Shoga Speaks — First Person
Join Filmmaker Dr. Robert Philipson as he explores stories from his personal life.
Episodes
17 episodes
Zanzibar 88, Part Two
Three months after his first visit, Robert Philipson returned to Zanzibar in July of 1988 and reconnected with his friends: Haroub, the object of infatuation; Abou, the civil servant with a wild streak, and his former teacher, mwalimu ...
Zanzibar 88, Part One
In March 1988, Robert Philipson, working on a dissertation about an untranslated Swahili playwright, arrived in Zanzibar for a two-week intensive language course at the Swahili Institute, but the island had other lessons to teach. Within hours ...
"Skinny"—The Black babysitter narrates her life with the Philipsons
Meet Doris Hale, the most intimate and important African American that my famlly knew and trusted, in her own words. Dr. Philipson conducted and transcribed the interview back in the early 90s. In anticipation of releasing the manuscript of the...
Still Life
"I have concluded from the melancholy nature of my subsequent development that the artifacts hung up on a child's wall can have a permanent effect on his life."So begins the essay on the role the Art played in my formation, an evolution...
The Goops
What's in a bedtime story? More than you might imagine. As we were growing up, my father introduced his version of imaginary creatures, the goops, into our household and family life. Created as negative role models to teach manners to Victorian...
A Salvage Job, Part One
America 1968. Everything was up for grabs. All passion and creativity seemed to gush from the counterculture. "Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive/But to be young was very heaven." I was young, 18, and enrolled as an undergraduate in the four...
A Salvage Job, Part Two
Sam and Daniel are in Israel, circa 1969. They are on a kibbutz, learning Hebrew in the morning and working for their room and board in the afternoon. Sam follows Daniel in his effort to deepen his Jewish identity. They go to Mount Tabor, site ...
HIV Negative
The phrase "HIV Negative" implies the diagnosis "HIV positive," a precursor to the AIDS epidemic which decimated the gay male population in the 1980s and beyond. The stigma, still a force in some sectors of our society, delayed the mobili...
The Wine of Remembrance
Host Dr. Robert Philipson guides listeners through a lyrical meditation on memory, identity, and the lasting imprint of Paris. Framed by a moment of reflection on the banks of the Oubangui River in the Central African Republic, Philipson recall...
The Old House
Dr. Robert Philipson reflects on the layered history and personal meaning of his childhood home in Southern California, weaving together Indigenous displacement, colonial conquest, and postwar suburban life. As he moves room by room through
Which Road Did You Come From?, Part One
Dr. Robert Philipson reflects on the emotional limbo of post-college life in 1970s Pasadena, where returning home sparks a spiral of depression, existential doubt, and a search for meaning. Amid the decay of suburban sprawl and family disconnec...
Which Road Did You Come From?, Part Two
In the conclusion of The Artificial Grandma, Dr. Robert Philipson continues his journey through post-college drift, emotional illness, and the disillusionment of returning home. Set against the backdrop of a failed commune dream, an ac...
Shylock, Uncle David and Me
In this deeply personal and thought-provoking episode, Robert Philipson traces the intertwined threads of family, faith, and identity, beginning with his great-uncle, Reform Judaism leader Rabbi David Philipson, and winding through his own comp...
The Artificial Grandma
Host Dr. Robert Philipson reflects on the life of his maternal grandmother, Jeanette, tracing a family legacy shaped by mismatched love, unspoken expectations, and the emotional weight of generational silence. From her immigrant roots and ill-f...
The Family Dog
Our choice of pets says a lot about who we are … and we are all very different. There are cat people; there are dog people; there are bird people; there are reptile people and on and on. The famlly pet can mark a child’s development for better ...
Cousin Marion, Part One
Dr. Philipson looks back at the life of his cousin Marion, a fiercely independent anti-colonialist and socialist documentary filmmaker, known for her work with Dutch filmmaker Joris Ivens. Philipson explores how, from an unpromising bourgeois J...
Cousin Marion, Part Two
Part Two continues the story of Marion's unbroken involvement with the Philipson family, maintained over the next four decades in spite of the distance that separated Paris from Pasadena. Dr. Philipson, whose development through French culture ...