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This is Our Body Politics. I'm Farai Chidea. Dr. Melissa Harris-Perry centers conversations on the black community, women, and intersectional justice as an academic, author,

and award-winning journalist and commentator.

Last year, she became the host and managing editor of WNYC's The Takeaway, a national daily news show with live reports from the field plus analysis.

She also serves as the Maya Angelou presidential chair at her alma mater, Wake Forest University, and runs the organization she founded, the Anna Julia Cooper Center.

I am so glad to be reunited, Melissa.

Hi, Farai. I'm so happy to hear your voice and talk with you.

I am too. We have so much to talk about, but I'm really just so glad to see you

thriving. And before we get to all your work things, how are you overall just as a human in these

very strange days? Oh, wrong day to ask. Most days, the answer is great. The answer to day is

that I have not had anything to eat and I have not slept.

And so I'm feeling like life is terrible.

But that's really just because I'm hungry and tired.

So I learned that very much like a toddler.

Like you got to fuel up and drink the water and sleep.

But most days, actually, I'm doing extraordinarily well and almost surprised to find this little life of mine

continuing to make itself. My children are wonderful and healthy and thriving. My parents are

...