In September, musician and poet K'Naan wrote an op-ed about returning to his native Somalia for The New York Times. He had left the country, which is in the grip of a devastating famine and violent civil war, twenty years earlier, fleeing with other members of his family for safety in Canada. He came on the show to discuss this in September.

On Sunday, our partners at The New York Times will run their ninth annual "Year in Ideas" issue, compiling some of the best (and and most eccentric) ideas that made headlines this year.

Moon-centric-legislation, Twitter-based-revolutions, hybrid car ringtones and zombiefied Jane Austen are all on the table as we speak with Chris Suellentrop, staff editor of the New York Times Magazine.

Hanukkah begins Friday. For this week's food segment, New York Times food writer Joan Nathan guides us on how to make Jewish food if you're new to the family and come from a different religious background.

Check out Nathan's recipes for Sweet Potato Latkes, Apple Cider Doughnuts and other Hanukkah dishes.

Disney’s first movie to feature a black princess, “The Princess and The Frog,” opens this week in select cities, and nationwide on December 11. Jeff Yang, trend forecaster for market research firm Iconoculture and columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, talks with us about the challenges of marketing a film to both a wide audience and niche segments. And Latoya Peterson, who’s been tracking the black community’s reaction to a princess who spends most of the movie as a frog, relays what she’s been hearing on the ground.

"The Twilight Saga: New Moon" hits movie theaters today, and fanatic teenage girls all over the country are making the film a phenomenon before it even opens. Takeaway contributor and New York Times movie critic A.O. Scott, our middle-aged reviewer who liked the movie, explains what all the fuss is about.

Click through to watch a trailer.

[Rakim's "Guess Who's Back"]

Rakim’s influence is all over contemporary hip hop (and beyond it), from Tupac and Jay-Z to Eminem and Rage Against the Machine. He releases his third solo album, “The Seventh Seal,” today – his first solo album in nine years. Morehouse College professor David Wall Rice talks with us about why Rakim is so respected in hip-hop circles, and why he's relatively unknown outside hip-hop despite his wide-ranging influence.

A.O. Scott has been covering film for The New York Times for 10 years; he joins us to look back on what's captured audiences and critics to define the first filmic decade of the 21st Century. He says the most memorable moments were often completely unpredictable. See where "The 40-Year-Old Virgin," "There Will Be Blood" and "The Minority Report" fit into Scott's look back on a decade of film criticsm.

[Above, our interview with Woody Harrelson, Ben Foster and director Oren Moverman]

"The Messenger" tells the story of the grief and pain that families go through when they find out they’ve lost a loved one to war, and the officers whose job it is to deliver that news. We talk to the film’s stars, Woody Harrelson and Ben Foster, about how the film changed their own outlooks on the reality of war.

Cookie Monster now eats vegetables, and various faces have come and gone, but  the core values and missions of Sesame Street aren't much different from when the show was first broadcast four decades ago. We look back at the show’s influence with original cast member Bob McGrath, who is still with the show today. We also look at the future of children's television in America with TV blogger Delaina Dixon.

[Watch the trailer for the just-released film "Precious"]

Before it was a film, "Precious" was a screenplay. And before it was a screenplay, it was a novel called "Push." We talk to Sapphire, who wrote the book, and Geoffrey Fletcher, who wrote the screenplay based on that novel, about what it took for the character of Clareece Precious Jones to evolve from print to screen.

Taylor Swift was the top-selling recording artist of 2008. According to Forbes, she’s the 69^th most powerful celebrity in America. She was recently nominated for more American Music Awards than any other artist this year. And, she’s only 19 years old. We talk to Swift about what it means to be a young star, her upcoming Saturday Night Live hosting gig, and how she feels about her high-profile awards show appearances.

If you're not familiar with her work, here is her chart-topping hit "Love Story":

Monty Python, the British comic troupe with a penchant for absurdist humor, retelling historic and biblical stories, and above all, glorifying Spam, are celebrating the 40th anniversary of their hugely influential comedy show, "Monty Python's Flying Circus." We look back on their work (which is, much to the Pythons' surprise, still making audiences laugh four decades later). Click through for more of our favorite clips.

Customers and stylists at Ambiance Hair and Spa in Brooklyn, NY answer the question: is there such a thing as "good hair"?

Chris Rock’s new documentary, “Good Hair,” will be released nationwide today. It explores issues about black women’s hair – from self-perceptions about texture to the origins of hair used in weaves. What is good hair? Is there such a thing? We ask Noliwe Rooks, director of Princeton's Center for African American Studies, and Marvet Britto, an entertainment executive and weave-enthusiast, who appears in Rock’s film.

Michael Moore has come out with his own take on the financial crisis. His new movie, "Capitalism: A Love Story," follows homeowners who have been foreclosed on by big banks, and the major players in government and in the financial industry who watched it all happen. We ask the man behind documentaries "Roger and Me," "Bowling for Columbine" and "Sicko" if he can call for change with this movie, and if he can still pull off his trademark ambushes now that his profile is so prominent.

This week marks 25 years since "The Cosby Show" first hit the airwaves. The show documented the rich and often hilarious family life of the Huxtables, an upper-middle-class black family living in Brooklyn. The show starred Bill Cosby as Dr. Cliff Huxtable, an obstetrician, his wife Claire, an attorney played by Phylicia Rashad, and their four (and later, five) children and eventually, grandchildren. The show revolutionized television's portrayal of black families; our friend, Essence Magazine Senior Editor Patrik Henry Bass, has been looking back at the television phenomenon and thinking about how it has aged. We also get a perspective from Ta-Nehisi Coates, who profiled Bill Cosby for The Atlantic last year.

"The Jay Leno Show" premiers on NBC tonight at 10:00 pm EST, and planning for the prime time premiere has gone on for months. We look at the lead up to the launch of a new late-night show with someone who has done it several times: Mitch Semel, network executive and  president of Semel Media. We also speak to TV blogger Delaina Dixon of delainadixon.com to find out if the buzz around "The Jay Leno Show" is justified.

View an interview with Jay Leno about his new show:

It's Friday, which is when we review the biggest movies coming out over the weekend. We speak to Rafer Guzman, film critic for Newsday about two highly anticipated films: Ang Lee's "Taking Woodstock", about a man who inadvertently sets off events that lead to the fabled music event; and a documentary by R.J. Cutler called "The September Issue," about Vogue Magazine and its notorious editor-in-chief, Anna Wintour.

Watch Anna Wintour's much talked-about appearance on David Letterman from earlier this week:

Michael Jackson died of a fatal drug overdose including the anesthetic Propofol, according to court documents unsealed on Monday. Jackson's death will now reportedly be treated as a homicide. To shed light on the latest news, we speak with Allison Samuels, national correspondent for Newsweek magazine; she has been following the Jackson case since his death two months ago.

While newspapers and magazines have lined their pages with details of Bernie Madoff's deceit, the literary world is still trying to cash in on the embezzlement drama. The sixth book on the life and times of the convicted Ponzi schemer hits bookstores today.

The book was penned by Sheryl Weinstein, former CEO of Hadassah, the Women’s Zionist Organization of America, and one of Madoff’s investors. We speak to Motoko Rich, who covers the publishing industry for The New York Times, along with author and journalist Erin Arvedlund, whose book “Too Good to be True: The Rise and Fall of Bernie Madoff” just came out this month.

Miles Davis’s seminal jazz album, “Kind of Blue,” turns 50 today. Davis, along with John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Wynton Kelly, Paul Chambers, Jimmy Cobb, Julian "Cannonball" Adderley, recorded the album – widely considered one of the greatest jazz albums in history – in early 1959, and released it on August 17th, 1959.

Joining The Takeaway to talk about the impact this album has had is WNYC’s Evening Music Host Terrance McKnight.