Accessibility links
Julie Caine Julie Caine is supervising senior editor for NPR's Throughline.
Headshot of Julie Caine
Stories By

Julie Caine

Tuesday

Octavia Butler: Visionary Fiction‬
Joelle Avelino

It's Been a Minute

Octavia Butler: Visionary Fiction‬

A special episode from our friends at NPR's history podcast Throughline: Octavia Butler's alternate realities and 'speculative fiction' reveal striking, and often devastating parallels to the world we live in today. She was a deep observer of the human condition, perplexed and inspired by our propensity towards self-destruction. But along with her warning is her message of hope - a hope conjured by centuries of survival and persistence. For every society that perishes in her books comes a story of rebuilding, of repair.

Octavia Butler: Visionary Fiction‬

Listen · 1:07:29
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/970148701/1199267819" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Thursday

What Happened After Civilization Collapsed

The Course of Empire (1836) by Thomas Cole. VCG Wilson/Getty Images hide caption

toggle caption
VCG Wilson/Getty Images

Throughline

What Happened After Civilization Collapsed

What happens after everything falls apart? The end of the Bronze Age was a moment when an entire network of ancient civilizations collapsed, leaving behind only clues to what happened. Today, scholars have pieced together a story where everything from climate change to mass migration to natural disasters played a role. What the end of the Bronze Age can teach us about avoiding catastrophe and what comes after collapse.

What Happened After Civilization Collapsed

Listen · 56:37
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/955735429/1200556869" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Thursday

The Anatomy Of Autocracy: Masha Gessen

Former President Donal Trump speaks from a Jumbotron screen as crowds gather for the "Stop the Steal" rally just before a mob descended on the Capitol. Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Images hide caption

toggle caption
Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Images

Throughline

The Anatomy Of Autocracy: Masha Gessen

Russian-born journalist Masha Gessen talks to us about how the rule of the people becomes the rule of the one, the role of the media, and what we can learn about the building blocks of autocracy from the work of philosopher and writer Hannah Arendt, and what history tells us are the ways to dismantle it.

The Anatomy Of Autocracy: Masha Gessen

Listen · 43:54
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/960766489/1200556873" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Thursday

The Anatomy of Autocracy: Timothy Snyder

Police clash with supporters of US President Donald Trump who breached security and entered the Capitol building in Washington D.C. Mostafa Bassim/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images hide caption

toggle caption
Mostafa Bassim/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Analysis

Throughline

The Anatomy of Autocracy: Timothy Snyder

When a mob of pro-Trump supporters violently stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, they also incited a defining moment in United States history. Now what? Historian Timothy Snyder talks to us about how we got here and what an insurrection could mean for the future of America.

The Anatomy of Autocracy: Timothy Snyder

Listen · 38:28
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/958828047/1200556877" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Thursday

Impeachment

The impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson in the Senate on March 13, 1868. The House approved 11 articles of impeachment against Andrew Johnson. After a 74-day Senate trial, the Senate acquitted Johnson on three of the articles by a one-vote margin each and decided not to vote on the remaining articles. Library of Congress/Getty Images hide caption

toggle caption
Library of Congress/Getty Images

Throughline

Impeachment

When Andrew Johnson became president in 1865, the United States was in the midst of one of its most volatile chapters. The country was divided after fighting a bloody civil war and had just experienced the first presidential assassination. We look at how these factors led to the first presidential impeachment in American history.

Impeachment

Listen · 19:04
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/956405668/1200556881" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Thursday

Supreme
Kaz Fantone

Throughline

Supreme

When, why, and how did the Supreme Court get the final say in the law of the land? The question of the Court's role, and whether its decisions should reign above all the other branches of government, has been hotly debated for centuries. And that's resulted in a Supreme Court more powerful than anything the Founding Fathers could have imagined possible.

Supreme

Listen · 1:00:09
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/943937968/1200556903" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Thursday

The Modern White Power Movement
Connie Jin

Throughline

The Modern White Power Movement

It has been nearly twenty years since 9/11 and during that time much of the media coverage and government attention has been directed at the threat of radical Islamist terrorism. Yet, during that time, it has been domestic terrorism from armed, mostly white American men, that has posed the biggest threat. This week, the rise of the modern white power movement.

The Modern White Power Movement

Listen · 49:45
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/940825490/1200556907" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Thursday

The Invention of Race

Portrait of Dr. Franz Boas. Corbis via Getty Images hide caption

toggle caption
Corbis via Getty Images

Throughline

The Invention of Race

The idea that race is a social construct comes from the pioneering work of anthropologist Franz Boas. During a time when race-based science and the eugenics movement were becoming mainstream, anthropologist Franz Boas actively sought to prove that race was a social construct, not a biological fact.

The Invention of Race

Listen · 40:54
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/936346847/1200556915" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Thursday

The Shadows of the Constitution

The preamble to the US Constitution. Joe Sohm/Visions of America/Universal Images Group via Getty hide caption

toggle caption
Joe Sohm/Visions of America/Universal Images Group via Getty

Throughline

The Shadows of the Constitution

The Constitution is like America's secular bible, our sacred founding document. In her play, What the Constitution Means to Me, Heidi Schreck goes through a process of discovering what the document is really about – who wrote it, who it was for, who it protected and who it didn't. Through Heidi's personal story, we learn how the Constitution and how it has been interpreted have affected not just her family but generations of Americans.

The Shadows of the Constitution

Listen · 44:19
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/933825483/1200556923" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Thursday

The Most Sacred Right
Kaz Fantone

Throughline

The Most Sacred Right

Frederick Douglass dreamed of a country where all people could vote and he did everything in his power to make that dream a reality. In the face of slavery, the Civil War and the violence of Jim Crow, he fought his entire life for what he believed was a sacred, natural right that should be available to all people - voting.

The Most Sacred Right

Listen · 1:03:32
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/919532810/1200556931" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Thursday

How We Vote
Kaz Fantone

Throughline

How We Vote

Drunken brawls, coercion, and lace curtains. Believe it or not, how regular people vote was not something the founding fathers thought much about, or planned for. Americans went from casting votes at drunken parties in the town square to private booths behind a drawn curtain. In this episode, the process of voting; how it was originally designed, who it was intended for, moments in our country's history when we reimagined it altogether, and what we're left with today.

How We Vote

Listen · 58:19
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/919532786/1200556935" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Tuesday

Presenting Throughline: 'James Baldwin's Fire'

James Baldwin poses while at home in Saint Paul de Vence, South of France during September of 1985. Ulf Andersen/Getty Images hide caption

toggle caption
Ulf Andersen/Getty Images

It's Been a Minute

Presenting Throughline: 'James Baldwin's Fire'

Writer and thinker James Baldwin used the power of his words to confront in order to connect, something that feels especially relatable in a year when the United States has been forced to reckon with racial inequality. This week we share an episode from our friends at NPR's Throughline, about James Baldwin, his life and philosophy, and what we can learn from him to lead us into the future.

Presenting Throughline: 'James Baldwin's Fire'

Listen · 46:12
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/920765711/1199267987" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">

Tuesday

Shopping On Shore Leave: How Seafarers Head To The Mall

First Officer Dheeraj Singh spends most of his time at the helm of a container ship, but on a three-hour shore leave from the Port of Oakland, he visits Old Navy at Bay Street Mall in Emeryville, Calif. Julie Caine/KALW hide caption

toggle caption
Julie Caine/KALW

Business

Shopping On Shore Leave: How Seafarers Head To The Mall

KALW

Most of us pack a lot of trips to the mall into the weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas. But what if you could only go shopping for just a few hours once a month?

Shopping On Shore Leave: How Seafarers Head To The Mall

Listen · 3:55
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/371223523/371253687" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Sunday

The Nile Project: Producing Harmony In A Divided Region

A group of Nile Project musicians play together at the Ndere Cultural Centre, Kampala, Uganda in January 2013. Left to right: Dina El Wedidi, Dafaalla El Hag, Lawrence Okello, Kasiva Mutua. Julie Caine hide caption

toggle caption
Julie Caine

Music News

The Nile Project: Producing Harmony In A Divided Region

It began as a conversation over a beer. Now, a collaboration between musicians across the Nile basin has expanded to concert tours, albums and courses at universities in the U.S. and East Africa.

The Nile Project: Producing Harmony In A Divided Region

Listen · 6:49
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/347733976/348412200" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript

Sunday

Opinion

In Uganda, The Fastest Public Transport Is DIY

Stand on any corner in Kampala, Uganda, and you'll be swarmed by motorcycles. These are boda bodas, the country's DIY public transportation system. For $1, you can get pretty much anywhere.

In Uganda, The Fastest Public Transport Is DIY

Listen · 2:59
Transcript
  • Download
  • <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/299708768/299708769" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player">
  • Transcript