Welcome to the World of Stories podcast! This is a biweekly show hosted by Hudson Lin and Margrit Talpalaru. Join us as we discover diverse stories the world over.

World of Stories

#0.5 Introduction Episode

Lin talks about how much she loved Green Book (https://www.greenbookfilm.com), winner of TIFF’s People’s Choice Awards, and its realistically diverse supporting cast surrounding the main story. 

Margrit tries to learn about North-American middle-graders from Kids Baking Championships (https://www.foodnetwork.com/shows/kids-baking-championship/episodes/youre-in-the-ballpark), but comes out with questions about why the onus is always on the minority to conform to dominant cultures. Plus, what the heck are bar cookies?

Our question of the episode: What stories have you seen that actually walks the talk of diversity? That shows marginalized people in everyday real ways. Join the conversation on Twitter at @World_ofStories or on SoundCloud at soundcloud.com/worldofstories.

Episode 1 - Green Book and Kids Baking Championship

Kat Chow of NPR's Code Switch (https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/) wrote about using the term "yellow" to describe East Asians in her article If We Called Ourselves Yellow. Lin discusses her unease with the term and its association with disease. 

From there, a conversation about acetate glasses manufactured to fit only a narrow strip of the population evolves into how stereotypes about races and ethnicities still reign in the popular imagination. 

Finally, Margrit raves about Webtoons (https://www.webtoons.com/en/) and their rich and entertaining library of diverse comic art.

Question of the episode: How do you feel about using the word "yellow" to describe East Asians? 

Bonus question: Do you have trouble finding glasses that fit? Do you have any solutions for making glasses fit better?

Episode 2 - Kat Chow's If We Called Ourselves Yellow, Glasses, and Webtoon

Lin liked Celeste Ng’s Everything I Never Told You (https://www.celesteng.com/everything-i-never-told-you) for its complex and unflinching portrayal of life as a racialized minority in 70’s America. The well-crafted story elicits strong emotions through the interwoven narrative strands that revolve around coping with grief and with oppressive social dynamics.

Another interwoven narrative, Brian Selznick’s The Marvels (https://www.themarvelsthebook.com/about_book.htm) is a touching middle-grade story set against the background of the AIDS crisis in the early nineties. Margrit loved it for the way it unfolds like a mystery with ever higher emotional stakes and for the message that everyone deserves to find themselves reflected in stories.

Question of the episode: Do you have a found story of your own, one that you were so excited to find and really spoke to you for who you were, even if it made you angry with its stark realism? Have you ever had the experience of finding your own story?

Comment on Twitter at @World_ofStories or at Soundcloud.com/worldofstories!

Episode 3 - Everything I Never Told You and The Marvels

Hope in trying times. Margrit finds refuge in Thích Nhất Hạnh’s book Happiness (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6550421-happiness) that combines meditation practices by the renowned Buddhist monk and activist with anecdotes from his daily life. We chat about the West’s penchant for appropriating spiritual practices like meditation and yoga and stripping them of their roots. 

Lin’s quest turns sour when the rom-com she chooses, Dating You/Hating You by Christina Lauren (http://christinalaurenbooks.com/books/dating-youhating-you/), turns out to be a study in barely challenged sexism. With a heroine who’s professionally successful, yet unpopular, and a hero who’s perfect on paper but unconvincing, Dating You/Hating You only goes through the motions of feminism, without actually embracing it.

Episode 4 - Happiness and Dating You/Hating You

Lin went to the promisingly titled “Telling Stories in the Age of Historical Amnesia” 2018 Harold Innis Lecture at the University of Toronto, and found it did not live up to the expectations. Charlotte Gray (https://www.charlottegray.ca), a highly acclaimed author of historical non-fiction, insisted on the need to understand and critique events in their historical context. We found it troubling when Gray used as an illustrative example the removal of the statue of John A. MacDonald (https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/john-a-macdonald-statue-victoria-city-hall-lisa-helps-1.4782065), Canada’s first prime minister, from in front of the city hall in Victoria, British Columbia.

Margrit raves about the Pulitzer-winning novel Less, by Andrew Sean Greer (https://andrewgreer.com/less/), that rare kind of book that approaches deep issues, but leaves you feeling joyous and hopeful. A book that manages to embed love within its structure, Less deals with all its characters and their idiosyncrasies not with mocking cruelty but with supreme gentleness.

GIVEAWAY: Open from Friday, November 23, to Friday, December 10, 2018. We are giving away a copy of Less by Andrew Sean Greer. To enter, follow us on Twitter @World_ofStories, and answer our question on Twitter or by email at worldofstoriespodcast@gmail.com. The winner will be drawn randomly and announced on our podcast on December 21, 2018.

QUESTION: Have you come across a story that involved difficult topics, perhaps controversial, perhaps ugly, yet it was told in a beautiful and uplifting way?

Episode 5 - Charlotte Gray's 2018 Harold Innis Lecture and Less

We revisit Green Book (https://www.tiff.net/tiff/green-book), and discuss how marginalized people—or parts of a marginalized existence—are left out of mainstream stories told from a more privileged perspective. 

Lin rejoices in the rich conversations about disability at the launch of Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice (https://arsenalpulp.com/Books/C/Care-Work) by  Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha. 

Margrit brings up some middle-grade novels featuring disabled protagonists. In some of them, living with disability is the main plot point, e.g., El Deafo by Cece Bell (https://www.scholastic.com/teachers/books/el-deafo-by-cece-bell/), Out of My Mind by Sharon M. Draper (http://sharondraper.com/bookdetail.asp?id=35), and Wonder by R.J. Palacio (https://wonderthebook.com/books/wonder). In The Magisterium series by Holly Black and Cassandra Clare (https://www.cassandraclare.com/series/the-magisterium-series/), the protagonist’s disability is neither easy to overlook, nor an impediment in the adventures he lives through.

QUESTION: What do you think about the pressures on marginalized people to constantly explain their marginalization? 

As always you can comment on this or previous episodes on Twitter at World_ofStories or email us at worldofstoriespodcast@gmail.com. We’d love to hear what you think!

Be sure to subscribe to our podcast to get new episodes as they drop. If you like our show, please leave us a review on iTunes, Google Play, or wherever you’re listening to us.

Episode 6 - Green Book Revisited, Care Work, and Disability Kid Lit

Tanya Talaga’s non-fiction book Seven Fallen Feathers (https://houseofanansi.com/products/seven-fallen-feathers_) illustrates the vicious confluence of racist attitudes and a colonizing culture through the stories of seven indigenous children who died in similar circumstances in Thunder Bay, Ontario. We talk about how much of the history and reality of indigenous people living in Canada is still obscured and rendered invisible today. 

Echo (http://www.pammunozryan.com/echo/) by Pam Muñoz Ryan weaves the fictional stories of three musically gifted children who live in politically charged times in mid-twentieth century. From Nazi Germany through the American Depression to the impact of Japanese interment in the US during WWII, political turmoil is personalized in the lives of children whose fates are linked by a special harmonica. 

QUESTION: Do you have an example of a story that touched you and informed you of people you didn’t really know much about?

Episode 7 - Seven Fallen Feathers and Echo

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A podcast about diverse stories the world over. Hosted by Hudson Lin and Margrit Talpalaru.

World of Stories

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