The Rev. Roy Hawthorne is one of the original windtalkers. They were a group of Navajo men who developed a secret code for American World War II fighters. The Japanese were able to break every other code the military developed. The Navajo code was the only one never solved by the Japanese and is considered the key tool in winning that war. The code was declassified in 2001, and the code talkers received Medals of Honor from President Bush. The new film Windtalkers is based on the story of the codemakers. Hawthorne gives talks about the codemaking process to schoolchildren nationwide.
Raha Shehadeh is a Palestinian lawyer and writer whose latest book is Strangers in the House: Coming of Age in Occupied Palestine. (Steer Forth Press) He is a founder of the nonpartisan human rights organization Al-Haq, an affiliate of the International Commission of Jurists, and author of several books about international law, human rights and the Middle East. Shehadeh lives in Ramallah. He was a guest on Fresh Air in February of this year and returns to talk about the latest news from the occupied territories.
Writer Michael Oren's new book is Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East. (Oxford University Press) Oren was raised and educated in the United States, and emigrated to Israel more than 25 years ago. He is a Senior Fellow at the Shalem Center, a Jerusalem-based institute for Jewish social thought and public policy. He is also the head of the Middle East history project.
Writer John Ridley wrote the screenplay for the new film Undercover Brother, which began life as a Web site animation. The film is an action comedy replete with 1970s fashions. Ridley has also just published a novel, A Conversation with the Mann, about a black comic in the civil rights era of the early 1960s.
Writer Michael Pollan. His book, The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World takes a look at four plants cultivated by humans: the apple, the tulip, potatoes and marijuana. Pollan demonstrates that plants and humans have developed a reciprocal, co-evolutionary relationship: do we plant potatoes, or do potatoes seduce us into planting them? Pollan questions the assumption that we are in charge of our agriculture. The book is now in paperback.
Photographer and reporter Scott Peterson of The Christian Science Monitor has been covering the war on terrorism since the Sept. 11 attacks. He is also the paper's Moscow bureau chief, and a former Middle East correspondent. Peterson recently attended a training camp for journalists to learn how to deal with kidnappers and gunmen. He was also a friend of murdered journalist Daniel Pearl. Peterson is the author of the book Me Against My Brother: At War in Somalia, Sudan, and Rwanda.
Robert Jay Lifton is professor of Psychiatry and Psychology at the Graduate School University Center and director of The Center on Violence and Human Survival at John Jay College of Criminal Justice at The City University of New York. He'll talk with us about the psychological impact of the threat of terrorism and the potential for nuclear war between Pakistan and India. Lifton specializes in the study of extremist religions and cults.
Directors Chris and Paul Weitz. Their new film, About a Boy is based on the novel by Nick Hornby and is playing in theaters now. The Weitz brothers, born to fashion designer John Weitz and actress Susan Kohner, first became famous for directing the 1999 teen comedy, American Pie. They also wrote the screenplay for the animated movie Antz and directed the Chris Rock movie Down to Earth. They live in New York.
Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews a number of CDs devoted to the music of Hoagy Carmichael: Stardust Melody (Bluebird); Hoagy Sings Carmichael (Pacific Jazz); Stardust Melody: Beloved and Rare Songs of Hoagy Carmichael (A-Records); Bill Charlap: Stardust (BlueNote).
Comic book writer Stan Lee. He was the leading creative force behind the rise of Marvel Comics and is responsible for many of the best-known comic book heroes. Forty years ago, he co-created the character Spider-Man. He also helped create The X-Men, The Fantastic Four and The Incredible Hulk. He is now Chairman Emeritus of Marvel Enterprises, and is executive producer of the new movie, Spider-Man. It stars Tobey Maguire, Willem Dafoe and Kirsten Dunst. His new book is called Excelsior! The Amazing Life of Stan Lee.
Gino Yevdjevich is the lead singer of the Bosnian-Bulgarian punk rock band Kultur Shock. He was a rock musician in Sarajevo when the Bosnian War broke out. During the war, he played a major role in rewriting the musical Hair into a new version called Hair: Sarajevo, AD 1992 which played in Sarajevo for three years to standing room only crowds. Yevdjevich now lives in Seattle; he moved there in 1996 when a theatre produced his play Sarajevo: Behind Gods Back. His band Kultur Shock has a new CD called F.U.C.C. the INS
David Newman is a political columnist for The Jerusalem Post. He is also chairman of the department of politics and government at Ben Gurion University of the Negev and editor of The International Journal of Geopolitics. He'll discuss the history of the Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza. He's written about the settlements in The New York Times. Newman is also author of the book, Population, Settlement and Conflict: Israel and the West Bank.
