1888: The How, The Why

Today Jonelle Strickland connects with Dr. Stephanie Takaragawa and Patti Hirahara. This episode was recorded live on October 6 at the Muzeo Museum and Cultural Center in Anaheim, CA.Dr. Stephanie Takaragawa is an Associate Professor of Sociology. Her research interests focus on issues of representation in film, mass media, art, performance, and cultural display. She is a founding member of the curatorial collective Ethnographic Terminalia. Her dissertation Visualizing Japanese-America: the Japanese American National Museum and the Construction of Identity examined the role of the Japanese American National Museum in the construction and dissemination of a Japanese-American identity.Patti Hirahara is an advocate in preserving the Japanese American legacy in the United States. She spoke at the FDR Presidential Library and Museum about the Japanese American incarceration and her family’s 2,000+ photographs taken and processed in a secret underground darkroom in a Wyoming Japanese incarceration camp during WWII.

Today Trevor Allred connects with Grace Talusan in collaboration with UCI and the Illuminations initiative.Grace Talusan was born in the Philippines and raised in New England. A graduate of Tufts University and the MFA Program in Writing at UC Irvine, she is the recipient of a U.S. Fulbright Fellowship to the Philippines and an Artist Fellowship Award from the Massachusetts Cultural Council. Talusan teaches the Essay Incubator at GrubStreet and at the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life at Tufts. She is the Fannie Hurst Writer-in-Residence at Brandeis University. The Body Papers, winner of the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing, is her first book.Building on UCI’s demonstrated excellence in the creative arts and cultural programming, Illuminations aims to ensure that all of our students, regardless of major, have serious and meaningful exposure to the creative arts. In addition, we seek to strengthen the connections between UCI and our regional arts and culture centers and institutions.Produce

A special live podcast featuring four of skateboarding’s brightest trailblazers: Jennifer Charlene, Briana King, Hilary Shanks and Victoria Taylor—four young women who are the essence of skateboarding’s DIY ethos, redefining what it means to be a skateboarder, and changing the landscape for future generations of women in skateboarding. Moderated by Robert Brink.This episode was recorded live on February 16 at the 1888 Center located in the Historic District of Old Towne Orange, CA.While growing up in Southern California, Jennifer Charlene trained in ballet & modern dance. In middle school, skateboarding naturally caught her attention. After completing the Royal Academy of dance curriculum, skating soon became a lifestyle for Jennifer, which she now spends most of her time doing.Briana King is a skateboarder, actress, and model born in East Los Angeles and has spent time working between Australia, LA, New York, and New Zealand, appearing in two feature films and a host of ads and editorials for the likes o

Erin Murphy is a fresh face in the music industry with a natural and sweet tone that goes hand-in-hand with her alternative pop singer/songwriter background. Her songs can be recognized by their subtle yet signature bluesy style which perfectly compliments Erin’s pop foundation. Getting involved in the music industry at a young age has boosted her career, writing and releasing her own single at the age of 15. Since then, Erin has released a second single while working alongside other artists, and last year independently released her debut EP titled "Real Life," which is a collection of songs based on her personal journey. Erin continues to work on new projects and collaborations.Sounds + Stories is an eclectic music series featuring live performances and entertaining discussions with emerging and established artists. Produced in collaboration with Brew Sessions Live. Special episodes are filmed and edited into a short documentary compilation with the audio from each episode recorded and archived for podcast.G

Sam Mihara is a second-generation Japanese American (Nisei) born and raised in San Francisco. When World War II broke out, the United States government forced Sam, age 9, and his family to move to the Heart Mountain, Wyoming camp. After the war ended, the family returned home to San Francisco.Sam attended UC Berkeley undergraduate and UCLA graduate schools, where he earned engineering degrees. He became a rocket scientist and joined the Boeing Company where he became an executive on space programs. Following retirement, Sam changed careers and is now a regular visiting lecturer at the University of California and is a national speaker on the topic of mass imprisonment in the U.S. He has visited many federal prisons including those for undocumented immigrants. Sam helped in the preservation of the Heart Mountain historic prison site in Northwest Wyoming and is now a board member of the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation, the non-profit organization that oversees the National Historic Landmark site.Sam speaks to

Dr. Stephanie Takaragawa is an Associate Professor of Sociology. Her research interests focus on issues of representation in film, mass media, art, performance, and cultural display. She is a founding member of the curatorial collective Ethnographic Terminalia. Her dissertation Visualizing Japanese-America: the Japanese American National Museum and the Construction of Identity examined the role of the Japanese American National Museum in the construction and dissemination of a Japanese-American identity. She is currently president of the Society for Visual Anthropology (2015-2017) a subsection of the American Anthropological Association. B.A., University of Southern California; M.A., Ph.D., Temple University.Patti Hirahara has been an advocate in preserving the Japanese American legacy in the United States and was a featured speaker at the FDR Presidential Library and Museum, last October, in Hyde Park, New York talking about the Japanese American incarceration and her family’s over 2,000 photographs processe

Dr. Kristine Dennehy is a history professor at California State University Fullerton, with a specialization in Japanese and Korean history. A Connecticut native, Dr. Dennehy majored in Japanese language at Georgetown University, completed her M.A. in Asian Studies at Sophia University in Tokyo, and received her Ph.D. in history at UCLA (2002) with a dissertation entitled “Memories of Colonial Korea in Postwar Japan.” In 2008-09, Dr. Dennehy served Historical Adviser for an oral history project interviewing over 80 Japanese-American veterans who had served in the Military Intelligence Service during the Allied Occupation of Japan (1945-1952) as interpreters and translators. She is a lifetime member of the Orange County Historical Society and the Fullerton Sister City Association and regularly presents her work to local and international audiences, including the Fullerton Public Library Town & Gown Series and the Asian Association of World Historians.Dr. Ester E. Hernández earned her Ph.D. in Social Science

Mary Adams Urashima is a historian, former journalist and freelance writer, with thirty years in media, governmental and public affairs, and author of Historic Wintersburg in Huntington Beach (History Press). She chairs the grassroots preservation effort to save the Furuta Gold Fish Farm and Wintersburg Japanese Mission property in Huntington Beach, known as Historic Wintersburg. Mary identified and named the historic property, which was designated one of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places in 2014 and one of America’s National Treasures in 2015.Mary has been researching and working to save Historic Wintersburg for almost nine years. Historic Wintersburg marks more than a century of Japanese American history and represents pioneer arrival and settlement in the American West, Orange County’s agricultural history, pioneer achievement, and the struggle for civil liberties. Everyone associated with the Furuta farm and Wintersburg Japanese Mission faced alien land laws and was forcibly removed from Califo

Luis Gómez moved to the United States at the age of 14 from Veracruz, Mexico and currently works at the LGBT Center OC as the Immigration Resources Specialist. He joined the Center’s team in 2015 after obtaining his Bachelor of Arts Degree in Psychology and Social Behavior from the University of California, Irvine. A beneficiary of the California Dream Act and DACA, Luis provides immigration resources to local LGBTQ individuals and fosters increased awareness and understanding about the intersectionalities of the immigrant and LGBTQ communities.  Chapters is a five-part Creative + Cultural Podcast series dedicated to stories surrounding the exclusion, forced removal, and internment of Japanese-Americans. The program also parallels a narrative thread through Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).Chapters is supported by the California Civil Liberties Public Education Program administered by the California State Library. This episode was recorded live on August 19 at the 1888 Center located in the Histo

A live recording of our educational podcast The Grammar of Science and Technology with Jennifer Anaya and Mark Essayian. Jennifer Anaya serves as vice president of marketing for Ingram Micro, where she is responsible for the strategic direction of marketing for the Americas, as well as leadership of Agency Ingram Micro. This year she was also appointed to serve as the global Executive Champion for Ingram Micro’s Trust X Alliance partner community. With nearly two decades of marketing experience, Jennifer has been recognized as one of the “Most Powerful Women in the IT Channel” by CRN Magazine, and regularly shares marketing and business best practices as a presenter at top industry events. Her career accomplishments include leading the successful development of Ingram Micro’s award-winning agency business. She has been instrumental in developing and evangelizing the Ingram Micro Americas’ ONE Ingram Micro value proposition, including creating strategies to showcase the business’ broad portfolio of products an

Breaking down the walls of a cubicle, Jake Bernard shed his 9-5 to return to his positive, feel-good roots. Reflecting his inner-optimist, Jake's beach-pop sound meshes the more colorful sides of Jason Mraz and John Mayer, and he's appeared at the Hotel Cafe, The Peppermint Club, BMI's Acoustic Lounge (Genghis Cohen), The Levitt Pavilion (with American Idol's Nick Fradiani), and The Bitter End. The Huffington Post recognizes his beach-pop sound as "intoxicating," and his love letter and tribute to Philadelphia, "City of Love," was recognized by Mayor Kenney and the Philadelphia Phillies.Sounds + Stories is an eclectic music series featuring live performances and entertaining discussions with emerging and established artists. Produced in collaboration with Brew Sessions Live. Special episodes are filmed and edited into a short documentary compilation with the audio from each episode recorded and archived for podcast.Guest: Jake BernardProduced by Past Forward in partnership with Brew Sessions Live.

A live recording of the 1888 Center Podcast with Francesca Lia Block and guest host, Samantha Dunn. Francesca Lia Block is the Lifetime Achievement Award winning author of over thirty acclaimed and widely translated books of fiction, non-fiction, short stories and poetry. She has also written a screenplay for Fox Searchlight and contributed essays, interviews and reviews to many publications including The Los Angeles Times, The Los Angeles Review of Books, Nylon and Spin. Francesca teaches at Antioch University, Los Angeles and UCLA Extension. Samantha Dunn is an editor at Coast Magazine. Her debut novel, Failing Paris, was a finalist for the PEN Center Fiction Award. Her memoir, Not By Accident: Reconstructing a Careless Life rose to bestseller lists in Los Angeles and San Francisco and her second memoir, Faith in Carlos Gomez, has been in production at  Lifetime Television. Sam’s work is widely anthologized, including the short story collection, Women on the Edge: Writing from Los Angeles, which she co-edi

A live recording of our educational podcast The Purpose of Past Tense with Pico Iyer. This program is themed on The Art of Stillness. Pico Iyer is the author of two novels and ten works of non-fiction, on subjects ranging from the Cuban Revolution to Islamic mysticism, from stillness to travel, and from forgotten nations of the world to the 21st century global order. An essayist for Time since 1986, he is a constant contributor to The New York Times, The New York Review of Books, Harper’s and more than 200 other newspapers and magazines worldwide, and he has published introductions to almost 60 other works. His books have been translated into more than 20 languages and both his 2008 meditation on the XIVth Dalai Lama, The Open Road, and his TED Book, The Art of Stillness, were national best-sellers. They have also made him a Guggenheim Fellow, a Pulitzer Prize nominee and a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Between 2012 and 2016, Pico Iyer delivered three talks for ted.com, and between them they

A live recording of our educational podcast The Purpose of Past Tense with Nachoem M. Wijnberg. Nachoem M. Wijnberg (Amsterdam, 1961) is a Dutch poet and novelist. His poetry has received many Dutch and Belgian awards, including the 2009 VSB Prize for the best book of poetry and the 2018 PC Hooft Prize, the most important literary career award in the Netherlands. His poetry has been translated into many languages, ranging from Chinese to Italian, and published in a wide range of journals, anthologies and books. Books in English include Advance Payment (Anvil Press/Carcanet, 2013), Divan of Ghalib (White Pine Press, 2016) and Of Great Importance (Punctum, 2018 Link). He is also a professor at the University of Amsterdam Business School. This event is co-hosted by Tabula Poetica and the Office of the President of Chapman University; see more at www.chapman.edu/poetry.     The Purpose of Past Tense A creative podcast dedicated to commitment and accomplishment. Focused on that moment when an idea becomes a succe

A live recording of our educational podcast The Purpose of Past Tense with Geoff Manaugh and guest moderator, Ryan Gattis. Geoff Manaugh is the author of the New York Times-bestselling book A Burglar’s Guide to the City (FSG Originals, 2016), as well as a freelance writer covering design, crime, infrastructure, and more for publications ranging from The New York Times Magazine to Businessweek. He lives in Los Angeles. Photo credit: Sasha Maslov/Wall Street Journal. Ryan Gattis is the author of SAFE, KUNG FU HIGH SCHOOL, and ALL INVOLVED: A Novel of the 1992 L.A. Riots, which won the American Library Association’s Alex Award and the Lire Award for Noir of the Year in France. He lives and writes in Los Angeles, where he is a member of street art crew UGLARworks, and a founding board member of 1888.     The Purpose of Past Tense A creative podcast dedicated to commitment and accomplishment. Focused on that moment when an idea becomes a success story, we ask innovative entrepreneurs to detail their journey from

A live recording of our educational podcast The Grammar of Science and Technology with Rebecca Skloot. This special program, entitled Dialogue on Bioethics: A Conversation with Rebecca Skloot, will be moderated by Dr. Andrew Lyon. Rebecca Skloot, a Presidential Fellow at Chapman University, is the author of the #1 New York Times Bestseller, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Her award winning science writing has appeared in The New York Times Magazine; O, The Oprah Magazine; Discover; and many other publications. She specializes in narrative science writing and has explored a wide range of topics, including goldfish surgery, tissue ownership rights, race and medicine, food politics, and packs of wild dogs in Manhattan. She has worked as a correspondent for WNYC’s Radiolab and PBS’s Nova ScienceNOW. She and her father, Floyd Skloot, co-edited The Best American Science Writing 2011. You can read a selection of Rebecca Skloot’s magazine writing on the Articles page of her site This event is co-hosted by Tab

A live recording of our educational podcast The Grammar of Science and Technology with Dr. Michael Shermer. Dr. Michael Shermer is the Publisher of Skeptic magazine, a monthly columnist for Scientific American, and a Presidential Fellow at Chapman University. He is the author of The Moral Arc, The Believing Brain, Why People Believe Weird Things, Why Darwin Matters, The Mind of the Market, How We Believe, and The Science of Good and Evil. His next book is Heavens on Earth: The Scientific Search for Immortality, the Afterlife, and Utopia. His two TED talks, viewed nearly 8 million times, were voted in the top 100 of the more than 2000 TED talks. Michael Shermer on stage at TED2014 - The Next Chapter, All-Stars Session 5 - The Future of Ours, March 17-21, 2014, Vancouver Convention Center, Vancouver, Canada. Photo: Bret Hartman     The Grammar of Science and Technology In 1902, Albert Einstein gifted a book, Karl Pearson’s The Grammar of Science, to his colleagues to start a conversation about the universe.

A live recording of our educational podcast The Grammar of Science and Technology with Adam Becker. Adam Becker is a physicist and science writer. He has written for the BBC and New Scientist, and has also recorded a video series with the BBC.  Adam earned a PhD in astrophysics from the University of Michigan and a BA in philosophy and physics from Cornell. He is currently a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley’s Office for History of Science and Technology; he lives in Oakland, California. Produced in partnership with Chapman University, Institute for Quantum Studies.     The Grammar of Science and Technology In 1902, Albert Einstein gifted a book, Karl Pearson’s The Grammar of Science, to his colleagues to start a conversation about the universe. Expanding on that conversation, we invite a variety of experts to share the stories behind landmark advancements and discoveries in the fields of science and technology. Recorded in front of a live audience at the 1888 Center, this educational program is designed as

Héctor Tobar is the Los Angeles-born author of four books, including the novels The Tattooed Soldier and The Barbarian Nurseries. His non-fiction Deep Down Dark: The Untold Stories of Thirty-Three Men Buried in a Chilean Mine and the Miracle that Set Them Free, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize: it was also a New York Times bestseller and adapted into the film The 33. The Barbarian Nurseries was a New York Times Notable Book and won the California Book Award Gold Medal for fiction. Tobar‘s fiction has also appeared in Zyzzyva and in Best American Short Stories 2016. He earned his MFA in Creative Writing from the University of California, Irvine, and has taught writing and journalism at Pomona College and the University of Oregon; he is currently an associate professor at UC Irvine. As a journalist, he was a foreign correspondent with the Los Angeles Times in Buenos Aires and Mexico City, and a part of the reporting team that earned a Pulitzer Prize

We took our Why We Write project on the road with an Orange County Tour. Live events were produced throughout Orange County and featured author readings from curated essay submissions. This event was recorded live at 1888 Center in Orange, California. Produced in partnership with Brew Sessions, Anaheim Packing District and The LAB.  1888 Center programs are recorded and archived as a free educational resource on our website or with your favorite podcast app including Apple and Spotify. Each interdisciplinary episode is designed to provide a unique platform for industry innovators to share stories about art, literature, music, history, science, or technology. Producers: Trevor Allred and Kevin Staniec Audio and Video: Brew Sessions Host: Sara Guerrero Moderator: Eric Morago Guests: Fisayo Adeyeye, Shelley Armenta, Abigail Ayulo, Jonathan Donabo, Elias Fulmer, Sara Guerrero, Liz Harmer, Carla Huezo, Jose Jaimes, Rebekah LeRoux, Brian Lin, Nick Mauer, Corin Reyburn, T.J. Reynolds, Julie Schulter, and Kristy Tat