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From the cover of The Black Mask magazine, June 1, 1923
Politics & History

The Gumshoes Who Took On the Klan

In the pages of Black Mask magazine, the Continental Op and Race Williams fought the KKK even as they shared its love of vigilante justice.

Unfolding AI

Young woman holding a cell phone

We Got Social Media Wrong. Can We Get AI Right?

How to be agents who use new AI tools, rather than subjects manipulated by them.

American Prison Newspapers 1880-2020

From Paahao Press, November 1943

How Prisoners Contributed During World War II

Prisoners not only supported the war effort in surprising ways during World War II, they fought and died in it.

In the Limelight

Annie Edson Taylor, 1902

American Daredevils

The nineteenth-century commitment to thrilling an audience embodied an emerging synergy of public performance, collective experience, and individual agency.

Suggested Readings

Congolese park rangers conduct a combat patrol July 21, 2006 at Ishango in the Virunga National Park in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

Violent Conservation, Deep-Sea Art, and Early Printing

Well-researched stories from Undark, Mongabay, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.

Most Recent

Ben Thanh Market in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Education & Society

Viêt Kiêu Find a “Home for Now” in Ho Chi Minh City

A growing number of overseas Vietnamese, or Viêt Kiêu, call Ho Chi Minh City home. Why are so many emigrants and their children returning to Vietnam?
World welterweight champion Emile Griffith in training at the Thomas a Beckett Gymnasium in London, for his upcoming fight against Britain's Dave Charnley, November 20th, 1964
Education & Society

Masculinity, Boxing, and the “Wild Brawl” That Changed the Sport

Bennie “Kid” Paret and Emile Griffith were both ready to fight, but it was unlikely either boxer was prepared for the outcome of their final bout.
Exchange Coffee House, Boston
Business

The First American Hotels

In the eighteenth century, if people in British North America had to travel, they stayed at public houses that were often just repurposed private homes.
Tina Turner
Arts & Culture

Why I Fell for Tina Turner

Empowerment, individual strength, and the many facets of love.

More Stories

Unfolding AI

Young woman holding a cell phone

We Got Social Media Wrong. Can We Get AI Right?

How to be agents who use new AI tools, rather than subjects manipulated by them.

American Prison Newspapers 1880-2020

From Paahao Press, November 1943

How Prisoners Contributed During World War II

Prisoners not only supported the war effort in surprising ways during World War II, they fought and died in it.

In the Limelight

Annie Edson Taylor, 1902

American Daredevils

The nineteenth-century commitment to thrilling an audience embodied an emerging synergy of public performance, collective experience, and individual agency.

Suggested Readings

Congolese park rangers conduct a combat patrol July 21, 2006 at Ishango in the Virunga National Park in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo.

Violent Conservation, Deep-Sea Art, and Early Printing

Well-researched stories from Undark, Mongabay, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.

Trending

Marie Stopes in her laboratory, 1904
Education & Society

Counting Orgasms With Marie Stopes

Before gall wasp expert Alfred Kinsey turned to the study of human sexuality, another biologist made her move.
Collections

Eastern Kentucky University American Slavery Collection

Sixteen documents, including slave bills of sale, tell the cruel story of the enslaved lives that were listed in ledgers.
Two arms with tattoos
Education & Society

Why Does the Bible Forbid Tattoos?

And have we been misinterpreting Leviticus?

Long Reads

From the cover of Paahao Press, Summer 1960
American Prison Newspapers 1880-2020

A Century of History in Five Hawaiian Prison Newspapers

Hawaiian language and culture are emphasized throughout, ranging from before statehood and during martial law to modern day women's prisons.
American actors Cindy Williams (right) and Ron Howard as Laurie and Steve on the set of the Lucasfilm production 'American Graffiti',
Arts & Culture

The Sonic Triumph of American Graffiti

In 1973, George Lucas joined forces with sound designer Walter Murch to celebrate a bygone era. They ended up revolutionizing the role music plays in film.
Edward Jenner vaccinating a young child
Health

Moving the Needle

Anti-vaxxers have been around as long as there have been vaccines.
Man typing on laptop. Subject view perspective. Wide angle.
Education

A Bot Might Have Written This

ChatGPT is here. How can teachers and students proceed to use it with integrity?

Editors' Picks

Education & Society

African American Studies: Foundations and Key Concepts

This non-exhaustive list of readings in African American Studies highlights the vibrant history of the discipline and introduces the field.
Politics & History

When a Woman Was “King”

Maria Theresa, the King of Hungary, ruled over the "accidental" Austro-Hungarian Empire, overseeing social, administrative, fiscal, and religious reforms.
Politics & History

Guns in America: Foundations and Key Concepts

This non-exhaustive list of readings on the role of guns in US history and society introduces the field as a subject of scholarly inquiry.
Science & Technology

Words for Birds

From the meaning of birdsong to the history of birdwatching, from the effects of climate change to the cunning of crows—our bird stories have it all.
Politics & History

Women in the Age of Polar Exploration

Opportunities were restricted during the so-called Heroic Age, but women still dreamed of exploration...and sometimes managed to reach the polar regions.

Science & Technology

Older woman praying in an almost empty church.

Can Religion Be Helpful for People With Chronic Pain?

A group of researchers asked this question of a group of patients in secularized Western Europe.
La Rue Catinat, Saigon, Vietnam, 1920s

Neurasthenia, Vietnamese Style

To self-diagnose with neurasthenia was to identify with modernity and civilization while also recognizing the harms caused by colonial structures.
Woman with a home pregnancy test

Home Pregnancy Tests

Before the arrival of home pregnancy tests, women had to seek answers at the doctor’s office, which was costly, inconvenient, and potentially embarrassing.

Open Community Collections on JSTOR

Eastern Kentucky University American Slavery Collection

Sixteen documents, including slave bills of sale, tell the cruel story of the enslaved lives that were listed in ledgers.
Central High School Annual Yearbook, Cleveland, Ohio,1920. Langston Hughes’s senior portrait is on the far right.

Class Production

A collection of high school yearbooks from Cleveland captures the rise, fall, and uncertain future of the American middle class.
Source: https://www.jstor.org/stable/saoa.crl.29887514

South Asia Open Archives Hits a Million

The open-access South Asia Open Archives on JSTOR now offers more than one million pages of digitized primary source material.

Syllabus

A series of newspaper covers

Studying Women’s Prison Newspapers

Reveal Digital's American Prison Newspapers Collection offers first-person perspectives about what matters to women in prison, from pregnancy to recovery.
L'Envoûteuse (The Sorceress) by Georges Merle, 1883

Radical Theology: A Syllabus

Radical theology aims to construct revolutionary understandings of myth, ritual, and scripture that speak to the dearth of meaning in our contemporary moment.
Mothers' Crusade for Victory over Communism

Moral Panics: A Syllabus

Research-backed stories that consider how and why moral panics begin and spread, who they serve, and what becomes of them in the end.

Reading Lists

AI generates images, text and videos, cute robot reaching out computer screen, holding file icons, artificial intelligence creates visual content provides it to user, vector illustration isolated

Artificial Intelligence: An AI-Generated Reading List

ChatGPT generated this annotated bibliography for us. Don't worry, we'll ask (and pay) a human to write one too.
From the poster for Black Girl by Ousmane Sembène, 1966

Ousmane Sembène: Feminism in African Francophone Cinema

Known as “the grandfather of African cinema,” Sembène created powerful female characters who challenged Western notions of gender and sexuality.
Lee Krasner: Living Colour exhibition at Barbican Art Gallery on May 29, 2019 in London, England.

Feminist Art History: An Introductory Reading List

Beginning with texts written in the 1970s, this reading list shows how the major questions, critiques, and debates developed in the field of feminist art history.

Fragments follows three scholars attempting to decipher Euripides’ Cresphontes from a few damaged scraps of text.

Pieces and Bits

American Prison Newspapers 1880-2020

From the cover of Paahao Press, Summer 1960

A Century of History in Five Hawaiian Prison Newspapers

Hawaiian language and culture are emphasized throughout, ranging from before statehood and during martial law to modern day women's prisons.
A series of newspaper covers

Studying Women’s Prison Newspapers

Reveal Digital's American Prison Newspapers Collection offers first-person perspectives about what matters to women in prison, from pregnancy to recovery.
Eugene Debs in prison at the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary, overlaid with his 1920 presidential campaign button

A Million Americans Once Voted for an Incarcerated Socialist

Eugene Debs campaigned for both president and prison reform from a federal penitentiary. His critiques of the prison system still resonate.

Annotations

Linda Brown Smith, Ethel Louise Belton Brown, Harry Briggs, Jr., and Spottswood Bolling, Jr. during press conference at Hotel Americana, 1964

Brown v. Board of Education: Annotated

The 1954 Supreme Court decision, based on the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, declared that “separate but equal” has no place in education.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry addresses delegates before he signed the COP21 Climate Change Agreement on Earth Day, April 22, 2016, at the United Nations General Assembly Hall in New York, N.Y.

The Paris Agreement: Annotated

Adopted by almost 200 parties at the 2015 UN Climate Change Conference, the Paris Agreement captures international ambitions for cooperative climate action.
Lyndon B. Johnson addresses the Nation March 31, 1968

Lyndon B. Johnson’s Decision Speech: Annotated

United States President Lyndon B. Johnson’s televised announcement that he would not run for re-election shocked a nation divided by the Vietnam War.

Quirky History

Jack Parsons

Sex-Cult Rocket Man

Jack Parsons, one of the “suicide squad” trio of young rocket-boy founders of Jet Propulsion Laboratory, had an improbable extracurricular life.
Albert Einstein, 1921

In Search of Einstein’s Brain

After Albert Einstein’s death in 1955, a pathologist—searching for the secret of genius—removed, dissected, and ultimately stole the mathematician’s brain.
A chemist examining a flask of urine

Early Doctors Diagnosed Disease by Looking at Urine

When uroscopy became trendy, it caused a minor scandal within the early medical profession.

Religion

Older woman praying in an almost empty church.

Can Religion Be Helpful for People With Chronic Pain?

A group of researchers asked this question of a group of patients in secularized Western Europe.
Degradation of William Sawtrey

Unmaking a Priest: The Rite of Degradation

The defrocking ceremony was meant to humiliate a disgraced member of the clergy while discouraging laypeople from viewing him as a martyr.
A Trappist monk in the cloisters of a monastery in County Waterford, Ireland, 1935

The Irish Fasting Tradition

Particularly before the Second Vatican Council (a.k.a. Vatican II), fasting was part of the Catholic calendar. No one took it more seriously than the Irish.

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