KPFA - Against the Grain

It’s both a precious resource and a dangerous pollutant, exponentially increasing crop yields, while fouling our waterways with blue-green algae. The element phosphorus has played a crucial role in agriculture and war, while its reserves are unevenly distributed, with much of the world’s supply located in the occupied territories of Western Sahara. Writer Dan Egan discusses the double-edged nature of an element that is increasingly depleted and overused. (Encore presentation.) Resources: Dan Egan, The Devil’s Element: Phosphorus and a World Out of Balance Norton, 2023 The post Phosphorus: Reaping the Harvest appeared first on KPFA.

When the system is stacked against you, when mainstream society sidelines you (or worse), where do you look for liberatory possibilities? Eve Dunbar describes how Ann Petry, author of the 1946 novel “The Street” as well as YA novels about Harriet Tubman and Tituba, insisted on satisfaction and not merely survival. Dunbar also talks about the value of what she calls monstrous work. Eve Dunbar, Monstrous Work and Radical Satisfaction: Black Women Writing under Segregation University of Minnesota Press, 2024 The post Radical Satisfaction appeared first on KPFA.

Many assume the majority of people living on the streets struggle with mental illness or just need jobs — and that homelessness is unfortunate, but intractable. Longtime advocate for the unhoused, Mary Brosnahan, argues that these are myths, and that much of what we assume about homelessness is wrong. She posits that at its root is the capitalist commodification of housing, illustrated in the past by Bronx landlords getting rid of low income tenants by burning their buildings to the ground to the systemic shortage of affordable housing today. (Encore presentation.) Resources: Mary Brosnahan, “They Just Need to Get a Job” 15 Myths on Homelessness Beacon Press, 2024 Invisible People Finland The post Getting Homelessness Wrong appeared first on KPFA.

Prentis Hemphill discusses their book “What It Takes to Heal: How Transforming Ourselves Can Change the World.” The post Against the Grain – July 30, 2025 appeared first on KPFA.

The climate crisis no longer looms in the future, but has arrived in the form of deadly heat waves, enormous floods and wildfires, hurricanes, and droughts. It’s clear that, along with fighting to slow climate change, we also need to protect ourselves and the most vulnerable around us from the devastating effects of global warming — especially as the Trump administration slashes existing safeguards. Science writer and broadcaster David Pogue discusses what we can do in an increasingly precarious world. The post Fund Drive Special: Preparing Oneself for Climate Emergencies appeared first on KPFA.

Mark Matousek discusses his book “Emerson, the Stoics, and Me: Timeless Wisdom for Living an Authentic Life.” The post Fund Drive Special: Emerson and the Stoics appeared first on KPFA.

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How was it that in less than two centuries the world’s tallest trees, the majestic redwoods, were almost logged off the face of the earth? And this despite the efforts over many generations, starting in the late 19th century, to preserve them. Greg King, writer and forest activist, argues that one of the world’s first greenwashing organizations – the Save the Redwoods League, founded by white supremacists – played a key role. He details the heroic struggle against the odds to defend these unique trees. The post Fund Drive Special: Fighting for the Redwoods appeared first on KPFA.

A radio and web media project whose aim is to provide in-depth analysis and commentary on a variety of matters — political, economic, social and cultural — important to progressive and radical thinking and activism. The post Against the Grain – July 22, 2025 appeared first on KPFA.

Floods are the most destructive natural disaster and, thanks to a heating climate, the damages caused by floods are expected to worsen significantly. Flood mitigation of the past, such as levies and dams, has proved inadequate and often counterproductive by mis-allocating precious resources. Tim Palmer argues that it’s time to start relocating our built environment out of the places with a high likelihood of flooding. (Encore presentation.) Tim Palmer, Seek Higher Ground: The Natural Solution to Our Urgent Flooding Crisis UC Press, 2024 Photograph credit: Mark Moran The post Mitigating Flooding appeared first on KPFA.

They fought to secure the vote for women. They used direct action, civil disobedience, and increasingly militant tactics to pursue their goals. Feyzi Ismail assesses the strategies and tactics of a group of British suffragettes with an eye toward building a more effective climate movement. Gregory Albo and Stephen Maher, eds. Socialist Register 2025: Openings and Closures: Socialist Strategy at a Crossroads The post Climate and Suffrage Struggles appeared first on KPFA.

Our lives are filled with innumerable choices, such as for the countless array of products for us to buy, assuming we can afford them. Our politics are often framed as a question of individual, not collective, choice such as the freedom to choose to have an abortion or the act of casting one’s vote in secret, away from the eyes other others. Historian Sophia Rosenfeld argues that the notion that freedom means “the freedom to choose” has been central to modern Western society, but may be coming apart. (Encore presentation.) Sophia Rosenfeld, The Age of Choice: A History of Freedom in Modern Life Princeton University Press, 2025 The post Is Freedom a Choice? appeared first on KPFA.

Over the course of two decades, publications of the Industrial Workers of the World featured the influential writings of a hobo, transient worker, columnist, poet, and songwriter named T-Bone Slim. Owen Clayton talks about Slim’s focus on workers’ everyday lives under capitalism, his political stances, his use of humor, and his commitment to worker organizing. Owen Clayton and Iain McIntyre, eds., The Popular Wobbly: Selected Writings of T-Bone Slim University of Minnesota Press, 2025 Owen Clayton, Vagabonds, Tramps, and Hobos: The Literature and Culture of U.S. Transiency, 1890–1940 Cambridge University Press, 2023 The post Wobbly Extraordinaire appeared first on KPFA.

The federal minimum wage languishes at $7.25 an hour and has not been raised since 2009. Given the disproportionate number of workers of color who receive the minimum wage or less, legal scholar Ruben Garcia argues that the fight for racial justice has to include raising the minimum wage. (Encore presentation.) Ruben J. Garcia, Critical Wage Theory: Why Wage Justice Is Racial Justice UC Press, 2024 Photo credit: Fibonacci Blue The post Racial Justice Through Raising the Minimum Wage appeared first on KPFA.

What role did Irish Catholics play within the U.S. left? Were Irish radicals more interested in freedom from British rule or in anticapitalism? And what effect did religious beliefs have on Irish Americans’ inclinations to break with the mainstream? David Emmons highlights Irish Americans’ contributions to dissidence, progressivism, and radicalism in the United States. David Emmons, History’s Erratics: Irish Catholic Dissidents and the Transformation of American Capitalism, 1870-1930 University of Illinois Press, 2024 The post Irish American Dissidents appeared first on KPFA.

As the environmental crisis worsens, not everyone is drawing the same lessons. On the far right, xenophobic and racist ideas are increasingly dressed up as means of protecting nature. And, as scholar Alexander Menrisky posits, contemporary American culture furnishes a wealth of material for the right, from the ubiquity of apocalyptic and misanthropic ideas to concerns with Wellness and bodily purity. Alexander Menrisky, Everyday Ecofascism: Crisis and Consumption in American Literature University of Minnesota Press, 2025 The post The Fodder of Eco-Fascism appeared first on KPFA.

The American diet is awash in junk food. More than half the calories Americans eat come from processed food and drink. Three decades ago, with obesity on the rise, the food industry funded scientists to conclude that exercise was the answer, rather than taxing soda and reining in the marketing of processed food. Anthropologist Susan Greenhalgh weighs in on Big Soda’s influence on science — at universities, through front groups — and the ways that companies like Coca-Cola influenced public health in the U.S. and in China, one of the largest markets for processed food in the world. (Encore presentation.) Susan Greenhalgh, Soda Science: Making the World Safe for Coca-Cola University of Chicago Press, 2024 Photo credit: Mike Mozart The post How Big Soda Shaped the Science of Exercise appeared first on KPFA.

Massive amounts of money are needed to address the multiple social and ecological crises besetting societies around the globe. According to Thomas Marois, the lion’s share of that financing will need to come from public banks. But many public banking institutions, he argues, must be democratized and definancialized. Gregory Albo and Stephen Maher, eds. Socialist Register 2025: Openings and Closures: Socialist Strategy at a Crossroads Monthly Review Press, 2025 The Public Banking Project at McMaster University Thomas Marois, Public Banks: Decarbonisation, Definancialisation, and Democratisation Cambridge University Press, 2021 (Image on main page by Christian A. Schröder.) The post Public Banks appeared first on KPFA.

A radio and web media project whose aim is to provide in-depth analysis and commentary on a variety of matters — political, economic, social and cultural — important to progressive and radical thinking and activism. The post Against the Grain – June 30, 2025 appeared first on KPFA.