Jason Loviglio with Aaron Henkin: EMPATHY MACHINES

Join us for a conversation with Jason Loviglio, author of Empathy Machines: This American Life, Podcasting, and the Public Radio Structure of Feeling.

The first book-length treatment of This American Life, Empathy Machines identifies the public radio program as a central cultural institution in the evolution of empathy as a "liberal feeling" central to podcast storytelling and the neoliberal era in which it developed. It revitalized the public radio traditions of investigative journalism and sonically inventive audio production, and ushered in appointment listening, a key innovation and disruption in the emerging chaotic attention economy of the 21st century.

Join us on the patio on July 21st to hear more and think more deeply about the program you may have encountered throughout your life.

Aaron Henkin, who has created and produced original radio programs and podcasts for WYPR, will join Jason Loviglio in conversation.

Order EMPATHY MACHINES here!

Jason Loviglio is professor and founding chair of Media and Communication Studies at The University of Maryland, Baltimore County. He is author of Empathy Machines: This American Life, Podcasting, and the Public Radio Structure of Feeling. He is co-editor The Routledge Companion to Radio and Podcast Studies, Radio’s New Wave, and Radio Reader: Essays in the History of Radio. He also co-edits Radio Journal: International Studies in Broadcast and Audio Media. He lives in Baltimore, MD.

Aaron is co-host of The Stoop Storytelling Series Podcast. Before that, he created and produced original radio programs and podcasts for WYPR, including The Maryland Curiosity Bureau. Aaron's neighborhood documentary series, Out of the Blocks, earned the 2018 national Edward R Murrow Award. His past work includes the long-running weekly cultural program, The Signal, and the Smithsonian Folkways Recordings series, Tapestry of the Times. Aaron's stories have aired nationally on NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered.