UMich Retirees Podcast

"The beloved American classic about a young girl's coming-of-age at the turn of the century, Betty Smith's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is a poignant and moving tale filled with compassion and cruelty, laughter and heartache, crowded with life and people and incident. The story of young, sensitive, and idealistic Francie Nolan and her bittersweet formative years in the slums of Williamsburg has enchanted and inspired millions of reader...

"Steve Wheeler is enjoying retired life. He does the odd bit of investigation work, but he prefers his familiar habits and routines: the pub quiz, his favorite bench, his cat waiting for him when he comes home. His days of adventure are over: adrenaline is daughter-in-law Amy’s business now." "Amy Wheeler thinks adrenaline is good for the soul. As a private security officer, she doesn’t stay still long enough for habits or routine...

"All of us have in our minds a cartoon image of what an autocratic state looks like, with a bad man at the top. But in the 21st century, that cartoon bears little resemblance to reality. Nowadays, autocracies are run not by one bad guy, but by sophisticated networks composed of kleptocratic financial structures, security services and professional propagandists. The members of these networks are connected not only within a given cou...

Edward Adams Former Chief Technology Officer Stephen M. Ross School of Business

Ever wonder what it would be like to have an intelligent conversation with a computer? A conversation exploring history, science and the arts; taking deep dives into philosophy, physics, medicine, and economics; discussing current books, movies and theater; engaging in casual chats about daily ...

"In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the worl...

"Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon, a novel of large beauty and power, creates a magical world out of four generations of black life in America, a world we enter on the day of the birth of Macon Dead, Jr. (known as Milkman), son of the richest black family in a mid-western town; the day on which the lonely insurance man, Robert Smith, poised in blue silk wings, attempts to fly from a steeple of the hospital, a black Icarus looking ho...

David Dunning

Professor of Psychology in the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts Faculty Associate in the Research Center for Group Dynamics, Institute for Social Research

Professor Dunning discusses the psychology underlying the notorious "Dunning-Kruger Effect," where people remain unaware of their incompetence and ignorance, thus left with illusions of expertise they...

The Rose Code by Kate Quinn is a book about three female code breakers -- Osla, Mab and Beth -- at Bletchley Park during WWII. The women form a friendship (and a book club) over the years, but a betrayal and traitor among their colleagues lands one of them in locked up in an asylum in the years after the war. But through a letter carefully smuggled out, she's able to issue a cry for help from her confinement.

In this exciting and e...

"Happy Days, The Andy Griffith Show, Gentle Ben—these shows captivated millions of TV viewers in the ’60s and ’70s. Join award-winning filmmaker Ron Howard and audience-favorite actor Clint Howard as they frankly and fondly share their unusual family story of navigating and surviving life as sibling child actors."

"With the perspective of time and success—Ron as a filmmaker, producer, and Hollywood A-lister, Clint as a busy charact...

Paul W. McCracken Professor of Business Economics and Public policy and Professor of Business Economics and Public Policy in the Stephen M. Ross School of Business

Professor of Economics in the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts

Professor Slemrod, an authority on tax policy design, is known for his pioneering research on...

Most are familiar with the Michigan-Ohio football rivalry, an intense but usually good-natured contest that stretches back over one hundred years. Yet far fewer may know that in the early nineteenth century Michigan and Ohio were locked in a different kind of battle---one that began before Michigan became a state. The conflict started with a long-simmering dispute over a narrow wedge of land called the Toledo Strip. The Toledo War:...

Barbara McQuade

Professor McQuade will discuss observations and recommendations from her recent book, Attack from Within: How Disinformation is Sabotaging America (Seven Stories Press, 2024). The book defines disinformation as "the deliberate use of lies to manipulate people, whether to extract profit or to advance a political agenda." She will discuss why disinform...

Terrance (Terry) Bertram President of the Legacy Law Center

Terry Bertram is a U-M alum, who has been providing estate and elder law planning services in the greater Washtenaw County area for over 30 years.  His talk will focus on the importance of keeping estate plans updated and the steps to assure solid planning for elder life, as well as protecting one's legacy for fami...

"Guy Montag is a fireman. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden. Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television “family.” But when he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn’t live in ...

Considered to be one of Agatha Christie's greatest, and also most controversial mysteries, 'The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd' breaks the rules of traditional mystery. The peaceful English village of King’s Abbot is stunned. The widow Ferrars dies from an overdose of Veronal. Not twenty-four hours later, Roger Ackroyd—the man she had planned to marry—is murdered. It is a baffling case involving blackmail and death that taxes Hercule Poi...

"Carl Bernstein, the Pulitzer Prize-winning coauthor of All the President’s Men and pioneer of investigative journalism, recalls his beginnings as an audacious teenage newspaper reporter in the nation’s capital―a winning tale of scrapes, gumshoeing, and American bedlam."

"In Chasing History, Bernstein recalls the origins of his storied journalistic career as he chronicles the Kennedy era, the swelling civil rights movement, and a s...

"Andy Borowitz argues that over the past fifty years, American politicians have grown increasingly allergic to knowledge, and mass media have encouraged the election of ignoramuses by elevating candidates who are better at performing than thinking. Starting with Ronald Reagan’s first campaign for governor of California in 1966 and culminating with the election of Donald J. Trump to the White House, Borowitz shows how, during the ag...

From Goodreads: "The serene and maternal Mrs. Ramsay, the tragic yet absurd Mr. Ramsay, and their children and assorted guests are on holiday on the Isle of Skye. From the seemingly trivial postponement of a visit to a nearby lighthouse, Woolf constructs a remarkable, moving examination of the complex tensions and allegiances of family life and the conflict between men and women. As time winds its way through their lives, the Ramsa...