Human Powered

Mar 03 2025 18 ep. 29 mins 7

Human Powered Podcast artwork

A podcast from Wisconsin Humanities, because being human is a shared experience, and we are here to explore it together. In season three, we are celebrating the people who make Wisconsin home. For ten years, our Love Wisconsin producers have been excavating beneath the surface of our state by talking with people and sharing what we learn, one story at a time. In this series, Love Wisconsin producer Jen Rubin reconnects with some of these people who generously shared their stories to offer nuance, delight, and complexity to our understanding of what it means to be a Wisconsinite.

In our first season, we went out to communities around the state to learn more about how our neighborhoods and lives are impacted by small but meaningful local projects — like getting hands dirty at community gardens in Green Bay, revitalizing history around a cooking fire on the Red Cliff Reservation, and collecting stories in small towns impacted by historic floods. Hosted by Jimmy Gutierrez and produced by Field Noise Soundworks.

Humanity Unlocked, the second season of Human Powered, is a series of six episodes about the power of the humanities in Wisconsin prisons. From a storytelling workshop at Oak Hill Correctional Facility to a poetry workshop with people who were formerly incarcerated to a conversation with writers and editors of prison newspapers, we explored the importance of finding tools for deeper understanding. Hosted by Dasha Kelly Hamilton and Adam Carr; produced by Field Noise Soundworks.

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Your Stories: Celebrating Ten Years of Love Wisconsin with Scott Schultz

Mar 03 2025 18 mins

For ten years, Love Wisconsin producers have been excavating beneath the surface of our state by talking with people and sharing what we learn, one story at a time. Over this anniversary year, we are excited to reconnect with some of the people who shared stories that our readers loved most. This episode of Human Powered features Scott Schultz. Scott is a farm boy from Wisconsin, a

Human Powered Presents: Uprooted

Jan 22 2025 39 mins

For this special edition of Human Powered, we are sharing an episode of a series called Uprooted produced by our friends at Wisconsin Life and WPR. In 1980, there was an exodus of Cubans who left their homes for the United States as part of the Mariel Boatlift. This includes almost 15,000 Cuban refugees who were sent to Fort McCoy in Sparta, Wisconsin. Wisconsin Humanities awarded

Human Powered Presents: The People's Recorder

Jan 15 2025 33 mins

For this special edition of Human Powered, we are sharing an episode of The People’s Recorder, a podcast series from Spark Media and funded in part with a grant from Wisconsin Humanities. The People’s Recorder tells stories about the Federal Writers’ Project, which was created by the Federal government as part of the New Deal during the Great Depression to provide jobs to out

Human Powered Presents: All In All Out with Shannon Ross

Jan 08 2025 40 mins

For this special edition of Human Powered, we are sharing an episode produced by our friends at The Community. The Community is a multi-dimensional nonprofit based in Milwaukee. It connects and empowers people on all sides of the criminal legal system through its Pre-entry and Correcting the Narrative strategies. The Community has been awarded Wisconsin Humanities grants for their

It's Not Just a Vote

Sep 23 2024 33 mins

The right to vote is a core building block for our democracy. We are taught that our vote matters and that voting is integral to our communities and our country. In this final episode of Humanity Unlocked, we confront a fundamental issue: roughly 45,000 people ‘on papers’ in Wisconsin do not have the right to vote, even though they are no longer in prison. Jerome Dillard, Execu

Bead by Bead

Sep 23 2024 39 mins

When James Price first learned how to bead, he was incarcerated at the Stanley Correctional Institution in Wisconsin. He had been told his whole life that he was not patient, but as he is tutored in beadwork by a group of Native American men, he discovers a history he wasn't taught in school. And, “bead by bead,” he also learns new things about himself. Once he was released, Ja

Art Against the Odds

Sep 23 2024 42 mins

People in prisons are cut off from their families, their communities, and in some cases their own feelings. Making art in prison — even with very few resources — can be a way to affirm your humanity in a place that is so often dehumanizing. So when the organizers of an exhibit of prison art put out a call for submissions, they were flooded with responses from incarcerated artis

Three Convicts, Twenty Dollars, and a Newspaper

Aug 31 2023 37 mins

Started in 1887 by three well-known convicts, The Prison Mirror is often considered the best prison newspaper in the United States. But it is just one of many. In the 1980s, Robert Taliaferro was a writer and editor for The Mirror, as it was called in those days. Shannon Ross is a writer who started The Community in 2014 when he was in prison. The newsletter, which he still edits t

A Mic and Five Minutes

Aug 31 2023 32 mins

Some would say that storytelling is what makes us human. In this episode, we are going to hear some great stories. We are heading to Oak Hill Correctional Facility, where the University of Wisconsin Odyssey Beyond Bars Project offers storytelling workshops each semester for incarcerated students who are in the English 101 course. This is UW-Madison’s first face-to-face credit-bea

Death-defying Feats

Aug 31 2023 38 mins

In the first episode of Human Powered 'Humanity Unlocked,' we are stepping out with the remarkable and singular Dasha Kelly Hamilton. Dasha wields words to make magic happen, whether on stage herself, in writing sessions like Prose & Cons, or while chatting with co-host and public historian Adam Carr. We'll drop into one of her workshops and talk with Josh and Fontaine, both st