Gist: Does Authenticity Matter?

On The Gist, the return of In Search Of hosted by Zachary Quinto, which used to be hosted by Leonard Nimoy, made us notice all the times actors have filled the shoes of others through multiple different reboots. The FIFA World Cup is great, but only the ConIFA World Football Cup has competitors from Székely Land, Abkhazia, and the County of Nice. Slate’s Josh Keating wrote the book on Invisible Countries, those tiny nation-states with little recognition but great stories to tell.  In the Spiel, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez defeated Joe Crowley in the recent Democratic primary race for Congress. Many commentators have called her authentic, but does that word have any actual meaning?