Unruly Subjects

Before he was a scholar, journalist, and podcast host, Chenjerai was a rapper. And this week’s show is all about how hip-hop is connected to our larger political struggles. 

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First, Chenjerai interviews his friend, the scholar, rapper, and UVA professor A.D. Carson. He's the author of Being Dope: Hip Hop and Theory through Mixtape Memoir. In their conversation, they talk a...

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Here at Unruly Subjects you know we’re celebrating May Day ✊🏻✊🏽✊🏾✊🏿

So this week, we’re featuring two interviews that help us think through this critical question: What does it take to build the kind of power that can actually meet this political moment?

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This week, we look back at the martial law crisis that happened in South Korea in 2024, the Union-led opposition that organized swiftly, and the nationwide general strike that helped played a key role in defeating martial law and spurring mass mobilization.

🙏 We make Unruly Subjects 100% independently! Support the show on Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/UnrulySubjects 

Chenjerai interviews Mikyung Ryu, the International Director of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) about what happened on December 3rd, 2024, how labor reacted, what broader forces made the response possible, and what lessons peop...

It’s Black Maternal Health Week! So on this week’s show we’re taking a deep look at the conditions Black mothers face before and after giving birth. 

🙏 We make Unruly Subjects 100% independently! Support the show on Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/UnrulySubjects 

We feature an esteemed guest to discuss the mental health dimensions of maternal health: Saadiqa Kumanyika, a psychotherapist who specializes in perinatal and postpartum maternal mental health. (Saadiqa is also the First Lady of Unruly Subjects). 

We also share an interview with Malajah Rigsby, a new mother, and her doula Sh...

This week on Unruly Subjects, Chenjerai finally gets into sports. Kind of. Recently, it came to his attention that Steph Curry - one of the greatest NBA players of all time - has been investing in Israeli technology that’s linked to military actions that country is taking in Palestine,Gaza, Iran, Lebanon, and beyond. What’s up with that? Chenjerai unpacks this situation with Dave Zirin, Sports Editor at The Nation Magazine, and Demetrius Noble, Professor of African American Diaspora Studies at UNC Greensboro. They discuss the “sports-washing” being choreographed by nations and companies perpetuating war and geno...

This week on Unruly Subjects, Chenjerai is joined by his close friend Professor D Noble to unpack the viral fallout surrounding white rapper Jack Harlow. Following Harlow’s move into Neo Soul with his new album Monica, Chenjerai and Professor Noble dive into the controversy sparked by Harlow’s recent interview on the New York Times’ Popcast, where he claimed he has "gotten Blacker."

Go beyond the individual critiques of Harlow and go deeper to analyze how the "post-Not Like Us" landscape has changed the rules for artists, and who actually controls the means...

This episode is all about the fight against data centers. Specifically, we’re sharing the story of how the residents of Monterey Park, California waged a successful campaign against the construction of a data center in their town. Chenjerai interviews Hrag Balian and Steven Kung, co-founders of No Data Centers in Monterey Park and Claire Wang, an independent journalist who has been covering the anti-data center movement for The Guardian and other outlets. 

We make Unruly Subjects 100% independently - support the show on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/UnrulySubjects  Go there now...

This week, Chenjerai drives down to Philly to break bread with his friend - community activist and advocate April Lee. They visit Black Dragon, an innovative takeout spot in West Philly featuring Black Chinese cuisine from the mind of Chef Kurt Evans. Over noodles and spring rolls, April gives her analysis of the family policing system and talks about survival, structural violence, parenting, and about what real community care actually requires. 

Also, Chenjerai calls up his friend Professor D Noble to find out what’s going on with the white rapper Jack Harlow and his comments about “getti...

This week, the show features a long conversation between Chenjerai and his good friend Ronald Young Jr. Ronald is the creator and host of Weight For It, an award-winning narrative podcast that explores the ways we think about our bodies. They talk about the latest season of the show, which gets deep into questions of identity, safety, and what health even means. And they also have a long discussion about how people argue - the consequences of debate as sport, how to build better arguments, and maybe how to come out the other side of these situations feeling okay. 

This week, we have an episode all about the Trump administration's attack on federal workers and how people are mobilizing to fight back. We feature an interview with two prominent organizers with the Federal Unionist Network: Paul Osadebe and Chris Dols. 

Paul Osadebe is a former Civil Rights attorney from the Department of Housing and Urban Development. He’s a union steward with the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) and an organizer with the Federal Unionist Network. Chris Dols is a former cost engineer and district value officer at the US Army Corps of Engineers. He was...

This week, we have an episode all about what’s happening right now in Brazil - and how we got here.  

We feature an interview with Gilberto Porcidonio, a journalist, screenwriter, and writer from Brazil. He is a reporter and fact-checker for Piauí magazine and narrator of Chumbo & Soul, an Audible podcast series produced by Rádio Novelo about the Brazilian dictatorship from the perspective of the Black population. Chenjerai and Gilberto have a wide-ranging discussion about what’s happening in Brazil right now -  from the history of Black politics and policing in Brazil, to the current...

This week, we feature an interview with journalist Gillian Brockell who recently wrote a story published in Mother Jones that breaks down what’s happening onboard ICE deportation flights, the private-equity airline that’s profiting off the cruelty, and more. 

Also, Chenjerai has an update on  labor struggles happening across the country and across sectors including the health care workers in NYC, the public school teachers on strike in San Francisco, and we share an excerpt of Chenjerai’s interview with Elisabeth Fay, a Clinical Associate Professor at NYU and an elected member of Contract Faculty United-UAW's bargaini...

This week, Chenjerai is back on one of his favorite beats: policing in America 👮

He has a long conversation with Mac Muir, the author of Cop Cop: Breaking the Fixed System of American Policing. Muir recently served as the Executive Director of Oakland, California’s Community Police Review Agency and before then was a Supervising Investigator at NYC’s CCRB. He shares stories from inside his work as a police investigator and discusses the changes needed to hold bad cops accountable. 

We also hear an excerpt from an interview with a nurse and negotiator on the fron...

This week, we feature a conversation with veteran labor organizer and strategist Bill Fletcher Jr. all about general strikes.  What do people mean when they say general strike? What makes strike power different from other kinds of protest power? And what kind of conditions actually have to exist for this kind of action to succeed, especially in a moment when the repression is this real?

In this episode, we also hear from two workers on the ground in Minneapolis: Dr. Robert Mills III is a pediatrician and Nakia Dunbar is a school administrator. They talked about what i...

This week, we feature an interview with Mother Jones reporter Abby Vesoulis, who recently co-authored with Ari Berman the report “Your Private Data Is Building Trump’s Voter Purge Machine”. Vesoulis breaks down the Trump administration’s plans for election interference via voter suppression, the Department of Justice’s role in purging voters, and how we can try to fight back ahead of the upcoming midterm elections. 

Also, Chenjerai previews a longer interview with veteran labor organizer and strategist Bill Fletcher Jr. about the purpose and power of general strikes. They discuss this in the context of the ongoing...

This week, we feature an interview with George “Conscious” Lee. He’s an orator, educator, and social media influencer who uses his platform to break news and promote dynamic understandings of justice. He’s built a massive, engaged audience on Instagram and TikTok  by highlighting social and political issues that demand widespread awareness. In his interview with Chenjerai, Conscious talks about why analyzing power is the center of his work, how joining his college debate team gave him lessons that organizers, journalists and all of us need right now, how he approaches interpreting the news, and the limitations and risks of...

While we're cooking up our next full episodes of Unruly Subjects, we wanted to re-share our first UNRULY HOTLINE segment that we originally published in Episode 2. In this segment, Chenjerai listens and reacts to callers that responded to the question: "How do you balance your love life with the struggle?” 

Unruly Subjects is created in partnership with Rowhome Productions. 

Become a Patreon supporter here: http://patreon.com/unrulysubjects 

Support the show

As the assault on Gaza continues and the crisis deepens, our individual freedom to critique Israel’s actions has become more and more fraught. We have a deep commitment to anti-racism in all its forms on Unruly Subjects, including antisemitism. But we find ourselves in a place where condemning the actions of a country is falsely - and often frighteningly - equated with being anti-semitic.

Darryl Li is an anthropologist and lawyer teaching at the University of Chicago. He's the co-author of a new study that puts this current moment in context. The study is titled  “Discriminating Again...

NEWS FIEND is a weekly segment where Chenjerai offers his commentary and reflections on some of the week's headlines. This is a feature that is offered for all Patreon members of Unruly Subjects, but we wanted to give our listener's here a taste of the UNRULY SUPPORTER perks.  We're a completely independent show! Each new supporter helps us make this project possible. 

Become a Patreon supporter here: http://patreon.com/unrulysubjects 

Included below are links to some additional articles and resources about the topics covered in this week's segment.

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This week - on the heels of Zohran Mamdani’s historic victory in NYC’s mayoral election - we’re featuring an interview with Maya Meredith, a Brooklyn-based leader in the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America’s Afrosocialists and Socialists of Color Caucus. Maya lets us know about some of DSA’s upcoming campaigns, talks about canvassing and organizing Black voters, and discusses fighting to create a more multiracial coalition within DSA. 

Also in this episode: Chenjerai talks with Daniel Coates about resisting ICE with Hands Off NYC, and Brooklyn-based artist Lauren Kaelin - a...

This week, we’re featuring an interview with the writer & culture critic Lovia Gyarkye, an editor at Hammer & Hope, a magazine of Black politics and culture. Lovia discusses her approach to cultural critique, looks back at a 2017 piece she wrote about Trevor Noah, makes a case for why everyone should become familiar with the Jamaican-born cultural theorist Stuart Hall. 

Also in this episode: An excerpt of a conversation with Conscious Lee about processing the news as an influencer. And Chenjerai responds to voicemails from the Unruly Hotline. Last week’s question was: “How do you balance your love li...

This is the very first episode of Unruly Subjects! And we’re featuring an interview with Roy Wood Jr.  Roy is a stand-up comedian and Emmy-nominated writer with a new book out - a memoir entitled The Man of Many Fathers. We talk about fatherhood, dive deep into a segment he did on the Daily Show about Cop City, and the role of comedy in times of political turmoil.  Also, Chenjerai reflects on a few news headlines, takes a phone call, & more. 

The Man of Many Fathers – Roy Wood Jr.

Roy’s new memoir about fatherhoo...

Unruly Subjects is a new podcast from Chenjerai Kumanyika and Rowhome Productions about the world as we’re living it, right now. Each week, we’ll check in about what’s happening in the news, and bring on some of the most brilliant, funny, and inspiring people to help us make sense of it all.

We’ll also be finding ways to connect with you and deepen the conversation on Patreon in the coming weeks and months. Unruly Subjects is an independent podcast, so to support the show, consider joining our ...