Podcast: “Listen in, Michigan”

  1. Episode 50: Making ‘the Joy Choice,’ featuring Michelle Segar, PhD/MPH/MS

    The simplistic concept of self-control is highly overrated when it comes to changing our eating and exercise habits, says award-winning researcher and health coach Michelle Segar. Listen in, as she turns that old behavior-change paradigm on its head.

  2. Episode 49: Remembering Jim Toy, featuring Scott Dennis

    In 1971, this LGBTQ+ pioneer helped establish U-M’s Human Sexuality Office — later becoming the Spectrum Center. Listen in, as U-M librarian and Toy’s friend Scott Dennis, MS ’90, recounts the late humanist’s extraordinary legacy. Toy passed away Jan. 1, 2022.

  3. Episode 48: Tales of a G-Man, featuring Greg Stejskal

    A month into Greg Stejskal’s gig as an FBI agent in Detroit, Jimmy Hoffa went missing. Listen in, as this retired G-man recounts some of the most captivating cases in his 31-year career — from unmasking Ann Arbor’s notorious drug dealer ‘the Joker’ to identifying the ‘Unabomber.’ It’s all in his book, ‘FBI Case Files: Michigan.’

  4. Episode 47: Sing to the Colors, featuring James Tobin

    Michigan Today readers know what a talented writer we have in author/historian and Michigan alum James Tobin. In this collection of fascinating stories about U-M history, Tobin reveals his entanglement and profound affection for the University of Michigan, its complexity, and the role scholarship plays in society.

  5. Episode 46: Scents and sensibilities, featuring Michelle Krell Kydd

    Humans don’t give our sense of smell enough respect, says Ann Arbor’s ‘professional nose’ Michelle Krell Kydd. Listen in, as Krell Kydd describes her favorite scentscapes in Ann Arbor and reveals how smell can enhance experiential education, cultural awareness, and more.

  6. Episode 45: Wisdom and whimsy, featuring David Zinn

    When local treasure David Zinn spots his imaginary friends – Sluggo, Nadine, and Philomena the Flying Pig – he draws them into life amid the cracks and flaws on our local sidewalks. But this man is no mere ‘Artist.’ He is Mr. Rogers, the Wizard of Oz, and a Buddha with a box of chalk. Listen in, as Zinn inspires us to look beyond what the eye can see.

  7. Episode 44: The (commencement) song remains the same

    Mark Twain is credited with saying, ‘History doesn’t repeat itself, but it often rhymes.’ The same could be said for commencement speeches. Listen in, as we revisit the most inspiring lines from past University of Michigan commencement speakers like Lawrence Kasdan, Joyce Carol Oates, Ken Burns, and more.

  8. Episode 43: Art’s tangible effect, featuring Wendell Pierce

    You may know him as Bunk from ‘The Wire’ or Antoine from ‘Treme,’ but University Musical Society audiences know him as a ‘digital residency artist.’ Actor Wendell Pierce stars in the stage play ‘Some Old Black Man,’ produced and filmed under quarantine in Detroit. Listen in, as he describes making live art under incredibly weird circumstances.

  9. Episode 42: The Interior Life of Albert Kahn, featuring Claire Zimmerman

    Experts tend to dismiss the architect behind U-M’s most iconic buildings as ‘generic’ or ‘mediocre.’ They miss the point, says Claire Zimmerman, University of Michigan historian of art and architecture. To Albert Kahn, space was not a material to be sculpted but something to be occupied. Listen in, as she recounts Kahn’s impact on campus.