UW Notebook, encouraged by the overlap between radio and podcasting, talked with the co-hosts of this prolific show with almost two dozen produced episodes so far. Also, below, EarthLab’s podcast “” releases a new season of timely topics.

“Coastal Café” is a joint production of Washington Sea Grant and the College of the Environment. Its 23 episodes and counting explore “cutting-edge marine science and related topics with researchers, policy experts and people who live and work on the Washington coast.” The show is broadcast every Wednesday at 5:10 p.m. on KPTZ, 91.9 FM out of Port Townsend.

The podcast/radio show is co-hosted by , Washington Sea Grant’s assistant director for communications; and , its boating program specialist. Both have past radio experience: Wagner with Seattle’s Classic KING FM and Barnett with a public radio station in Alaska.

The two say they modeled the program after a Maine Sea Grant radio show called “.” They approached Port Townsend radio station KPTZ with the idea for a show and the selection of marine-related topics appealed to the station, whose listeners include many in the maritime industry.

What is the audience for ‘Coastal Café’? Ìý

Aaron Barnett: The content is eclectic with a focus on Washington state but with national relevance. The audience we try to reach is composed of coastal stakeholders — vessel operators, marine trades, coastal homeowners, you name it.Ìý The show was also syndicated on Radio Free America for a year until they folded this summer.Ìý

MaryAnn Wagner: Really, anyone who has an interest in what is happening in the Pacific Ocean or Salish Sea, and along those shorelines would be interested in our show topics, including anyone interested in learning about the latest news in marine science and policy, or even just fishing and boating.

What episode might be the best for a newcomer to listen to first?Ìý

A.B.: That depends on what they are interested in. For example, if a newcomer is interested in the arts, we did a , whose band provides music for the show. We have many science-focused episodes, with most of those based at the UW. And we have a couple of shows focused on recreational boating and the commercial fishing industry.

M.W.: Aaron recently did an on-location show about aboard a U. S. Coast Guard Lifeboat, and we did a show on UW tsunami research in the Pacific Northwest — and another on abandoned and derelict boats and what to do about them. Coming up is a show for recreational boaters and beachgoers on how to help reduce marine debris, such as plastics and other garbage.

You are recording new episodes — what are the challenges of keeping the podcast going during the coronavirus shutdown?

A.B.: The biggest challenge we have faced during shutdown is finding a way to record good sound quality outside of the production and recording studio, since no one is allowed to tape in the station. We have experimented with different phone and internet platforms and think we have something that works now. However, good sound quality still hinges on good connection with the interviewee’s phone signal, which these days is usually from a cell phone.

M.W.: And cell phones are not always reliable! I really miss being in the studio setting with the interviewee sitting across the table with all the equipment.Ìý But that has not stopped us. Aaron and our excellent producer Jared DuFresne of KPTZ have experimented with a number of variations for taping the show remotely, and as Aaron said, they have found a good technical combination. The show must go on, and so it has.

We have found over the past two years that the number of marine topics we could report upon is endless. For example, there is so much research happening at the UW on marine and related environmental issues, that we could do multiple shows focused on UW projects alone.

I should add that we are always open to ideas from our listeners. So, please send us your ideas.

• To learn more or submit ideas, contact Wagner at maryannb@uw.edu or Barnett at aaronb5@uw.edu.

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EarthLab’s ‘Voices Unbound’ second season talks of social tensions from COVID-19

“” is a podcast created by EarthLab and UW Tacoma, and hosted by associate professor in the school’s Nursing and Healthcare Leadership Program. The podcast has now published its second season.

“In this series opener we go way-deep into the social tensions of our time,” show notes say, “discussing how racism in law enforcement and governmental responses to the COVID-19 epidemic contribute important environmental threats to communities in our region and elsewhere.”

The podcast also will continue to report on its analysis of answers to questions posed since 2019 about public attitudes toward environmental challenges.

Principal investigators for the work are Evans-Agnew and , urban ecologist and assistant professor in UW Tacoma’s School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences.

Read an earlier UW Notebook story about this podcast. For more information, contact Evans-Agnew at robagnew@uw.edu.

Here’s a quick look at a few such UW-created podcasts, from benevolent marketing to Arctic geopolitics — and a classics professor’s work being featured in a podcast produced by the Times Literary Supplement.

“”
EarthLab / UW Tacoma
Hosted by , associate professor, UW Tacoma Nursing and Healthcare Leadership Program.

“What do people think about environmental challenges? And what do they do every day to survive those challenges? We explore these questions in this podcast series,” say co-principal investigators Evans-Agnew and , urban ecologist and assistant professor in UW Tacoma’s School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences.

Beginning in 2019 and continuing earlier this year, this team of UW Tacoma professors and students asked people in Tacoma and the South Sound to fill out postcards with their own answers to those questions.

“We stood in the street, behind booths, in the sunshine and the rain … We chose places where we wouldn’t necessarily find the sort of people who already had a voice,” the researchers wrote. The team gathered about 1,000 postcards in all, and those responses are the subject of the podcasts.

Each podcast presents selections from the postcards, and the researchers also discuss their experiences. One episode features UW Tacoma plastics researcher and geoscience lecturer .

Evans-Agnew said the team plans a second series of the podcast that will focus on COVID-19, environment justice and police oppression issues.

“I also do not want to lose sight of the continued — and quiet roll-backs of environmental policy that are occurring in the shadows of this unrest,” Evans-Agnes said. “It is the untold story of this time.”

* * *Ìý

“”
Written and hosted by , senior lecturer, UW Bothell School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences.

“This podcast explores the emotional burden of climate change,” writes Atkinson, “and why despair leaves so many people unable to respond to our existential threat.”

The fourth episode, “Coping with Climate Despair in Four Steps,” outlines strategies to “beat the climate blues and become an agent of change.” Atkinson’s research focus is the environmental humanities and her teaching explores intersections between environmental studies and American culture and literature.

Atkinson added: “Meanwhile, frontline communities — particularly people of color, indigenous communities, and other historically-marginalized groups — are experiencing the heaviest mental health impacts of climate disruption and displacement. This series introduces ways to move from despair to action by addressing the psychological roots of our unprecedented ecological loss.”

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Hosted and produced by the Canadian Studies Center,
Jackson School of International Studies.

The inaugural 45-minute episode of this occasional podcast series features political science doctoral student

interviewing , former two-term premier of the Yukon Territory and the Jackson School’s 2013-14 Fulbright Canada Chair in Arctic studies.

The interview focuses on Penikett’s 2018 book “.” Publisher’s notes say the book explores the nature of a new “Northern consciousness” or “Arctic identity” beyond pop culture stereotypes that “fail to capture northern realities.”

Ahlness is a 2020-2021 Foreign Language and Area Studies fellow in Inuktitut with the Canadian Studies Center, which produces the podcast with the Jackson School’s International Policy Institute and Center for Global Studies.

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“”
Hosted by , senior lecturer in the and co-director of the .

“Marketing can be a force for good,” says Mills Barnhart, but it can also be “complicated, confusing and downright nerve-wracking.” Her podcast seeks to bring clarity to marketing chaos. “I talk about how you can think about marketing differently so you can do marketing differently with less stress and more joy.”

Mills Barnhart has produced the podcast weekly since April, with 1,500 downloads so far. Most episodes are a half-hour to an hour in length and have featured interviews with the UW’s of the Department of Communication and of the Evans School.

“Whether you work for a for-profit corporation or a nonprofit organization,” Mills Barnhart writes, “if you’re out to make the world a better place, this podcast will give you the insight and inspiration you need to market your mission with clarity and confidence.”

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Times Literary Supplement podcast discusses book by UW classics professor Sarah Levin-Richardson

A book by , UW professor of classics, was the subject of a recent podcast by the Times Literary Supplement, a publication of the Sunday Times of London. The book is “,” published by Cambridge University Press in 2019.

The podcast series is called “Freedom, Books, Flowers & the Moon” and the episode about Levin-Richardson’s book, featuring Rebecca Langlands of the University of Exeter is “.” Langlands also published a of the book.

Read more on the Department of Classics’ , and listen to the podcast either or downloadable from .