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b'This week on "State of Wonder," singer Beth Ditto breaks out from her band Gossip, the Slants gets their big day at the Supreme Court, and we look back on Thara Memory\'s complicated legacy.

After Years of Fighting, The Slants Prevail at the Supreme Court - 1:23

This week the United States Supreme Court cleared the way for the Portland dance rock band the Slants to register a trademark for its name \\u2014 something the Patent and Trademark Office had previously rejected, claiming it was derogatory. The Slants argued that their name reclaimed a racist slur, but the case also sets a permissive precedent for how the federal government handles trademarks using offensive language. It\'s prompted celebration from some groups\\u2014such as a well-known Washington football team\\u2014that use objectionable terms unironically.

Oregon Ballet Theater Centers Women Choreographers at Choreography XX - 6:33

It\\u2019s not at all rare for major ballet companies to go whole seasons without performing a single work created by a woman. Oregon Ballet Theater set out last year to change that with a new competition called Choreography XX. Of nearly 100 applicants, they chose three women from around the continent to create new works, set them on the company, and premiere them at free performances on June 29 and 30 in Washington Park\'s Rose Garden Amphitheater.

Powerhouse Singer Beth Ditto\'s New Solo Record: \'Fake Sugar\' - 13:37

As the singer of the hit garage-turned-dance-rock band Gossip, Beth Ditto rose to international acclaim with the 2006 breakout \\u201cStanding in the Way of Control\\u201d and broke the record in Germany for the longest-selling hit single with \\u201cHeavy Cross.\\u201d While touring with the band, she also became a fashion icon for her unique style and unapologetic approach to her weight, posing naked on the covers of magazines, walking in Paris fashion shows, collaborating on a line of MAC cosmetics and even creating her own clothing lines. She also penned a memoir about growing up poor in the south. Now, Ditto is mining those roots in her first full-length solo record, \\u201cFake Sugar.\\u201d

Playwright E.M. Lewis Stages a Different Kind of \'Gun Show\' - 22:14

The Oregon playwright E.M. Lewis grew up surrounded by guns and learned to shoot on a date with her husband-to-be. But then she found herself on the other end of a barrel during a robbery and lost her husband to a gun wound. She knows firsthand the whole range of emotions guns elicit, and she\\u2019s loaded them all into a provocative play \\u201cThe Gun Show.\\u201d The show debuted locally last fall, and it was so successful that Lewis and Vin Shambry, the actor who plays Lewis\'s character in the one-man show, are taking it on the road: first to Washington, DC, and then to a month-long run at the prestigious Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

Hood River Teacher Rachel Harry Wins the Tony for Theater Education - 31:39

The Tony Award for theater education goes to... teacher Rachel Harry at Hood River Valley High School. Harry welcomed us in during the final week of classes, so we could see what sets her program apart. She\'s been teaching in Hood River for 30 years, forging close connections with her students and pushing them toward fairly high-level creative practice.

Remembering Jazz Musician Thara Memory - 36:46

Jazz musician and educator died last Saturday night after an extended illness at 68. He lived hard, impacted hundreds of lives, mentored star musicians like Esperanza Spalding, and spent his final months trying to clear his reputation after former students accused him of inappropriate conduct. We look back on his complicated legacy.
Omar El Akkad\'s "American War" Imagines - 43:40

As a former correspondent for Toronto\\u2019s \'Globe and Mail newspaper, Omar El Akkad covered the Arab Spring in Egypt, military trials at Guantanamo Bay, refugee camps in Afghanistan, and the Black Lives Matter movement in Ferguson, Missouri. You can see many of those worlds in detail in his new book, but there\\u2019s a twist: El Akkad\\u2019s new book is a novel\\u2014a terrifyingly realistic one that\\u2019s set in the second half of the 21st century. The book is called "American War," and it\\u2019s the story of the second American Civil War\\u2014a war fought over fossil fuel consumption from 2074 to 2095.'