For decades, cultural tourism has been disparaged in Indian Country, bringing to mind images of non-Native Americans on vacation picking through baskets and jewelry. Tribes are now embracing the traveler who's looking for a different vacation experience, with leaders converging on the Cherokee Nation's Hard Rock Casino in Tulsa last September for the American Indian Alaska Native Tourism Conference.

Join KGOU's Susan Shannon (Osage) for Oklahoma Voices on Monday, Nov. 25 at 11 a.m., as she talks with Edward Hall III (Arikira/Hidatsa), one of the conference founders, along with Kevin Gover (Pawnee), director of the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C. Then, to mark Native American Heritage Month as well as Thanksgiving, KGOU will broadcast an encore on Thursday, Nov. 28 at 9 a.m.

 

Recent polling shows growing support for constructing storm shelters in all Oklahoma public schools, but policy makers are not in agreement about who should pay for them.

A public forum hosted by KGOU's Oklahoma Tornado Project explored the topic with state Rep. Joe Dorman (D-Rush Springs), who heads an intitiative petition effort to bring the issue to voters, Harold Brooks, a reasearcher for NOAA, and StateImpact Oklahoma's Joe Wertz, who has reported on the prevalence of shelters in schools. The panel discussion airs Monday, Dec. 2 at 11 a.m. on Oklahoma Voices.

 

Turkey Confidential is the annual live call-in show with Lynne Rossetto Kasper of The Splendid Table, designed to bail you out of any last-minute kitchen emergencies. This year, Lynne's guests are Mario Batali, Pati Jinich, Ted Allen, Alexandra Guarnaschelli and Michael Pollan.

Try Lynne's recipes and tune in Thanksgiving morning from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. CST for hints, tips, tricks, and lots of reassurance. And if you find yourself in need, her contact information is on our Special Programs page.

 

You may know it by the name Black Friday, but Nov. 29 marks the sixth annual StoryCorps National Day of Listening. On the day after Thanksgiving, StoryCorps is urging everyone to take a few minutes to interview a loved one about their life, and discover the stories of your closest family and friends.

StoryCorps has a free Do-It-Yourself interview guide with equipment recommendations and interview instructions available online. StoryCorps is again partnering with SoundCloud on the interactive National Day of Listening Wall. NPR's newsmagazines will air several companion stories throughout Thanksgiving week, and PBS airs the animated special Listening Is an Act of Love on Thanksgiving evening. Here's a sneak peek.

 

Planet Money, NPR's team of multimedia reporters covering the global economy, is making a t-shirt. On the shirts' journey from concept to finished product, Planet Money will introduce us to the people who grow the cotton, spin the yarn, and cut and sew the fabric. The team rode on the cargo ships along with the t-shirts from factories in Bangladesh and Colombia to ports in the U.S. and learned about the crazy tangle of international regulations which govern the t-shirt trade.

On-air stories on Morning Edition and All Things Considered begin Monday, Dec. 2. You can also follow the coverage on the Planet Money Makes A T-Shirt tumblr. This project was crowd sourced by a successful Kickstarter campaign -- this video explains it all.