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Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. speaking at Duke University on November 13, 1964
Politics & History

Colleges’ Reluctant Embrace of MLK Day

The push for a national Martin Luther King holiday prompted a fierce political tug-of-war, on campus and off.

Lingua Obscura

A woman writing a letter at a table

The Ladylike Language of Letters

Letters reveal how language changes. They also offer a peek into the way people--especially women--have always constructed their private and public selves.

Suggested Readings

Produce on a shelf at a supermarket

Unsafe Food, Masculinity, and the Nature of Beauty

Well-researched stories from The Verge, Tufts Magazine, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.

The Digital Voyage

An elderly man typing on a laptop

To Fight Fake News, Broaden Your Social Circle

Fake news is spread through online communities that become echo-chambers of like-minded ideas. What's your online community like?

Roundup

A leaf dotted with water droplets

Editors’ Picks 2018: Sustainability and the Environment

Wildfires in California, floods in Venice, robot-bees, and cows that mitigate climate change.

Most Recent

Xipe Totec Impersonator from AD 600-900
Education & Society

The Festival of the Flayed God

The terrifying and gruesome rituals of the Flayed God had a symbolic subtext that was somewhat gentler than one might imagine.
Richard E. Byrd’s First Antarctic Expedition, 1928-1930
Politics & History

Polar Expedition or Publicity Stunt?

Richard E. Byrd's 1928-1930 Antarctica Expedition was sponsored by mass media. Was it all about science and exploration -- or about Byrd's personal #brand?
Zion National Park
Politics & History

When the Park Ranger Was Not Your Friend

Early 20th century National Park Service Rangers were a notoriously rough-and-tumble lot.
A map of lines and metallic circuit connections by the American Telephone and Telegraph Co., 1891
Politics & History

When the Weather Service Spied on Americans

The United States National Weather Service began as part of the military, with a mandate to serve the interests of federal officials and business owners.

More Stories

Trending

Someone standing in the room of a hoarder
Health

What’s Causing the Rise of Hoarding Disorder?

Now that the DSM lists severe hoarding as a disorder apart from OCD, psychologists are asking what explains its prevalence.
Volunteer nurses tending to the sick and wounded.
Politics & History

When Death Was Women’s Business

In the 19th century, women called "watchers" tended to the dying and the dead.
A stack of books by Virginia Woolf
Arts & Culture

Was Modernism Meant to Keep the Working Classes Out?

In the 19th century, more working class readers started partaking in contemporary fiction. Modernist literature, however, was specifically not for them.

Long Reads

Someone standing in the room of a hoarder
Health

What’s Causing the Rise of Hoarding Disorder?

Now that the DSM lists severe hoarding as a disorder apart from OCD, psychologists are asking what explains its prevalence.
A chocolate orange meant to symbolize Brexit.
Politics & Government

The Many Metaphors of Brexit

How do metaphors shape political perceptions? And what do they mean for the future of Europe?
Composite image of Dmitri Mendeleev, a periodic table, and the Milky Way galaxy
Natural Science

How Far Does the Periodic Table Go?

Efforts to fill the periodic table raise questions of special relativity that “strike at the very heart of chemistry as a discipline.”
A woman's face lit up in a dark room
Education & Society

People with Depression Use Language Differently

New research shows that people with depression use absolute words, such as "always," "nothing," or "completely," more often than others.

Editors' Picks

Education & Society

Wittgenstein on Whether Speech Is Violence

When is speech violence? Sometimes. It depends. That’s a complicated question.
Politics & History

Gareth Dale on the Past and Future of Capitalism

An interview with Gareth Dale on his work on Karl Polanyi, and the past and future of capitalism.
Arts & Culture

Depressed People Aren’t Villains—Nor Are They Werewolves

Our tendency to view people with mental disorders as monsters instead of patients has a history that dates back to the 1400s.
Arts & Culture

The Many Modes of Mummification

From Egypt to East Asia, ways of making mummies have varied. Sometimes, as a recent find reveals, mummification happens completely by accident.
Arts & Culture

The Snow That Never Drifts: Emily Dickinson’s Slant Winter

Like many of her poems, Emily Dickinson's "The Snow That Never Drifts" presents a riddle for the reader

Arts & Culture

In a Glasgow Cotton Mill: Minding a Pair of Fine Frames and In a Glasgow Cotton Spinning Mill: Changing the Bobbin, 1907 by Sylvia Pankhurst

This British Suffragist Used Her Art for Activism

Sylvia Pankhurst gave up painting to focus on suffrage and anti-colonialism activism, but she continued to use her design sense throughout her career.
Martin Milner and Sally Field in Gidget

The Transgressive Subtext of Teen Surf Movies

Surf movies of the 1950s and 1960s only seemed squeaky-clean. Just beneath the surface was rebellion, rule-bending, and an embrace of the "other."
A stack of books by Virginia Woolf

Was Modernism Meant to Keep the Working Classes Out?

In the 19th century, more working class readers started partaking in contemporary fiction. Modernist literature, however, was specifically not for them.

Columns

Tarantella dancers, 1828

When Dancing Plagues Struck Medieval Europe

The tarantella is named for a peasant woman from southern Italy whose tarantula bite started a contagious dancing fever!
Zen Encounter (Niaoke Daolin and Bai Juyi)

Elixirs of Immortal Life Were a Deadly Obsession

Ironically enough.
Security camera

The World’s New Private Security Forces

The global private market for security has brought with it the need for hiring, measuring, and monitoring security workers in unprecedented ways.

A major question that we confront today is whether the neoliberal phase is giving way to something new.

Gareth Dale on the Past and Future of Capitalism

Politics & Government

A jury box in a courtroom in Texas.

Why Do We Still Use Juries?

The history of juries is actually quite revolutionary.
A chocolate orange meant to symbolize Brexit.

The Many Metaphors of Brexit

How do metaphors shape political perceptions? And what do they mean for the future of Europe?
Security camera

The World’s New Private Security Forces

The global private market for security has brought with it the need for hiring, measuring, and monitoring security workers in unprecedented ways.

Economics

The Sharing Economy Was Dead on Arrival

The Sharing Economy Was Dead on Arrival

Sharing economy firms like Lyft and Airbnb promised community, but the ideas they promoted as overturning the status quo are the status quo.
Nosferatu

Marxferatu: Teaching Marx with Vampires

For a younger generation trying to understand Marxism, the best way in may be: vampirism.

Can Universal Basic Income Achieve Economic Security?

A wealthy country like the United States needs a solution for improving the supply and fairness of work overall. Is universal basic income the way to go?

Education

Student with practice baby at Cornell University

When Home Ec Classes Borrowed Babies

In the early-to-mid 20th century, foster children in Canada and elsewhere were placed in practice homes and cared for by home economics students.
A classroom of white students in the 19th century

White Women’s Role in School Segregation

White American women have long played significant roles in maintaining racist practices. One sociologist calls the phenomenon "social mothering."
Two young people reading together.

Is Fan Fiction a Helpful Literacy Tool?

Some teachers are adapting to the internet age by trying to understand the "new literacies" of today's students.