Bill Cosby Honored As Greatest American Comic

On today’s show, we look back at 40 years of “black studies,” now often called African-American studies. It began as a discipline in 1969 at San Francisco State University following a student protest. For insight, Tony Cox speaks with Elizabeth Alexander, Chair of the African American Studies Department at Yale University; Greg Carr, who heads the Department of Afro-American Studies at Howard University; Dorothy Randall Tsuruta, chair of Africana Studies at San Francisco State University; and John McWhorter, a Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank.
[SEGMENTS A & B]

Plus, Bill Cosby is described as “the greatest American stand-up comic of all time” in a PBS special airing this week. It’s the Mark Twain Award ceremony, honoring the 72-year old comedy master. Is Cosby the best ever? Chris Rock and Jerry Seinfeld think so. But comedy has changed, drastically, and black comics are a big part of it. Tony Cox talks with with Darryl Littleton — a stand-up comedian and author — who says there’s a reason for all the profanity and toilet humor so evident today. His book is called Black Comedians on Black Comedy–How African Americans Taught Us to Laugh.
[SEGMENTS B & C]

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