Kelly McEvers says her new podcast Embedded is unique because it's a news podcast. "We take a story from the news, and we go deep," she says in this interview. "I'm in the soup of news every day." (As regular listeners know, she's also one of the hosts of NPR's All Things Considered.)
In an NPR news planning meeting, when something particularly interesting sticks out, she wants to learn more--to explore the "how" and "why" behind an event.
Embedded allows her to travel to places such as Waco, Texas, where rival biker gangs engaged in a brutal shootout that killed nine people. She spends time with one of the gangs, joining them in their clubs, trying to learn what they're really like.
The first season of the podcast is wrapping up, and McEvers joins us to talk about stark moments: meeting bikers, drug addicts, and people under seige in San Salvador, and giving us a close-up glimpse of their lives. It's the kind of reporting that can cause listeners to re-think their biases and empathize with people from vastly different backgrounds.
In this interview, we also talk about podcasting itself and the future of NPR and member stations such as WUTC.
