# Remembering Dolly Parton's Musical and Philanthropic Legacy

An episode of [On with Kara Swisher](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1643307527), 30 Aug 2026, 59 min.

Audio: https://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pdst.fm/e/pscrb.fm/rss/p/mgln.ai/e/257/traffic.megaphone.fm/VMP6564152936.mp3

Across the country, people continue to grieve Dolly Parton, the late country music icon who spent more than 60 years making us cry, laugh and fall in love. But in a country as fragmented and divided as the U.S., how did Dolly Parton become our "unproblematic fave”? In this bonus episode of On With Kara Swisher, Kara breaks down the legendary artist many call Saint Dolly with three Dolly experts. Tressie McMillan Cottom is a professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill, a culture critic and an award-winning author. Her latest New York Times column is titled, “Loving Dolly Was Easy. Understanding Her Was Hard.” Chely Wright is a country music artist and author of the book “Like Me: Confessions of a Heartland Country Singer." And Marissa Moss is a writer for Rolling Stone and author of the book “Her Country: How the Women of Country Music Became the Success They Were Never Supposed to Be.” Questions? Comments? Email us at on@voxmedia.com or find us on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Threads, and Bluesky @onwithkaraswisher. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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