Society & Culture

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews "Lost in Translation," a new romance set in China.

Film critic John Powers reviews "Your Friends & Neighbors."

Journalist and urban critic Roberta Brandes Gratz and an expert in downtown revitalization Norman Mintz. The two have collaborated on the new book "Cities: Back from the Edge: New Life for Downtown." (John Wiley & Sons). In the book they look at downtowns throughout the country that have come back to life and examine what revived them. Their recipe for success includes: preserving or introducing trolley traffic, developing farmers' markets, promoting short blocks, keeping government buildings downtown, and insuring citizen involvement in civic life.

Linguist Geoffrey Nunberg comments on how the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal has reminded us over the age-old debate over semantics. What is an inappropriate relationship? Can you have sex and still technically be a virgin?

John Powers reviews the new movies "The Slums of Beverly Hills" and the re-releass of Fellini's "Night of Cabiria."

We talk about the Chinese tradition of foot binding with photojournalist Beverly Jackson. Her new book is called "Splendid Slippers: A Thousand Years of An Erotic Tradition." (Ten Speed Press) Jackson is a collector of antique Chinese slippers, and will talk about the history, culture and implications of bound feet.

Linguist Geoff Nunberg talks about the new knowledge fad. He says terms that include the word knowledge, like "knowledge workers" and "knowledge assets" are sweeping corporate and academic America.

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews the newest movie version of "Lolita."

Evan Imber-Black is a family therapist who has written the new book "The Secret Life of Families: Truth Telling, privacy and reconciliation in a tell all society." (Bantam) She makes the distinction about what is a private matter and what is a secret. She is the director of program development at the Ackerman Institute for the Family in New York City and a professor of psychiatry at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

An excerpt from the 6/6/94 interview with astronaut Alan Shepard. He died yesterday.

Language critic Geoffrey Nunberg talks about the accuracy of automatic grammar checkers included with computer word processing programs like Microsoft Word.

Film critic John Powers reviews "There's Something About Mary," The new movie from Peter & Bobby Farrelly.

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."

William Pollack is a psychologist and codirector of the Center for Men at Harvard Medical Center. His new book "Real Boys: Rescuing Our Sons from the Myths of Boyhood" (Random House) is about how the stereotypes about masculinity are hurting young boys. Pollack contends that boys are in crisis, that they are given conflicting messages about what's expected of them, and that research shows that boys are doing less well in school than before, many of them have fragile self-esteem, and that rates of depression and suicide in boys is on the rise.

Baumbach's latest film is "Mr. Jealousy," about an irrationally jealous young man who is obsessed with his girlfriend's ex-lovers. He joins the therapy group of his girlfriend's ex-boyfriend in order to learn more about him. Baumbach wrote and directed the film, as well as his previous debut film "Kicking and Screaming." "Mr. Jealousy stars Eric Stoltz, Annabella Sciorra, and Chris Eigeman who we hear from later in the show.

Malick plays Nina Van Horn, a model turned fashion editor on the hit TV series "Just Shoot Me." Malick's real life is not so far off: in the seventies, she worked as a Wilhelmina model. Malick was also on the TV series "Dream On," in the role of Judith Tupper Stone, for which she won four cable ace awards.

Michaels talks about growing up in the sixties and seventies as the daughter of hippies in her new memoir, "Split: A counterculture Childhood." (Houghton Mifflin) Michaels grew up craving the straight life, but as a college student, she came to realize that she shared many of her parent's values. She is a contributing editor at "Threepenny Review" and a poet whose work has appeared in "Salon" and the "New York Times Magazine."

Food critic Ruth Reichl. Her new book is called "Tender at the Bone: Growing up at the Table," (Random House) and it's her memoir of a lifelong passion for food. Reichl has been the restaurant critic for the New York Times since 1993. Prior to that, she reviewed restaurants for the Los Angeles Times. She ran her own restaurant in Berkeley, California in the 1970s.

Maureen Corrigan interviews writer Richard Stevenson. That's a pseudonym for Richard Lipez ("LIP-ehz"). He works in the genre of gay detective mysteries. Since 1981, he's written a series of six books about detective Donald Strachey ("STRAY-chee"). He is also a Washington Post columnist under his real name. Stevenson's latest book is called "Strachey's Folly: A Donald Strachey Mystery." (St. Martin's Press)

Malachy McCourt is best-selling author Frank McCourt's ("Angela's Ashes") younger brother. He's just written a memoir of his own, entitled "A Monk Swimming." (Hyperion) It picks up where Frank's left off, in 1950s America. Malachy is also an actor and has had featured roles in the films "The Devil's Own," "She's the One," and "The Bonfire of The Vanities."