Race, Identity & Culture

Former president of South Africa, F.W. Deklerk. He dismantled apartheid, released Nelson Mandela from prison, and later shared a Nobel Peace Prize with Mandela. Deklerk has a new autobiography, "F.W. DeKlerk: The Last Trek A New Beginning (St. Martin's Press).

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews "Show Me a Hero : A Tale of Murder, Suicide, Race, and Redemption" by New York Times reporter Lisa Belkin. It examines the fallout from a federal court order requiring Yonkers, NY, to desegregate by moving hundreds of its poor minority residents into public housing on the middle-class side of town.
Description (Program)

Novelist Arthur Golden wrote the bestseller, "Memoirs of a Geisha" which was on the New York Times Bestseller List for one year. It's now out in paperback, and a movie version will be made by Stephen Spielberg. "Memoirs of a Geisha" was GOLDEN's debut as a novelist.(

T.J. Leyden is a former skinhead who now works for the Simon Wiesenthal Center for Tolerance, speaking out against hate and hate crimes. Leyden is 32 years old. He joined the Hammerskin, a Neo-Nazi group when he was 14, later became a recuiter, and left it at the age of 29. Now he is a consultant for the Center's Tools for Tolerance Program and speaks out around the country to school groups, church groups, law enforcement and military units.

Farmer is a member of the Cayuga Six Nations tribe from Canada. He stars in the new film "Smoke Signals," based on the story by Sherman Alexie. Farmer starred in the recent Jim Jarmusch film, "Dead Man" and the 1989 film "Powwow Highway," as well as numerous other films, plays, and television shows. Farmer also is publisher of "AboriginalVOICES: The Magazine of Evolving Native American Arts & Culture."

Bill Ivey is the new Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. He won Senate confirmation last month. He last served as the director of the Country Music Foundation. There he co-produced a new 3 CD set called "From Where I Stand: The Black Experience in Country Music." (Warner Bros) The collection traces the contributions African-Americans have had in country music. (stations: This was recorded before his confirmation hearings. He declined to talk about the NEA at that time.)

President of the University of Cape Town Mamphela Ramphele. During the 1970s she was a leader in the struggle against Apartheid, and was a colleague of Steven Biko. Later she became his lover. Biko was murdered while in detention and Ramphele was pregnant with his child. Ramphele is also a medical doctor and anthropologist. Her new memoir is "Across Boundaries: The Journey of a South African Woman Leader" (The Feminist Press)

Linguist Geoff Nunberg comments on the how dictionaries have chosen to define words considered to be offensive or derogatory to groups of people.

Filmmaker Wayne Wang. With the films "Chan is Missing," "Dim Sum," "Slamdance" and "Eat a Bowl of Tea," to his credit, Wang was the first Chinese-American film director to make an impact in the American film industry. Wang went on to direct "The Joy Luck Club," and the films "Smoke" and "Blue in the Face." His newest film is set in Hong Kong, "Chinese Box" starring Jeremy Irons.

Edward Ball has written about his family's role in American Slavery. His book is "Slaves in the Family" which is published by Farrar, Strauss and Giroux. Ball traced his family's history and learned that over six generations his family controlled more than 20 plantations and over four-thousand slaves.