© 2024 Ideastream Public Media

1375 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, Ohio 44115
(216) 916-6100 | (877) 399-3307

WKSU is a public media service licensed to Kent State University and operated by Ideastream Public Media.
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Author Kevin Young Explores the History of Hoaxes in Latest Book

Hoaxes, cons, and fakers have been a part of the fabric of American culture since the days of PT Barnum and Edgar Allen Poe. While some are harmless, hoaxes are now have manifested into serious threats in the forms of fabricated memoirs and false news stories. Are we entering a new era of hoaxes? How do we tell truth from bunk?

Poet and author Kevin Young answers these questions in his latest book "Bunk: The Rise of Hoaxes, Humbug, Plagiarists, Phonies, Post-Facts, and Fake News." The book won a 2018 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for non-fiction. He will be in Cleveland later this week for the ceremony and his event  Bunk and a Beer with Kevin Young. ideastream's Rick Jackson talked with Young ahead of the awards to learn more about "Bunk." 

- Kevin Young, author, "Bunk: The Rise of Hoaxes, Humbug, Plagiarists, Phonies, Post-Facts, and Fake News"