JACKSON, Wyo. — Ahead of his Brainstorm Speaker Series appearance on Sunday, celebrated podcaster and reporter Jad Abumrad will meet with local teenagers at an event hosted by the Teton County Library.
The four-time Peabody Award winner and former MacArthur Fellow created RadioLab, a podcast and public radio program broadcast on almost 600 stations across the U.S. Among Abumrad’s other creations are podcasts Dolly Parton’s America, More Perfect (about the U.S. Supreme Court) and Fela Kuti: Fear No Man. He also serves as Distinguished Research Professor of Communication of Science and Technology at Vanderbilt University.
His Brainstorm event has sold out; he will present his talk “Words Fail Me,” a “meditation on what it feels like to live inside information overload,” per Center for the Arts’ event announcement. Drawing on work by author Virginia Woolf, philosopher Henri Bergson, and composers Delia Derbyshire and Frédéric Chopin, Abumrad will discuss how “technological shocks” like the telegraph and radio have affected human perception as he considers artificial intelligence.
“We felt the topic of Jad’s Brainstorm presentation — what it feels like to live inside information overload — would bring about interesting perspectives from teens,” Teton County Library Adult Programmer Leah Shlachter said in a statement. “And Jad’s anecdotes about historical technological shocks may offer teens wisdom in approaching new technologies they encounter now and as adults.”
The library invites individual teens as well as classroom groups to attend the free talk on Nov. 15 at 2 p.m. in the library’s auditorium. No reservations are necessary. Adults will be welcomed at Abumrad’s Brainstorm presentation, which will be held at 7 p.m. at The Center.
