Still Processing

Today, Wesley leaves the studio – and goes home. He embarks on a journey that involves a car named Khad'ija, a tireless 92-year-old activist and one Chinatown. Last year, President Biden signed a $1 trillion infrastructure bill into law. One part of the initiative especially struck Wesley: the federal government’s acknowledgment that its mid-century push to build a massive highway system had caused suffering. Wesley started thinking about a highway that he sometimes crossed as a kid in Philadelphia: the Vine Street Expressway. When it was built in 1991, he never realized how deeply it had divided and altered the Chinatown neighborhood. What happened to all the people who were living there? How did their lives — and their communities — transform? On today’s show, Wesley returns to his hometown to try to find out. Click here for photos of Wesley's journey and more info about the episode.

From our living rooms to yours, “Still Processing” is back.

During this unprecedented time in our lives, we talk routines, dreams and what’s on our screens — or at least what will be on our screens. Because screens are all we have left.

Discussed this week:

“Darn That Dream” (Dinah Washington, 1954)

The Brian Lehrer Show (WNYC)

Working out with Mr. and Mrs. Muscle

“Ra Ma Da Sa” (Amanbir Singh, 2017)

The Wiz (directed by Sidney Lumet, 1978)

High Fidelity (Hulu, 2020)

Wesley has been obsessed with lists since he was a child — think Casey Kasem’s American Top 40, the Academy Awards and Rolling Stone’s Top 500 Albums of All Time. Now, he wants to think more seriously about expanding what we call the canon, making sure more people have a say in which works of art are considered great, enduring and important.

For guidance, Wesley sits down with Daphne A. Brooks, an academic, critic and music lover, to ask whether expanding the canon is even the right way to think about this. Her thoughts surprise him: We can do better than lists!

Check out Daphne A. Brooks's reading recommendations at this link or at nytimes.com/stillprocessing.

New episodes coming March 26! You’ve got a lot of time on your hands, and so do we. Let's spend it together <3.

When Quaker decided to take Aunt Jemima off the red pancake box after 131 years, did it also try to scrub the legacy she represents? And what sort of compensation is appropriate — and to whom — from a brand that maintained that image in public for so long?

Discussed this week:

• “Aunt Jemima Brand to Change Name and Image Over ‘Racial Stereotype’” (Tiffany Hsu, The New York Times, June 2020)
• “Aunt Jemima: I’se in Town, Honey” (Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia at Ferris State University)
• “The Dixie Chicks Change Their Name, Dropping the ‘Dixie’” (Ben Sisario, The New York Times, June 2020)
• “Lady Antebellum Sues the Singer Lady A Over Name Change” (Joe Coscarelli, The New York Times, July 2020)
• “Aunt Jemima’s Heirs’ $3 Billion Lawsuit Against Pepsi, Quaker Oats Tossed by Judge” (Tim Kenneally, The Wrap, February 2015)
• “What Is Owed” (Nikole Hannah Jones, The New York Times, June 2020)
• “The Case for Reparations” (Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Atlantic, June 2014)