What's CODE SWITCH? It's the fearless conversations about race that you've been waiting for. Hosted by journalists of color, our podcast tackles the subject of race with empathy and humor. We explore how race affects every part of society — from politics and pop culture to history, food and everything in between. This podcast makes all of us part of the conversation — because we're all part of the story. Code Switch was named Apple Podcasts' first-ever Show of the Year in 2020. Support public media by joining NPR+ at plus.npr.org. You’ll get perks for over 25 NPR podcasts, including bonus episod...
Latest episodes
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42 min
What if men read more books
Are the men in your life reading? How do you convince people to check out more novels? This week, we turn to our play cousins at It's Been a Minute and their recent conversation wi…
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34 min
How "defund the police" became radioactive
In 2020, “defund the police” was everywhere. Now, even politicians like AOC and Zohran Mamdani have turned around on it. But some proposals that fell under the defund umbrella, lik…
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38 min
Why fascists love “fitness”
Right-wing ideology has crept into gyms across the country. Is this a new phenomenon, or is the very idea of "fitness" ripe for politicization? Is our idea of fitness inherently fa…
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28 min
How much reality do we want in our reality TV?
Why do Black contestants on reality TV keep getting voted out first? Like a lot of people, B.A. Parker watches reality TV to escape. But seeing contestants of color on the receivin…
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28 min
How Hollywood stole the zombie from Haiti
Zombies have roots most fans have never heard of. In Haitian Vodou, being zombified meant being enslaved even in death. B.A. Parker talks to Maya Annik Bedward, director of the new…
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31 min
The shady deals behind data centers
Clarksdale, Mississippi, the birthplace of the blues, has been losing people, jobs, and businesses for years. Now land there has been rezoned to make room for a hyperscale data cen…
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43 min
Let’s stop pretending we desegregated schools
Seventy years after Brown v. Board of Education, Black parents still face an impossible choice about where to send their kids. Gene talks with his twin sister about the different c…
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30 min
The Lindsay Clancy case and the women we make into monsters
The Lindsay Clancy trial captured the nation this summer, and reactions toward Clancy have been split. The case brought much needed attention to postpartum psychosis, but some ques…
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34 min
Chris Brown won't get cancelled. This is why.
When Rep. Jasmine Crockett took the stage at a Chris Brown concert to honor him, the backlash came fast. It's a familiar cycle: every few years, Brown lands back in the news, and t…
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37 min
Do voters want woke?
Lots of progressive politicians eyeing runs for higher office are distancing themselves from the politics of 2020, like Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio Cortez declaring, "woke 1.0…
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25 min
Is Cuba Trump's next real estate project?
Cubans are living through near-constant blackouts after an executive order that called the Cuban government an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to U.S. national security and bloc…
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36 min
Why can’t people be normal about the WNBA?
The WNBA is more popular than ever, but the growth has come with a lot of unwanted attention, like protests at games and death threats directed towards players. This week, we talk…
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36 min
Why we’re all being watched
There’s a growing backlash to the surveillance systems that have quietly wired themselves into American neighborhoods, with concern growing among people who have never felt watched…
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28 min
25 years after 9/11, our definition of terrorism continues to expand
In the 25 years since 9/11, we've seen the definition of terrorism expand. The Trump administration has called more and more groups “terrorists,” from “narco-terrorists” in Ecuador…
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1 h 05
We're Miseducated on Lauryn Hill
Lauryn Hill is a generational voice, a cultural lightning rod, and one of music’s biggest what-ifs. Our very own B.A. Parker joined the Big Lives podcast, hosted by Kai Wright and…
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32 min
Freedom from fatness: Why GLP-1s go after Black bodies
Ads for GLP-1s are everywhere. This week, we dig into why so many of those ads seem to feature Black women with Sabrina Strings, author of “Fearing the Black Body” a book about the…
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27 min
Banana Ball's racial minstrelsy past
Banana Ball is a barnstorming baseball league revived by the tremendously popular Savannah Bananas, a team with millions of followers on TikTok and Instagram — known as much for th…
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33 min
Unpacking estrangement: Who goes No Contact?
Is there a family estrangement epidemic? This week, we dig into what’s behind the no-contact movement with sociologist Rin Reczek, author of the new book, “Families We Lose.” Rin w…
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1 h 14
Our Ancestors Were Messy: a Black history comedy show
In 1775, half a million enslaved people had to pick a side in a war between two groups of white men who both claimed to want freedom. In this live episode of Our Ancestors Were Mes…
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34 min
Trump is demanding English — while defunding ESL
Last year President Trump made English the official language of the United States. Then his administration moved to zero out the federal money that teaches it. But even fully funde…