Rough Drafts

Episode 7: Movement Journalism (w/ Dimo O.)

What would it look like if there was a civil war conflict, and how would journalists cover it in the United States? In a conversation recorded November 1, 2024 L and M invite their friend Dimo Ortiz to the podcast to reflect on the film ‘Civil War’ which portrays the experiences of journalists covering a domestic conflict in the mainland United States. In a wide-ranging conversation, they reflect their respective relationships with journalism and how journalism influences their perception of the political/social moment.
 
In particular, they sit with the tension between institutions that have captured the mainstream (the corporate media conglomerate, and the social media platforms that have captured collective attention), and  “movement journalism”, which was coined by Anna Simmonton in 2017, as a term to think about journalism in service of liberation. 
 
Dimo studied journalism while at Temple University and their formative experiences came as a student journalist covering Trump’s rise in 2016. They reflect on that experience in light of the past few years which has seen heightened surveillance and police violence, some targeted at journalists covering social movements. 
 
They think critically about who is a movement journalist, sitting with the legacy of Ida B. Wells, and the Chicago Defender, and think about the contemporary role of independent media and the potentiality//pitfalls of America’s celebrity-influencer culture. What is the consequence of news becoming ‘content’ or ‘entertainment’? 
 
Notes and Sources:
This conversation includes spoilers about the movie Civil War. 
Civil War: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt17279496/ 
https://www.niemanlab.org/2025/03/fivethirtyeight-is-shutting-down-as-part-of-broader-cuts-at-abc-and-disney/ 
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/washington-post-opinion-head-leaves-paper-section-shifts-focus-2025-02-26/ 
https://culturalpower.org/media/pdfs/CCP_doc_01_Tina_r4b.pdf

Episode 6: New Year's Eve Special 2024

In a conversation recorded on New Years Eve 2024, L and M reflect on artistic and cultural highlights of the year, their respective “ins” and “outs” for 2025, and forecast what the year/second half of the 2020s will hold. 

Episode 5: Hope and Nihilism in These Trying Times

Episode 5: Hope and Nihilism (Jan. 20)
 
L and M ask: what roles do hope and/or nihilism play in shaping political culture. In a meditative discussion held shortly after the US 2024 General Election, they reflect on how social movements and artistic expression hold potential to counter the isolation/alienation/exhaustion of the season ahead. 
 
Tressie Cottom, Daily Show https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nno64FGj8d0
WEB DuBois, Black Reconstruction in America (1935) https://cominsitu.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/w-e-b-du-bois-black-reconstruction-an-essay-toward-a-history-of-the-part-which-black-folk-played-in-the-attempt-to-reconstruct-democracy-2.pdf 
Jiirgen Habermas, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere
https://arditiesp.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/habermas_structural_transf_public_sphere.pdf
Ursula Le Guin, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Et9Nf-rsALk
Robert Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (2000)
Gabriel Winant, Exit Right https://www.dissentmagazine.org/online_articles/exit-right/
Calvin Warren, Abandoning Time: Black Nihilism and the Democratic Imagination
https://amst.winter-verlag.de/article/amst/2021/1/40
 

Episode 4: Amtrak Rail Renaissance

How has Amtrak shaped American transit historically and in the contemporary period?  L and M share their experiences riding the rail; they reflect on trips they’ve taken up and down the coast, and cross country. They swap stories about folks they’ve met, and look at the local and national impact of the Biden Infrastructure bill on Amtrak. 
 
Sources: 
“All Aboard Obama Express”, CBS News, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2GRwvk8EmI  
Amtrak Fiscal year 2023 (https://www.amtrak.com/content/dam/projects/dotcom/english/public/documents/corporate/nationalfactsheets/Amtrak-Company-Profile-FY2023-041824.pdf)
“Amtrak is Set to Carry More Passengers than Ever Before” NPR, Aug. 2 2024
https://www.npr.org/2024/08/03/nx-s1-5060436/amtrak-is-set-to-carry-more-passengers-than-ever-before-this-year
The Northeast Corridor: The Trains, the People, the History, the Region by David Alff
 

Episode 3: Black Bourgeoisie

What is the state of the Black Bourgeoisie? And who even is the Black Bourgeoisie? L gives M a preliminary entrance exam to see if he can make it (he fails). They reflect on common misconceptions of the Black bourgeoisie, with particular attention to the distinctions between “class” and “status”, and “wealth versus “income.” They swap examples from family and their dating lives, and pose questions about the future vitality of the Black bourgeoisie in relation to politics and literature.
 
Sources:
Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man
Margo Jefferson, Negroland
Franklin Frazier, Black Bourgeoisie
Lawrence Otis Graham, Our Kind of People 
Mary Patillo, Black Picket Fences
Kenneth W. Warren, What was African American Literature?  
 

Episode 2: Is This Jazz (w/ Seth T.)

What is the state of jazz in contemporary American culture? Maurice and Luke reconnect with their friend Seth, an independent jazz scholar and musician who shares his perspective cultivated by his reading and practice. Seth gives a historical overview of how the genre evolved through some of its most impactful contributors. In addition, he provides commentary on the relationship between jazz and white spectatorship and imitators (Jack Harlow maybe catches some strays).
 
Seth’s reflections urge us to think about the refined exploitation in the music industry and in black cultural expression more broadly. 
 
**Disclaimer: Luke’s segregation take may make certain folks blush and offend others; in the spirit of Rough Drafts, he is unserious (though not uninformed). Despite what he says, he looks forward to seeing his mother come holiday season and is a strong supporter of a multicultural democracy :)
 
Sources:
Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original by Robin D.G. Kelley (2010)
https://www.harvard.com/book/9781439190463 
 
As Serious As Your Life: Black Music and The Free Jazz Revolution By Val Wilmer (2018)
https://mastbooks.com/products/as-serious-as-your-life 
 
Free Jazz/Black Power By Philppe Carles and Jean-Louis Comolli; translated by Gregory Pierrot https://www.upress.state.ms.us/Books/F/Free-Jazz-Black-Power 
 
Jazz and Justice: Racism and the Political Economy of Music by Gerald Horne
 
References:
How it Feels To Be Colored Me, by Zora Neale Hurston (1929)
https://core-docs.s3.amazonaws.com/documents/asset/uploaded_file/619238/D12_How_it_Feels_to_be_Colored_ZNH_students__1___1___1_.pdf 
 
Blues People: Negro Music in White America  by Amiri Baraka
https://archive.org/details/bluespeoplenegroexp00bara 
https://www.amherst.edu/media/view/91518/original/Baraka+-+The+Modern+Scene.pdf 
 
Solar Myth
https://metrophiladelphia.com/solar-myth-john-coltrane-birthday/ 
screening director Shahkeem E. Williams’ new short film ‘Speakn’ Trane’ (written and produced by John Coltrane Symposium founder Anyabwile Love,  
 
On the Road by Jack Kerouac Howl by Allan Ginsburg
 
Soul (Disney Pixar)
 
Fact Checks: 
Sun Ra was definitely Black Arts Movement 
Immanuel *Wilkins* (not wilkerson)
 

Episode 0: A Rough Draft of Rough Drafts (Explicit)

Maurice and Luke, old friends from college, reconnected after their respective odysseys of the early 2020s, through their work at a bookstore. They decided to finally start that podcast they always talked about. They prepared three questions each for this episode to (re)introduce themselves to listeners and give a personal meditation on what Rough Drafts is | can | and could be!

Episode 1: State of American Masculinity in the 21st Century (Explicit)

The podcasts’ Founding Fathers started with the questions: what does it mean to be a man in the 21st century American context? And, how are these different types of masculinities being formed?
Perhaps apropos, they started with bell hooks. They reflect on the legacies of brothers, friends, and formative men in their lives. Critiques were had of Andrew Tate, Fresh and Fit, Kevin Samuels, and the (Black) Manosphere.
 
Sources: 
Fast Facts: Title IX NCES: https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=93
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/09/24/key-facts-about-public-school-teachers-in-the-u-s/
Understanding the (Black) Manosphere with https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upt_ks61_70
“Schooling Black Males”, in We real cool: Black men and Masculinity https://theindigenist.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/we-real-cool_black-men-masculinity-by-bell-hooks.pdf
A Man among Other Men by Jordanna Motlon https://www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501762932/a-man-among-other-men/
 
References: 
Driving with O.J Simpson by Harmony Holiday https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2024/07/19/driving-with-o-j-simpson/
Men are Lonely. We Explore Some Reasons Why, and What Can Be Done About It https://laist.com/news/kpcc-archive/how-to-la/men-are-lonely-we-explore-some-reasons-why-and-what-can-be-done-about-itWhat’s the Left’s Response to Andrew Tate? https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mtFPwRR2kz1Z7Qe5ZgtZn44Dz-1eE08NnP2dGcvDKSk/edit?ouid=108479077797216976854&usp=docs_home&ths=true
Luke’s substack: https://substack.com/home/post/p-148583471
Ezra Klein, “The Men–and Boys–are not Alright” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zX2qQ2Smkbg