us," and how communities are trying to recover.

Nearly 227 million Americans across all ages play video games, according to an Entertainment Software Association report. And the world of video games is more than just franchise titles and big-name companies like Sony and Nintendo -- there’s a diverse and growing cohort of gamers, designers, developers and executives driving innovation in the art, tech, and narrative of a changing industry. We take an interactive look at the gaming world and the next generation of gamers and game design.

Have you ever felt "slipfast" (a longing to melt into a crowd and become invisible)? Or "scabulous" (proud of a certain scar on your body)? Those are some of the many words John Koenig has created for emotions  we've felt all our lives but lacked words to describe. We talk to Koenig about why he says there are vast holes in our emotional lexicon and why it's important for humans to develop a richer language to describe our interior lives. Koenig's new book, more than ten years in the making, is "The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows."

This beautiful Bay Area of ours contains stories and secrets, histories and futures — and if you know where to look and what questions to ask, you will find them. Imbibe enough of those and that’s how you become a person of this place. That can be hard work OR you can listen to the KQED podcast Bay Curious. Host Olivia Allen-Price joins us as we revisit Bay Curious episodes about Frida Kahlo, saying Frisco, dialing POP-CORN for the time, and more.

In a time of uncertainty, the holiday movie offers a world of good cheer, maybe a few good songs, and a reliably predictable happy ending. But what makes a good holiday movie? Hallmark, Lifetime, Netflix and other outlets are offering viewers hundreds of titles – nearly all romantic comedies that have resurrected careers of stars from the 90s and which invariably feature snow, hot cocoa and two people who don’t get along but eventually fall in love. And then there are classics like “It’s A Wonderful Life” and “Meet Me in St. Louis.” We’ll talk about why holiday movies are so popular, hear from you about your favorites, and answer the question: “Is Die Hard a holiday movie?”

As the year ends, we’ll take a moment to look back at books that we loved, couldn’t stop thinking about, and kept telling others to read. As we enter the third year of the pandemic, readers are still gravitating toward dystopian-themed books. Other popular titles explore topics such as white supremacy, identity, and connecting with nature. Some of the top picks from the Forum team include Clint Smith’s “How the Word is Passed,” “Crying in H Mart” by Michelle Zauner, Jose Vadi's “Interstate,” and “Parable of the Sower” by Octavia E. Butler. And we want to hear your picks, send us the best book you read last year and why to forum@kqed.org or leave us a voicemail at 415-553-3300.

As we continued to navigate the pandemic in 2021, music remained a key source of solace and entertainment. We reemerged into public spaces to attend live shows and festivals. Lil Nas X had everyone talking with a very savvy release of his debut album “Montero” and made clear he was no “one hit wonder.” Wizkid and Tems’ infectious Afro-pop song “Essence” got a second life at parties and cookouts, becoming one of the year’s biggest hits. Powerhouse singers Jasmine Sullivan and Adele both had triumphant returns with searing, vulnerable albums after years without releasing music. And we got a new look at beloved artists like Tina Turner and The Beatles in feature documentaries. We unpack some of the biggest songs and musical moments of 2021.

In this hour, we unpack some of the Bay Area’s best songs and biggest musical moments of 2021. Bay Area rapper Stunnaman02 got everyone “Big Steppin” with his song and viral dance move. The band Destroy Boys brought us “cathartic, angst-combating, middle-finger-pointing post-punk” according to KQED contributor Rae Alexandra. Local singer-songwriters weren’t afraid to be their authentic selves and share how they’re really feeling about the world. Communities and fans mourned beloved Bay Area hip hop artists Gift of Gab of Blackalicious, Shock G of Digital Underground and Baba Zumbi of Zion-I. We’ll hit rewind on 2021 and get listeners' picks for the best in local music. 

Last December, amid news of effective vaccines and a new administration, Atlantic science writer Ed Yong tweeted that he was “gently hopeful” about getting to celebrate his 40th birthday party in person in 2021 with a few dozen friends. A lot can change in a year. With a third wave of Covid looming thanks to the highly transmissible Omicron variant, Yong made the tough call to cancel his party last week. We talk with Yong about the latest Omicron developments and preview President Biden’s planned Tuesday address to the nation on Covid.

For her new book How the Other Half Eats: The Untold Story of Food and Inequality in America, Stanford-trained sociologist Priya Fielding-Singh talked to 75 Bay Area families from a variety of backgrounds about their everyday food choices. She joins us to discuss class, race, and nutritional inequity and why, as she writes in the book, “access to healthy food is about more than geography and finances.”

For his new book, ‘Misfire: Inside the Downfall of the NRA,’ NPR investigative reporter Tim Mak dove deep into the inner workings of the National Rifle Association. Over the course of three years, Mak interviewed 120 sources and pored through thousands of pages of documents, emails and memos, and in his book, he offers a portrait of an organization wracked by venality, gross mismanagement and financial misconduct, much of it caused by Wayne LaPierre, the NRA CEO and his wife Susan, who plundered membership dues to pay for their extravagant lifestyle. We talk to Mak about his book and the future of the NRA.

Brazilian jazz guitarist Bola Sete is considered one of the greatest – but also underappreciated – musical talents of his era. A new three-disc compilation, “Samba in Seattle: Live at the Penthouse, 1966-1968,” captures live recordings of Sete, who lived and performed in the Bay Area for decades, at a storied jazz club. Critics say the new album highlights Sete, who died in Marin County in 1987, at the prime of his career and brings much deserved appreciation to his artistry. The recordings, however, could have been lost forever if not for a few strokes of fate. We talk about the life and music of Bola Sete.

Of the many Californians who died of COVID , 1 in 8 lived in a nursing home, totaling almost 9400 people.  The high death toll is now prompting legislators to rethink oversight and funding of these institutions. We’ll talk about how the pandemic has exposed systemic problems with the quality of care in nursing homes and what a proposed state budget reform linking nursing home funding to new quality standards,  might mean for the approximately 400,000 state nursing home residents.

In her celebrated 1999 essay collection "Remembered Rapture" — about the life and craft of a writer — feminist author and educator bell hooks insisted that "[n]o Black woman writer in this culture can write ‘too much’. Indeed, no woman writer can write ‘too much'.... No woman has ever written enough.” hooks, who passed away Wednesday at age 69, published more than 30 books, including the noted works “Ain’t I A Woman?”, “All About Love,” “Sisters of the Yam” and “Teaching to Transgress.” Her writing was foundational in shaping Black feminist thought and widening the feminist worldview beyond white, middle class identity. From her pointed critiques of the “imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarch” to her poignant thoughts on love and healing, we'll reflect on hooks' life and work.

The Food and Drug administration on Thursday permanently lifted a restriction on mailing abortion pills to patients. Previously, the pills had to be physically handed out by physicians, but that rule had been loosened during the pandemic. The decision comes as the US Supreme court is considering limits on abortion rights, and is likely to spark further legal battles. We’ll talk about the FDA’s move with Roll Call reporter Sandyha Raman.

The searing images of Afghans desperate to get on to planes leaving Kabul brought the world’s attention to the crisis created in part by the American withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan in August. In the four months that have passed, the Taliban have solidified their rule, the international community has responded with sanctions and asset freezes of funds, and a humanitarian crisis of epic proportions has begun unfolding. According to the United Nations, “nearly 23 million people – that is 55% of the population – are facing extreme levels of hunger and nearly 9 million of them are at risk of famine.” The Bay Area is home to one of the largest enclaves of Afghan Americans, and that community has been working tirelessly to help new arrivals and to offer assistance to a country in tatters. As the intensifying crisis nearly disappears from American media coverage, we talk to an Afghan refugee about her fraught journey to leave the country she loves and her community’s struggle to resettle, and we’ll discuss the

Taking the side of environmental groups and commercial beekeepers, a California judge earlier this month said he would issue a statewide order banning a pesticide called sulfoxaflor. Part of the class of neuro-active insecticides called neonicotinoids, sulfoxaflor protects crops from insects, but scientists say it is toxic to bees. A study by environmental group Earthjustice found that the number of honeybee colonies in the U.S. fell by 45% from April 2020 to April 2021. We’ll talk about the ban and the worrying decline of pollinators.