Stephanie Bastek

Stephanie Bastek is the senior editor of the Scholar and the producer/host of the Smarty Pants podcast.

The Shipping News

Ian Kumekawa tells the story of the global economy in one barge

By Stephanie Bastek | Friday May 9, 2025

Coming Home

Craig Thompson digs up memories of farm labor and the history of ginseng

By Stephanie Bastek | Friday April 25, 2025

Muscle Memory

Michael Joseph Gross on the importance of strength, past and present

By Stephanie Bastek | Friday April 11, 2025

The Most Famous Unknown Artist

David Sheff puts Yoko Ono in the spotlight

By Stephanie Bastek | Friday March 28, 2025

The Root Cause

Padraic X. Scanlan tells the real history of the Irish Potato Famine

By Stephanie Bastek | Friday March 14, 2025

Something New in the West

Kurt Beals on translating All Quiet on the Western Front

By Stephanie Bastek | Friday February 28, 2025

Family/History

David Levering Lewis digs into his own origin story

By Stephanie Bastek | Friday February 14, 2025

The Epic Viking Saga of the Everyday

Eleanor Barraclough on the ordinary people of Norse history

By Stephanie Bastek | Friday January 31, 2025

Keepers of the Old Ways

Eliot Stein on the people keeping cultural traditions alive

By Stephanie Bastek | Friday January 17, 2025

The Snow Maiden

Our final episode of 2018 is a send-off to the solstice

By Stephanie Bastek | Monday December 30, 2024

The Profiteers

By Stephanie Bastek | Wednesday March 9, 2016

You Could Look It Up

By Stephanie Bastek | Tuesday February 23, 2016

The Wonder of Wuthering Heights

By Stephanie Bastek | Tuesday February 16, 2016

The Firebrand and the First Lady

By Stephanie Bastek | Monday February 8, 2016

The Society of Genes

By Stephanie Bastek | Wednesday January 20, 2016

Philip Sparrow Tells All

By Stephanie Bastek | Monday January 11, 2016

Unruly Equality

By Stephanie Bastek | Thursday January 7, 2016

Masters of Empire

By Stephanie Bastek | Tuesday December 22, 2015

One Child

By Stephanie Bastek | Monday December 14, 2015

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