Americana - 18/10/2009

Matt Frei presents an insider guide to the people and the stories shaping America today. Combining location reports with lively discussion and exclusive interviews, the show provides new and surprising insights into contemporary America. President Barack Obama makes his first visit to New Orleans since becoming president. Matt Frei talks to New Orleans-born trumpeter Irvin Mayfield about what life is like these days in the city still coming back to life from the ravages of Hurricane Katrina. As major news networks scramble to innovate and meet the changing demands of their audiences, Matt Frei talks to former CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather about the ways Americans consume news. Many American big-city newspapers are holding on for dear life - and sometimes not holding on at all - but some small-town papers are doing just fine. Matt Frei talks to publisher Gloria Trotter in Oklahoma, who has co-published the Tecumseh Countywide News and Sun for the last 26 years. She explains how small papers like hers are managing to continue going strong. After 40 years of Monty Python humour, many Americans can still quote a trove of the troupe's lines, verbatim, and with very bad English accents. Hayes Davenport, editor of the Harvard Lampoon, tries to explain why.