Call Your Girlfriend

We say goodbye, in the final episode of Call Your Girlfriend. In typical fashion, we're going out talking about how friends have been helping us get through the pandemic, the never-ending furor over Joe Rogan, and what podcasts we're loving. If you're looking to subscribe to something new, check out Do You Know Mordechai, Sweet Bobby, and Like a Virgin. Plus, what we're going to do next, and some of your voicemails. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We're not dead yet! Aminatou talks with legendary podcast, poet and essayist Nichole Perkins about navigating relationships as a Black woman, desire, boundaries, longing, and much more as we chat about her new book, Sometimes I Trip on How Happy We Could Be. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Is there anything you miss from before the internet? Reading, focus, getting lost, filing cabinets, are just a few of the things New York Times Book Review editor Pamela Paul discusses with us. Her new book is 100 Things We've Lost to the Internet.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A different kind of newsy episode with Aminatou, Ann and Gina.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We talk with one of our favorite writers, The New Yorker's Ariel Levy, about dynastic wealth, how we experience grief, and big surprises in life, including the joys of getting older and having children. Her podcast that chronicles maternity wear icon Liz Lange, of the New York Steinbergs is The Just Enough Family. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Can’t be that hard, right? We pass the mic to Nereya Otieno, one of Ann’s 2021 writing fellows, who sits down with two women who have started initiatives to improve the lives of a select few in hopes that it can spark a radical shift. Tia Korpe is the founder of Future Female Sounds, a nonprofit organization based in Copenhagen that aims to make DJing accessible to women and gender-minorities everywhere. Cybille St. Aude-Tate is a chef and children’s book author and the co-founder of Honeysuckle Projects, a multifaceted endeavor to engage community and lineage through nourishment with Afrocentric ideologies at the center. And Nereya is in the process of starting Rising Artist Foundation, an organization to give grants to musicians who typically fall outside the existing funding system. They all redefine the idea of entrepreneurship as an act in service of community.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We talk with Mayukh Sen about seven immigrant women who remade American cuisine and his new book, Taste Makers. Plus, racism in the worlds of food writing and publishing and who gets to break out.   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Women over 50 are too often erased, including on this very podcast. Grace Bonney has been collecting inspiration and advice from women of more advanced experience in her new book, Collective Wisdom. She's gathered interviews and intergenerational conversations with over 100 trailblazing women, who describe the ups, downs, and lessons learned while forging their unique paths. Grace Bonney founded Design*Sponge, a daily website dedicated to the creative community, and Good Company, a print magazine at the intersection of creativity and business. In 2019, she shuttered both of these publications to focus more on in-person community, and she’s currently in graduate school training to become a therapist. She is the author of In the Company of Women: Inspiration and Advice from Over 100 Makers, Artists, and Entrepreneurs. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Grief can come in so many forms and impact us in unexpected ways. Illustrator and designer Ngaio Parr knows all too well, having lost four family members in four years. Retreating from family and friends? Strange physical symptoms? Suddenly seeing things everywhere that echo a lost loved one? All these normal forms of grieving can be confusing in a world that's all too ready to have you move on. To help, Ngaio has designed and illustrated The Grief Companion, a deck of cards with beautiful abstract watercolor images with prompts, insights and actions, for the moments when you can only do a little bit at a time. Plus, we discuss how to be there for friends who are grieving. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Yasi Salek's podcast Bandsplain has us listening to music like teens again, with obsessive curiosity about whole albums and the quirks and life stories that draw us into the artists we come to love, or learn more about canonical artists we never understood.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

George McCalman is an artist, a writer, an illustrator, and a designer. This man does it ALL. He spent many years as a magazine creative director, shaping the look and feel of publications such as Mother Jones, Readymade, Afar. Then he opened up his own studio, McCalman Co, where he collaborates on branding, design, and editorial projects. This year his work was nominated for a National Design Award for communication design. He’s a writer. He shows his fine art in galleries. He created the Observed column for the San Francisco Chronicle, in which he illustrated his observations of the city’s cultural life. Recently, he worked on chef Bryant Terry’s new book, Black Food, which is a gorgeous tribute to the foodways of the African diaspora and is out next week. George is also deep in the work of creating Illustrated Black History: Honoring the Iconic and the Unseen, which will be out next year. LINKS McCalman.co Return to Sender / Tell Me Three Things I Can Do Illustrated Black History Black FoodSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

How fixed are we in our ways of being and doing things? We're always confronting change, but how much can we choose it? These are some of the big ideas through small moments Jade Chang tackles in her Audible Original, You've Already Changed Your Life: A Recipe for a Revelation. Jade is a friend of the podcast, deep thinker, and author of the excellent novel, The Wangs vs. The World.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In a special episode brought to you by Rewire News Group, we go deep on the conservative push to regulate and ban abortion in Texas and Mississippi with Imani Gandy and Jessica Mason Pieklo of the Boom Lawyered podcast. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Emily Ladau and Kelly Dawson return to dispel dull narratives around disability and go beyond the 101. How coping with fragility creates resilience. How friendships deepen with the knowing and trust that disabled people share. What allyship looks like to them as physically disabled women. The hypocrisies of non-disabled people's reactions to COVID, and, in its wake, how we can all look more closely at what it means to live a full life. LINKS: Kelly Dawson Emily Ladau Emily’s new book, Demystifying Disability  Demystifying Disability, Emily and Kelly’s 2019 conversation for CYG On becoming friends with a non-disabled person - Cup of Jo What is disabled motherhood like? - Cup of JoSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Dr. Anita Hill made history in 1991 when she testified to the Senate Judiciary committee about the sexual harassment perpetrated against her by Clarence Thomas. After the all-white, all-male committee led by then-Senator Joe Biden heard Dr. Hill's testimony, Clarence Thomas was confirmed to the US Supreme Court.  In the 30 years since, Anita Hill has spent her career as a law professor hearing from survivors of gender-based violence, ranging from harassment (which she expected) to assault. In her new book, Believing, she connects the dots between the systems that empower abuse and minimize vulnerable people, and the culture that keeps us as bystanders. From that history, she tackles the policy solutions we'll need to reform the system from the inside and the social courage we'll need to muster to transform it.  As Dr. Hill's book focuses on gender-based violence and discrimination, there is factual discussion in this episode about the existence of sexual harassment, assault and abuse. Survivors, please take good care when listening.  Links: Believing Anita Hill’s opening statement in her 1991 testimony Biden expresses regret to Anita Hill From the CYG archive: Joe Biden ProblemsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A simple question with loaded answers.  On today's episode, we unravel a few of those knots with Courtney Martin and Dr. Dena Simmons, whose interracial friendship has weathered distance, accountability, academic rigor, heartbreak, and mutual support. They met over a decade ago when Courtney profiled Dena for her book about young activists, Do It Anyway. At the time, Dena was a classroom teacher. Since then she has earned her PhD and is writing her own book about breaking up with whiteness, the forthcoming White Rules for Black People. Dena also gave Courtney notes on a subsequent book, Learning in Public, about Courtney's decision to send her white child to her neighborhood school in Oakland, rather than seeking a private school or other public school that centered whiteness. Dena's notes and questions to Courtney are included in footnotes and strikeouts in the main text.  This is a conversation about building better schools, deeper community, and how friendship can be at the heart of our activism.  Learning in Public by Courtney Martin Dena's website Courtney's websiteSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Don't today's conspiracy theories make UFOs and JFK conspiracy theories seem quaint, almost sweet? Dr. Stacy Wood breaks down how independent communities of belief have accelerated online. It's not only the fault of social media, but as we reorganize how we search and find information, Facebook, YouTube, Google, and others are all part of how we have become so entrenched in our beliefs. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Comedy and art criticism don't exactly sound like parallel career paths. But after bouncing from a freelance hustle to a fancy art world job to improv classes, Christina Catherine Martinez realized she wanted to do both. We talk about how she navigates making a life and a career as an intellectual and a comedian, how alike those performances are on social media, and how power and money infect everything. One place she is sharing her voice is in her book, Aesthetical Relations. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

As OnlyFans flips and flops on the sex workers that built its platform, we revisit our interview with Lorelei Lee on the history of sex work legislation. Lorelei is a writer and performer who discusses how sex work is neither purely exploitative nor purely empowering. Instead, like all work, it's complicated.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Miranda Bennett has long been one of our favorite designers. We discuss how she got started making and selling clothes, how she balances running a sustainable business with keeping the lights on, and tips for shopping sustainably (even though we know there is no ethical consumption under capitalism).See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.