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Speaker 1: Hi, everyone, Sophia Bush here. Welcome to Work in Progress,

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Speaker 1: where I talk to people who inspire me about how

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Speaker 1: they got to where they are and where they think

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Speaker 1: they're still going. Today's guest is Christopher Smith. He is

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Speaker 1: a clinical professor in the School of Communication at USC's

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Speaker 1: Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, where he also jointly

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Speaker 1: runs the Media Economics and Entrepreneurship Program. Now why am

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Speaker 1: I so excited he's here Because he happens to have

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Speaker 1: been my college professor at USC and my favorite professor

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Speaker 1: of all time. Professor Smith is the reason why I

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Speaker 1: love journalism so much and why I see the value

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Speaker 1: in journalism and social justice working hand in hand. It

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Speaker 1: was so much fun to see him and talk to

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Speaker 1: him for the podcast. He is fascinating, brilliant, and so

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Speaker 1: thought provoking. And I am so excited that you all

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Speaker 1: will get to learn from him today too. It's almost

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Speaker 1: like you get to sit in on one of my classes.

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Speaker 1: He is just the best, and if you're lucky enough

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Speaker 1: to be at USC, take his class. I promise that

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Speaker 1: will change your life. I'm so excited that you're here today.

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Speaker 1: Thanks for having This is a trip and so fun,

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Speaker 1: so I want to take everybody back a little bit.

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Speaker 1: And it's funny that you remember the year, because I

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Speaker 1: realized that I didn't. But I was looking through the

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Speaker 1: notes from your call and you said it was two

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Speaker 1: thousand two when I was in your class, which is

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Speaker 1: crazy to me. I just started at USC, you had

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Speaker 1: that was my first year? Okay? And where were you before?

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Speaker 1: I was at I was getting my PhD University of Wisconsin,

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Speaker 1: man Sin and I wrote my dissertation back in New

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Speaker 1: York City. I've worked as a research analyst at a

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Speaker 1: tech PR firm, and uh, when I finished, when I

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Speaker 1: defended my dissertation, I got the offer to come to

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Speaker 1: USC as a postdoctoral fellow, and uh, I started, and

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Speaker 1: I've been there ever since. So take me back, what

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Speaker 1: does it mean to work in tech PR in two

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Speaker 1: thousand two? Because this is pre iPhone, this is pre Twitter, Facebook, Instagram,

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Speaker 1: just the dawn of the consumer facing Internet. I mean basically,

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Speaker 1: when Mark Andresen bought the Netscape browser company public and

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Speaker 1: fall of to the that started the Internet frenzy, the

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Speaker 1: dot com frenzy, and so Domino's positive Dominoes after that, Amazon, Yahoo, eBay,

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Speaker 1: all those first wave Internet companies came to market, and

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Speaker 1: the excitement in the late nineties was just through the roof.

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Speaker 1: It was like the digital gold rush had begun. And

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Speaker 1: so any young person in New York the Bay Area

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Speaker 1: you wanted to be in that game. And so I

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Speaker 1: was writing my dissertation on the way that technology spurs

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Speaker 1: asset price appreciation and spurs the cultural phenomenon around asset

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Speaker 1: price appreciations that we call bubbles. And so the dot

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Speaker 1: com era was a classic bubble and I was already

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Speaker 1: studying that. So as I was writing my dissertation, I said, well,

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Speaker 1: it would be great to be even closer to the action.

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Speaker 1: And so I also got a full time job working

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Speaker 1: as a representative for startups that wanted consulting on their

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Speaker 1: communication strategies and just their market positioning. Yeah, so it

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Speaker 1: was exciting. So when you talk about a bubble asset

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Speaker 1: price appreciate appreciation, can you tell people what that means

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Speaker 1: for for people who don't When new technology is going

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Speaker 1: all the way back to the steam engine and railroad occur,

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Speaker 1: they transform society, they transform business, they transform the economy,

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Speaker 1: and they also transform the way we think, um just

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Speaker 1: in everyday life, about what's possible, how we might behave

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Speaker 1: and what we can aspire to, and those are all

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Speaker 1: natural byproducts of new inventions and and new ways of

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Speaker 1: doing things. That kind of excitement. People place bets on

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Speaker 1: how far the impact of those exciting new things can

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Speaker 1: take us, and they literally place financial bets on that.

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Speaker 1: And when you literally get like an ignition of excitement

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Speaker 1: around a phenomena and a lot of people are placing bets,

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Speaker 1: bystanders see all those people placing bets, and they sense

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Speaker 1: the excitement and they want in as well, and you

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Speaker 1: get positive contagion effect of people being really interested in

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Speaker 1: this area, wanting to be in on it, and wanting

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Speaker 1: to be part of the financial reward that's going to

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Speaker 1: come from it. And when that becomes a mass phenomena,

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Speaker 1: it creates a bubble because what that what's happening is

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Speaker 1: people's expectations of the impact become bigger than the immediate

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Speaker 1: near term impact is actually going to be. And when

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Speaker 1: you get a correction between those expectations and the reality,

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Speaker 1: that's when the market goes down. That's when the bubble bursts.

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Speaker 1: And we saw that, we realized that you see that

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Speaker 1: all the time. That's a byproduct of of of financial capitalism,

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Speaker 1: you know, and innovation. But when the action is good

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Speaker 1: and the music is playing, it's a it's a wonderful

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Speaker 1: time to be dancing because it's really catchy, it's really exciting,

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Speaker 1: it's fun and to be young. And in the midst

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Speaker 1: of that, it felt like the Roaring twenties all over again,

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Speaker 1: you know, like, you know, the the excitement that working hard,

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Speaker 1: working late, playing hard, staying up late, you know, burning

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Speaker 1: the candle at both ends. To be in New York

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Speaker 1: at any time as a young person is exciting. To

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Speaker 1: be in New York at a time of that kind

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Speaker 1: of game change is particularly exciting. So it was really great.

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Speaker 1: But with the benefit of hindsight, we know that a

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Speaker 1: lot of the value that was initially created around those

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Speaker 1: startups at that time didn't matter, didn't didn't come to

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Speaker 1: mean very much in a longstanding way. So you know,

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Speaker 1: we kind of know that those kind of periods are

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Speaker 1: gonna happen, but we also know that when the bubble bursts,

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Speaker 1: reckoning what actually mattered from that time, um is always

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Speaker 1: a little bit difficult. And so were you writing your

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Speaker 1: dissertation on these topics, Absolutely absolutely, And you know, the

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Speaker 1: idea is is how do peep bill come to adjust

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Speaker 1: their everyday thinking to these new realities. What are the

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Speaker 1: mechanisms of representation, of culture, of of of of just

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Speaker 1: you know, everyday life that are just people's thinking to

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Speaker 1: these new possibilities. These new possibilities always have to persuade

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Speaker 1: people a that this is safe, this is okay, this

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Speaker 1: is going to add to your sense of security, and

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Speaker 1: then on top of that that you're gonna have greater

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Speaker 1: degrees of liberty from this. If you can do all

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Speaker 1: those things, lessen people's fear factor of the unknown and

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Speaker 1: the new, and make them feel like they're going to

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Speaker 1: be enhanced, then you can you can really make a

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Speaker 1: lot of headway and bringing new ideas to market without

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Speaker 1: much resistance or less resistance. And so I was really

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Speaker 1: curious about during that dot com era, how we're everyday

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Speaker 1: people coming to make sense of the dawning of the Internet.

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Speaker 1: So every time you have what it's called a wave

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Speaker 1: of creative destruction and new ideas are coming, you know,

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Speaker 1: into the mainstream. Analyzing how are everyday people in different

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Speaker 1: pockets of the population, with different degrees of stakes in

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Speaker 1: the news, in the change, how are they adjusting. That's

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Speaker 1: always eminently fascinating because I think people today forget what

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Speaker 1: the late nineties felt like. The Internet was a great unknown.

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Speaker 1: It was like exploring space totally, and and people thought

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Speaker 1: it was a joke. Not only was it the great unknown,

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Speaker 1: it was something that people like a lot of new

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Speaker 1: things that people don't understand. They try to diminish it

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Speaker 1: by making fun of it. And and and you know,

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Speaker 1: media companies, you know, you know the space that you were.

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Speaker 1: You know, no one took it seriously. If you go

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Speaker 1: back to YouTube and you see these grainy, pre high

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Speaker 1: def videos of newscasters reporting on the dawn of the Internet.

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Speaker 1: For them, it's like this this weird, fattish, marginal thing.

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Speaker 1: And instead it's become the spine of everything, and it

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Speaker 1: isn't isn't it interesting to think about? As you said,

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Speaker 1: that the Internet is the spine of everything. But in

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Speaker 1: a way, the Internet is still in its infancy. It's

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Speaker 1: kind of like a preteen. We have to raise it.

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Speaker 1: We have to teach it how to behave We have

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Speaker 1: to give it rules and parameters because it thinks it

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Speaker 1: knows everything, and it's creating a big mess when it's

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Speaker 1: given you know, unsupervised time and and it's wild to

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Speaker 1: realize that we unleashed this thing into the world, and

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Speaker 1: in a way we have to play catch up and

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Speaker 1: clean up. Absolutely no, You're absolutely right. I mean, we

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Speaker 1: do not have the frameworks culturally or or politically to

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Speaker 1: really capture all of the implications that the Internet has unleashed,

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Speaker 1: and we are playing catch up, and it's a it's

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Speaker 1: a it's a messy process. So I want to get

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Speaker 1: into the Internet with you and talk about usc with you,

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Speaker 1: obviously in our time there, and I want to learn

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Speaker 1: about how you wound up at Wisconsin and chose this

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Speaker 1: path for yourself. But before we go through your story,

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Speaker 1: I always kind of like to rewind because I sit

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Speaker 1: with people and they're doing incredible things in the present day,

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Speaker 1: and you have been for quite some time now. But

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Speaker 1: I'm curious how you became like this. I'm curious about

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Speaker 1: who you were as a kid. Were you so observational

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Speaker 1: and interested in systems? Were you this this sort of

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Speaker 1: strong presence? Do you think when you were ten? You know,

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Speaker 1: who's Chris when he's a kid? And where did you

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Speaker 1: grow up? I want to I want to I want

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Speaker 1: to start there. Oh my gosh, Well, you know I mean,

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Speaker 1: without going to into the weed. I think if I

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Speaker 1: look back on my childhood growing up in northern New Jersey,

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Speaker 1: twenty minutes outside of New York City, I think what

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Speaker 1: really defines my growing up was being at the crossroads,

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Speaker 1: at the intersection of a lot of different cultural streams.

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Speaker 1: Where did you grow up in New Jersey? I grew

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Speaker 1: up in a in a town in Essex County called

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Speaker 1: East Orange, and I went to school my whole life

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Speaker 1: in a town called Montclair. My mom grew up in

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Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, oh no, that whole area from I

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Speaker 1: guess Teaneck. It's where a school called Dwight Englewood is

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Speaker 1: and that they were one of my school's main rivals

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Speaker 1: growing up. I went to a school my whole life

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Speaker 1: called Montclair, Kimberly Academy Private School and Upper Montclair, and yeah,

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Speaker 1: that all the private schools in that region and inclusive

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Speaker 1: of Manhattan and the bronx Um of New York, those

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Speaker 1: were our rivals, and going all the way down to Princeton.

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Speaker 1: So you know, I was I'm a product of that

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Speaker 1: classic tri state area New York, New Jersey, Connecticut kind

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Speaker 1: of kind of seen and what was going on there, then,

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Speaker 1: what was the kind of energy you were growing up in.

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Speaker 1: I mean, I think anyone who's ever not to date myself,

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Speaker 1: but anyone who's ever seen the Ate, the classic HBO

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Speaker 1: show The Sopranos, can get a little taste of the

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Speaker 1: fabric of northern New Jersey and the aspect of northern

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Speaker 1: New Jersey. It's a very unique and specific cultural scene,

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Speaker 1: very you know, old school immigrant based um, very old

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Speaker 1: world and tough. Like people from that area are like,

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Speaker 1: you know, really no nonsense and and and gritty and

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Speaker 1: and and and very proud of kind of no matter

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Speaker 1: whether you're white collar, blue collar, anywhere in between. Everyone

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Speaker 1: has a hard hat mentality. Like everyone like is like

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Speaker 1: not afraid to roll up their sleeves. And so I'm

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Speaker 1: proud of being from that area because although i love

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Speaker 1: living in l A and I'm not going anywhere and

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Speaker 1: I've been here twenty years, when you're from that area,

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Speaker 1: you you feel like you've got that inborn grid. And so,

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Speaker 1: you know, New Jersey kind of gave me that. But

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Speaker 1: for me personally, the intersection um that I'm speaking about is,

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Speaker 1: you know, my parents weren't from that area. They were

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Speaker 1: from rural Virginia, and so I kind of was like

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Speaker 1: a first generation immigrant um kid. Where my parents migrated,

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Speaker 1: they were part of the Great Migration, the African American

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Speaker 1: migration of rural southern dwellers who just knew they were

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Speaker 1: gonna have more opportunities in the north. And when my

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Speaker 1: parents graduated from college in the mid sixties, they were

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Speaker 1: at the you know, the Great Migration started in the

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Speaker 1: early twentieth century, they were at the tail end of

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Speaker 1: the Great Migration, and they moved north. My dad started

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Speaker 1: a business, and New Jersey became our home. So every

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Speaker 1: summer growing up, I would go back to the rural

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Speaker 1: area of Virginia near Charlottesville that they were from and

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Speaker 1: stay with my grandparents. And and I'm actually flying back

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Speaker 1: there this weekend. And that is a very bucolic like seen,

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Speaker 1: like just very idyllic um butterflies in the cornfield and

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Speaker 1: livestock and you know, your own crops and the whole

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Speaker 1: nine yards of rural life. And then I'm growing up

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Speaker 1: in a place where when I look outside my school cafeteria,

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Speaker 1: there's New York City. And also when my parents arrived

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Speaker 1: in East Orange in late sixties early seventies, what greeted

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Speaker 1: them upon arrival were the race riots of nineteen sixty

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Speaker 1: seven in York. So that was their arrival was the

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Speaker 1: beginning of white flight. So East Orange in New York,

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Speaker 1: and many of these communities were communities where you know,

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Speaker 1: European immigrants had lived for generations and Jewish, Italian Irish,

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Speaker 1: and that's where they had planted roots and formed a

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Speaker 1: vibrant community. And sad to say is the historical record

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Speaker 1: shows the arrival of black migrants meant they're moving out.

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Speaker 1: And so they moved to the western suburbs of Livingston,

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Speaker 1: Short Hills, Morristown and they became real enclaves, white enclaves,

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Speaker 1: and Newark, East Orange and those more industrial communities became black.

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Speaker 1: And so my parents come from the rural South, raised

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Speaker 1: me in a place that is going to become defined

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Speaker 1: by white flight, and I go to a majority white,

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Speaker 1: affluent private school my entire life. So those are three

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Speaker 1: domains that I'm connecting during my childhood going south to

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Speaker 1: visit my grandparents, being deeply steeped in the rural life

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Speaker 1: of the South and all the cultural morays there, Northeastern

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Speaker 1: urban living, and also totally privileged, affluent private education and

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Speaker 1: all that that brings with it from a cultural scene,

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Speaker 1: and that kind of so constantly, I mean now they

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Speaker 1: call it code switching, but constantly knowing how to navigate

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Speaker 1: those worlds. I don't know if it gave me a

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Speaker 1: certain kind of charisma, but it definitely gave me a

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Speaker 1: certain kind of cultural fluency and how to get along

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Speaker 1: with people, because I didn't balkanize myself in any given area.

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Speaker 1: I had black friends that were staunchly from the urban domain.

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Speaker 1: I had white friends who summered in Nantucket every summer.

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Speaker 1: I had, you know, all of my relatives and friends

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Speaker 1: and cousins in the South who picked blackberries at harvest time.

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Speaker 1: And I was weaving in and out of all those

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Speaker 1: worlds at a time of real transformational um change, being

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Speaker 1: so steeped in all those different communities as you, as

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Speaker 1: you explain, and also living through a real transformational period

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Speaker 1: of this migration and this white flight and this I

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Speaker 1: imagine really sort of ever moving feeling in the community

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Speaker 1: around you. Did that create any kind of fear for

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Speaker 1: you as a kid, or or did you just know

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Speaker 1: it to be true because you moved through all those

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Speaker 1: worlds and and as you mentioned, you just sort of

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Speaker 1: learned how to behave in every arena that you found

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Speaker 1: yourself in. Well, I don't. I mean, I think as

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Speaker 1: far as I never felt any fear as a child,

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Speaker 1: in that sense, I was very motivated as a child

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Speaker 1: because I knew I could see the the beauty of

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Speaker 1: it is. I felt secure in all of those environments,

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Speaker 1: so I felt changes everything. Yeah, I feel very blessed

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Speaker 1: that I had a very secure, intact household and upbringing

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Speaker 1: my extended family in the rural South where it was

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Speaker 1: just idyllic and beautiful and charmed, and I felt very

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Speaker 1: welcome in the affluent white world where I went to school,

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Speaker 1: and I felt very connected. I think thankfully I started

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Speaker 1: there right out of kindergarten, so in many respect it

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Speaker 1: was all that I knew and I was. I had

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Speaker 1: a wide range of friends and felt deeply connected. So

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Speaker 1: I never felt like I never had a place. I

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Speaker 1: felt blasting that I had many places to call home.

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Speaker 1: But I think I felt very motivated because I knew

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Speaker 1: that there was a really I felt the momentum behind

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Speaker 1: my extended families carving out of security and what could

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Speaker 1: have been and was quite frankly a hostile segregated environment

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Speaker 1: in the South that they had carved out a place

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Speaker 1: of peace and tranquility from which to raise a family

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Speaker 1: that could go out and spread out and be vibrant

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Speaker 1: wherever they chose to move. Against all odds, they carved

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Speaker 1: that out. And then my parents were very entrepreneurial, and

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Speaker 1: my dad was a striving entrepreneur. So here I come,

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Speaker 1: firstborn in my family. I have a five brother who's

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Speaker 1: five years younger. I felt the energetic, motivational momentum of

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Speaker 1: all that my ancestors had done up until my parents

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Speaker 1: time to kind of move our family's destiny down the road.

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Speaker 1: So I didn't view it as like a weight, but

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Speaker 1: I knew I'm at this particular school for a reason.

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Speaker 1: I'm there to kind of advance myself and advance our

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Speaker 1: family's destiny along the way. So I was very, very

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Speaker 1: motivated by that continuum. That's beautiful because I know that

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Speaker 1: sort of when your whole community feels as though it's

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Speaker 1: going through a tumultuous change, it can be scary for

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Speaker 1: kids who don't have language. And it's interesting that you

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Speaker 1: talk not about a feeling of tumultuousness, but rather a

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Speaker 1: feeling forward motion like we were in this in this

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Speaker 1: energetic part of to make it really real. Part of

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Speaker 1: that is survivors instinct, because let's not kid ourselves. I

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Speaker 1: could see that if you didn't keep if you didn't

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Speaker 1: keep up with the current as it were, you could

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Speaker 1: be waylaid along the trajectory of your maturation. Because I

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Speaker 1: could see kids in my neighborhood who just my instinct

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Speaker 1: was telling me that the cap on their aspirations was

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Speaker 1: likely going to be different than mine. Just by dint

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Speaker 1: of my parents decision to be entrepreneurial and to convert

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Speaker 1: their economic resources into a private education. They could have

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Speaker 1: converted those assets into anything else, fancier vacations, a fancier house, whatever,

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Speaker 1: they converted a lot of critical portion of it into

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Speaker 1: me and my brother's education. When I would come home

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Speaker 1: and I play football with my neighborhood friends in the street,

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Speaker 1: or play basketball in one another's backyard, you could just

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Speaker 1: see different phenomena of urban life that your instinct, even

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Speaker 1: as a young person, even maybe pre adolescent, is telling

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Speaker 1: you yellow flag, yellow flag warning, like those are areas

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Speaker 1: that could stop your four trajectory. And so you kind

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Speaker 1: of you kind of learned how to avoid certain pitfalls

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Speaker 1: along the way because they're very organic to where you

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Speaker 1: are and they're very real, to say nothing of the

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Speaker 1: psychic risks of losing your way navigating an affluent white

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Speaker 1: world and where you live knowing that many of those

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Speaker 1: affluent whites fled because you were coming you That could

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Speaker 1: do a psychic number on you if you let it. So,

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Speaker 1: they're the they're the organic risks of attrition of how

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Speaker 1: young black men and women from early ages in certain

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Speaker 1: communities face great at risk odds. And then there's the

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Speaker 1: risk of what happens to you when perhaps you pursue

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Speaker 1: inclusion too dogged lee and give up all kinds of

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Speaker 1: psychic comforts to be included in these other spaces of privilege.

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Speaker 1: Either one can be a tax on your well being

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Speaker 1: and your eventual prosperity. It's a lot to balance for

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Speaker 1: a kid, that balance the two worlds and making sure

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Speaker 1: you feel full in both. Yeah, but I mean at

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Speaker 1: the end of the day, love carries the day. Love

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Speaker 1: and substance pursuing substantive nourishment every place you go like

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Speaker 1: dials you into the proper channels of of just vibrant energy.

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Speaker 1: And I think you know, just by the way I've

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Speaker 1: been raised, That's the way I'm geared is to pursue

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Speaker 1: the light and not the darkness or anywhere else. I'd

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Speaker 1: like to go to people who really inspire and and

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Speaker 1: you know love, you know, like like you you, gravitating

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Speaker 1: into the light keeps you in the in the space

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Speaker 1: of where love is most paramount. And you know, I

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Speaker 1: think that no matter where you are, if you if

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Speaker 1: you have that calibration and orientation, you'll be fine. You'll

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Speaker 1: be fine. But it takes, as they say, takes a village.

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Speaker 1: It kind of takes a kind of steeping in that

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Speaker 1: perspective early on to kind of, you know, coordinate your

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Speaker 1: gears for that journey. And if you don't get coordinated

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Speaker 1: like that, it can be harder to kind of course

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Speaker 1: correct on your own down the road. But I think

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Speaker 1: I was really hardwired, pretty robustly from the outset, So

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Speaker 1: I'm very thankful for that. You you make your classroom

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Speaker 1: feel like that, Your classroom feels really steeped in in

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Speaker 1: a motivated, loving energy, and I don't I'm sure all

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Speaker 1: your students tell you that, but just in case, I

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Speaker 1: wanted to make sure I didn't, you know, I mean

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Speaker 1: I feel blessed. I mean, obviously we all you know,

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Speaker 1: if we're blessed, we have a lot of options. Certainly

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Speaker 1: had options to how I was going to make a career,

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Speaker 1: but I liked teaching and education because there is a

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Speaker 1: church like quality to it. There is a the best

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Speaker 1: part of church, not the theological dogmatic part of church

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Speaker 1: where you're adherent or you're out, but the idea that

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Speaker 1: love is the currency and mingling souls is a moment,

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Speaker 1: and the classroom and just working in research teams and

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Speaker 1: all those kind of things that we do and education.

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Speaker 1: There aren't many things you can do like the work

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Speaker 1: you do acting and creating inspiring. How many careers are

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Speaker 1: there where your job is to inspire people, where your

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Speaker 1: job is to like turn people on as as to

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Speaker 1: what the possibilities for themselves are, not the possibilities of

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Speaker 1: your remuneration, but the possibilities of their enhancement. There aren't

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Speaker 1: that many ways you can do that, and I just chose.

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Speaker 1: I felt like my comparative advantage was in the classroom.

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Speaker 1: That I felt like I was, you know, anointed and

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Speaker 1: sort of that that was the place for me to be.

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Speaker 1: And you know, like I like being in those settings

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Speaker 1: where you feel the love flow and you feel the

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Speaker 1: positive energy flow, and you feel that that ambition to

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Speaker 1: enhance others flow and to the degree I mean obviously,

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Speaker 1: you know the classroom is also very individuated, and everyone's

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Speaker 1: pursuing their own outcome. But when you can levin that

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Speaker 1: with any kind of communal energy, it's all to the

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Speaker 1: better and everyone will benefit from that. And so that's

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Speaker 1: how I roll, you know, That's how I roll. Everyone

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Speaker 1: does it differently. So how do you Because obviously I

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Speaker 1: know you wound you wound up at USC and became

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Speaker 1: my favorite professor. You're at your private school on the

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Speaker 1: East coast, you wind up in Wisconsin. What's what's the

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Speaker 1: sort of what awakens in you as a student that

401
00:26:34,720 --> 00:26:37,359
Speaker 1: leads you on your collegiate journey that eventually led you

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Speaker 1: to my collegiate journey. What's what's that storyline? Well? Number one,

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Speaker 1: I mean, I think I wanted to go against the grain.

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Speaker 1: So that's another part of my of my makeup is

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Speaker 1: I like to take the road lesser travel, and so

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Speaker 1: I didn't I definitely wanted to go to a different

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Speaker 1: part of the country. So at that time things weren't

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Speaker 1: as national and global as they are now. Um, so

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Speaker 1: pretty much kids who graduated from East Coast prep schools

410
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Speaker 1: in that day went to East Coast schools, Liberal Arts

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Speaker 1: schools or the Ivy League. So all my friends were

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Speaker 1: either going to Bucknell or you Pen or schools of

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Speaker 1: that ilk Smith, Williams Amherst. And I was like, I

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Speaker 1: wanted to be different, and so when I considered schools,

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Speaker 1: I considered USC and that was very exotic in those days.

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Speaker 1: But I ended up going to University of Chicago, and

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Speaker 1: I was probably a hand one of a handful of

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Speaker 1: people who went further west upon graduation. So that just

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Speaker 1: dialed me into sort of like always wanted to expand

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Speaker 1: and spread my wings. And at that time, the main

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Speaker 1: thing that was happening in the world was that the

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Speaker 1: media ecosystem was just blossoming and burgeoning fourth and in

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Speaker 1: that day and age, the catalyst was cable television and

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Speaker 1: that was the MTV era and the era of ESPN

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Speaker 1: coming on the scene and though in CNN, and so

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00:28:05,640 --> 00:28:11,520
Speaker 1: those seeing that ecosystems start to broaden the options of

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Speaker 1: entertainment choice and amplify the ability for a message to spread.

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Speaker 1: As an undergraduate student in Chicago. I started to get

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Speaker 1: really interested in the sociology of culture and understanding how

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Speaker 1: culture moves the public imagination and has economic effects. And

431
00:28:31,880 --> 00:28:34,920
Speaker 1: so when I came back to the New York area,

432
00:28:34,960 --> 00:28:37,880
Speaker 1: I worked as an arts and entertainment editor for four

433
00:28:38,000 --> 00:28:42,400
Speaker 1: years and then I just had a wonderful time in

434
00:28:42,440 --> 00:28:45,880
Speaker 1: that space. But I wanted to deepen my sort of

435
00:28:46,120 --> 00:28:49,920
Speaker 1: intellectual appreciation of these phenomena that were happening in the

436
00:28:49,920 --> 00:28:52,440
Speaker 1: media world. So I went back to Wisconsin to get

437
00:28:52,440 --> 00:28:55,880
Speaker 1: a PhD. And that's what led me eventually to USC

438
00:28:56,240 --> 00:28:58,360
Speaker 1: And what did you do for your PhD? I was

439
00:28:58,400 --> 00:29:02,520
Speaker 1: in a media and cultural study program and the University Wisconsin, Madison,

440
00:29:02,840 --> 00:29:06,360
Speaker 1: and so we that program was all about studying the

441
00:29:06,400 --> 00:29:11,800
Speaker 1: cultural impacts of media and how media really becomes the

442
00:29:11,880 --> 00:29:15,800
Speaker 1: chief way that we make meaning of the world around us.

443
00:29:15,800 --> 00:29:18,880
Speaker 1: That it's no longer about making It's not as much

444
00:29:19,840 --> 00:29:23,520
Speaker 1: the old framework of religion being the prism through which

445
00:29:23,520 --> 00:29:26,800
Speaker 1: we understand the world around us. That was the traditional

446
00:29:26,840 --> 00:29:30,520
Speaker 1: way in all civilizations. You know that that religious basis

447
00:29:30,920 --> 00:29:33,720
Speaker 1: was the framework through which you understood the world as

448
00:29:33,760 --> 00:29:37,640
Speaker 1: you matured. Now it's media for better and for worse.

449
00:29:37,800 --> 00:29:43,360
Speaker 1: It's it's media. And as media really intensifies and and

450
00:29:43,480 --> 00:29:47,600
Speaker 1: deepens into the fabric of everyday life, that meaning making process,

451
00:29:47,640 --> 00:29:51,760
Speaker 1: it's more complex. So there's a never ending range of

452
00:29:51,840 --> 00:29:56,400
Speaker 1: phenomena to explore. And that was because I was in

453
00:29:56,480 --> 00:29:59,600
Speaker 1: my program at the dawn of the Internet. You're at

454
00:29:59,600 --> 00:30:02,880
Speaker 1: that home it where you know, um kind of a

455
00:30:02,960 --> 00:30:08,080
Speaker 1: three sixty multi platform ecosystem was just beginning. So you know,

456
00:30:08,160 --> 00:30:11,600
Speaker 1: we we we were just at the cusp of looking

457
00:30:11,600 --> 00:30:14,520
Speaker 1: into that. Do you think looking back that that was

458
00:30:15,360 --> 00:30:18,320
Speaker 1: a wild time for your then professors to try to

459
00:30:18,360 --> 00:30:22,000
Speaker 1: figure out how to teach you as students about what

460
00:30:22,120 --> 00:30:26,880
Speaker 1: was happening because there was this unknown thing coming. Yes,

461
00:30:27,040 --> 00:30:31,560
Speaker 1: I think the thing that really radicalized the classroom at

462
00:30:31,600 --> 00:30:34,960
Speaker 1: that time where the racial dynamics of the late nineties.

463
00:30:35,760 --> 00:30:40,560
Speaker 1: I arrived at University of Wisconsin. My first semester was

464
00:30:40,840 --> 00:30:46,400
Speaker 1: the semester of the O. J. Simpson trial and verdict.

465
00:30:46,640 --> 00:30:53,440
Speaker 1: And so just because things are so much more just

466
00:30:53,600 --> 00:30:57,520
Speaker 1: on full blast crazy now, people also forget just how

467
00:30:57,640 --> 00:31:04,200
Speaker 1: highly charged the cultural fabric was around race in the

468
00:31:04,280 --> 00:31:09,480
Speaker 1: nineties when gangster rat was rising in the West. Uh,

469
00:31:09,600 --> 00:31:12,080
Speaker 1: you had just had the Rodney King incident in the

470
00:31:12,120 --> 00:31:16,240
Speaker 1: early nineties UM, and all the insurrectionary energy that came

471
00:31:16,280 --> 00:31:19,360
Speaker 1: out of that here in l A. And then all

472
00:31:19,400 --> 00:31:22,680
Speaker 1: of the police and communal brutality that was happening in

473
00:31:22,760 --> 00:31:27,280
Speaker 1: New York. I mean, there are numerous cases that New

474
00:31:27,360 --> 00:31:31,720
Speaker 1: Yorkers remember from those years that I mean, now we're

475
00:31:31,760 --> 00:31:34,520
Speaker 1: remembering the Central Park five. I mean, there you go. So,

476
00:31:34,680 --> 00:31:40,040
Speaker 1: I mean that was something that people were just beginning

477
00:31:40,480 --> 00:31:43,600
Speaker 1: to wrap their heads around the whole idea of how

478
00:31:44,120 --> 00:31:48,840
Speaker 1: media was a mechanism for people to discuss those events,

479
00:31:48,880 --> 00:31:53,160
Speaker 1: and whether it was pop music via gangster rap or

480
00:31:53,200 --> 00:31:57,400
Speaker 1: whether it was the seven news cycle of the likes

481
00:31:57,440 --> 00:32:01,160
Speaker 1: of CNN covering something like the o A trial. Just

482
00:32:01,520 --> 00:32:06,960
Speaker 1: race and and the growing popularity of of Black American

483
00:32:07,040 --> 00:32:12,240
Speaker 1: culture in popular culture, the crossover effect of how popular

484
00:32:12,720 --> 00:32:15,960
Speaker 1: black expressive culture was becoming in those days, and how

485
00:32:16,000 --> 00:32:20,720
Speaker 1: it was becoming part of the basic cultural expression of

486
00:32:20,880 --> 00:32:25,160
Speaker 1: all young Americans. All those things were happening UM at

487
00:32:25,200 --> 00:32:28,840
Speaker 1: that time, and that's for me, that was probably the

488
00:32:28,880 --> 00:32:34,080
Speaker 1: main dynamic that was like central to kind of shifting

489
00:32:34,080 --> 00:32:38,480
Speaker 1: the conversation, because that's that's really what made cultural studies

490
00:32:38,680 --> 00:32:43,720
Speaker 1: UM such a useful tool to unpack insights from all

491
00:32:43,760 --> 00:32:47,479
Speaker 1: those things, because cultural studies, if nothing else, tells you

492
00:32:47,520 --> 00:32:54,480
Speaker 1: that media matters, and traditionally the humanities teaches you that

493
00:32:54,480 --> 00:32:59,120
Speaker 1: that media and pop culture in general is inconsequential, doesn't

494
00:32:59,200 --> 00:33:01,840
Speaker 1: doesn't matter it all, that the real stuff of life

495
00:33:02,760 --> 00:33:08,360
Speaker 1: comes from economic factors and comes from more material factors

496
00:33:08,360 --> 00:33:12,680
Speaker 1: in people's life, and the culture is mean, it is

497
00:33:12,720 --> 00:33:16,239
Speaker 1: not important. That's so interesting to me because I think

498
00:33:16,280 --> 00:33:19,920
Speaker 1: of culture is the expression of who we are, and

499
00:33:20,080 --> 00:33:23,920
Speaker 1: economics and material things there, they're pieces of our lives,

500
00:33:24,040 --> 00:33:29,800
Speaker 1: but the expression of who people are feels to me

501
00:33:30,000 --> 00:33:35,840
Speaker 1: like a much bigger deal. People are still fighting to

502
00:33:36,240 --> 00:33:41,120
Speaker 1: make the narrative aspect of meaning making matter as much

503
00:33:41,120 --> 00:33:45,640
Speaker 1: as the material dimension. And there's a Nobel winning economist

504
00:33:45,720 --> 00:33:49,240
Speaker 1: named Robert Schiller who just released a book called Narrative

505
00:33:49,280 --> 00:33:53,400
Speaker 1: Economics and the whole idea is and his whole research

506
00:33:53,480 --> 00:33:59,040
Speaker 1: project has been to make heart and fast quantitative economists

507
00:33:59,080 --> 00:34:03,080
Speaker 1: who gauge their view on how the world works strictly

508
00:34:03,120 --> 00:34:08,480
Speaker 1: by the numbers metrics to appreciate that the stories people

509
00:34:08,600 --> 00:34:14,120
Speaker 1: tell about the world around them has economic effects, and

510
00:34:14,160 --> 00:34:16,960
Speaker 1: that it's not just the numbers tell it all, but

511
00:34:17,040 --> 00:34:22,200
Speaker 1: the stories people tell about the lived reality, it's just

512
00:34:22,320 --> 00:34:26,719
Speaker 1: as meaningful. And so whether in the economics discipline, the

513
00:34:26,800 --> 00:34:31,800
Speaker 1: media studies discipline, gender studies discipline, a lot of people

514
00:34:31,840 --> 00:34:35,120
Speaker 1: have been doing the work of making the cultural realm

515
00:34:35,200 --> 00:34:39,399
Speaker 1: appreciate it for what it is, um real. And it's

516
00:34:39,400 --> 00:34:43,360
Speaker 1: a lot easier now because culture is just so wall

517
00:34:43,400 --> 00:34:46,400
Speaker 1: to wall that people can ignore it. But it's still

518
00:34:47,080 --> 00:34:49,680
Speaker 1: still a bit of an uphill slav from time to time.

519
00:34:51,640 --> 00:34:54,080
Speaker 1: So what did it feel like when you started at

520
00:34:54,200 --> 00:34:58,120
Speaker 1: USC in two thousand one and what did you come

521
00:34:58,160 --> 00:35:00,400
Speaker 1: to teach? How do you This is of question that

522
00:35:00,400 --> 00:35:04,480
Speaker 1: I'm always bouncing around in my head. How do you

523
00:35:04,560 --> 00:35:07,600
Speaker 1: when you become a teacher figure out what you're going

524
00:35:07,640 --> 00:35:10,640
Speaker 1: to teach your students? How do you write your first syllabus?

525
00:35:10,719 --> 00:35:14,880
Speaker 1: I can't imagine the terror sitting at the computer with

526
00:35:14,960 --> 00:35:17,359
Speaker 1: the cursor on the blank page. Where do you? Where

527
00:35:17,360 --> 00:35:19,560
Speaker 1: do you start with us? I think a big part

528
00:35:19,600 --> 00:35:24,480
Speaker 1: of your graduate training is specialization UM and there's benefits

529
00:35:24,480 --> 00:35:29,160
Speaker 1: to specialization, and you know there's downside, But in order

530
00:35:29,239 --> 00:35:33,919
Speaker 1: to be marketable, you have to have a visible area

531
00:35:33,960 --> 00:35:37,840
Speaker 1: of expertise and that becomes what you get hired to teach.

532
00:35:38,239 --> 00:35:42,520
Speaker 1: So media culture and your specific take on those areas

533
00:35:42,560 --> 00:35:46,760
Speaker 1: and your specific area of interest in those areas becomes

534
00:35:46,800 --> 00:35:48,920
Speaker 1: what you get hired to teach. So I kind of

535
00:35:49,040 --> 00:35:55,480
Speaker 1: knew that that intersection of race, the economy, and culture

536
00:35:56,320 --> 00:35:59,560
Speaker 1: was my intersection that was going to kind of feed

537
00:35:59,600 --> 00:36:01,520
Speaker 1: a lot of what I taught. So I came to

538
00:36:01,640 --> 00:36:06,360
Speaker 1: USC to really broaden their appreciation for that intersection between

539
00:36:06,440 --> 00:36:09,480
Speaker 1: race and pop culture. Now that being said, you're not

540
00:36:09,760 --> 00:36:13,120
Speaker 1: taught to teach as a graduate student. No, there's no

541
00:36:13,160 --> 00:36:16,440
Speaker 1: way you can really teach people to teach. You have

542
00:36:16,600 --> 00:36:19,640
Speaker 1: to learn by doing it. And so part of every

543
00:36:19,680 --> 00:36:24,920
Speaker 1: graduate students career in graduate school is being a teaching assistant,

544
00:36:25,239 --> 00:36:29,720
Speaker 1: where you get just the hands on kind of proximity

545
00:36:29,760 --> 00:36:33,520
Speaker 1: to running a classroom. But then always there's the different

546
00:36:33,560 --> 00:36:35,440
Speaker 1: feeling of being thrown into the deep end of the

547
00:36:35,440 --> 00:36:39,319
Speaker 1: pool and having to guide an entire classroom over a

548
00:36:39,360 --> 00:36:43,799
Speaker 1: fifteen or ten week period, and you know, but you know,

549
00:36:44,000 --> 00:36:46,920
Speaker 1: it just comes with the territory. But I mean, I

550
00:36:46,960 --> 00:36:51,000
Speaker 1: think the thing that that was interesting about coming to

551
00:36:51,160 --> 00:36:57,360
Speaker 1: USC was USC was just beginning its trajectory of rising

552
00:36:57,960 --> 00:37:02,840
Speaker 1: in the pecking order and and and having international stature.

553
00:37:03,400 --> 00:37:07,080
Speaker 1: So I think when I arrived, I felt that surge

554
00:37:07,239 --> 00:37:11,080
Speaker 1: that President Steve Sample had kind of stirred, and so

555
00:37:11,160 --> 00:37:14,280
Speaker 1: you really, I really felt like USC was a campus

556
00:37:14,320 --> 00:37:18,000
Speaker 1: on the move, and my instinct was that l A

557
00:37:18,200 --> 00:37:20,439
Speaker 1: was a sitting on the move. And I think I've

558
00:37:20,440 --> 00:37:23,520
Speaker 1: been both of those assumptions have really been born out,

559
00:37:23,880 --> 00:37:27,680
Speaker 1: because l A and SC have transformed um incredibly. But

560
00:37:28,080 --> 00:37:31,640
Speaker 1: you know, so when I arrived at SC, there was

561
00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:37,680
Speaker 1: this this need to pay more attention to media in

562
00:37:37,800 --> 00:37:39,799
Speaker 1: always and that was part of the reason why I

563
00:37:39,840 --> 00:37:43,640
Speaker 1: was hired UM. And at that time, the thing that

564
00:37:43,680 --> 00:37:47,440
Speaker 1: it just happened was the attacks of nine eleven. So

565
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:50,319
Speaker 1: I think the thing that was happening broader in a

566
00:37:50,400 --> 00:37:54,680
Speaker 1: gea political sense, is this dawning awareness that the world

567
00:37:54,960 --> 00:37:57,800
Speaker 1: order was never going to be the same again, and

568
00:37:58,480 --> 00:38:03,520
Speaker 1: that there was a age or shift happening in on

569
00:38:03,600 --> 00:38:06,759
Speaker 1: the axis upon which the world spins, you know. And

570
00:38:06,840 --> 00:38:12,400
Speaker 1: so I realized that I wanted to challenge myself to

571
00:38:12,560 --> 00:38:15,600
Speaker 1: kind of open my mind up to the changes that

572
00:38:15,640 --> 00:38:18,880
Speaker 1: we're happening in a whole new space, and that I

573
00:38:18,920 --> 00:38:21,640
Speaker 1: had been in New York kind of long enough and

574
00:38:21,640 --> 00:38:24,960
Speaker 1: it was time to be at a different frontier and

575
00:38:25,040 --> 00:38:27,080
Speaker 1: being on the West Coast felt like the place to be.

576
00:38:37,280 --> 00:38:41,480
Speaker 1: So our class communications for a nation? How did you

577
00:38:41,560 --> 00:38:44,560
Speaker 1: remember that? And and the and the subtitle of the

578
00:38:44,719 --> 00:38:47,160
Speaker 1: of the course title was and I won't get the

579
00:38:47,160 --> 00:38:49,319
Speaker 1: words perfect, but it was a something. I don't know

580
00:38:49,360 --> 00:38:52,239
Speaker 1: if it was an education on or an analysis of

581
00:38:53,400 --> 00:38:58,000
Speaker 1: the history of black music in America from slave songs

582
00:38:58,000 --> 00:39:01,440
Speaker 1: to modern day hip hop. And I was like, what it?

583
00:39:01,680 --> 00:39:04,600
Speaker 1: What is that? And I want to study that class?

584
00:39:05,560 --> 00:39:07,880
Speaker 1: And I think growing up as a kid in l

585
00:39:07,920 --> 00:39:11,160
Speaker 1: a who also had a family in Jersey, and spending

586
00:39:11,200 --> 00:39:13,200
Speaker 1: so much time there in the summer, you know, my

587
00:39:13,320 --> 00:39:16,439
Speaker 1: summers went from the West coast to to the East

588
00:39:16,480 --> 00:39:21,480
Speaker 1: coast and being being in this really crazy changing universe

589
00:39:21,560 --> 00:39:24,479
Speaker 1: of that zone of New Jersey and going into New York.

590
00:39:24,520 --> 00:39:28,920
Speaker 1: And you know, I like, I went into college having

591
00:39:28,960 --> 00:39:32,040
Speaker 1: spent the years of my high school career listening to

592
00:39:32,160 --> 00:39:37,520
Speaker 1: Biggie and Tupac and and loving this sort of there

593
00:39:37,600 --> 00:39:42,480
Speaker 1: was this energy, there was this vibration of of rebellion.

594
00:39:42,640 --> 00:39:46,840
Speaker 1: And when I look back now understanding more about culture

595
00:39:47,160 --> 00:39:50,160
Speaker 1: from an educated and curious adult perspective than I did

596
00:39:50,200 --> 00:39:53,560
Speaker 1: when I was a teenager, you know, you you look

597
00:39:53,600 --> 00:39:55,799
Speaker 1: back at the influence of music. You know. I grew

598
00:39:55,840 --> 00:39:58,640
Speaker 1: up in a house where we listen to Motown and

599
00:39:58,800 --> 00:40:03,160
Speaker 1: Elvis and the Beatle and the Eagles, and and my

600
00:40:03,239 --> 00:40:06,399
Speaker 1: parents were so curious when I started listening to rap.

601
00:40:06,520 --> 00:40:08,839
Speaker 1: And you know, my my dad thought he was cool,

602
00:40:08,960 --> 00:40:10,960
Speaker 1: like being able to talk to me about run DMC.

603
00:40:11,120 --> 00:40:13,000
Speaker 1: He's like, well, you know, I know some cool rappers.

604
00:40:13,000 --> 00:40:16,520
Speaker 1: I was like, relax, mr, sweet Canadian man, you know.

605
00:40:16,600 --> 00:40:20,480
Speaker 1: And but I didn't know then how much even someone

606
00:40:20,800 --> 00:40:23,440
Speaker 1: like Elvis, who my dad grew up listening to, was

607
00:40:23,880 --> 00:40:28,920
Speaker 1: taking inspiration from, if you put it kindly, from black music.

608
00:40:29,920 --> 00:40:34,239
Speaker 1: And it was just so. There was something about the

609
00:40:34,239 --> 00:40:36,640
Speaker 1: title of your core of your class on the page

610
00:40:36,719 --> 00:40:40,200
Speaker 1: that made me say, I feel like answers to so

611
00:40:40,320 --> 00:40:42,560
Speaker 1: many things I love and so many things I'm curious

612
00:40:42,600 --> 00:40:45,759
Speaker 1: about culturallyier in that class. Well, thank you for that.

613
00:40:45,760 --> 00:40:48,200
Speaker 1: I mean, it was I mean, first of all, having

614
00:40:48,280 --> 00:40:51,200
Speaker 1: you in class was like a blessing and like a

615
00:40:51,239 --> 00:40:55,680
Speaker 1: miraculous moment, because it's so cool to see where you

616
00:40:55,719 --> 00:40:58,560
Speaker 1: are now and all the wonderful work you've done, and

617
00:40:58,640 --> 00:41:01,520
Speaker 1: all the wonderful work you're doing going and what you're

618
00:41:01,560 --> 00:41:05,319
Speaker 1: shortly destined to keep doing in all the impacts you're

619
00:41:05,320 --> 00:41:07,879
Speaker 1: going to make, because that was who you were then.

620
00:41:08,680 --> 00:41:13,120
Speaker 1: You know, you were always leaning in to comp you know,

621
00:41:13,239 --> 00:41:19,879
Speaker 1: complicated issues and difficult conversations. You were always um had

622
00:41:19,960 --> 00:41:24,920
Speaker 1: that kind of sensibility of courage and bravery and empathy

623
00:41:25,040 --> 00:41:30,319
Speaker 1: and really listening to people, like being very convicted in

624
00:41:30,360 --> 00:41:33,520
Speaker 1: your beliefs. But also listen, you were a leader, and

625
00:41:33,560 --> 00:41:35,960
Speaker 1: so you were always kind of like at the center,

626
00:41:36,800 --> 00:41:41,759
Speaker 1: and people always were rallied around you, and you were

627
00:41:41,760 --> 00:41:44,160
Speaker 1: always in the front row. And so I remember you

628
00:41:44,360 --> 00:41:48,960
Speaker 1: vividly from those days. So it's it's it's really heartwarming

629
00:41:49,320 --> 00:41:54,239
Speaker 1: and gratifying to see where you've taken your ambitions from

630
00:41:54,280 --> 00:41:56,920
Speaker 1: then till now. And it's it's when anyone would want

631
00:41:56,920 --> 00:41:59,480
Speaker 1: to see to see that that person has really kind

632
00:41:59,520 --> 00:42:05,520
Speaker 1: of fulfilled what they presented then. So so that being said, yeah,

633
00:42:05,640 --> 00:42:09,160
Speaker 1: I mean I think that when we were together in

634
00:42:09,280 --> 00:42:13,600
Speaker 1: that class, like I said before, there was that moment

635
00:42:13,640 --> 00:42:18,560
Speaker 1: of cultural change that represented crossing over that the maturation

636
00:42:18,640 --> 00:42:22,799
Speaker 1: of the cable media economy meant and in the maturation

637
00:42:23,080 --> 00:42:28,880
Speaker 1: of hip hop's sophistication meant that wherever you were in

638
00:42:28,920 --> 00:42:33,600
Speaker 1: the world, you were receiving these hip hop driven messages

639
00:42:33,680 --> 00:42:38,200
Speaker 1: and energies, and so just being aware of that was

640
00:42:38,239 --> 00:42:40,920
Speaker 1: something that people were really dialed into and what the

641
00:42:40,960 --> 00:42:43,440
Speaker 1: implications of that are. And I think in terms of

642
00:42:43,440 --> 00:42:47,600
Speaker 1: framing the class between how hip hop was one bookend

643
00:42:47,840 --> 00:42:52,880
Speaker 1: and the slave spirituals were the other, Black music always

644
00:42:52,920 --> 00:42:59,759
Speaker 1: has had that aspirational yearning for either salvation and the

645
00:42:59,760 --> 00:43:03,440
Speaker 1: after life or salvation here on earth. And but that

646
00:43:03,640 --> 00:43:08,960
Speaker 1: yearning is the central mode of Black music and that

647
00:43:09,080 --> 00:43:14,440
Speaker 1: blues element to Black music, and it's just morphed and

648
00:43:14,600 --> 00:43:18,399
Speaker 1: taking different forms as we've moved from jazz to rock

649
00:43:18,480 --> 00:43:21,680
Speaker 1: and roll to hip hop and R and B and etcetera,

650
00:43:22,000 --> 00:43:24,960
Speaker 1: but that core is the same. So I think I

651
00:43:25,000 --> 00:43:28,000
Speaker 1: probably wanted to capture that in the class. And I

652
00:43:28,040 --> 00:43:32,000
Speaker 1: think at that moment when you were referencing Tupac and Biggie,

653
00:43:32,400 --> 00:43:36,279
Speaker 1: I think because of all of the racial conflicts and

654
00:43:36,400 --> 00:43:39,480
Speaker 1: dynamics of that time, there was a certain way that

655
00:43:39,640 --> 00:43:45,840
Speaker 1: rappers then were making the obstacles to their yearnings visible

656
00:43:45,920 --> 00:43:50,560
Speaker 1: in their songs and also shifting the direction of their yearnings.

657
00:43:50,560 --> 00:43:53,359
Speaker 1: So they were shifting their their yearnings to a more

658
00:43:53,400 --> 00:44:00,000
Speaker 1: American dream, more consumption oriented vision of the American dream,

659
00:43:59,840 --> 00:44:02,920
Speaker 1: and and and and and that was new too, that

660
00:44:02,960 --> 00:44:08,560
Speaker 1: the music was part of the radicalism was about accumulating

661
00:44:08,760 --> 00:44:12,080
Speaker 1: wealth and displaying that wealth, and that that was a

662
00:44:12,120 --> 00:44:15,520
Speaker 1: whole new phenomena that people were wrapping their heads around

663
00:44:15,760 --> 00:44:19,240
Speaker 1: and now and so they were pretty much urgently saying,

664
00:44:20,080 --> 00:44:23,839
Speaker 1: we want to take our culture and cash in on

665
00:44:24,280 --> 00:44:27,520
Speaker 1: the cultural power that we have, and we want to

666
00:44:27,920 --> 00:44:32,000
Speaker 1: monetize that. And so that was really a big part

667
00:44:32,160 --> 00:44:35,000
Speaker 1: of of what was going on, and studying all the

668
00:44:35,040 --> 00:44:39,600
Speaker 1: implications of what does black politics mean when cashing in

669
00:44:39,760 --> 00:44:44,960
Speaker 1: becomes the objective? How does that change the political traditions

670
00:44:45,080 --> 00:44:47,760
Speaker 1: of Black America well, and how does it make people

671
00:44:47,840 --> 00:44:51,280
Speaker 1: uncomfortable when you talk about it in that way? Cashing

672
00:44:51,280 --> 00:44:54,160
Speaker 1: in on your culture When you think back to the

673
00:44:54,239 --> 00:44:57,640
Speaker 1: music we were studying, starting with Slave Spirituals, really means

674
00:44:57,719 --> 00:45:01,000
Speaker 1: cashing in on everything you're called her has been denied.

675
00:45:02,080 --> 00:45:06,879
Speaker 1: And I remember we were analyzing how wrapped in that

676
00:45:06,960 --> 00:45:13,080
Speaker 1: era was was very flashy and I'll never forget we

677
00:45:13,120 --> 00:45:16,440
Speaker 1: talked about you put up on the board the image

678
00:45:16,440 --> 00:45:18,600
Speaker 1: of Little Kim on the cover of Interview magazine. It

679
00:45:18,640 --> 00:45:21,600
Speaker 1: was a big yellow background and she had like one

680
00:45:21,640 --> 00:45:24,080
Speaker 1: of her amazing wigs on, and she was posed so

681
00:45:24,120 --> 00:45:27,920
Speaker 1: you couldn't see her body, but she was nude, and

682
00:45:27,960 --> 00:45:30,640
Speaker 1: they had painted her a makeup artist had painted the

683
00:45:30,680 --> 00:45:34,960
Speaker 1: Louis Vuitton logo on her entire body, so her body

684
00:45:35,200 --> 00:45:39,920
Speaker 1: was representative of this luxury leather bag, you know, these

685
00:45:40,000 --> 00:45:43,439
Speaker 1: luxury leather goods that, to your point, historically had been

686
00:45:43,560 --> 00:45:48,400
Speaker 1: made unattainable two people who looked like her. And you

687
00:45:48,520 --> 00:45:51,400
Speaker 1: talked to us about what a statement it was for

688
00:45:51,480 --> 00:45:54,560
Speaker 1: her to say, no, I am the luxury me and

689
00:45:54,640 --> 00:46:00,719
Speaker 1: this body I'm I am luxury fashion, and how evolutionary

690
00:46:00,880 --> 00:46:05,440
Speaker 1: that was, and we forgot We wouldn't think about that now,

691
00:46:05,480 --> 00:46:08,040
Speaker 1: but that was a real moment for a black woman

692
00:46:08,960 --> 00:46:13,000
Speaker 1: to set to stamp her body with the logo of

693
00:46:13,400 --> 00:46:19,600
Speaker 1: a French couture house. And I remember, I've obviously never

694
00:46:19,640 --> 00:46:21,120
Speaker 1: forgotten it. You know, I was in your class when

695
00:46:21,160 --> 00:46:27,319
Speaker 1: I was twenty so yeah, later iconic photo, and you know,

696
00:46:27,400 --> 00:46:32,040
Speaker 1: I think that how in the two decades since then,

697
00:46:32,760 --> 00:46:36,200
Speaker 1: you know, the kind of self branding ethos has just

698
00:46:36,360 --> 00:46:39,960
Speaker 1: become the order of the day. That was kind of

699
00:46:40,000 --> 00:46:43,560
Speaker 1: like the first wave of that. And you know, rappers

700
00:46:43,560 --> 00:46:47,919
Speaker 1: have a very astute sensibility. All cultural creators do by

701
00:46:47,960 --> 00:46:51,600
Speaker 1: definition is they're they're at the edge of what is

702
00:46:51,640 --> 00:46:54,879
Speaker 1: possible to be thought, and they're kind of leading us

703
00:46:54,960 --> 00:46:58,440
Speaker 1: forward in every arena of creativity. And so in that

704
00:46:58,560 --> 00:47:02,000
Speaker 1: rap arena, they were kind of leading us into this

705
00:47:02,600 --> 00:47:08,799
Speaker 1: space of thinking about how yourself is a product and

706
00:47:09,400 --> 00:47:14,480
Speaker 1: that kind of losing the shame of that, and because

707
00:47:14,560 --> 00:47:19,200
Speaker 1: of the urgency of needing to be included from ghetto

708
00:47:19,239 --> 00:47:25,240
Speaker 1: wise communities and needing to rise from those communities like that,

709
00:47:25,239 --> 00:47:28,239
Speaker 1: that having no shame in your game, as it were,

710
00:47:28,760 --> 00:47:32,400
Speaker 1: is necessary to make the relentless moves you need to

711
00:47:32,440 --> 00:47:36,640
Speaker 1: make to change your situation. And we live in at

712
00:47:36,719 --> 00:47:42,240
Speaker 1: time that everyone feels that kind of baseline insecurity now

713
00:47:42,760 --> 00:47:46,440
Speaker 1: and and and and now we have the the media

714
00:47:46,520 --> 00:47:52,359
Speaker 1: tool kit to translate those kind of anxious impulses. We

715
00:47:52,440 --> 00:47:57,560
Speaker 1: have to express ourselves and be seen and also monetize

716
00:47:57,600 --> 00:48:01,680
Speaker 1: those expressions. We now all have that capacity, but at

717
00:48:01,719 --> 00:48:05,560
Speaker 1: that time, just the basic idea, have no shame to

718
00:48:05,719 --> 00:48:08,440
Speaker 1: do what you need to do to express yourself and

719
00:48:08,520 --> 00:48:13,719
Speaker 1: to modify that expression and brand it and license it

720
00:48:14,560 --> 00:48:17,440
Speaker 1: and and and view it as i p that you

721
00:48:17,520 --> 00:48:21,520
Speaker 1: own and can collaborate with other I p owners over

722
00:48:22,480 --> 00:48:25,480
Speaker 1: that little Kim photo. That was the beginning of that

723
00:48:25,520 --> 00:48:29,880
Speaker 1: whole ethos. Now everyone lives at ethos. Everyone lives at ethos.

724
00:48:29,880 --> 00:48:33,920
Speaker 1: The whole influencing economy is predicated on that ethos for

725
00:48:34,000 --> 00:48:37,320
Speaker 1: good and for bad and for indifferent And at the baseline,

726
00:48:37,320 --> 00:48:44,000
Speaker 1: it's about that striving and that modifying your expression. So cool?

727
00:48:44,680 --> 00:48:47,719
Speaker 1: Are there things you remember from from that second year

728
00:48:47,760 --> 00:48:50,320
Speaker 1: of class before I start asking you about how how

729
00:48:50,360 --> 00:48:53,839
Speaker 1: things are moving now? I wonder if, because as you say,

730
00:48:53,880 --> 00:48:56,520
Speaker 1: it was the second year of teaching, it, what sticks

731
00:48:56,560 --> 00:48:58,520
Speaker 1: out to you when you think back to the beginning

732
00:48:58,600 --> 00:49:03,399
Speaker 1: of of your work at SC and and in that class. Um,

733
00:49:03,440 --> 00:49:06,879
Speaker 1: I think the things I think about when I look

734
00:49:06,920 --> 00:49:12,200
Speaker 1: back are just how amazing it is to work with

735
00:49:13,080 --> 00:49:16,200
Speaker 1: young people who are who are coming into their own

736
00:49:16,239 --> 00:49:22,200
Speaker 1: because you're continually renewed and replenished. And you know, a

737
00:49:22,200 --> 00:49:26,520
Speaker 1: lot of my friends they they kind of are envious

738
00:49:26,600 --> 00:49:30,560
Speaker 1: of this space where you get to work with never

739
00:49:30,719 --> 00:49:35,040
Speaker 1: ending waves of really smart and precocious young people who

740
00:49:35,200 --> 00:49:38,160
Speaker 1: energize you. And so when I look back, I really

741
00:49:38,600 --> 00:49:41,240
Speaker 1: think that that's one of the things that remains the same,

742
00:49:41,920 --> 00:49:46,640
Speaker 1: is that the level of energy at a place like USC.

743
00:49:47,040 --> 00:49:53,800
Speaker 1: It's just so phenomenal. And USC is such a incredibly optimistic,

744
00:49:54,120 --> 00:49:59,000
Speaker 1: can do place that you know, from almost moment one,

745
00:49:59,120 --> 00:50:02,239
Speaker 1: I felt like that was the place I wanted to be.

746
00:50:02,360 --> 00:50:04,919
Speaker 1: And you know, you know, I think that's what really

747
00:50:05,000 --> 00:50:10,920
Speaker 1: defines the USC experience is how how deep to the

748
00:50:10,920 --> 00:50:17,919
Speaker 1: bone marrow that feeling of energy and positive optimism is there.

749
00:50:18,440 --> 00:50:21,040
Speaker 1: And I'm realizing we're talking about the class, but so

750
00:50:21,080 --> 00:50:22,759
Speaker 1: many people who are going to be listening to this

751
00:50:23,360 --> 00:50:26,200
Speaker 1: I haven't taken or or won't have the opportunity to

752
00:50:26,200 --> 00:50:28,640
Speaker 1: take your class. And for anyone who is at USC

753
00:50:28,760 --> 00:50:32,080
Speaker 1: who's listening to this, you're welcome. You also have your

754
00:50:32,080 --> 00:50:36,000
Speaker 1: new favorite professor. Can you give listeners an overview a

755
00:50:36,040 --> 00:50:39,919
Speaker 1: little bit of what the curriculum covered in the course,

756
00:50:39,920 --> 00:50:42,000
Speaker 1: because we touched on it a little bit. And I

757
00:50:42,040 --> 00:50:45,000
Speaker 1: have so many standout moments like the interview cover and

758
00:50:45,000 --> 00:50:47,320
Speaker 1: and you talking to us about you know, Biggie rapping

759
00:50:47,320 --> 00:50:50,160
Speaker 1: about a Cherry m three and us talking about the

760
00:50:50,200 --> 00:50:57,359
Speaker 1: era of how rap music and and people in New

761
00:50:57,440 --> 00:51:01,680
Speaker 1: York City we're using muzi and graffiti as protest with

762
00:51:01,719 --> 00:51:05,640
Speaker 1: the subway cars, and and I remember our analysis of

763
00:51:05,680 --> 00:51:09,440
Speaker 1: slave spirituals starting at the beginning. But I would love

764
00:51:09,480 --> 00:51:12,239
Speaker 1: for you to offer people kind of an overview of

765
00:51:12,280 --> 00:51:14,759
Speaker 1: how the course works and what you're weaving together through it,

766
00:51:14,800 --> 00:51:18,080
Speaker 1: because I'm sure they're curious as we talk about little details.

767
00:51:18,440 --> 00:51:24,040
Speaker 1: The main place of conceptual inflection is the way that

768
00:51:24,400 --> 00:51:31,719
Speaker 1: culture is formulated at a time when our socio economic

769
00:51:31,800 --> 00:51:36,680
Speaker 1: basis is manufacturing, and the way culture is formulated when

770
00:51:36,719 --> 00:51:44,680
Speaker 1: it's our socio economy is driven by communications and it

771
00:51:44,840 --> 00:51:51,920
Speaker 1: fundamentally rewires society and the way movements occur and the

772
00:51:51,960 --> 00:51:56,240
Speaker 1: way goals are set, the targets that people set before themselves.

773
00:51:56,280 --> 00:51:59,680
Speaker 1: It's like, that's where I want to go. The manufacturing

774
00:51:59,760 --> 00:52:06,279
Speaker 1: air and the industrial era just kind of a raid aspirations, targets,

775
00:52:06,400 --> 00:52:12,600
Speaker 1: and conditions completely differently than what they began to do

776
00:52:12,880 --> 00:52:17,520
Speaker 1: from the mid late nineteen sixties, certainly early nineteen seventies

777
00:52:17,800 --> 00:52:21,080
Speaker 1: going forward, when it was all about d industrializing and

778
00:52:21,160 --> 00:52:24,800
Speaker 1: moving to a more computer generated way of creating value.

779
00:52:25,440 --> 00:52:30,840
Speaker 1: And the real philosophical shift at that inflection point in

780
00:52:30,920 --> 00:52:35,080
Speaker 1: our system of governance is that we could no longer

781
00:52:35,200 --> 00:52:40,480
Speaker 1: afford to help the less fortunate with treasury dollars, and

782
00:52:40,680 --> 00:52:47,840
Speaker 1: that providing government spending for educational programs, public assistance programs

783
00:52:47,880 --> 00:52:52,560
Speaker 1: of all types needed to be shrunk so that we

784
00:52:52,680 --> 00:52:59,120
Speaker 1: could spur economic growth in the financial arena, in entrepreneurial arenas.

785
00:52:59,160 --> 00:53:02,279
Speaker 1: That we had to kind of forgive the expression to

786
00:53:02,400 --> 00:53:07,240
Speaker 1: kind of cut the dead weight of society loose, because

787
00:53:07,320 --> 00:53:10,160
Speaker 1: from the mid nineties sixties forward, part of what the

788
00:53:10,239 --> 00:53:13,560
Speaker 1: Vietnam War signified is that the world was becoming a

789
00:53:13,600 --> 00:53:17,400
Speaker 1: more competitive place and that the post World War period

790
00:53:17,800 --> 00:53:20,360
Speaker 1: of the US kind of being the dominant player on

791
00:53:20,400 --> 00:53:23,959
Speaker 1: the scene wasn't going to be the case anymore. And

792
00:53:24,120 --> 00:53:28,399
Speaker 1: as the world became more competitive, the whole notion of

793
00:53:28,520 --> 00:53:32,760
Speaker 1: providing a safety net was being shredded and pulled away,

794
00:53:33,320 --> 00:53:37,160
Speaker 1: and so it was become a lot more Darwinian and

795
00:53:37,200 --> 00:53:40,480
Speaker 1: you were gonna have to kind of survive kind of

796
00:53:40,560 --> 00:53:43,759
Speaker 1: on your own steam. And so what that meant was

797
00:53:44,160 --> 00:53:47,720
Speaker 1: is that black people, who had always been at the

798
00:53:47,760 --> 00:53:50,840
Speaker 1: lower end of the pecking order, at least during the

799
00:53:50,880 --> 00:53:54,680
Speaker 1: manufacturing era, when there was also this presumption of we're

800
00:53:54,760 --> 00:53:58,160
Speaker 1: kind of all in it together, there was a clear sense, well,

801
00:53:58,480 --> 00:54:02,040
Speaker 1: all I need to do is be included, and if

802
00:54:02,040 --> 00:54:04,239
Speaker 1: I'm included, then I could do what everyone else is doing.

803
00:54:04,440 --> 00:54:07,040
Speaker 1: I can be educated, I can live in neighborhoods where

804
00:54:07,080 --> 00:54:09,440
Speaker 1: I prefer I could express my preferences. I want to

805
00:54:09,480 --> 00:54:11,680
Speaker 1: go to this school, I wanna live in this neighborhood.

806
00:54:11,719 --> 00:54:15,240
Speaker 1: I want to strive in this manner. But when things

807
00:54:15,320 --> 00:54:20,480
Speaker 1: shift to kind of a more computer driven situation where

808
00:54:20,480 --> 00:54:24,640
Speaker 1: people are kind of fragmenting the social safety net, then

809
00:54:24,640 --> 00:54:26,799
Speaker 1: it becomes a lot more complex, and the people who

810
00:54:26,840 --> 00:54:31,959
Speaker 1: are kind of most at risk already, they become representative

811
00:54:32,040 --> 00:54:35,400
Speaker 1: of the dead weight to cut away, not to finance

812
00:54:35,440 --> 00:54:39,799
Speaker 1: by alternative means and and kind of enable with you know,

813
00:54:39,840 --> 00:54:42,560
Speaker 1: public programs, but to cut away. And so the hip

814
00:54:42,560 --> 00:54:47,759
Speaker 1: hop artists gave expression to what it felt like to

815
00:54:47,920 --> 00:54:52,200
Speaker 1: be positioned socially that way, to be at that place

816
00:54:52,800 --> 00:54:57,240
Speaker 1: where the transformation of society was going to be felt

817
00:54:57,440 --> 00:55:03,600
Speaker 1: most harshly. And black music of the days of slavery,

818
00:55:03,640 --> 00:55:07,920
Speaker 1: they expressed what it was like to be sort of

819
00:55:08,840 --> 00:55:13,120
Speaker 1: utilized or positioned in a certain way in the modalities

820
00:55:13,160 --> 00:55:16,319
Speaker 1: of that time. Rappers were expressing what it was like

821
00:55:17,080 --> 00:55:20,040
Speaker 1: at in their time, and what you can capture by

822
00:55:20,080 --> 00:55:25,480
Speaker 1: taking raps seriously is just the sensuous way of what

823
00:55:25,600 --> 00:55:31,320
Speaker 1: it feels like on the ground when these post welfare

824
00:55:31,360 --> 00:55:36,719
Speaker 1: state transformations actually occur, the pain that it elicits. And

825
00:55:37,040 --> 00:55:40,960
Speaker 1: one of the main ways that that that shift occurred

826
00:55:41,040 --> 00:55:46,040
Speaker 1: was obviously mass incarceration and you know, really hyper policing,

827
00:55:46,520 --> 00:55:50,120
Speaker 1: the war on drugs and all of those kind of things.

828
00:55:50,800 --> 00:55:53,319
Speaker 1: That was kind of like one of the ways that

829
00:55:53,320 --> 00:55:58,680
Speaker 1: that this kind of neoliberal shift was operationalized. And so

830
00:55:58,920 --> 00:56:03,719
Speaker 1: RAP is really uh soundtrack of that neoliberal shift, that

831
00:56:03,840 --> 00:56:09,480
Speaker 1: movement from that liberal order of the welfare state and

832
00:56:09,520 --> 00:56:15,319
Speaker 1: the manufacturing era to that neoliberal state of affairs where

833
00:56:15,360 --> 00:56:20,120
Speaker 1: we're moving to a more computerized, digitized, knowledge based framework

834
00:56:20,160 --> 00:56:24,200
Speaker 1: of creating value, and the way you access that is

835
00:56:24,239 --> 00:56:27,680
Speaker 1: according to your own entrepreneurial energy. There's not going to

836
00:56:27,760 --> 00:56:33,640
Speaker 1: be any public pathways provided to give you an on

837
00:56:33,800 --> 00:56:36,520
Speaker 1: ramp for that. You have to figure it out for yourself.

838
00:56:37,120 --> 00:56:40,640
Speaker 1: And so RAP kind of really articulates what it felt

839
00:56:40,680 --> 00:56:44,920
Speaker 1: like for them to have to figure all that out. Well,

840
00:56:45,080 --> 00:56:50,120
Speaker 1: when you were a community that has this generational impact

841
00:56:50,320 --> 00:56:54,800
Speaker 1: of having resources withheld and then suddenly you go through

842
00:56:54,840 --> 00:56:59,400
Speaker 1: this mass cultural shift and you're told that if you

843
00:56:59,400 --> 00:57:01,160
Speaker 1: want to get for the hump of the shift, you've

844
00:57:01,160 --> 00:57:07,160
Speaker 1: gotta bet on your own resources, and you terrifying. It's terrifying,

845
00:57:07,200 --> 00:57:11,600
Speaker 1: but it's also galvanizing because, like book or T. Washington's

846
00:57:11,640 --> 00:57:16,480
Speaker 1: ethos was cash your buckets where they lay, meaning use

847
00:57:16,640 --> 00:57:20,920
Speaker 1: what you have at your disposal and pull yourself up,

848
00:57:21,000 --> 00:57:23,400
Speaker 1: do what you need to do. And so the rappers

849
00:57:23,400 --> 00:57:28,720
Speaker 1: are like, we have this, we have cards stacked against us,

850
00:57:28,760 --> 00:57:31,880
Speaker 1: but look at the ingenuity we see all around us,

851
00:57:31,960 --> 00:57:37,880
Speaker 1: these incredibly brilliant creative artists. Let's let's make something happen

852
00:57:37,920 --> 00:57:41,800
Speaker 1: with that, and let's tell the stories of what it's

853
00:57:41,840 --> 00:57:46,880
Speaker 1: like to be rugged entrepreneurs in the underground economy, making

854
00:57:47,240 --> 00:57:52,200
Speaker 1: things happen where we are. And those are captivating stories,

855
00:57:52,600 --> 00:57:56,560
Speaker 1: and it created a vibrant commercial market around those stories

856
00:57:56,600 --> 00:57:59,920
Speaker 1: that continues. It is the ingenuity of saying, you might

857
00:58:00,080 --> 00:58:02,040
Speaker 1: try to keep me out of that sector, Okay, I'll

858
00:58:02,040 --> 00:58:05,720
Speaker 1: create my own sector. Exactly. It's a start up mentality.

859
00:58:05,880 --> 00:58:09,880
Speaker 1: And you know, in this era of you know, valorizing

860
00:58:10,200 --> 00:58:16,720
Speaker 1: lean startups and founders, classic founder startup entrepreneurial mentality, we're

861
00:58:16,720 --> 00:58:20,520
Speaker 1: gonna do this lean and mean and literally by any

862
00:58:20,560 --> 00:58:24,680
Speaker 1: means necessary, and um, we're gonna make it happen and

863
00:58:24,760 --> 00:58:26,640
Speaker 1: the rest is history. So that's what I think I

864
00:58:26,720 --> 00:58:29,520
Speaker 1: was really trying to capture is that is that rap

865
00:58:29,720 --> 00:58:34,360
Speaker 1: is a lens through which you can understand this this

866
00:58:34,360 --> 00:58:38,720
Speaker 1: this incredibly important transformation and the overall economy. That it's

867
00:58:38,760 --> 00:58:41,960
Speaker 1: just one key lens through which you can understand it.

868
00:58:42,520 --> 00:58:44,360
Speaker 1: Um like wrap now is a key way you can

869
00:58:44,440 --> 00:58:49,120
Speaker 1: understand the continual evolution of our digital economy. You know,

870
00:58:49,280 --> 00:58:53,600
Speaker 1: people from the margins are always on the front lines

871
00:58:53,960 --> 00:58:58,320
Speaker 1: of trying new things, and music is always a space

872
00:58:58,840 --> 00:59:01,520
Speaker 1: where the dispossess us can have a voice, and so

873
00:59:01,560 --> 00:59:04,680
Speaker 1: you can learn a lot by paying attention to what's

874
00:59:04,720 --> 00:59:09,680
Speaker 1: going on there about whatever might be happening. What do

875
00:59:09,720 --> 00:59:12,440
Speaker 1: you include? What are some highlight points that you include?

876
00:59:12,480 --> 00:59:15,080
Speaker 1: Now when you have this conversation with students, who are

877
00:59:15,080 --> 00:59:18,920
Speaker 1: you focusing on? Are you are you talking about? You know,

878
00:59:19,000 --> 00:59:23,040
Speaker 1: obviously it's a tragic outcome, but Nipsey Hustle, for example,

879
00:59:23,400 --> 00:59:25,840
Speaker 1: and what he chose to do as a rapper, what

880
00:59:25,920 --> 00:59:28,600
Speaker 1: he was doing for Crenshaw, choosing to live off slaws

881
00:59:28,600 --> 00:59:33,560
Speaker 1: in really invigorating his community and opening Vector ninety and

882
00:59:33,880 --> 00:59:38,800
Speaker 1: talking to young kids from Crenshaw about finance. You know

883
00:59:39,160 --> 00:59:41,400
Speaker 1: that's a that's the next that's a that's the next

884
00:59:41,440 --> 00:59:45,120
Speaker 1: wave of ingenuity there. No, you're so right, Sophia. I mean,

885
00:59:45,880 --> 00:59:52,160
Speaker 1: I think development economics and really formulating in twenty nine

886
00:59:54,320 --> 01:00:00,600
Speaker 1: what does a development agenda constitute today is just finitional

887
01:00:00,680 --> 01:00:04,920
Speaker 1: to our times and it's definitional to uh major aspect

888
01:00:05,000 --> 01:00:08,920
Speaker 1: of our political discourse right now is how do we uplift?

889
01:00:09,280 --> 01:00:12,240
Speaker 1: How do we develop? Like? What are the tools we have?

890
01:00:12,400 --> 01:00:16,360
Speaker 1: So needless to say, we have some very credible and

891
01:00:16,480 --> 01:00:20,840
Speaker 1: charismatic politicians with noble intentions who believe that a major

892
01:00:20,920 --> 01:00:27,640
Speaker 1: aspect of development, community development requires redistribution of resources, different

893
01:00:27,640 --> 01:00:31,920
Speaker 1: types of levels of taxation, and allocation of resources in

894
01:00:31,920 --> 01:00:35,600
Speaker 1: different ways. Obviously, that's a political trigger point in the

895
01:00:35,640 --> 01:00:38,640
Speaker 1: discourse and always has been in the in the time

896
01:00:38,680 --> 01:00:41,640
Speaker 1: since we've made the shift towards smaller government being the

897
01:00:41,720 --> 01:00:45,400
Speaker 1: order of the day. But redistribution is a major framework

898
01:00:45,600 --> 01:00:50,040
Speaker 1: through which people understand a building block towards development. But

899
01:00:50,160 --> 01:00:53,200
Speaker 1: then there's another camp that says growth is the way

900
01:00:53,360 --> 01:00:56,720
Speaker 1: to develop a community. And I think that a lot

901
01:00:56,800 --> 01:01:01,960
Speaker 1: of people on the progressive left are, for legitimate reasons,

902
01:01:02,320 --> 01:01:06,880
Speaker 1: distrustful of the growth agenda that they see that growth

903
01:01:07,120 --> 01:01:11,160
Speaker 1: really enables a lot of the worst forms of exploitation

904
01:01:11,560 --> 01:01:15,000
Speaker 1: and value extraction. I think when you look at Nipsey Hustle,

905
01:01:15,800 --> 01:01:18,360
Speaker 1: I do think it's a bit of a corrective to

906
01:01:18,440 --> 01:01:22,160
Speaker 1: that inclination to distrust growth, because I don't think you're

907
01:01:22,160 --> 01:01:26,840
Speaker 1: gonna be able to read distribute your way into evening

908
01:01:26,880 --> 01:01:30,120
Speaker 1: the playing field. Leveling the playing field, You're going to

909
01:01:30,240 --> 01:01:36,920
Speaker 1: have to create grassroots forms of value creation through entrepreneurship.

910
01:01:37,280 --> 01:01:40,600
Speaker 1: And I think Nipsey Hustle kind of represented that. And

911
01:01:40,640 --> 01:01:44,800
Speaker 1: I think that before we started our conversation, we were

912
01:01:44,800 --> 01:01:47,920
Speaker 1: talking about how the pendulum can fling from one, you know,

913
01:01:48,000 --> 01:01:50,280
Speaker 1: do a one eight. I think that we've you know,

914
01:01:50,320 --> 01:01:54,000
Speaker 1: we've got to not take the needle too far in

915
01:01:54,080 --> 01:01:59,120
Speaker 1: the side of redistribution, that we forget that growth is legitimate,

916
01:01:59,480 --> 01:02:03,320
Speaker 1: and grow is a way in which people have always

917
01:02:03,400 --> 01:02:07,560
Speaker 1: better their opportunities. And that given like you said that

918
01:02:08,240 --> 01:02:11,360
Speaker 1: young Black Americans, particularly in the inner city, have been

919
01:02:11,880 --> 01:02:15,160
Speaker 1: the deck has been stacked against them from even attempting

920
01:02:15,200 --> 01:02:18,960
Speaker 1: to be entrepreneurial. Why should we withhold that from them

921
01:02:19,000 --> 01:02:22,080
Speaker 1: any longer or not cheer lead on behalf of that.

922
01:02:22,240 --> 01:02:26,600
Speaker 1: I think Nipsey hustles um life kind of invites us

923
01:02:26,920 --> 01:02:30,280
Speaker 1: to valorize what he was trying to do in Crenshaw

924
01:02:30,720 --> 01:02:33,520
Speaker 1: by by sort of spreading the message that that's a

925
01:02:33,680 --> 01:02:39,200
Speaker 1: viable way of changing people's opportunities. It's amazing to think

926
01:02:39,240 --> 01:02:45,280
Speaker 1: about what's changed in these last you know, fifteen plus

927
01:02:45,400 --> 01:02:52,760
Speaker 1: years in in this really common cultural conversation about startups

928
01:02:52,800 --> 01:02:57,400
Speaker 1: and entrepreneurship and and how we can invest locally and

929
01:02:57,480 --> 01:02:59,280
Speaker 1: what kind of change we're going to make and what

930
01:02:59,400 --> 01:03:01,320
Speaker 1: kind of read attribution we want to have. I mean,

931
01:03:01,920 --> 01:03:05,600
Speaker 1: it's it's unbelievable. And I do think so much of

932
01:03:05,600 --> 01:03:08,880
Speaker 1: the access to that information and to these ideas, and

933
01:03:08,960 --> 01:03:11,880
Speaker 1: to these artists, and to these spaces and to these

934
01:03:11,880 --> 01:03:14,160
Speaker 1: places around the world that we never really used to

935
01:03:14,160 --> 01:03:17,480
Speaker 1: think we could go to comes from this Internet economy,

936
01:03:17,600 --> 01:03:21,040
Speaker 1: comes from this exposure to all things that we have

937
01:03:21,080 --> 01:03:26,560
Speaker 1: available at our fingertips on our phones. And I'm curious, how,

938
01:03:27,160 --> 01:03:30,080
Speaker 1: with your background in media and in messaging and all

939
01:03:30,120 --> 01:03:35,240
Speaker 1: of this, how do you keep up now? Because now

940
01:03:35,400 --> 01:03:38,959
Speaker 1: your students in college, they've been on social media since

941
01:03:39,000 --> 01:03:44,720
Speaker 1: they were ten. They they've had access to things that

942
01:03:45,320 --> 01:03:47,360
Speaker 1: are just different for so many of us. You know,

943
01:03:47,440 --> 01:03:51,560
Speaker 1: there there wasn't Twitter until I was already out of

944
01:03:51,600 --> 01:03:56,000
Speaker 1: college and on a TV show. So yeah, do do

945
01:03:56,040 --> 01:03:58,120
Speaker 1: you feel like they're teaching you as well? Do they

946
01:03:58,200 --> 01:04:00,680
Speaker 1: know things before you know them? Do you have to

947
01:04:00,720 --> 01:04:04,760
Speaker 1: be online more to keep up with them? How do

948
01:04:04,840 --> 01:04:08,880
Speaker 1: you do it? Um? I think they, I mean they're

949
01:04:08,920 --> 01:04:13,720
Speaker 1: they're the current generation's ability to process information is unrivaled.

950
01:04:14,360 --> 01:04:18,000
Speaker 1: I mean they have grown up at a with a

951
01:04:18,080 --> 01:04:21,840
Speaker 1: device in their hands that brings them a tsunami of

952
01:04:22,000 --> 01:04:27,520
Speaker 1: curated and non curated waves of information. So their ability

953
01:04:27,600 --> 01:04:30,560
Speaker 1: to quickly sift what they're interested in and what they're

954
01:04:30,600 --> 01:04:34,960
Speaker 1: not is unrivaled. And they're at a place like USC

955
01:04:35,320 --> 01:04:38,240
Speaker 1: or a place where you know, you're you're, you're around

956
01:04:38,320 --> 01:04:40,760
Speaker 1: a lot of people who are who are who are

957
01:04:40,800 --> 01:04:44,800
Speaker 1: really activated to lean in just it's it's just incredible

958
01:04:45,080 --> 01:04:49,040
Speaker 1: the speed at which they're able to process things. But

959
01:04:49,920 --> 01:04:54,240
Speaker 1: wisdom still counts for a lot, and being able to

960
01:04:54,280 --> 01:04:58,240
Speaker 1: see patterns based on what has come before means a lot.

961
01:04:58,360 --> 01:05:02,640
Speaker 1: And so I think what what students seek now is

962
01:05:03,360 --> 01:05:08,120
Speaker 1: stewardship in not getting buried in history, but knowing enough

963
01:05:08,160 --> 01:05:11,440
Speaker 1: about what's come before that they can be enabled to

964
01:05:11,480 --> 01:05:16,640
Speaker 1: see new patterns emerge because to properly discern what's coming

965
01:05:16,640 --> 01:05:19,720
Speaker 1: at them every day exactly and to have judgment. Um.

966
01:05:19,800 --> 01:05:26,160
Speaker 1: They do appreciate being enable to have judgment, and and

967
01:05:26,160 --> 01:05:28,880
Speaker 1: and and so I think that is a big part

968
01:05:28,880 --> 01:05:32,720
Speaker 1: of the educational mission now because if you don't, if

969
01:05:32,760 --> 01:05:34,520
Speaker 1: you're looking at all this media, and I read a

970
01:05:34,520 --> 01:05:37,040
Speaker 1: statistic a few years ago, so it's probably more. But

971
01:05:37,120 --> 01:05:38,840
Speaker 1: if a couple of years ago I read a stad

972
01:05:38,840 --> 01:05:42,320
Speaker 1: that said that we intake more media in every twenty

973
01:05:42,320 --> 01:05:44,600
Speaker 1: four hour cycle than had been created in the prior

974
01:05:44,640 --> 01:05:48,760
Speaker 1: ten thousand years combined. So I think it's why people

975
01:05:48,880 --> 01:05:51,880
Speaker 1: can quickly identify, to your point, what they're interested in.

976
01:05:52,200 --> 01:05:54,600
Speaker 1: It's why we can often sniff out when we're being

977
01:05:54,640 --> 01:05:59,000
Speaker 1: sold something inauthentic. It's it's why we can see patterns

978
01:05:59,040 --> 01:06:03,520
Speaker 1: in the present exposure. But I'm so glad you bring

979
01:06:03,600 --> 01:06:08,080
Speaker 1: up the importance of understanding your history and understanding the

980
01:06:08,160 --> 01:06:10,960
Speaker 1: systems in which we live and how they were created,

981
01:06:11,040 --> 01:06:13,720
Speaker 1: and who they work for and who they don't work for,

982
01:06:14,240 --> 01:06:17,680
Speaker 1: because it can get really easy when you're so good

983
01:06:17,680 --> 01:06:19,760
Speaker 1: at in taking media every day, to assume you know

984
01:06:19,840 --> 01:06:23,360
Speaker 1: everything because you see everything, just because you know today

985
01:06:23,600 --> 01:06:25,960
Speaker 1: doesn't mean you have a clue where it comes from

986
01:06:26,000 --> 01:06:29,360
Speaker 1: if you haven't done your research. Absolutely, And I think

987
01:06:29,360 --> 01:06:33,120
Speaker 1: you've touched on one of the greatest challenges today is

988
01:06:33,160 --> 01:06:37,680
Speaker 1: that we are all really cocooned in the present moment.

989
01:06:38,280 --> 01:06:43,200
Speaker 1: And I know you are well versed in our wellness

990
01:06:43,920 --> 01:06:48,080
Speaker 1: economy and the power of meditation and yoga, and there's

991
01:06:48,120 --> 01:06:50,760
Speaker 1: power in the present moment. But the power of the

992
01:06:50,760 --> 01:06:56,120
Speaker 1: present moment is stillness, not inputs. And so I think

993
01:06:56,200 --> 01:07:00,120
Speaker 1: that where immediate ecology is concerned, people get stuck in

994
01:07:00,120 --> 01:07:05,640
Speaker 1: the present moment just absorbing all these inputs. And and

995
01:07:05,760 --> 01:07:10,720
Speaker 1: that's that's dangerous because, um, let's face it, the vast

996
01:07:10,760 --> 01:07:17,680
Speaker 1: majority of those inputs are inconsequential, meaningless distractions, their energy drainers,

997
01:07:18,520 --> 01:07:22,040
Speaker 1: um and and and so. And you know, students aren't

998
01:07:22,080 --> 01:07:27,240
Speaker 1: always adapted how to put things together. And so, you know,

999
01:07:27,360 --> 01:07:31,400
Speaker 1: I think teaching and appreciation of history helps people when

1000
01:07:31,400 --> 01:07:33,920
Speaker 1: they come back to the present moment, to kind of

1001
01:07:35,120 --> 01:07:39,000
Speaker 1: zero in on what's really meaningful and not get caught

1002
01:07:39,040 --> 01:07:41,600
Speaker 1: up in all the all the distractions and the noise.

1003
01:07:41,840 --> 01:07:44,080
Speaker 1: Is there advice you offer your students for how to

1004
01:07:44,240 --> 01:07:50,080
Speaker 1: how to manage their online on screen experience not not

1005
01:07:50,280 --> 01:07:52,520
Speaker 1: so much, because I you know, I do think they're

1006
01:07:52,560 --> 01:07:54,919
Speaker 1: they're pretty media savvy. I mean, I do think that

1007
01:07:56,080 --> 01:08:03,240
Speaker 1: having appreciation for the different news outlets that are steeped

1008
01:08:03,280 --> 01:08:07,600
Speaker 1: and standing by the information they present is critical that

1009
01:08:07,680 --> 01:08:12,560
Speaker 1: you know, and supporting those organizations um with your dollars

1010
01:08:12,600 --> 01:08:16,000
Speaker 1: and you know, yeah, you know, you know, I think

1011
01:08:16,040 --> 01:08:20,400
Speaker 1: that those organizations deserve our support, and so part of

1012
01:08:20,400 --> 01:08:23,720
Speaker 1: what I do is just getting students to institute in

1013
01:08:23,800 --> 01:08:28,040
Speaker 1: their media consumptive behavior to make sure that you respect

1014
01:08:28,120 --> 01:08:32,599
Speaker 1: certain outlets above others, and that you commit early on

1015
01:08:33,360 --> 01:08:37,120
Speaker 1: and drawing down information from those outlets and then supporting

1016
01:08:37,120 --> 01:08:42,439
Speaker 1: those organizations um materially but overall, in my classes, I

1017
01:08:42,479 --> 01:08:46,240
Speaker 1: really stress that they will be well served knowing some

1018
01:08:46,320 --> 01:08:50,879
Speaker 1: of the basic economic fundamentals of what makes media function

1019
01:08:50,960 --> 01:08:54,599
Speaker 1: as a business. And if they know those, no matter

1020
01:08:54,640 --> 01:08:58,479
Speaker 1: what the changes are, they're always going to ultimately come

1021
01:08:58,520 --> 01:09:02,120
Speaker 1: down to certain a six of creating a market. I mean,

1022
01:09:02,120 --> 01:09:05,519
Speaker 1: there are only a few ways to really make money

1023
01:09:05,560 --> 01:09:11,200
Speaker 1: for media, um and those ways have certain dynamics attached

1024
01:09:11,240 --> 01:09:15,280
Speaker 1: to them, and so understanding those dynamics can serve you

1025
01:09:15,360 --> 01:09:18,519
Speaker 1: well and you don't get caught up in just chasing

1026
01:09:18,560 --> 01:09:21,599
Speaker 1: the flavor of the month. Um so I at my age,

1027
01:09:21,640 --> 01:09:26,000
Speaker 1: I can't compete in like knowing every person or phenomenon

1028
01:09:26,000 --> 01:09:29,120
Speaker 1: that represents the new thing, But I am pretty well

1029
01:09:29,240 --> 01:09:33,080
Speaker 1: versed in knowing why any new phenomenon might have staying

1030
01:09:33,080 --> 01:09:37,639
Speaker 1: power or might actually be impactful interesting. Do you, over

1031
01:09:37,680 --> 01:09:40,559
Speaker 1: the course of a class follow let's say at the

1032
01:09:40,560 --> 01:09:44,479
Speaker 1: beginning of a semester, some media phenomenon hits. Will you

1033
01:09:44,520 --> 01:09:47,000
Speaker 1: guys touch on it through the course of a semester

1034
01:09:47,120 --> 01:09:49,320
Speaker 1: to see what happens with it. I think one of

1035
01:09:49,320 --> 01:09:53,479
Speaker 1: the things I do more than ever is we try

1036
01:09:53,520 --> 01:09:59,879
Speaker 1: to find a real business case that either a largest

1037
01:10:00,000 --> 01:10:04,760
Speaker 1: ablished media company or startup has in their approach to

1038
01:10:04,800 --> 01:10:10,639
Speaker 1: a given market, and we frame that problem and we

1039
01:10:10,840 --> 01:10:14,200
Speaker 1: tease that the working out of that problem throughout the

1040
01:10:14,200 --> 01:10:18,760
Speaker 1: semester in teams, and different teams will either tackle the

1041
01:10:18,800 --> 01:10:23,559
Speaker 1: same problem or tackle different problems with different tools. But

1042
01:10:23,640 --> 01:10:27,839
Speaker 1: I think that really is that kind of experiential learning

1043
01:10:28,000 --> 01:10:32,160
Speaker 1: model really is in keeping with giving students the skills

1044
01:10:32,200 --> 01:10:36,040
Speaker 1: they need to actually participate in what's going on and

1045
01:10:36,080 --> 01:10:38,120
Speaker 1: not just learn about it in the aftrict, but actually

1046
01:10:38,120 --> 01:10:42,479
Speaker 1: participate in it. And when you talk about media models

1047
01:10:42,520 --> 01:10:46,000
Speaker 1: doing it right. And when you talk about quality sources

1048
01:10:46,040 --> 01:10:50,840
Speaker 1: of well researched, real journalism that also deserves to be

1049
01:10:50,880 --> 01:10:54,760
Speaker 1: financially supported, I'm curious who who do you subscribe to

1050
01:10:54,880 --> 01:10:56,840
Speaker 1: and who do you follow? What are your what are

1051
01:10:56,840 --> 01:11:00,360
Speaker 1: your top outlets that you really, as an expert, believe

1052
01:11:00,400 --> 01:11:05,200
Speaker 1: in and stand by and pay for well. In the

1053
01:11:05,200 --> 01:11:10,720
Speaker 1: intersection of media and technology, I subscribe to a bespoke

1054
01:11:11,240 --> 01:11:15,200
Speaker 1: publication called The Information that a former editor from the

1055
01:11:15,200 --> 01:11:20,560
Speaker 1: Wall Street Journal started, and that's phenomenal like Silicon Valley

1056
01:11:20,760 --> 01:11:25,360
Speaker 1: tech coverage, you know, l a Silicon Valley intersection coverage

1057
01:11:25,400 --> 01:11:31,880
Speaker 1: that's phenomenal resourced information. Traditionally, my daily bread, Financial Times

1058
01:11:31,880 --> 01:11:35,920
Speaker 1: in Wall Street Journal every day in my driveway and online,

1059
01:11:36,439 --> 01:11:39,960
Speaker 1: and New York Times online and physical paper in my

1060
01:11:40,040 --> 01:11:44,880
Speaker 1: driveway on Sunday. Those are my three. And the global

1061
01:11:45,280 --> 01:11:50,560
Speaker 1: perspective you get from the Financial Times is just incredible.

1062
01:11:50,600 --> 01:11:55,200
Speaker 1: I think it's vital for people, young, up and coming

1063
01:11:55,240 --> 01:11:58,080
Speaker 1: people today to have a global perspective, you know, whether

1064
01:11:58,080 --> 01:12:01,400
Speaker 1: it's from the BBC or find Angel Times or you

1065
01:12:01,400 --> 01:12:04,639
Speaker 1: know UM. I also subscribe to, you know, the South

1066
01:12:04,720 --> 01:12:09,080
Speaker 1: China Post to get a you know, China, Chinese perspective

1067
01:12:09,439 --> 01:12:12,680
Speaker 1: on technology and innovation and what China represents in the

1068
01:12:12,680 --> 01:12:15,519
Speaker 1: global economy. So I think wherever you choose it, have

1069
01:12:15,800 --> 01:12:19,400
Speaker 1: some outlet that gives you a global perspective and doesn't

1070
01:12:19,439 --> 01:12:23,439
Speaker 1: view every phenomena through a US centric lens, because you

1071
01:12:23,479 --> 01:12:27,799
Speaker 1: know the world isn't like that, and and um, we're

1072
01:12:27,840 --> 01:12:30,679
Speaker 1: always prone to being too us centrics. I think that's

1073
01:12:30,800 --> 01:12:34,400
Speaker 1: vital is having some bread and butter outlet that gives

1074
01:12:34,400 --> 01:12:37,559
Speaker 1: you a global perspective that's curated and that they're willing

1075
01:12:37,560 --> 01:12:40,320
Speaker 1: to stand behind. Because obviously you can cobble together a

1076
01:12:40,320 --> 01:12:44,400
Speaker 1: global perspective from feeds you get from different people on Twitter,

1077
01:12:45,200 --> 01:12:50,040
Speaker 1: but following those organizations that they give you the platform

1078
01:12:50,120 --> 01:12:52,800
Speaker 1: to dive into a global perspective is key to get

1079
01:12:52,800 --> 01:12:57,000
Speaker 1: people started. And following the reporting, not just the perspectives

1080
01:12:57,040 --> 01:13:02,480
Speaker 1: of people who you admire, but actual are reporting, hard reporting.

1081
01:13:03,000 --> 01:13:07,600
Speaker 1: And I mean when you read the opinions in the

1082
01:13:07,680 --> 01:13:11,680
Speaker 1: Financial Times, or even though a lot of their political

1083
01:13:11,800 --> 01:13:16,720
Speaker 1: beliefs are different than mine the Wall Street Journal, it's sophisticated,

1084
01:13:17,160 --> 01:13:23,040
Speaker 1: nuanced argument. And the more you get accustomed to sophisticated

1085
01:13:23,320 --> 01:13:29,120
Speaker 1: nuanced argument, you get accustomed to realizing argument is not

1086
01:13:29,400 --> 01:13:34,719
Speaker 1: all or nothing. It's about making cases, absorbing other cases,

1087
01:13:34,760 --> 01:13:39,040
Speaker 1: and participating in an ongoing conversation. Is not just putting

1088
01:13:39,080 --> 01:13:43,639
Speaker 1: people on blast and doing takedowns and so forth, but

1089
01:13:43,640 --> 01:13:48,000
Speaker 1: but but really having a dialogue. And so I think

1090
01:13:48,040 --> 01:13:51,320
Speaker 1: that's what you learn from those kind of platforms. And

1091
01:13:51,360 --> 01:13:53,200
Speaker 1: I think to move away from this idea that you

1092
01:13:53,240 --> 01:13:56,599
Speaker 1: have to be right or die or canceled and more

1093
01:13:56,680 --> 01:14:00,760
Speaker 1: into a space where we can see the ramifications of

1094
01:14:00,760 --> 01:14:03,559
Speaker 1: a lack of nuance, you know, if I may, That's

1095
01:14:03,560 --> 01:14:05,880
Speaker 1: what I view the Trump presidency as there is a

1096
01:14:05,920 --> 01:14:08,040
Speaker 1: complete lack of nuance. This is just a person who

1097
01:14:08,080 --> 01:14:10,320
Speaker 1: says my way or the highway. But it's the way

1098
01:14:10,360 --> 01:14:12,920
Speaker 1: of a bully in a sandbox on the playground. It's

1099
01:14:13,000 --> 01:14:17,479
Speaker 1: unsophisticated and thus very dangerous to our policy or foreign

1100
01:14:17,479 --> 01:14:21,280
Speaker 1: policy or national security. And to your point, I don't

1101
01:14:21,320 --> 01:14:23,479
Speaker 1: agree with a lot of the political views and in

1102
01:14:23,520 --> 01:14:25,799
Speaker 1: the Wall Street Journal, but I read it for that reason.

1103
01:14:26,560 --> 01:14:29,320
Speaker 1: And I read, and I pay for the Washington Post,

1104
01:14:29,320 --> 01:14:31,120
Speaker 1: and I read, and I pay for the New York Times,

1105
01:14:31,160 --> 01:14:32,960
Speaker 1: and I read, and I pay for The New Yorker,

1106
01:14:33,720 --> 01:14:37,160
Speaker 1: and I subscribe. It's so important, and I love oh

1107
01:14:37,280 --> 01:14:41,439
Speaker 1: I love getting into the mail, but I subscribe to it.

1108
01:14:41,520 --> 01:14:43,679
Speaker 1: Really does you gotta be you really have to be diligent.

1109
01:14:43,720 --> 01:14:45,479
Speaker 1: It's hard. But I do find that when I travel

1110
01:14:45,520 --> 01:14:47,320
Speaker 1: I'm a little bit better because I read on planes.

1111
01:14:47,800 --> 01:14:52,719
Speaker 1: But you know, and I also follow and read the BBC,

1112
01:14:52,880 --> 01:14:56,480
Speaker 1: and I follow and read Al Jazeera, and it's so important.

1113
01:14:56,479 --> 01:14:58,120
Speaker 1: And now I know I have to start reading the

1114
01:14:58,160 --> 01:15:00,439
Speaker 1: South China Times, and I have to start reading the

1115
01:15:00,479 --> 01:15:03,920
Speaker 1: Financial Times. So thank you for that. Those Financial Times

1116
01:15:04,000 --> 01:15:07,000
Speaker 1: is incredible, I mean, just so well done. But to

1117
01:15:07,080 --> 01:15:11,240
Speaker 1: your point, I mean sad to say for whatever reason,

1118
01:15:11,720 --> 01:15:14,280
Speaker 1: and the reasons are legion. We live in a time

1119
01:15:14,320 --> 01:15:18,280
Speaker 1: where nuance looks weak and people, I mean, one of

1120
01:15:18,280 --> 01:15:23,800
Speaker 1: the main criticisms of President Obama from his opponent political opponents,

1121
01:15:24,200 --> 01:15:28,800
Speaker 1: was that he was too professorial and that his kind

1122
01:15:28,840 --> 01:15:33,360
Speaker 1: of ways of communicating, in his ways of processing information

1123
01:15:33,840 --> 01:15:40,080
Speaker 1: were were like ineffectual because they were too considerate of

1124
01:15:40,400 --> 01:15:45,479
Speaker 1: you know, and and so people want certainty. Now these

1125
01:15:45,520 --> 01:15:49,960
Speaker 1: are anxious times, and they want certainty, and nuance looks

1126
01:15:49,960 --> 01:15:52,559
Speaker 1: weak in those in those settings. And so I was

1127
01:15:52,600 --> 01:15:55,559
Speaker 1: watching some news report. I don't it might even have

1128
01:15:55,600 --> 01:15:58,000
Speaker 1: been Fox News, one of the rare moments when I

1129
01:15:58,040 --> 01:16:01,760
Speaker 1: turned the dial to Fox News, but a commentator was

1130
01:16:01,800 --> 01:16:04,840
Speaker 1: saying that one thing that the that the Democrats have

1131
01:16:04,880 --> 01:16:09,200
Speaker 1: to understand during this this primary season is that they

1132
01:16:09,240 --> 01:16:15,000
Speaker 1: need to find a candidate that projects strength and projects

1133
01:16:15,040 --> 01:16:18,840
Speaker 1: like that commentator's idea of what being presidential was was

1134
01:16:18,920 --> 01:16:22,640
Speaker 1: having a certain bearing in body language, that right or

1135
01:16:22,680 --> 01:16:27,880
Speaker 1: wrong in the belief being expressed was certain. And he said, well,

1136
01:16:28,080 --> 01:16:31,680
Speaker 1: no matter what you think about President Trump, this is

1137
01:16:31,760 --> 01:16:34,560
Speaker 1: him speaking. When you look at him, you see strength.

1138
01:16:35,200 --> 01:16:39,599
Speaker 1: And for a lot of people that is true. They

1139
01:16:39,680 --> 01:16:43,559
Speaker 1: see someone who if someone attacks him, he attacks back.

1140
01:16:43,880 --> 01:16:47,320
Speaker 1: They see someone that whether he's right or wrong, he

1141
01:16:47,479 --> 01:16:51,120
Speaker 1: just says it with force, and that's what they want.

1142
01:16:51,360 --> 01:16:56,320
Speaker 1: They don't really care about the nuance. They just want

1143
01:16:56,360 --> 01:16:58,880
Speaker 1: the strength. Which is so strange to me because I

1144
01:16:58,920 --> 01:17:01,160
Speaker 1: feel like those quality of these you're describing, if we

1145
01:17:01,200 --> 01:17:03,840
Speaker 1: can call them, qualities we all were taught not to

1146
01:17:04,880 --> 01:17:10,120
Speaker 1: become during recess. You know, don't be a bully, don't

1147
01:17:10,720 --> 01:17:14,200
Speaker 1: don't claim that you know everything. Don't. It's so strange

1148
01:17:14,240 --> 01:17:17,439
Speaker 1: to me because I think the idea of being professorial obviously,

1149
01:17:17,439 --> 01:17:20,600
Speaker 1: as I said across from a professor, the idea of

1150
01:17:20,640 --> 01:17:24,759
Speaker 1: being willing to listen and intake all information and really

1151
01:17:24,840 --> 01:17:29,760
Speaker 1: deduce what's right and what's best and what works for

1152
01:17:29,800 --> 01:17:34,000
Speaker 1: the most people. Those are things I so admire. Yeah,

1153
01:17:34,040 --> 01:17:39,680
Speaker 1: I think that people who study populist movements suggest that

1154
01:17:39,760 --> 01:17:46,000
Speaker 1: at times of maximum or times of high rates of change,

1155
01:17:47,000 --> 01:17:51,240
Speaker 1: anxiety creating rates of change, people turned towards figures that

1156
01:17:51,280 --> 01:17:55,240
Speaker 1: represent strength. That's the danger of fascism, is that that

1157
01:17:55,400 --> 01:18:02,120
Speaker 1: populous desire for certainty can trigger a fascist grounds well,

1158
01:18:02,560 --> 01:18:05,080
Speaker 1: and you know, so you know around the world there's

1159
01:18:05,200 --> 01:18:08,640
Speaker 1: risk factors for that right now. But the baseline is

1160
01:18:08,680 --> 01:18:13,120
Speaker 1: that these are the degree of which to which everything

1161
01:18:13,200 --> 01:18:18,799
Speaker 1: is complexifying is stunning. Everything is super complex, and people

1162
01:18:18,920 --> 01:18:23,920
Speaker 1: want people to simplify everything for them, and and it's

1163
01:18:23,920 --> 01:18:27,799
Speaker 1: a it's a huge challenge we face. And I'm curious

1164
01:18:27,840 --> 01:18:30,840
Speaker 1: to what you think the role of the Internet plays,

1165
01:18:30,920 --> 01:18:34,920
Speaker 1: because you know, we talk about trusted journalistic sources, which

1166
01:18:34,920 --> 01:18:37,040
Speaker 1: are always the people who I believe we should go to,

1167
01:18:38,040 --> 01:18:40,840
Speaker 1: but so many people get their news, as you mentioned,

1168
01:18:40,840 --> 01:18:44,479
Speaker 1: from Twitter, they get their news unfortunately, from Facebook. And

1169
01:18:44,520 --> 01:18:46,640
Speaker 1: we looked at the other day that we're recording this.

1170
01:18:46,720 --> 01:18:49,120
Speaker 1: Twitter has just announced that they will no longer be

1171
01:18:49,160 --> 01:18:53,200
Speaker 1: accepting any ad dollars for political ads. Politicians on any

1172
01:18:53,240 --> 01:18:58,439
Speaker 1: side cannot buy ads on Twitter anymore, while Facebook is

1173
01:18:58,479 --> 01:19:02,040
Speaker 1: saying it will not monitor any language used in ads

1174
01:19:02,040 --> 01:19:05,639
Speaker 1: by politicians, effectively allowing them to lie in any way

1175
01:19:05,680 --> 01:19:08,240
Speaker 1: that they choose, which we've seen the dangers of in

1176
01:19:08,840 --> 01:19:11,080
Speaker 1: you know, debunked videos. There was a there was a

1177
01:19:11,120 --> 01:19:14,439
Speaker 1: scandal created and videos shared on Facebook that claimed that

1178
01:19:14,600 --> 01:19:17,880
Speaker 1: you know, Planned Parenthood was selling baby parts, which was

1179
01:19:17,920 --> 01:19:21,679
Speaker 1: actually not true. It was doctored. Video was incredibly damaging

1180
01:19:21,720 --> 01:19:24,960
Speaker 1: to the yeah deep fakes. It was incredibly damaging to

1181
01:19:26,160 --> 01:19:28,640
Speaker 1: millions and millions of women who only have access to

1182
01:19:28,680 --> 01:19:31,080
Speaker 1: their healthcare and their cancer screenings and Planned Parenthood, to

1183
01:19:31,160 --> 01:19:34,640
Speaker 1: men who get their healthcare at Planned Parenthood. And and

1184
01:19:34,720 --> 01:19:37,200
Speaker 1: we see Facebook in this moment where Twitter is saying

1185
01:19:37,280 --> 01:19:39,599
Speaker 1: no more political ads were not doing it. We don't

1186
01:19:39,640 --> 01:19:45,200
Speaker 1: want to risk that people could be persuaded or or

1187
01:19:45,200 --> 01:19:48,400
Speaker 1: that their election, you know that our elections could be

1188
01:19:48,439 --> 01:19:52,400
Speaker 1: affected by Twitter messaging because we can't possibly police it.

1189
01:19:52,479 --> 01:19:54,160
Speaker 1: Facebook is saying we're not going to police it. Do

1190
01:19:54,200 --> 01:19:57,280
Speaker 1: whatever you want. And Facebook has just made much to

1191
01:19:57,400 --> 01:20:00,960
Speaker 1: my horror, bright part one of its trusted sources of

1192
01:20:01,000 --> 01:20:03,760
Speaker 1: news and a journalist who I deeply respect, and I'm

1193
01:20:03,760 --> 01:20:05,240
Speaker 1: sad that I have to say this, but we live

1194
01:20:05,240 --> 01:20:07,120
Speaker 1: in a world where I'm scared that if I name him,

1195
01:20:07,320 --> 01:20:10,719
Speaker 1: he'll get trolled online. The day that was announced, journalist

1196
01:20:10,840 --> 01:20:13,519
Speaker 1: retweeted the News about it and said, Breitbart wrote a

1197
01:20:13,600 --> 01:20:16,880
Speaker 1: hit piece on my daughter when she was thirteen years old.

1198
01:20:18,360 --> 01:20:27,400
Speaker 1: They are a dangerous, incredibly weaponized, vitriolic, essentially hate platform,

1199
01:20:27,439 --> 01:20:32,080
Speaker 1: and Facebook is giving them credence so as to publicly

1200
01:20:32,560 --> 01:20:35,160
Speaker 1: be able to say we're not quote picking sides, but

1201
01:20:35,240 --> 01:20:38,280
Speaker 1: when you don't pick size between truth and lies, you are,

1202
01:20:38,360 --> 01:20:44,240
Speaker 1: in my estimation, paving a very clear runway for fascism.

1203
01:20:44,280 --> 01:20:47,640
Speaker 1: And so I'm curious what you think, what do we

1204
01:20:47,760 --> 01:20:50,759
Speaker 1: do here? And what do corporations that aren't news outlets,

1205
01:20:51,720 --> 01:20:55,479
Speaker 1: what do they have as far as responsibility in this game? Well,

1206
01:20:55,520 --> 01:20:59,840
Speaker 1: I think you know what's happening is we're catching up

1207
01:20:59,880 --> 01:21:04,880
Speaker 1: to the changes at the platform economy has wrought in

1208
01:21:04,920 --> 01:21:09,000
Speaker 1: our lives, and that's going to require a shift in

1209
01:21:09,040 --> 01:21:12,920
Speaker 1: our government, and we're gonna need to create a agency

1210
01:21:13,080 --> 01:21:16,920
Speaker 1: or expand the function of the FCC to have a

1211
01:21:16,960 --> 01:21:23,559
Speaker 1: division that exclusively looks at the digital media economy that

1212
01:21:24,479 --> 01:21:29,280
Speaker 1: we've been trying to kind of have oversight minimally to

1213
01:21:29,400 --> 01:21:31,720
Speaker 1: the digital media economy, and to the extent that we

1214
01:21:31,800 --> 01:21:35,040
Speaker 1: have any oversight or assumed in the oversight of it,

1215
01:21:35,040 --> 01:21:38,160
Speaker 1: it's been according to the rules of the old days

1216
01:21:38,200 --> 01:21:43,160
Speaker 1: of publishing and broadcasting, and it's a mismatch. And so

1217
01:21:43,600 --> 01:21:48,160
Speaker 1: one of the greatest areas of opportunity for students of

1218
01:21:48,200 --> 01:21:52,679
Speaker 1: mine and young people the world over is to carve

1219
01:21:52,720 --> 01:21:59,200
Speaker 1: out meaningful policy making careers at that intersection where content

1220
01:21:59,280 --> 01:22:02,040
Speaker 1: people talk to technologists. Can you talk to me about

1221
01:22:02,040 --> 01:22:04,839
Speaker 1: what you mean by that a meaningful policy making career?

1222
01:22:05,240 --> 01:22:08,640
Speaker 1: Are what are suggestions for that? I mean in Washington,

1223
01:22:08,720 --> 01:22:12,000
Speaker 1: d C. We have an absence of young people who

1224
01:22:12,080 --> 01:22:16,200
Speaker 1: understand technology the people. And this is not agism, but

1225
01:22:16,320 --> 01:22:19,080
Speaker 1: this is just quite simply people of a certain generation

1226
01:22:19,439 --> 01:22:24,280
Speaker 1: don't appreciate how different the landscape is now, so they

1227
01:22:24,360 --> 01:22:27,679
Speaker 1: don't even know how to ask the right questions, look

1228
01:22:27,680 --> 01:22:31,240
Speaker 1: in the right places, think in certain ways, and consider

1229
01:22:31,280 --> 01:22:35,360
Speaker 1: the implications. So there's a right opportunity for a whole

1230
01:22:35,360 --> 01:22:44,080
Speaker 1: new generation of young professionals not to continue going exclusively

1231
01:22:44,160 --> 01:22:48,120
Speaker 1: to work for the platform companies themselves. For their for

1232
01:22:48,160 --> 01:22:51,960
Speaker 1: their various divisions, including their government relations arms, but to

1233
01:22:52,080 --> 01:22:57,519
Speaker 1: work in government to make policy over these areas, and

1234
01:22:57,600 --> 01:23:03,479
Speaker 1: to have enough facility in speaking engineering speak that when

1235
01:23:03,479 --> 01:23:06,880
Speaker 1: people from platform companies come and talk about the way

1236
01:23:06,920 --> 01:23:10,840
Speaker 1: they're out their algorithms work, and the way their philosophies

1237
01:23:10,880 --> 01:23:13,719
Speaker 1: of what their platform is all about come to speak,

1238
01:23:14,000 --> 01:23:18,080
Speaker 1: that you're articulate and fluent in how to speak back

1239
01:23:18,080 --> 01:23:20,720
Speaker 1: to them in a language that they understand, but in

1240
01:23:20,720 --> 01:23:24,040
Speaker 1: a language that other people the mainstream understands as well.

1241
01:23:24,320 --> 01:23:27,719
Speaker 1: And I think for our school, the Annenberg School, were

1242
01:23:27,840 --> 01:23:31,960
Speaker 1: very uniquely student to prepare students for that. But overall,

1243
01:23:32,400 --> 01:23:36,280
Speaker 1: I think that we need to recognize how powerful these

1244
01:23:36,320 --> 01:23:41,000
Speaker 1: platforms are in creating the dynamics where we make meaning

1245
01:23:41,080 --> 01:23:47,040
Speaker 1: of our lives. And number two, that these companies depend

1246
01:23:47,160 --> 01:23:52,040
Speaker 1: on aggregating large audiences for advertising, and that they could

1247
01:23:52,080 --> 01:23:56,639
Speaker 1: care less what aggregates those audiences. And we know that

1248
01:23:56,720 --> 01:24:01,960
Speaker 1: things that are charged get people as attention, and they

1249
01:24:01,960 --> 01:24:04,280
Speaker 1: can stack ads against that, and that's the business model.

1250
01:24:04,600 --> 01:24:08,800
Speaker 1: To shift the business model at Facebook to embrace that

1251
01:24:08,840 --> 01:24:13,320
Speaker 1: we are a media company that informs the way people

1252
01:24:13,400 --> 01:24:16,679
Speaker 1: understand the way the world works, requires them to build

1253
01:24:16,680 --> 01:24:22,960
Speaker 1: out a completely different costly infrastructure, and that reallocation of

1254
01:24:23,040 --> 01:24:26,800
Speaker 1: dollars they're not interested in. So the same kind of

1255
01:24:26,840 --> 01:24:32,719
Speaker 1: obstacles against the reallocation of resources in oil and gas

1256
01:24:32,760 --> 01:24:37,600
Speaker 1: extraction and building out a new infrastructure for a green economy,

1257
01:24:37,840 --> 01:24:41,800
Speaker 1: Recognizing and acknowledging that this change has to happen is

1258
01:24:41,840 --> 01:24:45,080
Speaker 1: the same reason why Facebook is not shifting gears because

1259
01:24:45,080 --> 01:24:48,640
Speaker 1: they don't want to change. They don't want to reallocate resources.

1260
01:24:48,680 --> 01:24:51,080
Speaker 1: It's too expensive. It makes me crazy, though, because the

1261
01:24:51,120 --> 01:24:55,439
Speaker 1: resources exist, both for us in transferring from fossil fuels

1262
01:24:55,439 --> 01:24:58,360
Speaker 1: to a green economy and for Facebook. You know when

1263
01:24:58,439 --> 01:25:02,040
Speaker 1: when the heads of the company have billion dollar salaries,

1264
01:25:02,439 --> 01:25:06,480
Speaker 1: the resources exist. And I guess where I get confounded

1265
01:25:06,560 --> 01:25:10,360
Speaker 1: is that I feel that we, as the American public,

1266
01:25:10,439 --> 01:25:13,840
Speaker 1: deserve better. We deserve those resources to be allocated for

1267
01:25:13,880 --> 01:25:16,240
Speaker 1: the betterment of all of us. I agree, and I

1268
01:25:16,280 --> 01:25:20,360
Speaker 1: think in both areas and in many other areas, this

1269
01:25:20,439 --> 01:25:24,080
Speaker 1: is a moment where the courage of our convictions is required,

1270
01:25:24,720 --> 01:25:29,280
Speaker 1: and specifically in this digital media economy, we must hold

1271
01:25:29,320 --> 01:25:34,360
Speaker 1: our polity. Are elected officials accountable to hold Mark Zuckerberg

1272
01:25:34,360 --> 01:25:37,639
Speaker 1: and Facebook accountable? They can't be left off the hook

1273
01:25:38,080 --> 01:25:41,800
Speaker 1: for political expediency's sake, right, And to your point, we

1274
01:25:41,880 --> 01:25:45,200
Speaker 1: do need young people to know that there will be

1275
01:25:45,240 --> 01:25:47,719
Speaker 1: this job market and that they can create this job

1276
01:25:47,760 --> 01:25:52,240
Speaker 1: market for this sort of new tech policy division department

1277
01:25:52,520 --> 01:25:56,240
Speaker 1: sphere in government. And I'm hoping that anyone who's in

1278
01:25:56,280 --> 01:25:58,559
Speaker 1: college is listening to this, wants to go there, Please

1279
01:25:58,600 --> 01:26:03,400
Speaker 1: go there. And that makes me feel hopeful because I

1280
01:26:03,439 --> 01:26:06,000
Speaker 1: do believe that with with us, the demand is high

1281
01:26:06,080 --> 01:26:13,200
Speaker 1: for societal betterment. And if we do higher education differently,

1282
01:26:14,080 --> 01:26:19,640
Speaker 1: we can also train engineers to have a more humanistic outlook.

1283
01:26:20,120 --> 01:26:25,000
Speaker 1: It's both educating humanists to understand the language of technology

1284
01:26:25,360 --> 01:26:28,920
Speaker 1: and the and the way technology works um and the

1285
01:26:28,960 --> 01:26:32,360
Speaker 1: way business models are layered on those technologies better, but

1286
01:26:32,479 --> 01:26:37,160
Speaker 1: also that the engineers are working with humanists at the

1287
01:26:37,200 --> 01:26:40,360
Speaker 1: earliest stages of how they learn how to build the

1288
01:26:40,479 --> 01:26:44,679
Speaker 1: things they build and take humans into account and take

1289
01:26:44,800 --> 01:26:49,599
Speaker 1: the social spillovers of what they build into account as

1290
01:26:49,760 --> 01:26:52,720
Speaker 1: early as they can. You can never always be in

1291
01:26:52,800 --> 01:26:56,120
Speaker 1: advance of unintended consequences. And Facebook was made in that

1292
01:26:56,200 --> 01:26:58,880
Speaker 1: with the noblest of intentions, and it's changed the world

1293
01:26:58,880 --> 01:27:01,719
Speaker 1: in so many wonderful ways. But it was never made

1294
01:27:01,760 --> 01:27:06,280
Speaker 1: with any humanistic outlook in mind, and that's got to

1295
01:27:06,439 --> 01:27:11,720
Speaker 1: change going forward our motivations thereafter. Absolutely part of that

1296
01:27:11,840 --> 01:27:15,760
Speaker 1: change is In August, the Business Roundtable, collection of the

1297
01:27:15,840 --> 01:27:19,000
Speaker 1: CEOs of the most powerful companies in America, said that

1298
01:27:19,080 --> 01:27:24,160
Speaker 1: instead of thinking purely about shareholder value being the watchword

1299
01:27:24,640 --> 01:27:28,360
Speaker 1: and the metric for judging business success, companies need to

1300
01:27:28,400 --> 01:27:32,080
Speaker 1: be judged and operate according to stakeholder value. So from

1301
01:27:32,160 --> 01:27:37,960
Speaker 1: climate change to platforms, it's about with that change and outlook.

1302
01:27:38,720 --> 01:27:44,840
Speaker 1: Companies are incentivized to reward their top decision makers to

1303
01:27:45,120 --> 01:27:50,439
Speaker 1: think about those humanistic impacts as part of their incentive

1304
01:27:50,439 --> 01:27:53,400
Speaker 1: structure within the company. And so I think we're seeing

1305
01:27:54,120 --> 01:27:56,360
Speaker 1: the and a lot of people are cynical about that

1306
01:27:56,439 --> 01:28:00,360
Speaker 1: Business Roundtable proclamation, but I do think that as it

1307
01:28:00,439 --> 01:28:07,200
Speaker 1: becomes specified and how those stakeholder interests are actually accounted for,

1308
01:28:08,280 --> 01:28:10,880
Speaker 1: we'll will definitely move the needle. And I think we're

1309
01:28:10,880 --> 01:28:13,920
Speaker 1: just at the early days of figuring out how to

1310
01:28:14,000 --> 01:28:17,960
Speaker 1: actually measure what we want to see happen in the

1311
01:28:18,040 --> 01:28:22,120
Speaker 1: platform space. I love that, and we do. We have

1312
01:28:22,280 --> 01:28:26,240
Speaker 1: to consider our impact outside of ourselves. It can't just

1313
01:28:26,360 --> 01:28:31,880
Speaker 1: be any longer a return on investment profit margin. That's

1314
01:28:31,920 --> 01:28:34,960
Speaker 1: your report card. Um that that that can't be anymore

1315
01:28:34,960 --> 01:28:37,559
Speaker 1: because if that is, you're going to continue to invest

1316
01:28:37,600 --> 01:28:41,120
Speaker 1: in the fossil fuel economy because that is what's returning

1317
01:28:41,600 --> 01:28:45,840
Speaker 1: on established investment. You're going to continue investing in Facebook's

1318
01:28:45,920 --> 01:28:50,920
Speaker 1: established business model, Google's established business model because their money,

1319
01:28:51,120 --> 01:28:55,880
Speaker 1: their cash engines. So once you move away from rewarding

1320
01:28:56,520 --> 01:29:00,920
Speaker 1: businesses purely for returning profit, you can you can get somewhere,

1321
01:29:00,920 --> 01:29:03,920
Speaker 1: but it's it's going to be hard, all right. We

1322
01:29:03,960 --> 01:29:06,759
Speaker 1: need a whole new class of leadership in Washington. Clearly

1323
01:29:15,080 --> 01:29:16,880
Speaker 1: something I do want to bring up just because it's

1324
01:29:16,880 --> 01:29:20,639
Speaker 1: something I find inspirational about you as a former student,

1325
01:29:20,680 --> 01:29:23,400
Speaker 1: and obviously as a person who loves Hannenburg and USC

1326
01:29:24,160 --> 01:29:26,360
Speaker 1: when we talk about as we have been in this

1327
01:29:26,439 --> 01:29:29,920
Speaker 1: very macro way, about how we think about how we're

1328
01:29:29,920 --> 01:29:33,679
Speaker 1: affecting those outside of ourselves and our immediate sphere, you,

1329
01:29:33,880 --> 01:29:36,919
Speaker 1: as you know, my former professor and still a current professor,

1330
01:29:37,920 --> 01:29:41,640
Speaker 1: have always been in my memory and in all of

1331
01:29:41,680 --> 01:29:46,599
Speaker 1: my continuing experience with you such a supportive human being.

1332
01:29:47,479 --> 01:29:51,160
Speaker 1: And for me as a young girl, you were you

1333
01:29:51,200 --> 01:29:52,880
Speaker 1: were the first person who ever told me I should

1334
01:29:52,880 --> 01:29:56,719
Speaker 1: have my writing published. I'll never forget it. You said,

1335
01:29:56,760 --> 01:29:59,559
Speaker 1: maybe not while you're in college, but when you're ready,

1336
01:30:00,439 --> 01:30:05,680
Speaker 1: you come talk to me. And you've always in this

1337
01:30:05,760 --> 01:30:08,160
Speaker 1: sort of modern lexicon that we have now that we

1338
01:30:08,240 --> 01:30:10,920
Speaker 1: didn't have then, you've always been such an incredible ally

1339
01:30:11,680 --> 01:30:14,200
Speaker 1: and as a as a man in a position of leadership.

1340
01:30:14,560 --> 01:30:19,679
Speaker 1: You founded the Women's Leadership Society at Annamburg and it's

1341
01:30:19,720 --> 01:30:24,000
Speaker 1: the first professional developmental organization of its kind under the

1342
01:30:24,040 --> 01:30:29,599
Speaker 1: Annaburg umbrella. And I guess, first I want to say

1343
01:30:29,640 --> 01:30:33,280
Speaker 1: thank you, and and second, I'm curious when we think

1344
01:30:33,280 --> 01:30:36,599
Speaker 1: about widening our sphere of impact, what what motivated you

1345
01:30:36,640 --> 01:30:41,599
Speaker 1: to do that for the women at Annaburg. I just

1346
01:30:42,560 --> 01:30:46,800
Speaker 1: I saw in Annenburg that all of these brilliant young

1347
01:30:46,800 --> 01:30:52,040
Speaker 1: women didn't have a space to have difficult conversations about

1348
01:30:52,560 --> 01:30:55,920
Speaker 1: how they viewed the world, and that a lot of

1349
01:30:55,960 --> 01:31:01,000
Speaker 1: times outlooks are just assumed that they're just gonna happen.

1350
01:31:01,320 --> 01:31:05,280
Speaker 1: But people need spaces to talk. They need spaces. And

1351
01:31:05,479 --> 01:31:08,800
Speaker 1: going back to Virginia Wolf, this idea of women need

1352
01:31:08,880 --> 01:31:12,760
Speaker 1: a room of one's own, women need a space two.

1353
01:31:13,160 --> 01:31:16,040
Speaker 1: And Virginia Wolf's point was that a room of one's

1354
01:31:16,080 --> 01:31:20,280
Speaker 1: own required women to be financially independent. That as long

1355
01:31:20,360 --> 01:31:24,360
Speaker 1: as Victorian age women required the man of the house

1356
01:31:24,920 --> 01:31:28,800
Speaker 1: to finance their every aspiration, they were disempowered. And so

1357
01:31:28,880 --> 01:31:31,840
Speaker 1: a room of one's own was a metaphor of saying that,

1358
01:31:31,920 --> 01:31:36,920
Speaker 1: in various ways, women need spaces and vehicles of empowerment

1359
01:31:37,040 --> 01:31:41,800
Speaker 1: that are exclusive to them. So, like I said, I

1360
01:31:41,840 --> 01:31:45,760
Speaker 1: approach my work from a standpoint of love and substance,

1361
01:31:46,200 --> 01:31:50,320
Speaker 1: and I just continually saw that so many of the

1362
01:31:50,400 --> 01:31:56,280
Speaker 1: most substantive people, the woman sitting across from me, we're women,

1363
01:31:57,280 --> 01:31:59,400
Speaker 1: and it will it might surprise you, it might not.

1364
01:31:59,720 --> 01:32:02,639
Speaker 1: But every time I would bring in a C suite

1365
01:32:02,800 --> 01:32:10,400
Speaker 1: level game changing person of a certain age that was male, CEO, CFO, CMO,

1366
01:32:11,520 --> 01:32:14,080
Speaker 1: and they would walk into my classes. And one particular

1367
01:32:14,160 --> 01:32:17,559
Speaker 1: year in particular, when just by happenstance, one of my

1368
01:32:17,600 --> 01:32:22,639
Speaker 1: classes was all women women, and every C suite level

1369
01:32:22,680 --> 01:32:25,040
Speaker 1: person had walked in to speak with us that semester

1370
01:32:26,320 --> 01:32:29,280
Speaker 1: literally did a double take when they saw it was

1371
01:32:29,320 --> 01:32:33,840
Speaker 1: all women. And what that alerted me to is that

1372
01:32:34,560 --> 01:32:38,799
Speaker 1: men don't think they're passing the baton of leadership to women.

1373
01:32:40,520 --> 01:32:44,679
Speaker 1: If you're surprised when you're coming to impart your wisdom

1374
01:32:44,760 --> 01:32:49,200
Speaker 1: of your experience to young people, and you express shock

1375
01:32:49,840 --> 01:32:54,760
Speaker 1: that the people you're speaking to our women, that's meaningful.

1376
01:32:54,840 --> 01:32:58,439
Speaker 1: That means that your assumption is I'm not transmitting this

1377
01:32:58,720 --> 01:33:02,679
Speaker 1: vital in for nation to a constituency of women. I'm

1378
01:33:02,720 --> 01:33:05,400
Speaker 1: not thinking of them in that way. And it that

1379
01:33:05,560 --> 01:33:07,240
Speaker 1: was number one. And then it occurred to me as

1380
01:33:07,280 --> 01:33:10,360
Speaker 1: well that when I asked my students at that time

1381
01:33:10,960 --> 01:33:13,800
Speaker 1: their interest in being leaders and this was right around

1382
01:33:13,840 --> 01:33:16,320
Speaker 1: the time that Chryl Sandberg was publishing Lean In, but

1383
01:33:16,400 --> 01:33:18,839
Speaker 1: it hadn't happened yet, but it was in that space

1384
01:33:20,000 --> 01:33:23,040
Speaker 1: most of my brilliant young women when they raise their hands,

1385
01:33:23,920 --> 01:33:25,840
Speaker 1: very few of them raise their hands when asked, do

1386
01:33:25,880 --> 01:33:29,760
Speaker 1: you see yourself being a catalyst for change in a

1387
01:33:29,840 --> 01:33:34,240
Speaker 1: leadership role? And I was like, why not? And as

1388
01:33:34,720 --> 01:33:38,439
Speaker 1: we talked about why not, I realized because we couldn't

1389
01:33:38,439 --> 01:33:43,280
Speaker 1: continue the conversation like we should and could in that

1390
01:33:43,400 --> 01:33:47,680
Speaker 1: classroom setting. I said, we need an auxiliary space for

1391
01:33:47,760 --> 01:33:52,400
Speaker 1: women to develop belief in their capacity and belief in

1392
01:33:52,439 --> 01:33:57,160
Speaker 1: one another, and an outlook that says leadership is okay.

1393
01:33:58,240 --> 01:34:02,479
Speaker 1: And if we need to bring in in primarily women,

1394
01:34:03,080 --> 01:34:06,840
Speaker 1: game changers to help inspire them, then so be it.

1395
01:34:07,439 --> 01:34:11,040
Speaker 1: But obviously men aren't precluded from coming. But the idea

1396
01:34:11,120 --> 01:34:14,479
Speaker 1: is have a space at Antinburg for women to connect,

1397
01:34:15,080 --> 01:34:18,880
Speaker 1: have a space where they can be inspired, and have

1398
01:34:19,000 --> 01:34:22,040
Speaker 1: a space where they can be informed about the issues

1399
01:34:22,080 --> 01:34:25,080
Speaker 1: that matter to them, either pre professional or just in

1400
01:34:25,120 --> 01:34:30,519
Speaker 1: their lives. And so I love my students, and I

1401
01:34:30,560 --> 01:34:36,400
Speaker 1: love all my students equally, and I realized up constituency

1402
01:34:36,439 --> 01:34:39,519
Speaker 1: among the students I love. My female students had a

1403
01:34:39,560 --> 01:34:43,360
Speaker 1: particular need, as I saw it, for a room of

1404
01:34:43,400 --> 01:34:47,719
Speaker 1: their own and a space to grow their outlooks because

1405
01:34:47,760 --> 01:34:51,760
Speaker 1: we have to unlearn society's messaging that we don't get

1406
01:34:51,760 --> 01:34:56,839
Speaker 1: the baton, and that requires extra effort. It happened each

1407
01:34:56,880 --> 01:35:01,759
Speaker 1: and every time UH senior leader came from any given

1408
01:35:01,880 --> 01:35:05,960
Speaker 1: company um that they were surprised, and I was always

1409
01:35:06,040 --> 01:35:08,120
Speaker 1: kind of like, why are they surprised or why does

1410
01:35:08,160 --> 01:35:12,160
Speaker 1: it even why does it even register? Like humans are humans,

1411
01:35:12,240 --> 01:35:17,439
Speaker 1: like males, mixed groups, you know, females, whomever. If a

1412
01:35:17,520 --> 01:35:21,439
Speaker 1: human being is there, you vibe with them and engage.

1413
01:35:21,720 --> 01:35:25,599
Speaker 1: But something about the gender dynamic of seeing all women

1414
01:35:25,960 --> 01:35:29,920
Speaker 1: just caused these men to be back on their heels,

1415
01:35:30,640 --> 01:35:33,280
Speaker 1: and and and and if I picked up on that,

1416
01:35:33,360 --> 01:35:35,600
Speaker 1: I know that my students picked up on that, and

1417
01:35:35,640 --> 01:35:38,760
Speaker 1: that sends a subtle and not so subtle message about

1418
01:35:38,880 --> 01:35:43,479
Speaker 1: your legitimacy as the next in line. Um and so

1419
01:35:43,680 --> 01:35:47,600
Speaker 1: we I just felt like I needed to bring resources

1420
01:35:47,600 --> 01:35:51,519
Speaker 1: to bear to kind of advance our Annenberg women as

1421
01:35:51,560 --> 01:35:56,280
Speaker 1: best I could. That's so cool, thank you. Yeah. And

1422
01:35:56,640 --> 01:35:59,240
Speaker 1: so I mean I think that you know, they call

1423
01:35:59,320 --> 01:36:02,439
Speaker 1: it being an ally. Now, I don't think to be

1424
01:36:02,520 --> 01:36:05,120
Speaker 1: an ally you need to have a particular interest in

1425
01:36:05,200 --> 01:36:08,240
Speaker 1: any area. You just have to have an interest in

1426
01:36:08,320 --> 01:36:13,479
Speaker 1: helping those that need help. Um. Yeah, But for someone

1427
01:36:13,520 --> 01:36:15,840
Speaker 1: who actually gets in and does the work to create

1428
01:36:15,840 --> 01:36:18,479
Speaker 1: a systemic change, you aren't actually just an ally. A

1429
01:36:18,960 --> 01:36:21,479
Speaker 1: term that I was taught by my friend Lovey, who

1430
01:36:21,479 --> 01:36:24,280
Speaker 1: talks about how women who look like me need to

1431
01:36:24,320 --> 01:36:26,680
Speaker 1: show up for women of color like her. She's like,

1432
01:36:26,760 --> 01:36:28,320
Speaker 1: I'm done with the allies. I want you to be

1433
01:36:28,360 --> 01:36:31,200
Speaker 1: my accomplice. Like, if I'm gonna get arrested, I want

1434
01:36:31,240 --> 01:36:33,280
Speaker 1: you to get arrested to And there's a real thing.

1435
01:36:33,640 --> 01:36:36,200
Speaker 1: So I want to pass the baton from women to

1436
01:36:36,320 --> 01:36:38,080
Speaker 1: you as a as a man, to say, like you're

1437
01:36:38,160 --> 01:36:42,920
Speaker 1: you're fully an accomplished territory and thing. I mean, another

1438
01:36:42,960 --> 01:36:46,479
Speaker 1: word they use is a champion that you know, can

1439
01:36:46,560 --> 01:36:51,000
Speaker 1: you champion the ambitions of others? And I think that

1440
01:36:51,000 --> 01:36:54,360
Speaker 1: that's I mean the whole Professor, it has been about

1441
01:36:54,960 --> 01:36:59,479
Speaker 1: champion the next generation. At the doctoral level, you literally

1442
01:36:59,600 --> 01:37:02,760
Speaker 1: champion in the next generation of professors. You've always been

1443
01:37:02,760 --> 01:37:06,240
Speaker 1: such a champion of us, and I've been championed my

1444
01:37:06,280 --> 01:37:09,200
Speaker 1: whole life, and so I feel like it's just it's

1445
01:37:09,240 --> 01:37:14,360
Speaker 1: just giving back and circulating the blessing. Yeah, I actually

1446
01:37:14,400 --> 01:37:16,799
Speaker 1: forgot about this, but you'll you'll love this. So, speaking

1447
01:37:16,800 --> 01:37:19,240
Speaker 1: of your former students, me and Ali mcguil, who used

1448
01:37:19,280 --> 01:37:21,760
Speaker 1: to be my roommate who took your class together, we

1449
01:37:21,800 --> 01:37:24,600
Speaker 1: were both at can Line this year, you know, big

1450
01:37:24,640 --> 01:37:27,719
Speaker 1: advertising and media summit in France. It's a whole situation

1451
01:37:27,800 --> 01:37:30,000
Speaker 1: and she's there with her company and I'm there to

1452
01:37:30,040 --> 01:37:32,759
Speaker 1: speak and we're just like, isn't this crazy? Like remember

1453
01:37:32,760 --> 01:37:34,200
Speaker 1: when we were in college and we lived in a

1454
01:37:34,320 --> 01:37:36,720
Speaker 1: room that was you know, three d square feet and

1455
01:37:37,160 --> 01:37:39,760
Speaker 1: maybe not even maybe half that. We were laughing about

1456
01:37:39,800 --> 01:37:41,839
Speaker 1: it and she said, do you know what I remember

1457
01:37:41,840 --> 01:37:44,240
Speaker 1: from college? She goes, remember, Professor Smith, and I was like,

1458
01:37:44,280 --> 01:37:47,920
Speaker 1: he's coming on my podcast and uh and she said, yeah,

1459
01:37:47,920 --> 01:37:51,040
Speaker 1: do you remember when there was a day when he

1460
01:37:51,320 --> 01:37:53,960
Speaker 1: said you know? And it was probably after some big

1461
01:37:54,000 --> 01:37:56,479
Speaker 1: like you know, usc weekend we all had papers do

1462
01:37:56,560 --> 01:37:59,360
Speaker 1: and she goes, he told everybody that everybody turned into

1463
01:37:59,400 --> 01:38:02,320
Speaker 1: half as paper, he said, except for one. She was like,

1464
01:38:02,400 --> 01:38:04,040
Speaker 1: do you remember this? And I was like no. And

1465
01:38:04,120 --> 01:38:06,680
Speaker 1: she said, he read a paper to the class and

1466
01:38:06,960 --> 01:38:10,439
Speaker 1: afterwards put it down on your desk. And I was

1467
01:38:10,640 --> 01:38:13,960
Speaker 1: dying loving and all my now coworkers looked at me

1468
01:38:13,960 --> 01:38:15,760
Speaker 1: and said, why is that not surprising? And I was like,

1469
01:38:15,800 --> 01:38:18,240
Speaker 1: I'm so mortified, and also that's really true, and I

1470
01:38:18,280 --> 01:38:20,639
Speaker 1: was like, I wrote really good papers in that class.

1471
01:38:22,040 --> 01:38:24,360
Speaker 1: But yeah, she said, he read your paper to the class.

1472
01:38:24,360 --> 01:38:26,800
Speaker 1: And I was your roommate, and I was like, she

1473
01:38:26,840 --> 01:38:28,720
Speaker 1: can write a paper like that in a day. And

1474
01:38:29,160 --> 01:38:31,720
Speaker 1: I said to her, what occurred to me now is

1475
01:38:31,760 --> 01:38:36,840
Speaker 1: that not on any subject, but I was so invested

1476
01:38:36,880 --> 01:38:39,920
Speaker 1: in your class because of the creative ways that you

1477
01:38:40,000 --> 01:38:43,439
Speaker 1: taught and thought and teach now and think, and the

1478
01:38:43,479 --> 01:38:46,320
Speaker 1: way that the ways that you invested in and championed us,

1479
01:38:46,760 --> 01:38:49,120
Speaker 1: that I would I would sit down to write a

1480
01:38:49,120 --> 01:38:52,360
Speaker 1: paper for class, and I'd wind up writing for eight hours.

1481
01:38:52,439 --> 01:38:54,759
Speaker 1: I would just do it all day. I was so

1482
01:38:55,400 --> 01:38:59,000
Speaker 1: into what we were doing that I didn't want to

1483
01:38:59,040 --> 01:39:02,360
Speaker 1: get up from my work. And I think it's very

1484
01:39:02,479 --> 01:39:07,360
Speaker 1: rare when teachers and professors can make your work feel

1485
01:39:07,400 --> 01:39:10,920
Speaker 1: like play. Yeah, I think that in all of our

1486
01:39:10,960 --> 01:39:15,000
Speaker 1: lives and all that we do, whatever we do, if

1487
01:39:15,080 --> 01:39:19,760
Speaker 1: we can find that element of coaching others, it's powerful.

1488
01:39:20,600 --> 01:39:24,360
Speaker 1: That dynamic of of of of being a coach and

1489
01:39:24,439 --> 01:39:28,840
Speaker 1: being a champion and making people see the power of

1490
01:39:28,880 --> 01:39:32,280
Speaker 1: their own way of viewing things is just a real

1491
01:39:33,080 --> 01:39:36,479
Speaker 1: It just makes me very fulfilled. When you talk about

1492
01:39:37,479 --> 01:39:40,080
Speaker 1: being championed and you talk about learning to coach, I'm

1493
01:39:40,120 --> 01:39:44,960
Speaker 1: curious if that comes from perhaps some best advice you

1494
01:39:45,000 --> 01:39:48,559
Speaker 1: were ever given. And then I wonder what advice you

1495
01:39:48,600 --> 01:39:54,960
Speaker 1: would give to students now who want to study journalism. Well,

1496
01:39:55,000 --> 01:39:58,439
Speaker 1: I would say interestingly enough. I mean, I'm I mean,

1497
01:39:58,600 --> 01:40:01,960
Speaker 1: I've gotten so much good it advice over the years.

1498
01:40:02,479 --> 01:40:07,240
Speaker 1: But I'll go back to USC and say that a

1499
01:40:07,439 --> 01:40:11,400
Speaker 1: kind of way of thinking that got deeply in my bones,

1500
01:40:12,040 --> 01:40:14,400
Speaker 1: and that was a part of the USC climate when

1501
01:40:14,400 --> 01:40:18,720
Speaker 1: I got there. Was when Pete Carroll was coach legendary

1502
01:40:18,800 --> 01:40:23,280
Speaker 1: Pete Carroll, and you know, you were just at the

1503
01:40:23,360 --> 01:40:26,439
Speaker 1: beginning of what was going to become the Pete Carroll

1504
01:40:26,640 --> 01:40:31,960
Speaker 1: era of just USC just dominance in football and just

1505
01:40:32,680 --> 01:40:35,040
Speaker 1: you know what that brings to USC's campus when the

1506
01:40:35,040 --> 01:40:38,080
Speaker 1: football team is clicking on all cylinders is next level.

1507
01:40:38,640 --> 01:40:42,160
Speaker 1: But Pete Carroll this book, he wrote in this phrase

1508
01:40:42,200 --> 01:40:47,479
Speaker 1: he had win Forever. That to me that because Pete

1509
01:40:47,520 --> 01:40:52,560
Speaker 1: Carroll like epitomize that kind of win forever optimism that

1510
01:40:52,600 --> 01:40:54,760
Speaker 1: if you that if you have the right if you

1511
01:40:54,920 --> 01:41:01,200
Speaker 1: find the right frequency of vibration of positivity, it'll just

1512
01:41:01,280 --> 01:41:07,320
Speaker 1: keep going. And until the scandal at USC hit that

1513
01:41:07,400 --> 01:41:10,840
Speaker 1: caused Pete Carroll to move on, we pretty much looked

1514
01:41:10,920 --> 01:41:14,240
Speaker 1: like we were in win forever mode. And Pete Carroll's

1515
01:41:14,280 --> 01:41:17,720
Speaker 1: gone on and taking his philosophy to the Seattle Seahawks

1516
01:41:17,800 --> 01:41:21,080
Speaker 1: and continued his winning ways. And what that dialed me

1517
01:41:21,120 --> 01:41:25,439
Speaker 1: into is that you can you won't always win, but

1518
01:41:25,560 --> 01:41:30,479
Speaker 1: you will always be going in a positive direction if

1519
01:41:30,520 --> 01:41:34,360
Speaker 1: you have a certain attitude. And so that win forever

1520
01:41:35,000 --> 01:41:38,680
Speaker 1: ethos like really stuck with me, you know, as as

1521
01:41:38,720 --> 01:41:41,000
Speaker 1: to like, you know, if you can like kind of

1522
01:41:41,400 --> 01:41:45,120
Speaker 1: generate a kind of way of treating yourself, in a

1523
01:41:45,160 --> 01:41:49,200
Speaker 1: way of treating others, in a way of forming teams

1524
01:41:49,280 --> 01:41:53,920
Speaker 1: when teams are necessary. You can enter any battle with

1525
01:41:54,000 --> 01:41:57,360
Speaker 1: what we at USC called that fight on mentality and

1526
01:41:57,439 --> 01:42:00,800
Speaker 1: that stay in the fight mentality and it's and it's real.

1527
01:42:00,920 --> 01:42:03,479
Speaker 1: So you know, I think it's not so much advice,

1528
01:42:03,960 --> 01:42:10,559
Speaker 1: but I try to inner situations with that spirit of

1529
01:42:10,840 --> 01:42:14,360
Speaker 1: you know, of just positivity. And for me, Pete Carroll

1530
01:42:14,520 --> 01:42:19,880
Speaker 1: really kind of like like steep me in that that's

1531
01:42:19,920 --> 01:42:22,200
Speaker 1: so cool. I like it as a mantra. I like

1532
01:42:22,280 --> 01:42:24,639
Speaker 1: it as a as a choice of how to live

1533
01:42:25,280 --> 01:42:27,920
Speaker 1: because it almost harkens to me that idea that if

1534
01:42:27,960 --> 01:42:32,160
Speaker 1: you make decisions, even when we're talking about policy, shortsighted

1535
01:42:32,200 --> 01:42:35,760
Speaker 1: policy decisions become scary for the future of humanity. If

1536
01:42:35,800 --> 01:42:38,000
Speaker 1: we're thinking about how do we do things that mean

1537
01:42:38,080 --> 01:42:41,799
Speaker 1: we as a collective win forever. We make better choices,

1538
01:42:41,880 --> 01:42:46,439
Speaker 1: we shoot for longevity absolutely and sustaining. And I guess

1539
01:42:46,479 --> 01:42:50,679
Speaker 1: to really spell out the kind of basis of Pete's phrase,

1540
01:42:51,439 --> 01:42:58,559
Speaker 1: it's love, it's trust, it's honesty, it's consistency, and its

1541
01:42:58,560 --> 01:43:01,519
Speaker 1: willingness to compete. That when you put those five things

1542
01:43:01,560 --> 01:43:05,160
Speaker 1: together in a team setting and in the setting of yourself,

1543
01:43:05,640 --> 01:43:12,720
Speaker 1: a willingness to compete. Honesty, truth, accountability, love, You've got

1544
01:43:12,800 --> 01:43:15,960
Speaker 1: the recipe for magic, and that magic can be sustained.

1545
01:43:16,560 --> 01:43:21,000
Speaker 1: And it's a framework that as the players change, and

1546
01:43:21,080 --> 01:43:24,439
Speaker 1: as our individual lives evolve and change, and we become

1547
01:43:25,200 --> 01:43:29,240
Speaker 1: different types of people because our capacities changes, we age

1548
01:43:29,320 --> 01:43:34,960
Speaker 1: or whatever. When you keep that basic framework love, accountability, honesty, trust,

1549
01:43:35,960 --> 01:43:39,040
Speaker 1: you're kind of good no matter what, and and and

1550
01:43:39,080 --> 01:43:43,440
Speaker 1: it's like organizations that build that in are winning organizations.

1551
01:43:44,080 --> 01:43:48,559
Speaker 1: People who build that framework into their lives are winning people.

1552
01:43:49,160 --> 01:43:51,439
Speaker 1: And right now, going back to some of the macro

1553
01:43:51,920 --> 01:43:55,840
Speaker 1: conversation we were having before, our country is struggling to

1554
01:43:56,120 --> 01:44:06,480
Speaker 1: rEFInd that framework as the base is for our national dynamics. Accountability, love, honesty,

1555
01:44:07,400 --> 01:44:13,600
Speaker 1: you know all those things, nuance, nuance. So for young students,

1556
01:44:14,000 --> 01:44:16,320
Speaker 1: how do you offer a version of that advice to them? What?

1557
01:44:16,320 --> 01:44:18,000
Speaker 1: What do you think people who want to go into

1558
01:44:18,040 --> 01:44:23,960
Speaker 1: journalism should keep in mind. I've really believed that people

1559
01:44:24,000 --> 01:44:28,320
Speaker 1: going into media and journalism today can't be risk averse.

1560
01:44:28,880 --> 01:44:32,960
Speaker 1: They have to be willing to take risks, and that's

1561
01:44:32,960 --> 01:44:35,360
Speaker 1: hard for a lot of young people. Because they might

1562
01:44:35,360 --> 01:44:39,400
Speaker 1: be burdened with dead and taking risk is scary in

1563
01:44:39,439 --> 01:44:43,800
Speaker 1: the extreme for them. But if you take risks, you

1564
01:44:43,840 --> 01:44:47,360
Speaker 1: can make change. Um, if this is not a time

1565
01:44:47,920 --> 01:44:51,040
Speaker 1: to play business as usual, we need to shake things

1566
01:44:51,040 --> 01:44:54,840
Speaker 1: out and we need to do things differently, but still

1567
01:44:54,880 --> 01:44:59,519
Speaker 1: have that core framework of a fundamental ways of treating

1568
01:44:59,560 --> 01:45:03,680
Speaker 1: yourself and treating others and including people and bringing people in.

1569
01:45:03,960 --> 01:45:08,280
Speaker 1: But going into journalism and media, now you have to

1570
01:45:08,320 --> 01:45:13,160
Speaker 1: be willing to do things differently, and you know if

1571
01:45:13,439 --> 01:45:17,160
Speaker 1: you're If you're not, you know you're already committing yourself

1572
01:45:17,600 --> 01:45:20,600
Speaker 1: to kind of obsolescence and there's no reason for that.

1573
01:45:20,640 --> 01:45:23,120
Speaker 1: And the other thing is in terms of taking risks,

1574
01:45:23,160 --> 01:45:26,519
Speaker 1: go big, go big like like think big, like and

1575
01:45:26,520 --> 01:45:30,800
Speaker 1: and like get a like don't be afraid of your

1576
01:45:30,800 --> 01:45:33,639
Speaker 1: own dreams. And I think that's what you represent so

1577
01:45:33,720 --> 01:45:38,240
Speaker 1: well is from an from an early age you kind

1578
01:45:38,280 --> 01:45:43,080
Speaker 1: of weren't daunted by your own imagination of what you

1579
01:45:43,160 --> 01:45:48,360
Speaker 1: might be capable of. And other students that I remember

1580
01:45:48,400 --> 01:45:51,320
Speaker 1: from your era, like people you might remember like Alexis

1581
01:45:51,400 --> 01:45:55,240
Speaker 1: Jones and people who got into activism and people who

1582
01:45:55,240 --> 01:46:00,320
Speaker 1: became entrepreneurs. This idea of not being a aid of

1583
01:46:00,439 --> 01:46:04,200
Speaker 1: your own vision and believing that you can be the

1584
01:46:04,280 --> 01:46:09,280
Speaker 1: agent of change. That's for me what this generation has

1585
01:46:09,320 --> 01:46:14,240
Speaker 1: as an opportunity like none other, because they've got tools

1586
01:46:14,280 --> 01:46:17,160
Speaker 1: that no one else has ever had to actually make

1587
01:46:17,200 --> 01:46:21,759
Speaker 1: those dreams realities. And the thing that kind of troubles

1588
01:46:21,800 --> 01:46:25,519
Speaker 1: me a little bit is that, for various reasons, from

1589
01:46:25,560 --> 01:46:30,240
Speaker 1: the debt overhanging to other reasons, even though all these

1590
01:46:30,240 --> 01:46:33,120
Speaker 1: tools exist, a lot of young people are more afraid

1591
01:46:33,160 --> 01:46:37,320
Speaker 1: of taking risks than ever before. And and and I

1592
01:46:37,360 --> 01:46:42,479
Speaker 1: think that's something that speaks to they don't feel like

1593
01:46:42,520 --> 01:46:46,479
Speaker 1: there's a foundation in the culture that gives them that

1594
01:46:46,520 --> 01:46:49,400
Speaker 1: feeling that there's something to fall back on, not a

1595
01:46:49,600 --> 01:46:53,320
Speaker 1: safety net per se, but just a trust factor that

1596
01:46:53,400 --> 01:46:56,840
Speaker 1: everything will be okay if I take this risk. And

1597
01:46:56,880 --> 01:46:59,800
Speaker 1: I think that that should inspire us all to kind

1598
01:46:59,800 --> 01:47:03,360
Speaker 1: of come together as a country and make sure that

1599
01:47:03,439 --> 01:47:07,000
Speaker 1: this generation and the ones that come later have that baseline.

1600
01:47:07,840 --> 01:47:12,519
Speaker 1: We will be okay, We will be okay. And and

1601
01:47:12,520 --> 01:47:15,040
Speaker 1: and and so I think people should take risks, believe

1602
01:47:15,080 --> 01:47:18,960
Speaker 1: in their own dreams, and trust that the things will happen,

1603
01:47:19,320 --> 01:47:22,639
Speaker 1: to make sure that everything will be okay no matter

1604
01:47:22,680 --> 01:47:27,680
Speaker 1: what happens. Okay one more. The title of the podcast

1605
01:47:28,200 --> 01:47:31,559
Speaker 1: is called work in Progress. I wonder when you hear

1606
01:47:31,640 --> 01:47:33,960
Speaker 1: work in progress, what's the first thing that comes to mind?

1607
01:47:34,040 --> 01:47:37,200
Speaker 1: Is a work in progress in your life? Work in

1608
01:47:37,280 --> 01:47:44,599
Speaker 1: progress to me means peace of mind with change because

1609
01:47:44,680 --> 01:47:48,479
Speaker 1: at my stage of life now with two children that

1610
01:47:48,520 --> 01:47:55,200
Speaker 1: are now becoming adolescents, young adults, just making sense of

1611
01:47:55,320 --> 01:48:00,760
Speaker 1: how they've changed is just makes my mind like just world.

1612
01:48:00,960 --> 01:48:03,479
Speaker 1: And I think, you know, work in progress is we're

1613
01:48:03,520 --> 01:48:08,280
Speaker 1: always working to kind of make sense of what's changing.

1614
01:48:09,040 --> 01:48:13,000
Speaker 1: And for me, like like the work in progress is

1615
01:48:13,040 --> 01:48:18,640
Speaker 1: like learning how to kind of like activate that calm

1616
01:48:18,680 --> 01:48:22,960
Speaker 1: in the storm. And so I'm really into meditation and

1617
01:48:23,400 --> 01:48:28,240
Speaker 1: really into yoga, and I love what that teaches you

1618
01:48:28,800 --> 01:48:32,840
Speaker 1: about practicing your own calm because what they teach you

1619
01:48:32,840 --> 01:48:36,040
Speaker 1: in meditation is the art of meditation is not being

1620
01:48:36,080 --> 01:48:39,160
Speaker 1: in that space where your mind is empty and you

1621
01:48:39,200 --> 01:48:41,679
Speaker 1: can look through your third eye and you can kind

1622
01:48:41,680 --> 01:48:46,080
Speaker 1: of feel the kind of spaciousness that you can create

1623
01:48:46,120 --> 01:48:48,880
Speaker 1: by you know, being at one with your breath and

1624
01:48:48,920 --> 01:48:51,559
Speaker 1: so forth. But if the fact that you'll never master that,

1625
01:48:52,600 --> 01:48:56,400
Speaker 1: you know, meditation teaches you that you never master that

1626
01:48:56,479 --> 01:48:59,519
Speaker 1: in that your mind just by definition is always going

1627
01:48:59,560 --> 01:49:02,000
Speaker 1: to move and wander, and as they put it, be

1628
01:49:02,040 --> 01:49:05,000
Speaker 1: the monkey mind that hops from one thing to the next.

1629
01:49:05,640 --> 01:49:08,240
Speaker 1: But the beauty of meditation is knowing you can always

1630
01:49:08,280 --> 01:49:13,360
Speaker 1: come back to that calm, and you can always reactivate

1631
01:49:13,400 --> 01:49:17,519
Speaker 1: your breath and reactivate your awareness of where you are

1632
01:49:18,120 --> 01:49:21,400
Speaker 1: and who you are. Starting with who you are is

1633
01:49:21,439 --> 01:49:25,120
Speaker 1: your breathing, and from your breath comes everything else, your

1634
01:49:25,160 --> 01:49:29,240
Speaker 1: heart rate and everything else, and and so that's a

1635
01:49:29,400 --> 01:49:33,280
Speaker 1: never ending work in progress. And so for me, that

1636
01:49:34,000 --> 01:49:36,320
Speaker 1: really is one of the things that work in progress

1637
01:49:36,360 --> 01:49:40,840
Speaker 1: means is is coming back to yourself and committing to

1638
01:49:41,080 --> 01:49:45,320
Speaker 1: always coming back committing that. That's the work, is always

1639
01:49:45,840 --> 01:49:51,240
Speaker 1: committing to return to that effort to be in sync

1640
01:49:51,320 --> 01:49:54,080
Speaker 1: with who you really are and who you're really intended

1641
01:49:54,120 --> 01:49:58,240
Speaker 1: to be. I love that. Thank you, Thank you. I

1642
01:49:58,320 --> 01:50:00,559
Speaker 1: can just talk to you all day. Thank you for

1643
01:50:00,600 --> 01:50:08,920
Speaker 1: having me. This show is executive produced by Me, Sophia Bush,

1644
01:50:09,040 --> 01:50:13,400
Speaker 1: and sim Sarna. Our supervising producer is Alison Bresnik. Our

1645
01:50:13,439 --> 01:50:17,519
Speaker 1: associate producer is Kate Linley, Our editor is Josh Wendish,

1646
01:50:17,920 --> 01:50:20,360
Speaker 1: and our music was written by Jack Garrett and produced

1647
01:50:20,400 --> 01:50:23,400
Speaker 1: by Mark Foster. This show is brought to you by Killion.

1648
01:50:23,439 --> 01:50:24,799
Speaker 1: Anatomy