Code Switch

News stories of conflict involving people of color raise questions about the role of diversity in newsrooms...

Failure can be devastating, but it can also make us stronger and smarter. This week, TED speakers explore how failure clears the way for success, in our everyday work, and our innermost lives.

The day after the police shooting of Philando Castile, hundreds of young Asian Americans connected online to write an open letter to their parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles, asking them to support movements like Black Lives Matter. It also broached a subject many felt deeply uncomfortable bringing up to their older relatives: anti-black racism in Asian American communities. The letter has set off countless conversations across generations of immigrant families in many different languages...

Aging is inevitable. We can slow it down a little, but could we ever bring it to a grinding halt? In this episode, TED speakers explore how we all might live longer and even better lives. (Original broadcast date: May 22, 2015).

When Philando Castile was killed by a police officer during a recent traffic stop, it was the last of at least 46 times he had been pulled over by police. How does that happen? And what does it say about policing in communities of color? Gene Demby talks with NPR's Cheryl Corley and Eyder Peralta, who reported on Castile's encounters with local police.

For thousands of years, we've searched to answer the question: Who are we? Today, science has brought us closer than ever to the answer. This hour, TED speakers share ideas on what makes us ... us.

In the aftermath of deadly police shootings of black men and the deaths of five policemen by at the hands of a black gunman, Shereen Marisol Meraji and Gene Demby explore perspectives on policing while black...

It's hard to figure out what to say after the horrific violence of the last week, which began with two new viral videos of police shooting black men and ended with a deadly attack by a black gunman on police officers. But Shereen Marisol Meraji, Gene Demby along with Kat Chow of the Code Switch Team got some help from a Dallas resident as well as Harvard historian Khalil Gibran Muhammad, who has written extensively about race, crime and policing.

Our relationship with animals is complicated: we love and fear them; hunt, consume and protect them. In this hour, TED speakers explore what happens when humans and animals interact. (Original broadcast date: September 5, 2014).

Why do some people of color embrace the American flag while others refuse to wave it? Gene Demby and Adrian Florido unpack the complicated patriotism and evolving use of the flag with immigrant rights protesters and Native American veterans.