Ideas

You likely have never heard of Matilda Joslyn Gage. Gloria Steinem calls her “the woman ahead of the women who were ahead of their time.” Matilda worked side by side with Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton to get women the vote in the United States and co-wrote the history of the women’s movement with them. IDEAS producer Dawna Dingwall looks into why the towering figure was erased by her peers, and the work that is being done to write Matilda back into history. *This episode originally aired on Feb. 26, 2026.

"The Matilda Effect" was a term coined by a historian Margaret Rossiter to describe women whose work had been overlooked and erased from history, like Matilda Gage. Listen to this podcast to hear about the lost women of science and how Rossiter gave them the credit they deserved.

Guests in this episode:

Angelica Shirley Carpenter, author of Born Criminal: Matilda Joslyn Gage, Radical Suffragist
Michael Patrick Hearn, author of the Annotated Wizard of Oz
Gita Dorothy Morena, great-great-granddaughter of Matilda Joslyn Gage
Ciarrai Eaton, executive director of the Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation
The late Sally Roesch Wagner, former ED of the Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation appears courtesy of The Book Dreams Podcast, WCNY's Repeating History podcast, the International Wizard of Oz Club and filmmaker Jeremy Kagan.

In an era of political polarization and fatigue from ongoing crises, hope is critical. But it's not something you have; it's something you do, argues education scholar Kari Grain. "Critical hope" in action is not just the belief that transformation is possible — it's necessary. In her book, she explores seven principles for practicing hope that confront toxic positivity, social injustices, and gives anger and grief a seat at the table. *This episode originally aired on Dec. 22, 2025.

Kari Grain is a professor at the University of British Columbia in the Faculty of Education, where she leads the Masters program in Adult Learning and Global Change Program. She delivered the University of Prince Edward Island’s 2025 Shannon K. Murray Lecture on Hope and the Academy.

Fact and fiction may seem poles apart but writers Esi Edugyan and Tiya Miles find the two intertwine perfectly in their award-winning storytelling. Both authors try to imagine past lives in their work, in part so that we may reimagine our own. They may operate in different realms but what they share is the telling of profoundly important stories that would otherwise go untold. It's been a longtime goal for IDEAS to bring these two accomplished authors together for a discussion — and it was worth the wait.

This podcast was recorded in front of an audience in January 2026 at a Toronto Public Library event.

The world is feeling darker and darker these days. So this podcast might be a much-needed balm. It's about hope — a practice that scholar Shannon Murray argues can't be passive. That's where the German term 'freudenfreude' comes in, when someone celebrates the good fortune of others as if it's their own. Murray explains the power of freudenfreude and offers a guide to hope, empathy, and patience through the lens of Shakespeare. Yes. The Bard's words tie into all of this. *This episode originally aired on Nov. 13, 2023.

Throughout his career, it wasn't unusual for David Bowie to sing about death. But the musician used his own mortality as a theme for a final album that he released just two days before he died, on his 69th birthday. In this podcast IDEAS looks into the meaning of Bowie's enigmatic last songs, and explores the many ways that an artist’s mortality gives their work new meaning. *This episode originally aired on Jan. 11, 2016.