[Unedited] Elizabeth Alexander with Krista Tippett

On Being with Krista Tippett

On Being Studios

Sociology, Spirituality, Religion & Spirituality, Krista Tippett, Arts, Culture, On Being, Society, Society & Culture, Science, Social Sciences

4.7 • 10.2K Ratings

🗓️ 4 April 2019

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

A prolific writer on sociology, history, economics, and politics, W.E.B. Du Bois was one of the most extraordinary minds of American and global history. His life traced an incredible arc; he was born three years after the end of the Civil War and died on the eve of the March on Washington. In 1903, he penned the famous line that “the problem of the 20th century is the problem of the color line.” Du Bois was a formative voice for many of the people who gave us the Civil Rights Movement and for all of us navigating the still-unfolding, unfinished business of civil rights now. We bring his life and ideas into relief through three conversations with people who were inspired by him. Elizabeth Alexander is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and president of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Her books include “Crave Radiance” and her memoir, “The Light of the World.” This interview is edited and produced with music and other features in the On Being episode “Maya Angelou, Elizabeth Alexander, and Arnold Rampersad — W.E.B. Du Bois and the American Soul.” Find more at onbeing.org.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Support for On Being with Krista Tippett comes from the Fetzer Institute, helping build the spiritual
0:04.9	foundation for a loving world. Fetzer envisions a world that embraces love as a guiding principle
0:10.7	and animating force for our lives, a powerful love that helps us live in sacred relationship
0:15.8	with ourselves, others, and the natural world. Learn more by visiting fetzer.org.
0:22.5	I'm Krista Tippett, and this is On Being's Unheard Cuts. Up next, my unedited conversation with poet Elizabeth Alexander.
0:31.2	There is a shorter, produced version of this, wherever you get your podcasts.
0:36.8	You know, they're different from what we do normally because they're about an historical figure,
0:42.3	but the idea is more, is not, is to introduce this person to modern people.
0:48.4	And it's not, they're not historical treatments.
0:51.5	There's a bit of that in there, but it's really how does this, how does the
0:55.2	legacy of this person? And specifically for us, you know, the human and spiritual legacy, spiritual
1:00.8	defined expansively, how does that resonating in 21st century lives? So really to bring that
1:05.8	into the present. And I'm also telling you that because we have other voices in this show.
1:11.9	So, like, you don't have to cover all the ground.
1:14.1	You don't have to be.
1:14.8	Yeah.
1:15.1	No, so you, and I really feel like at this point, I have a number of interviews.
1:19.8	I have one of his biographers, Arnold Ramperset.
1:25.5	Oh, super.
1:26.2	Oh, my gosh.
1:27.0	And he read, his voice is gorgeous. And he did some, just in the end,
1:32.0	we just had him to a bunch of readings of, so we have him. And we also have this woman named
	...

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