Berkeley Talks

The Page Act and the making of racialized US immigration control

12 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Before there was the Chinese Exclusion Act, there was the Page Act. Passed in 1875 amid growing anti-Chinese sentiment in the 19th century, the P...

For Nobel laureate Randy Schekman, it all began with pond scum and a toy microscope

28 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When UC Berkeley Professor Randy Schekman was 12, he scooped up a jar of pond scum and examined it under his toy microscope.“I just could not believ...

The complicated role of media in motherhood

14 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the early 20th century, prominent figures in psychology, psychiatry and pediatrics in the U.S. began to promote a new standard for mothers: that th...

Top Biden official calls for unity, ‘moral courage’ in public service

01 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The United States is in a moment like no other in recent history, says Deb Haaland, former President Joe Biden's secretary of the Interior Department ...

How Berkeley became a powerhouse for innovation and startups

17 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

UC Berkeley is widely considered a leader in innovation and startups. Pitchbook university rankings from 2025 announced, for the third year in a row, ...

Long said to be ‘too big to fail,’ the ocean needs a new narrative

03 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In this Berkeley Talks episode, renowned marine ecologist Jane Lubchenco discusses how a persistent narrative that the ocean is “too big to fail” ...

Alva Noë on how art allows us to see everyday things anew

19 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In his 2023 book The Entanglement, UC Berkeley philosopher Alva Noë argues that human nature is not a fixed phenomenon, and that art acts as a kind o...

How forgiveness changes you and your brain

05 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As the science director at UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, Emiliana Simon-Thomas thinks a lot about how prosocial emotions and behaviors ...

Nobel laureate Jennifer Doudna on CRISPR and the future of gene editing

22 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For UC Berkeley’s Jennifer Doudna, the revolutionary discovery of CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing began 15 years ago with a meeting at the campus’s Free ...

Berkeley scholars unpack what's at stake for U.S. democracy

08 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Every spring semester, UC Berkeley Assistant Professor Shereen Marisol Meraji teaches a class on race and journalism. In the course, she and her stude...

Economist on the benefits of a (modest) billionaire tax

25 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In this Berkeley Talks episode, economist Gabriel Zucman discusses how wealth inequality and billionaire wealth has soared in recent decades, promptin...

Ezra Klein on building the things we need for the future we want (revisiting)

11 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Today we are revisiting an October 2023 Berkeley Talks episode in which Ezra Klein, a New York Times columnist and host of the podcast The Ezra Klein ...

How the tobacco industry drove the rise of ultra-processed foods

27 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In the early 1960s, R.J. Reynolds, one of the largest and most profitable tobacco companies in the U.S. at the time, wanted to diversify its business....

Energy justice expert on his pursuit for affordable and clean energy for all

13 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 228, Tony Reames, a professor of environmental justice at the University of Michigan, discusses how the U.S. energy system h...

A debate on how to feed the world without ‘eating the earth’

30 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

By 2050, the global population is expected to reach about 10 billion people. That means we need to find a way to feed nearly 2 billion more mouths in ...

Daniel Handler (aka Lemony Snicket) on reading the authors you want to write like

16 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It took nearly six years for bestselling author Daniel Handler to sell his first book, a satirical novel called The Basic Eight. When his agent sold i...

In 1970, one in five Americans moved every year. Now it’s one in 13. What changed?

02 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 225, The Atlantic journalists Yoni Appelbaum and Jerusalem Demsas discuss the decline of housing mobility in the United Stat...

The case for a philosophical life, with Agnes Callard and Judith Butler

18 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates is considered the father of Western philosophy, one whose most famous ideas have all but risen to the level of ...

J Finley on how Black women use sass to claim their humanity

04 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When J Finley arrived at UC Berkeley as a graduate student in 2006, she planned on studying reparations and the legacy of slavery. But after a fellows...

Law professors debate the merits of originalism

21 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks podcast episode 222, UC Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky and Brian Fitzpatrick, the Milton R. Underwood Chair in Free Enterprise ...

Heather Cox Richardson on the evolution of the Republican Party

07 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 221, American historian Heather Cox Richardson joins Dylan Penningroth, a UC Berkeley professor of law and history, in a con...

UC Berkeley political scientist asks: Does democracy work?

21 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

If someone asked you to describe democracy in one word, what would you say? An October 2024 survey by the Political Psychology of American Democracy P...

How hospitals collect medical debts can hurt patients. Why?

07 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

When Luke Messac began his emergency medicine residency at Rhode Island Hospital in 2018, he noticed a lot of his patients came to him concerned about...

Coming of age as an unaccompanied migrant youth in the U.S.

24 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 218, sociology professor Stephanie Canizales discusses her 2024 book, Sin Padres, Ni Papeles, about the experiences of undoc...

A blueprint for creating a world where everyone belongs

10 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 217, john a. powell and Stephen Menendian, director and assistant director of UC Berkeley’s Othering and Belonging Institu...

Poet Ocean Vuong on disobedience and the power of language

27 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 216, celebrated poet and novelist Ocean Vuong joins in conversation with UC Berkeley English Professor Cathy Park Hong, a po...

How do we make better decisions?

13 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 215, a cross-disciplinary panel of UC Berkeley professors, whose expertise ranges from political science to philosophy, disc...

Veteran news editors on how the media covered the election

29 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 214, former editors of the New York Times and the Washington Post, Dean Baquet and Marty Baron, eva...

Computational folklorist on how storytelling becomes belief

15 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 213, Timothy Tangherlini, a UC Berkeley professor in the Department of Scandinavian and director of the Folklore Graduate Pr...

The future of American democracy

01 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 212, a panel of UC Berkeley experts from former presidential administrations take a critical look at the issues that have le...

A return to monarchy? Bradley Onishi on Project 2025

18 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 211, Bradley Onishi, a scholar of religion, an ex-evangelical minister and the co-host of the politics podcast Straight Whit...

With white helmets and GoPros, these volunteers risk it all in Syria’s civil war

04 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2011, mass protests erupted in Syria against the four-decade authoritarian rule of the Assad family. The uprising, which became part of the larger ...

Legal scholars on free speech challenges facing universities today

20 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 209, renowned legal scholars Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of Berkeley Law, and Nadine Strossen, professor emerita of the New York...

What is understanding? Berkeley scholars discuss

06 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 208, three UC Berkeley professors from a wide range of disciplines — psychology, biology and ethnic studies — broach a d...

It’s not just psychedelics that change minds, says Michael Pollan. Storytelling does, too.

23 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 207, bestselling author and UC Berkeley Professor Emeritus Michael Pollan discusses how he chooses his subjects, why he co-f...

The science behind the emotions in 'Inside Out 2'

09 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

There’s a scene toward the end of the new Pixar film Inside Out 2 where the main character, 13-year-old Riley, is having a panic attack in the penal...

Journalist Jemele Hill on the intersection of sports and race (revisiting)

26 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 205, sports journalist Jemele Hill discusses her career at the intersection of sports, race and culture in the U.S. at a UC ...

How the Supreme Court divided America

12 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 204, Michael Waldman, president and CEO of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, discusses the history of the...

Reconsidering Black America’s relationship to the plantation

28 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 203, Alisha Gaines, a professor of English and an affiliate faculty member in African American studies at Florida State Univ...

Adam Gopnik on what it takes to keep liberal democracies alive

14 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 202, New Yorker writer Adam Gopnik discusses liberalism — what it means, why we need it and the endless dedication it requ...

'Wave' memoirist on writing about unimaginable loss

31 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In 2004, Sonali Deraniyagala was on vacation with her family on the coast of Sri Lanka when a tsunami struck the South Asian island. It killed her hus...

Gigi Sohn on her fight for an open internet

28 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 200, Gigi Sohn, one of the nation’s leading public advocates for equal access to the internet, delivers the keynote addres...

Harry Edwards to sociology grads: Even in turbulent times, always believe in yourself

24 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 199, Harry Edwards, a renowned sports activist and UC Berkeley professor emeritus of sociology, gives the keynote address at...

Feeling like a failure isn't the same as failing, filmmaker tells journalism grads

23 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 198, documentary filmmaker Carrie Lozano delivers the keynote address at the 2024 Berkeley Journalism commencement ceremony....

Berkeley commencement speeches celebrate resilience, bravery

17 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 197, we're sharing a selection of speeches from UC Berkeley's campuswide commencement ceremony on May 11. The firs...

Ruth Simmons on access and equity in higher education

03 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 196, Ruth Simmons, a longtime professor and academic administrator, discusses how the journey to equal access and fairness i...

The future of psychedelic science

19 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 195, UC Berkeley professors discuss how and why psychedelic substances first evolved, the effects they have in the...

Sociologist Harry Edwards on sport in society (revisiting)

05 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 194, Harry Edwards, a renowned sports activist and UC Berkeley professor emeritus of sociology, discusses the inte...

Sci-fi writer Kim Stanley Robinson on the need for 'angry optimism'

22 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 193, science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson discusses climate change, politics and the need for "angry optimi...

The future of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA)

08 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 192, Sarah Deer, a citizen of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation of Oklahoma and a University Distinguished Professor at the Univer...

Justice Sonia Sotomayor on fighting the good fight

23 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 191, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor talks about getting up every morning ready to fight for what she b...

Why so many recent uprisings have backfired

09 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 190, journalist and UC Berkeley alumnus Vincent Bevins discusses mass protests around the world — from Egypt to Hong Kong ...

American democracy and the crisis of majority rule

26 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 189, Harvard Professor Daniel Ziblatt discusses how Americans need to do the work of making the U.S. political system more d...

Free speech on campus in times of great division

12 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 188, a panel of scholars discusses free speech on university campuses — where things stand today, what obligatio...

Protecting survivors of sex trafficking

29 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 187, Bernice Yeung, managing editor of Berkeley Journalism’s Investigative Reporting Program; public health journalist Isa...

The transformative potential of AI in academia

15 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 186, a panel of UC Berkeley scholars from the College of Letters and Science discusses the transformative potentia...

Nate Cohn on polling and the 2024 election

01 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 185, New York Times chief political analyst Nate Cohn discusses how polling works, the challenges facing poll...

A blueprint for housing reform

17 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 184, Richard Rothstein, a senior fellow at UC Berkeley's Othering and Belonging Institute, and housing policy expe...

Poulomi Saha on why we're so obsessed with cults

03 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 183, Poulomi Saha, an associate professor in the Department of English and co-director of the Progr...

Ezra Klein on building the things we need for the future we want

20 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 182, Ezra Klein, a New York Times columnist and host of the podcast The Ezra Klein Show, ...

Chinese activist Ai WeiWei on art, exile and politics

06 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 181, renowned artist and human rights activist Ai WeiWei discusses art, exile and politics in a conversation with ...

What are Berkeley's Latinx Thriving Initiatives?

22 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 180, Dania Matos and Fabrizio Mejia, vice chancellor and associate vice chancellor, respectively, for UC Berkeley’...

Poet Ishion Hutchinson reads 'The Mud Sermon' and other poems

08 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 179, Jamaican poet Ishion Hutchinson reads several poems, including "The Mud Sermon," "The Bicycle Eclogue" and "A...

Michael Brown's family on keeping his memory alive

25 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 178, Rashad Arman Timmons, a fellow at UC Berkeley’s Black Studies Collaboratory, joins in conversation with the...

Oppenheimer's Berkeley years

16 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 177, a panel of scholars discusses theoretical physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer and how his years at UC Berkeley shaped him, ...

Jessica Morse on how we can live with fire

28 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this Berkeley Talks episode, Jessica Morse, the deputy secretary for forest and wildland resilience at the California Natural Resources Agency, dis...

Siri creator Adam Cheyer shares secrets of entrepreneurship

14 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Siri creator Adam Cheyer talks about the long road to launching the virtual assistant, how to take an entrepreneurial idea from conception to impact a...

Legal scholars unpack Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action

10 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode, three leading legal scholars — john a. powell, director of UC Berkeley’s Othering & Belonging Institute (OBI); Erwin Chemerin...

Poets laureate share works about creation, sacrifice and home

30 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode, three poets laureate — Lee Herrick, the first Asian American poet laureate of California; Kealoha, Hawai'i’s first poet laureate;...

Biden economic adviser on building a clean energy economy

16 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Heather Boushey, a member of President Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) and chief economist to the Investing in America Cabinet, discusses...

Climate grief: Embracing loss as a catalyst for collective action

03 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Journalist and climate activist Naomi Klein joins Indigenous scholar Yuria Celidwen and posthumanist thinker Bayo Akomolafe, both senior fellows at UC...

Pulitzer-winner Natalie Wolchover: 'Knowledge of physics is a superpower'

30 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this Berkeley Talks episode, Natalie Wolchover, a senior editor at Quanta Magazine and winner of the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in Explanatory Report...

Sociology Ph.D. graduates on the power of family and deep inquiry

26 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode, two Ph.D. graduates in sociology — Kristen Nelson and Mario Castillo — give the graduate student address at the UC Berkeley Depar...

Tennessee Rep. Justin Jones to graduates: 'The world needs your imagination'

19 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In an impassioned keynote address to graduates of UC Berkeley's Goldman School of Public Policy, Tennessee state Rep. Justin Jones urged them to do th...

How a lie from medieval Europe spread antisemitism across the world

05 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Magda Teter, professor of history and the Shvidler Chair of Judaic Studies at Fordham University and author of the 2020 book, Blood Libel: On the Trai...

ChatGPT developer John Schulman on making AI more truthful

24 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

UC Berkeley alumnus John Schulman, the lead developer of ChatGPT, talks about how AI language models sometimes make things up — often convincingly —...

International journalists on women's rights in Iran and Afghanistan

07 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Award-winning journalists — Arezou Rezvani, Jane Ferguson, Zahra Joya and Berkeley Journalism Dean Geeta Anand — discuss women’s rights in Iran ...

Jitendra Malik on the sensorimotor road to artificial intelligence

24 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Jitendra Malik, a professor of electrical engineering and computer sciences at UC Berkeley, gives the 2023 Martin Meyerson Berkeley Faculty Research L...

The rise and destruction of the Jewish fashion industry

10 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Uwe Westphal, author of the 2019 book, Fashion Metropolis Berlin 1836-1939: The Story of the Rise and Destruction of the Jewish Fashion Industry, disc...

Economists on what it'll take to rebuild Ukraine

24 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

To mark the first anniversary of Russia’s initial full-scale invasion of Ukraine, we are sharing a panel discussion with four leading economists abo...

Women of the Black Panther Party

11 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In celebration of the new book, Comrade Sisters: Women of the Black Panther Party, Judy Juanita, Madalynn Rucker and Ericka Huggins discuss their time...

Artist William Kentridge on staying open to the 'less good' ideas

28 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

World-renowned South African artist William Kentridge discusses the process of making the 2019 chamber opera Waiting for the Sibyl. He also touches on...

Adriana Green and Nadia Ellis discuss 'The Yellow House'

13 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Adriana Green, a Ph.D. student in the Department of African American Studies and African Diaspora Studies at UC Berkeley, and Nadia Ellis, an associat...

Emiliana Simon-Thomas on where happiness comes from (revisiting)

31 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In episode #158 of Berkeley Talks, we revisit a lecture by Emiliana Simon-Thomas, science director of UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, in ...

The social safety net as an investment in children

16 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Hilary Hoynes, a UC Berkeley professor of economics and of public policy, and Haas Distinguished Chair in Economic Disparities, discusses the emerging...

Inna Sovsun on what's next in Russia's war on Ukraine

02 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Ukrainian Member of Parliament Inna Sovsun joins Yuriy Gorodnichenko, a professor of economics at UC Berkeley, and Janet Napolitano, a professor at th...

Poet Alex Dimitrov reads from 'Love and Other Poems'

18 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Alex Dimitrov reads from his 2021 book of poems Love and Other Poems. The Sept. 8 reading was part of the UC Berkeley Library’s monthly ev...

Judith Heumann on the long fight for inclusion

04 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 154, leading disability rights activist and UC Berkeley alumna Judith Heumann discusses her lifelong fight for inclusion and...

Indigenous access, political ecology in settler states

22 Oct 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Clint Carroll, an associate professor of ethnic studies at the University of Colorado Boulder, and a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, gives a talk call...

U.S. military bases in World War II Latin America

10 Oct 2022

Contributed by Lukas

UC Berkeley history professor Rebecca Herman discusses her new book, Cooperating with the Colossus: A Social and Political History of U.S. Milita...

Novelist Ilija Trojanow on the utopian prerogative

23 Sep 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Novelist Ilija Trojanow discusses why we need to embrace the idea of utopia in order to imagine a better future."It's important to not confuse what do...

Activist Pua Case on the movement to protect Mauna Kea

09 Sep 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Pua Case, a Native Hawaiian activist and caretaker from the Flores-Case ʻOhana family, discusses the movement to protect Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano...

How we learn language across communities and cultures

27 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 149, Mahesh Srinivasan, an associate professor in UC Berkeley's Department of Psychology, discusses the importance of child-...

Learning from nature to design better robots

13 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Robert Full, a professor of integrative biology and founder of the Center for Interdisciplinary Biological Inspiration in Education and Research at UC...

Scholars on using fantasy to reimagine Blackness

29 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

A panel of scholars discusses UC Berkeley professor Darieck Scott's new book Keeping It Unreal: Black Queer Fantasy and Superhero Comics, wh...

America wants gun control. Why doesn't it have it? (revisiting)

15 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

"If having a gun really made you safer, then America would be one of the safest countries in the world. It’s not," said Gary Younge, a professor of ...

ACLU leader on how voter suppression works

01 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Abdi Soltani, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Northern California, discussed on Feb. 18, 2022, key moments for voti...

'Mother Jones' editor on how the super-rich really live

17 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 144, Mother Jones senior editor Michael Mechanic joins Berkeley Journalism professor David Barstow to discuss his new book, ...

Climate displacement and remaking the built environment

03 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In Berkeley Talks episode 143, a panel of UC Berkeley experts discuss climate displacement — what it means to abandon places, the power dy...

Timnit Gebru on how change happens through collective action

31 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In a special episode, Timnit Gebru, founder and executive director of the Distributed Artificial Intelligence Research Institute and one of the m...