Hey, I'm Jeff Bennett and welcome to settle in. Our guest today is sociologist, professor, writer,

MacArthur Fellow, and New York Times opinion columnist Tressie McMillan Kottom. We talk about the

collapse of the public's faith in institutions, how class shaped her path in life, the stories we

tell ourselves, what they tell us, and why they stick.

Her surprising prescription for feeling exhausted by the onslaught of bad news,

and how to find hope for a better future off the internet.

So settle in as I talk with Tressie McMillan Cotton.

Tressie McMillan Cotton, thanks so much for making time and for speaking with us.

It is an absolute pleasure to be with you.

You are a sociologist. You're a writer. You're a professor. You're a New York Times opinion columnist.

Your work lives outside the academy in public spaces. When did you realize that your work wasn't just academic? It was civic. Oh, my goodness. You know, from the outset, I was developing

my academic expertise in the shadow of just a real intellectual love affair with early 20th century sociologist.

So someone like a W.B. Du Bois was very inspirational to me.

And so I had to grapple very early on with the question of who is my work for.

And historically, you know, black academics, black cultural workers have never really had the choice of not engaging

with the civic problems of things like citizenship, our legal inclusion in the Constitution.

And so almost from the outset, I felt compelled to decide to whom am I speaking and for whom

am I speaking. And I took a lot of comfort in the fact that people I consider the greatest

intellectual sort of our time never made a decision between the academy and the people. And in speaking

to the people, their work was actually much more strident, much more

focused. I think it was sharper. But, you know, someone like a Du Bois was writing novels at the same

time that he was producing arguably, I would say defensively, some of the most important sociology

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