Past Forward

This is an introduction to Season Five of Chapters. In this episode we document the year 2025, with context from our past, and we learn moving forward. Our goal with this new series is to explore the word incarceration as it relates to the experience of Japanese Americans following Executive Order 9066. We also want to consider the word incarceration and its effect on communities, families, and individuals through conversations with artists, community leaders, government officials, historians, journalists, lawyers, and nonprofit organizations.In this episode we highlight conversations with guests from this series, including Teresa Watanabe, a journalist at the Los Angeles Times for over three decades; Tarell Alvin McCraney, award-winning writer, producer, educator, and Artistic Director of the Geffen Playhouse; Kirn Kim, who, at 16 years old, was sentenced to 25 years to life as an adult; Donald K. Tamaki, a member of the pro bono legal team that reopened the landmark Supreme Court case Korematsu v. United States; Peggy Nagae, who served as lead counsel on the Coram Nobis case of Min Yasui 40 years after his conviction following Executive Order 9066; Dale Minami, coordinating attorney for the Coram Nobis case for Korematsu, Hirabayashi and Yasui, and lead counsel for Fred Korematsu; Ricardo D. García, Public Defender for Los Angeles County; Abdi Soltani, Executive Director of the ACLU of Northern California; Chessie Thacher, Senior Staff Attorney at the ACLU of Northern California; Soji Kashiwagi, Executive Director and playwright for the Grateful Crane Ensemble; Tamiko Nimura, co-author of the book, We Hereby Refuse, and author of the upcoming book, A Place for What We Lose, A Daughter's Return to Tule Lake; Kathryn Bannai, lead counsel for Gordon Hirabayashi’s Coram Nobis case which led to his conviction being vacated 40 years later; and Ann Burroughs, President and CEO of the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles.Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.Guests: Teresa Watanabe, Tarell Alvin McCraney, Kirn Kim, Donald K. Tamaki, Peggy Nagae, Dale Minami, Ricardo D. García, Abdi Soltani, Chessie Thacher, Soji Kashiwagi, Tamiko Nimura, Kathryn Bannai, and Ann BurroughsHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: December 16, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

When we started this project in August of 2024 we were focused on the fact that 18 out of the 20 most destructive fires in California’s history have happened in the last 25 years, and 15 of them in the last 10 years. Everything changed when we started recording and fires spread all over the region. If you live in the Western United States, there is a high likelihood you have been directly or indirectly affected by wildfires. That is why we launched this series, to explore this phenomenon and connect with those who have studied fires, written about fires, fought the fires on the ground, raised funds to protect the land, and created technology to keep all of us aware of where the fire is and where we need to be to remain safe.This is an introduction to Season One of The Fire Problem. In this episode we document the year 2025, with context from our past, and we learn moving forward. In this episode we highlight conversations with guests from this series, including award-winning author, John Vaillant, who talks about his book, Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter World; Nick Mott and Justin Angle, award-winning podcasters and authors of This Is Wildfire; David Weinstein and Hugh Coxe of Trust for Public Land, serving as the Northern Rockies Program Director and Project Manager in California; Chief Brian Fennessy of the Orange County Fire Authority; and John Mills, CEO and co-founder of WatchDuty.The Fire Problem is an education program that considers unresolved symptoms of The Fire Problem. This special podcast series will examine and explain underlying challenges and vulnerabilities with our climate, environment, politics, and vegetation. Conversations with conservationists, first responders, historians, politicians, scientists, technologists, tribal leaders, and more will help diagnose our situation with opportunities for treatment. Human influence is at the heart of The Fire Problem and our goal is to learn from past neglect and failure and plan for a future of education and prevention. Produced with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University with support from the Orange County Community Foundation.Guests: John Vaillant, Nick Mott and Justin Angle, Chief Brian Fennessy, David Weinstein and Hugh Coxe, and John MillsHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: December 2, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Martin Puchner is the Byron and Anita Wien Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Harvard University, where he also serves as the founding director of the Mellon School of Theater and Performance Research. Puchner completed his BA at the Universität Konstanz; MA at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and at UC Irvine; and PhD at Harvard University. A recent fellow of both the Guggenheim Foundation and Cullman Center, he has published over a dozen books and anthologies, including Poetry of the Revolution: Marx, Manifestos, and the Avant-Gardes (Princeton, 2006), which won the MLA’s James Russell Lowell Award; The Drama of Ideas: Platonic Provocations in Theater and Philosophy (Oxford, 2010), awarded the Joe A. Callaway Prize and the Walter Channing Cabot Prize; The Written World: How Literature Shaped Civilization (Random House, 2017); Literature for a Changing Planet (Princeton, 2022); and Culture: The Story of Us, From Cave Art to K-Pop (Norton, 2023). Puchner is the co-editor of Against Theatre: Creative Destructions on the Modernist Stage (Palgrave, 2006) and The Norton Anthology of Drama (2009), and the general editor of the Norton Anthology of World Literature.Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on the Environment and Building Resilient Futures is a series that explores how natural, social, and political climates both shape and are changed by institutions and social structures. We engage with artists, educators, activists and authors to examine where we live and how we live in our surrounding environment and what it takes to build a resilient future.Guest: Martin PuchnerHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.Date recorded: November 26, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Heidi Beirich is the Co-Founder, Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism.  Beirich is also an Advisory Board Member of the Network for Hate Studies based out of the University of Ontario Institute of Technology and the former Intelligence Project Director of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) Intelligence Project, which publishes the award-winning Intelligence Report and the Hatewatch blog. Beirich is an expert on various forms of extremism, including the white supremacist, nativist and neo-Confederate movements, as well as racism in academia.Beirich oversaw the SPLC’s yearly count of the nation’s hate and anti-government groups, was a frequent contributor to the SPLC’s investigative reports and is an oft-sought speaker at conferences on extremism.  Before joining the SPLC staff in 1999, Beirich earned a doctorate in political science from Purdue University.  She is the co-editor and author of several chapters of Neo-Confederacy: A Critical Introduction.Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on the Environment and Building Resilient Futures is a series that explores how natural, social, and political climates both shape and are changed by institutions and social structures. We engage with artists, educators, activists and authors to examine where we live and how we live in our surrounding environment and what it takes to build a resilient future.Guest: Heidi BeirichHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.Date recorded: November 19, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

A Macondo fellow, Margaret Elysia Garcia is the author of the poetry collections Iconistas! (Lit Kit Collective, 2025), the daughterland poems (El Martillo Press, 2023), and Burn Scars, (Lit Kit Collective, 2022). She is the author of the short story collection Graft (Tolsun Books, 2022), and the forth coming collection Chicana Noir: Stories (El Martillo Press, 2026).  She’s the co-editor of the forthcoming Red Flag Warning: Mutual Aid and Community in California’s Fire Country, (AK Press, June 2025). She’s been awarded a non-tuition fellowship to work on her novel through Chapman University in Orange, CA.Margaret’s is the recipient of multiple Pushcart nominations, 2nd place winner in the 34th Annual National Chicana/Latina Literary Award, University of California, Irvine, Solstice Literary Press Award (ebook), a California Arts Council grant recipient, Chapman University’s non-tuition fellowship grantee, participant in Disquiet International, Community of Writers, and Black Rock Mountain Artist Residency. Her story collection Graft was a recommended read at Small Press Distribution November 2022. She teaches English as a second language with Santa Ana College.Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on the Environment and Building Resilient Futures is a series that explores how natural, social, and political climates both shape and are changed by institutions and social structures. We engage with artists, educators, activists and authors to examine where we live and how we live in our surrounding environment and what it takes to build a resilient future.Guest: Margaret Elysia GarciaHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.Date recorded: November 12, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Kristi Lippire is a Los Angeles–based sculptor and professor whose work investigates the intersections of material culture, urban infrastructure, and visual theory. A specialist in color theory, she conducts long-form research into the social, historical, and perceptual structures that shape the built environment. Her practice often draws on archives, photography, and site-specific observation, translating architectural elements into sculptural, textile, and graphic forms that reframe their cultural and political resonance. Lippire’s projects engage with histories of modernism, feminist interventions in design, and the role of ornament and color in shaping spatial experience. She has exhibited nationally and internationally, with works featured in museums, galleries, and public art contexts. In addition to her studio practice, Lippire is committed to teaching and mentorship, fostering critical engagement with materials, processes, and the social dimensions of artmaking in her role as professor and mentor.Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on the Environment and Building Resilient Futures is a series that explores how natural, social, and political climates both shape and are changed by institutions and social structures. We engage with artists, educators, activists and authors to examine where we live and how we live in our surrounding environment and what it takes to build a resilient future.Guest: Kristi LippireHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.Date recorded: November 5, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Jaime L. Jacobsen is an Assistant Professor of Journalism and Media Communication and the Director of the Center for Science Communication at Colorado State University. She is an Emmy Award-winning filmmaker who has over a decade of experience collaborating with diverse communities across the globe to craft and share compelling social justice, human rights, and scientific stories. Jaime has worked in a variety of cross-cultural contexts across the globe, including leading Documentary and Photography expeditions for National Geographic Student Expeditions in Australia and Tanzania, producing films for Engineers Without Borders in Kenya and Pathfinder International in Mozambique, teaching documentary filmmaking at Notre Dame University-Louaize in Lebanon, and completing a professional fellowship with Rotary International in Brazil. Jaime has a Master of Fine Arts in Science and Natural History Filmmaking from Montana State University. She lives in Fort Collins, Colorado with her husband and two young children.Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on the Environment and Building Resilient Futures is a series that explores how natural, social, and political climates both shape and are changed by institutions and social structures. We engage with artists, educators, activists and authors to examine where we live and how we live in our surrounding environment and what it takes to build a resilient future.Guest: Jaime L. JacobsenHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.Date recorded: October 8, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Ann Burroughs is the President and CEO of the Japanese American National Museum. She is an internationally recognized leader in the field of human rights and social justice. She is the Chair of the Board of Directors of Amnesty International USA and was formerly Chair of Amnesty International’s Global Assembly. Her life-long commitment to racial and social justice was shaped by her experience as a young activist in her native South Africa where she was jailed as a political prisoner for her opposition to apartheid. For over 25 years, she has worked with leaders, organizations, and networks in the US and abroad to promote diversity, racial justice and a rights-based culture. She has previously served as Executive Director of the Taproot Foundation and as the Executive Director of LA Works, and has worked as a consultant to the Omidyar Network, the Rockefeller Foundation and the government of South Africa.Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.Guest: Ann BurroughsHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: October 29, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Kathryn Bannai was lead counsel in Gordon Hirabayashi's coram nobis case from 1982 to early 1985. Among other critical work, she successfully defeated the government’s effort to dismiss Hirabayashi’s case and persuaded the court to grant an evidentiary hearing. That hearing led to overturning Hirabayashi’s convictions for resisting the curfew and exclusion orders promulgated under E.O. 9066. In addition to practicing law, she adjudicated cases for the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal and Seattle’s Public Safety Civil Service Commission. She has served as president of the Seattle Chapter JACL; president of the New York Chapter JACL; member of the Board of Trustees of Eastern Washington University; member of the Board of Directors of Little Tokyo Community Council (Los Angeles); and Advisory Council member of Kizuna (Los Angeles). She was also co-chair of the committee that nominated Mitsuye Endo Tsutsumi for recognition that led to her receiving posthumously the Presidential Citizens Medal.Kathryn is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Japanese American National Museum (JANM)Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.Guest: Kathryn BannaiHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: October 15, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Tamiko Nimura, Ph.D., is an award-winning Asian American (Sansei/Pinay) creative nonfiction writer, community journalist, and public historian. She writes from an interdisciplinary space at the intersection of her love of literature, grounding in American ethnic studies, inherited wisdom from teachers and activists, and storytelling through history. Her work has appeared in a variety of national and international outlets, including San Francisco Chronicle, Smithsonian Magazine, Off Assignment, Narratively, The Rumpus, SFMOMA Open Space, and Seattle’s International Examiner.A two-time VONA Voices fellow, she has received awards from the Ford Foundation, Artist Trust, City of Tacoma Artists Initiative, the Tacoma Arts Commission, and the Tacoma Historical Society. Her commissioned work includes a California permanent exhibit, a co-authored graphic novel titled We Hereby Refuse, and a 10+-year series of essays for the Japanese American National Museum. She is a board member of the Tule Lake Committee. Her forthcoming memoir is titled A PLACE FOR WHAT WE LOSE: A DAUGHTER’S RETURN TO TULE LAKE (University of Washington Press). As the direct descendant of Japanese American World War II incarcerees, Tamiko has worked to keep this history alive through her writing and public speaking.Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.Guest: Tamiko NimuraHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: September 10, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Soji Kashiwagi has been the Executive Director and Playwright of the Grateful Crane Ensemble since its founding in 2001. As a playwright, Soji's works such as "The Camp Dance: The Music & The Memories" and "Nihonmachi: The Place to Be" have been seen nationally at JACL conventions in Phoenix, Salt Lake City and Chicago, and most recently at the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. Other works include "The J-Town Jazz Club," "Misora Hibari: A Tribute to a Legend," "Natsukashi no Kouhaku Uta Gassen" and the JA dysfunctional family comedy, "Garage Door Opener." Soji also wrote the scripts and Grateful Crane performed special presentations for the Go For Broke National Education Center's "Evening of Aloha" in 2013, and the Tuna Canyon Coalition's luncheon in 2017.Internationally, Soji led Grateful Crane's Goodwill Tours to Tohoku, Japan in 2014 and 2016, where the group sang songs of hope for tsunami survivors living in temporary housing. Under his leadership, Grateful Crane has been recognized with a Bravo Award from the Asia America Symphony Association in 2010, the Daniel Inouye Leadership Award from the Cherry Blossom Festival of Southern California in 2011 and the 2016 Heritage Award from the Aquarium of the Pacific.Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.Guest: Soji KashiwagiHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: June 30, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

John Mills has changed the way we live with fire through his 501c3 non-profit organization Watch Duty. John spent many years in Silicon Valley focusing on underserved markets that had been overlooked by technologists. In 2012 he founded Zenput as CTO, focused on retail food services operations which was acquired in 2022. After living in San Francisco for 16 years, he moved off-the-grid to Sonoma County in 2020 where he was faced with the terrifying reality of life in the wildlands without the information needed to make informed decisions. Having developed software for over 30 years beginning at age 8, John found himself with a life or death problem he had to solve not only for himself, but for his community. He spent more than a year understanding the problems and then together, with his team, created Watch Duty in just 80 days. Today Watch Duty has a team of over 200 active and retired wildland firefighters, dispatchers, first responders, and reporters supporting millions of citizens and first responders who rely on the Watch Duty App across the American West to stay safe.The Fire Problem is an education program that considers unresolved symptoms of The Fire Problem. This special podcast series will examine and explain underlying challenges and vulnerabilities with our climate, environment, politics, and vegetation. Conversations with conservationists, first responders, historians, politicians, scientists, technologists, tribal leaders, and more will help diagnose our situation with opportunities for treatment. Human influence is at the heart of The Fire Problem and our goal is to learn from past neglect and failure and plan for a future of education and prevention. Produced with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University with support from the Orange County Community Foundation.Guest: John MillsHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: July 17, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Chessie Thacher is a senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Northern California, where she devotes her time to First Amendment issues, government transparency, criminal justice reforms, and voting rights litigation.   Prior to joining the ACLU, Chessie worked as an attorney at Keker, Van Nest & Peters LLP, a San Francisco-based law firm that focuses on high-stakes litigation and trials. While at the firm, Chessie developed a dynamic pro bono practice, partnering with the ACLU on several amicus briefs that advocated for criminal justice and immigration-related reforms. A graduate of Stanford Law School, Chessie won the school’s Deborah L. Rhode Public Interest award and was a Levin Center Public Interest Fellow. Chessie Thacher has provided additional resources below:Know Your Rights - Free Speech at California Colleges and UniversitiesKnow Your Rights - Campus Protests and More: Student Discipline at California Colleges and UniversitiesChapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.Guest: Chessie ThacherHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: June 25, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Dr. Adwoa Opong is an Assistant Professor of History at Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University. Dr Opong earned a BA in history in the study of religions from the University of Ghana. She continued at the University of Ghana to pursue an MPhil in History, focusing on women’s organization and the nationalist struggles in Ghana. Adwoa received her PhD in History and also received her graduate certificate in the women, gender and sexuality studies program at Washington University. In addition to women and gender history, Adwoa has interests in the area of sexuality, postcolonial history and transnational feminism. She plans to broaden her study beyond Ghana in her examination of the professionalization of social work in post-colonial Africa.Justin de Leon, Ph.D. is the director of the Ethnic Studies program at Chapman University and is a Senior Advisor for the Mediation Program for University of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. De Leon earned his Ph.D. in international relations with a focus on feminist theory and indigeneity and is completing a book project entitled Resurgent Visual Sovereignty (University of Nebraska Press). His research focuses on Indigenous sovereignty and ontological security through storytelling and filmmaking. De Leon is exploring relational approaches to community-based filmmaking.Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on Gender and Sexuality is a series that explores how culture, power, institutions, and social structures shape our understandings of gender and sexuality.Guests: Dr. Adwoa Opong and Dr. Justin de LeonHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.Date recorded: June 18, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Takeo Rivera is a specialist in performance studies with a focus on race, sexuality, and gender in U.S. American cultural production. He is currently an Assistant Professor of English at Boston University.  His current project, Model Minority Masochism: Performing the Cultural Politics of Asian American Masculinity (Oxford University Press, April 2022) is focused on masochism and techno-orientalism in Asian American cultural production across multiple media, including theater, literature, graphic novels, historical archives, and video games.Dr. Rivera is also a playwright whose plays have been staged in New York City, Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay Area. His creative work explores race, masculinity, and sexuality at length. His play Goliath has been recognized by the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival, the New Works of Merit Playwriting Contest, and the Planet Connections Theater Festivity. He has also worked with Poetic Theater Productions, CompanyONE Theater and PlayGround San Francisco.Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on Gender and Sexuality is a series that explores how culture, power, institutions, and social structures shape our understandings of gender and sexuality.Guest: Takeo RiveraHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.Date recorded: May 08, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Abdi Soltani has served as the executive director of the ACLU of Northern California since 2009. During his tenure, he has pursued long-term priorities to deepen the ACLU’s presence in the California Central Valley and elevate the ACLU’s voice on state policy at the California state capitol. Through 2015, he co-chaired the Blue Ribbon Commission on Marijuana Policy with then Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom, where he helped draft the blueprint for safe and equitable legalization of marijuana in California. He has also worked on campaigns for racial justice, criminal justice reform, voting rights, and immigrants’ rights.Abdi is a graduate of Stanford University. He was awarded the John Gardner Public Service Fellowship in 1995, the Gerbode Foundation Fellowship in 2002 and the Levi Strauss Foundation Pioneer in Justice Fellowship in 2010. He also serves on the Advisory Board of Pars Equality Center, the Statewide Leadership Council of the Public Policy Institute of California, and the Board of the San Francisco Foundation.As an Iranian-American, Abdi is a champion of the 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution, educating the public about its origins in the movement to abolish slavery and its impacts for equality and freedom for all of us.Chapters is a multi-part series concerning the history and the lessons of civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices carried out against communities or populations—including civil rights violations or civil liberties injustices that are perpetrated on the basis of an individual’s race, national origin, immigration status, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.This project was made possible with support from Chapman University and The California Civil Liberties Public Education Program, a state-funded grant project of the California State Library.Guest: Abdi SoltaniHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: April 04, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

John Fischer has served as director of the Normal Public Library since 2023. In this role, Fischer leads teams responsible for the educational, cultural, informational and recreational resources provided by the library to enrich the quality of life for Normal citizens. Fischer has worked in public libraries for more than 20 years, including time at Bloomington Public Library and St. Louis County Library.Without Libraries was created to provide librarians a platform to share stories about education, discuss current programs, and consider life without libraries. Libraries provide access to information and educational resources, promoting literacy, critical thinking skills, and community building by offering a safe space for people to learn, research, and connect with others. Join the conversation at Past Forward.Guest: John FischerProduced by: Past ForwardPast Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

David Weinstein has been Trust for Public Land’s Western Conservation Finance Director for a decade. He advises local and state governments throughout the Western United States on how to design, pass, and implement legislative initiatives and ballot measures that create funding for land and water conservation and climate-smart solutions. A Wyss Foundation Fellow and Coloradoan, David has been involved in conservation politics and policy for more than a decade, formerly working for Outdoor Industry Association, U.S. Senator Mark Udall, and on Colorado Governor Hickenlooper’s first gubernatorial campaign. He chaired the Board of Directors for the Montana Conservation Corps, and previously volunteered for Alaska Wilderness League and the National Parks Conservation Association. David lives in Bozeman, MT and is an avid backcountry skier, mountain biker, boater, angler, runner, backpacker, birder, and packrafter.Hugh Coxe. As a project manager with Trust for Public Land, I identify and manage land protection projects that preserve open space of critical local, regional, and national importance in Southern California. Our land protection efforts focus on climate resilience, and I currently lead our California Wildfire Resilience program. Before joining TPL in 2020, I worked in land use and transportation planning and policy at both the local and state levels.The Fire Problem is an education program that considers unresolved symptoms of The Fire Problem. This special podcast series will examine and explain underlying challenges and vulnerabilities with our climate, environment, politics, and vegetation. Conversations with conservationists, first responders, historians, politicians, scientists, technologists, tribal leaders, and more will help diagnose our situation with opportunities for treatment. Human influence is at the heart of The Fire Problem and our goal is to learn from past neglect and failure and plan for a future of education and prevention. Produced with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University with support from the Orange County Community Foundation.Guests: David Weinstein and Hugh CoxeHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by: Past ForwardDate recorded: March 19, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Selicia Applegate is the Workshop Manager at Palatine Public Library. With over 10 years at the library, Selicia helped grow the department from a traditional tech support desk into a bustling makerspace that can run over 20 pieces of equipment at once—especially during the holidays.“I focus on hands-on, inclusive learning experiences through our makerspace. In 2024, I was honored with the ILA Crosman Memorial Award for innovation, dedication, and leadership potential. One highlight has been creating programs like our community freedom quilt and later teaching other librarians how to replicate that outreach. I deeply believe that libraries and makerspaces are vital hubs that foster creativity, collaboration, and lifelong learning. When we pair access to tools and technology with a safe space for inclusive experimentation, we don’t just support personal growth—we help strengthen the entire community.”Without Libraries was created to provide librarians a platform to share stories about education, discuss current programs, and consider life without libraries. Libraries provide access to information and educational resources, promoting literacy, critical thinking skills, and community building by offering a safe space for people to learn, research, and connect with others. Join the conversation at Past Forward.Guest: Selicia ApplegateProduced by: Past ForwardPast Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.

Micol Hebron is an interdisciplinary artist whose practice includes studio work, curating, writing, social media, crowd-sourcing, teaching, public-speaking, and both individual and collaborative projects. She has been engaged in individual and collaborative projects in Los Angeles since 1992. Hebron is an Associate Professor of Art at Chapman University; the founder/director of The Situation Room resource space for the creative community; the Gallery Tally Poster Project about gender equity in contemporary galleries; and the Digital Pasty/Gender Equity initiative for the internet.In the past she has been the Chief Curator at the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art; the director of the UCLA Summer Art Institute; an editorial board member at X-Tra magazine; an independent curator; a conservator at LACMA, and the co-founder of Gallery B-12 in Hollywood in the 90s. She has served on advisory boards at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Birch Creek Ranch Residency (Utah), Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and UCLA.She is the founder of the LA Art Girls, and the Co-Founder of Fontbron Academy. She employs strategies of consciousness-raising, collaboration, generosity, play, and participation to support and further feminist dialogues in art and life. Hebron has presented exhibitions, performances, and lectures at numerous international institutions.Engaging the World: Leading the Conversation on Gender and Sexuality is a series that explores how culture, power, institutions, and social structures shape our understandings of gender and sexuality.Guest: Micol HebronHost: Jon-Barrett IngelsProduced by Past Forward in partnership with Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at Chapman University.Date recorded: March 12, 2025Past Forward is providing this podcast as a public service. The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. Please read our Program and Product Disclaimer for more information.