I've been listening to As It Happens much more frequently ever since Trump launched his trade war against Canada. For readers unfamiliar with the program, here are excerpts from the Wikipedia entry:
As It Happens is a Canadian interview show that airs on CBC Radio One in Canada and various public radio stations in the United States through Public Radio Exchange. Its 50th anniversary was celebrated on-air on November 16, 2018. It has been one of the most popular and acclaimed shows on CBC Radio.The bulk of the program consists of a CBC journalist, currently Nil Köksal since 2022, conducting telephone interviews with newsmakers and other persons of interest. The other co-host, Chris Howden as of January 6, 2020, introduces the interviews and other segments...The show is broadcast each weekday from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m. (half an hour later in Newfoundland) throughout Canada. It used to be widely accessible to much of the northern United States, but as the CBC switched its CBC Radio One from powerful AM signals in Eastern Canadian urban centres to FM stations, it became harder to receive CBC content further away from the border.
I download the podcasts to my phone and listen to them while running errands. My introduction to the program actually began way back in 1997, when I presented a research paper on the role of sleep paralysis in literature and folklore at a national meeting in San Francisco. In that lecture I mentioed the "old hag" phenomenon in Newfoundland. Two evening later I was in my hotel room when the phone rang, and moments later I was being interviewed by then-host Michael Enright.
American listeners to NPR's All Things Considered will find themselves right at home with As It Happens. The whimsical humor nicely offsets the grimmer realities of world news. I invite readers to leave their own reviews in the comments.
Addendum: One interesting segment several days ago was a report that some Canadian professional hockey games will now be simulcast on the radio in the Cree and Inuktitut languages, as well as the traditional English and French. What was most interesting to me was that instead of adopting English words for concepts like "icing" and "cross-checking," they are going to create new words in their own language - demonstrating an admirable respect for ancient languages.
I catch it early in the morning, at 4am on WCAI. I sometimes fall asleep to it, which is okay. It is nice to hear that Canada accent. Best of all, it beats listening the BBC that is on all the other NPR stations all night long.
ReplyDeleteI love our CBC radio and this segment is one of my favourites. Thanks for promoting it.
ReplyDeleteYou have great taste. I grew up on AIH in the evenings and I now play the podcast for my kids when they are trapped in the car. For a Canadian in the USA it is a little slice of home. I find the human perspective, with which they approach both the whimsical and the serious, missing from most news interviews. Try quirks and quarks if you like science or the debaters for true Canadian wit.
ReplyDeleteAs a Canadian, I appreciate your desire to listen to good CBC programming! I love As It Happens. There are some classic interviews which are a delight (a quick synopsis can be found here - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/As_It_Happens). And we always listen to "Gift of the Magi" at Christmas. Your post is a salve to the ongoing threat and insults to our sovereignty.
ReplyDeleteI listen to AIH on KNOW/MPR out of St. Paul every evening at 10 p.m. Love their silly puns!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Mr Twyki. Well worth a listen. Also from the Commonwealth on non-USA, I can recommend BBC's Americast Podcast, for an informed but detached view on American politics
ReplyDeleteAIH does occasionally does stories about events in the 11th province.
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