Outsider/Insider is an MIT Sloan podcast. It was developed to provide tools for members of the MIT community—as well as other communities that resemble MIT in that they are workplaces or schools and they aspire for their diversity to be a source of strength. Another goal is what the co-hosts—the MIT sociologists and management professors Ray Reagans and Ezra Zuckerman Sivan-- like to call “delight in discovery.”
Ray and Ezra are quite open and frank about the difficulties that MIT and other universities have faced in realizing this aspiration, with a particular focus on the challenges that emerged in the fall of 2023 when community members from two distinct communities—those with a “natural affinity” with one of the two sides of the war that began on 10/7 (many Jews and Israelis, many Middle Easterners and North Africans, especially Palestinians)—felt unsupported at time of great need.
Yet while Ray and Ezra’s conversations are meant to help address a pain point, they are also designed to be playful and inspiring. The playfulness is intellectual—the fun of wrestling with puzzles about the world and excitedly considering novel insights; but it’s also personal—the kind of teasing and poking at one another that good friends do. Ray and Ezra believe that the “outsider-insider” relationship they model are both rewarding and achievable for many people. Very likely, you too are blessed with cherished relationships like Ray and Ezra’s, even if you may not give call them by that name and even if you don’t reference academic research when you do so.
How to listen & comment
Show notes with references and summary of key ideas can be found on the on Substack episode pages, with opportunity for comment:
- Episode 1 (The Invisible Logic of Jewish Peoplehood; release date: 9/9/24)
- Episode 2 (The Invisible Logic of Black Family Reunions; release date: 9/9/24)
- Episode 3 (The Promise and Challenge of Universities as Inclusive Communities release date: 9/9/24)