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A promotional image for Yellowjackets
Arts & Culture

Girls Gone Greek

The most influential character on Showtime’s Yellowjackets is the one who goes unnamed: Dionysus.

Learning to Look

How to Interpret the Meaning of an Image

This week, we practice using our skills of visual analysis and learn how to "read" deliberately constructed images.

Suggested Readings

Ludwig Van Beethoven's hair

Beethoven’s Hair, Underwater Women, and Future Food

Well-researched stories from Vox, Knowable Magazine, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.

In the Limelight

A large poster for the film Ebony Parade with a blue background and an off-white border. Across the blue background are red musical notes and stars outlined in white. At the top center in red lettering is "20 Great Stars". Printed in the center in small black type is "Astor Pictures presents" followed by "EBONY PARADE" in large yellow letters over a red background. Surrounding the title are color photographic portraits of the stars of the film. At the top left are the faces of Mantan Moreland, Dorothy Dandridge and Ruby Hill, followed by a full portrait of a seated Mabel Lee and in the bottom left corner is an image of the Mills Brothers gathered around two microphones. On the right side are the faces of Cab Calloway, Vanita Smythe, Francine Everett, and Count Basie. At the bottom right is a yellow box bordered in black with red text that reads "featuring / Cab Calloway * Count Basie / His Band His Band / Mills. Bros. * Vanita Smythe / Mantan Moreland * Mable Lee/ Ruby Hill * Francine Everett / Dorothy Dandridge * Pat Flowers / and / Day, Dawn, and Dusk * Jubilaries".

Mills Panoram and Soundies

In the 1940s, these short films set to music transgressed Hollywood’s racial mythology to create space for Black artists to experiment—and have fun.

Plant of the Month

Watercolor illustration of Plumeria Acuminata commissioned by Scottish doctor and botanist William Roxburgh, late 18th century or early 19th century.

Plant of the Month: Frangipani

An ornamental plant whose white flowers hang over graveyards and temples in Southeast Asia presents complicated questions on national belonging and religious identity.

Most Recent

From the poster for Black Girl by Ousmane Sembène, 1966
Reading Lists

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.
Washington Market, New York, 1872
Politics & History

Feeding a City the Municipal Way

Between 1790 and 1860, New York City’s food markets were public, sustained by active government involvement. What happened?
Saint John the Baptist in Prison Visited by Salome by Guercino
Art & Art History

Taking Liberties With Biblical Stories

In the Christian New Testament, Saint John the Baptist and Salome never meet. Why, then, does she appear at the bars of his cell in Guercino’s moody painting?
CNC machine drilling with coolant
Business & Economics

Uneven Impacts: The Virtual Water Trade

The virtual water trade reveals significant disparities between water-rich states and their trade partners.

More Stories

Learning to Look

How to Interpret the Meaning of an Image

This week, we practice using our skills of visual analysis and learn how to "read" deliberately constructed images.

Suggested Readings

Ludwig Van Beethoven's hair

Beethoven’s Hair, Underwater Women, and Future Food

Well-researched stories from Vox, Knowable Magazine, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.

In the Limelight

A large poster for the film Ebony Parade with a blue background and an off-white border. Across the blue background are red musical notes and stars outlined in white. At the top center in red lettering is "20 Great Stars". Printed in the center in small black type is "Astor Pictures presents" followed by "EBONY PARADE" in large yellow letters over a red background. Surrounding the title are color photographic portraits of the stars of the film. At the top left are the faces of Mantan Moreland, Dorothy Dandridge and Ruby Hill, followed by a full portrait of a seated Mabel Lee and in the bottom left corner is an image of the Mills Brothers gathered around two microphones. On the right side are the faces of Cab Calloway, Vanita Smythe, Francine Everett, and Count Basie. At the bottom right is a yellow box bordered in black with red text that reads "featuring / Cab Calloway * Count Basie / His Band His Band / Mills. Bros. * Vanita Smythe / Mantan Moreland * Mable Lee/ Ruby Hill * Francine Everett / Dorothy Dandridge * Pat Flowers / and / Day, Dawn, and Dusk * Jubilaries".

Mills Panoram and Soundies

In the 1940s, these short films set to music transgressed Hollywood’s racial mythology to create space for Black artists to experiment—and have fun.

Plant of the Month

Watercolor illustration of Plumeria Acuminata commissioned by Scottish doctor and botanist William Roxburgh, late 18th century or early 19th century.

Plant of the Month: Frangipani

An ornamental plant whose white flowers hang over graveyards and temples in Southeast Asia presents complicated questions on national belonging and religious identity.

Trending

Digital illustration of surrealistic faceless human with spiritual thoughts. Made with vector vibrant color gradient geometry forms. Minimalist textured painting on mental, medical and artistic theme.
Science & Technology

Mindful March: The Unexpected Benefits of Mindfulness

Mindfulness has been linked with ethical decision making and avoidance of cognitive biases. Can it lead to better performance at work?
Brown Bears Sitting Together
Plants & Animals

Celebrate World Bear Day!

The joy and concern we feel on World Bear Day perfectly represents our complicated—and sometimes contradictory—feelings about these massive mammals.
Two arms with tattoos
Education & Society

Why Does the Bible Forbid Tattoos?

And have we been misinterpreting Leviticus?

Long Reads

A poster made by Ghazal Foroutan
Politics & History

Was She Really Rosie?

The unlikely, true story of the Westinghouse “We Can Do It” work-incentive poster that became an international emblem of women’s empowerment.
A study of facial expression and gesture, 1823
Politics & History

How Upper Lips Got Stiff

The truism that “boys don’t cry” is a Western social convention. Colonialism and imperialism made sure it spread East.
Olivia Hussey and Leonard Whiting join hands in Romeo and Juliet, 1967
Arts & Culture

Her Bounty Is Boundless

From the first actor—a man—to play Juliet to the “girl boss” version on Broadway, Shakespeare’s young lover offers something new in every iteration.
Samuel Delany at the St. Mark's Poetry Project in New York
Arts & Culture

Ode to Samuel Delany

Composed half-a-century ago, The Ballad of Beta-2 was a science-fiction vision of the future that speaks directly to our present.

Editors' Picks

Politics & History

Transgender Legal Battles: A Timeline

New laws regarding transgender youth are based on the assumption that the gender binary is natural.
Education & Society

Death by Crowding

In the aftermath of tragedies, it's easy to focus on the assignation of blame. But how well do we understand the causes of crushing crowds?
Politics & History

Harvey Milk’s Gay Freedom Day Speech: Annotated

Five months before his assassination in 1978, Harvey Milk called on the president of the United States to defend the rights of gay and lesbian Americans.
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.
Politics & History

American as Apple Pie

How marketing made guns a fundamental element of contemporary boyhood.

Science & Technology

Digital illustration of surrealistic faceless human with spiritual thoughts. Made with vector vibrant color gradient geometry forms. Minimalist textured painting on mental, medical and artistic theme.

Mindful March: The Unexpected Benefits of Mindfulness

Mindfulness has been linked with ethical decision making and avoidance of cognitive biases. Can it lead to better performance at work?
Brown Bears Sitting Together

Celebrate World Bear Day!

The joy and concern we feel on World Bear Day perfectly represents our complicated—and sometimes contradictory—feelings about these massive mammals.
Cougar Silhouette

Ghost Cats of the East

Why do people claim to see cougars in the eastern United States when the cats are now extremely rare in that part of North America?

Open Community Collections on JSTOR

The Sweet Sixteen of Sneakers on JSTOR

Why should basketball fans have all the March Madness fun? We're running a basketball sneaker bracket. Play along on Twitter.

Railroad Chapel Cars Brought God to the People

Between 1890 and 1946, thirteen railroad chapel cars made their way across America, spreading a Christian message in rural communities.
Llainfadyn cottage. This 1762 cottage is solidly-built of mountain boulders, and a pair of stout oak trusses supports the roof of small, locally-quarried slates.

Vernacular Architecture in Wales

The pioneering collection of farm and craft buildings at the National Museum of Wales in Cardiff preserves traditional design and building techniques.

Syllabus

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.
Dakota pipeline protestors

Celebrating Indigenous Peoples and Cultures

More and more states are choosing to celebrate Indigenous Peoples' Day instead of Columbus Day.

Reading Lists

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.
Watercolor painting of the earth by Martin Eklund

Planetary Health: Foundations and Key Concepts

The groundwork for the field of planetary health was laid by a range of disciplines and movements, including medicine, ecology, health, and feminism.

History is chasing you, America, like a mean dog, and the only way to get it off your back is to turn around and stare it in the face.

Remembering Her Memories: Lucille Clifton’s Generations in Our Time

American Prison Newspapers 1880-2020

Ruby Bridges

Chainlink Chronicle: Celebrating Black History in Louisiana

An exploration of one prison newspaper’s commitment to celebrating Black History with a unique focus on its home state.
An illustration of a bedroom with a prison guard tower through the window

Controversy and Conjugal Visits

Conjugal visits were first allowed as incentives for the forced labor of incarcerated Black men, the practice expanding from there. Is human touch a right?

The First Famous Football Team Behind Bars

Sing Sing's football team, The Black Sheep, ascended to fame even though its players were incarcerated. One player was so good, he signed with the Eagles.

Annotations

Title page for Sinners in the hands of an angry God, 1741

Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God: Annotated

Jonathan Edwards’s sermon reflects the complicated religious culture of eighteenth-century America, influenced not just by Calvinism, but Newtonian physics as well.
American Army Entering the City of Mexico, Filippo Constaggini, 1885

The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo: Annotated

Signed February 2, 1848, the treaty compelled Mexico to cede 55 percent of its territory, bringing more than 525,000 square miles under US sovereignty.
An orangutan attacks a woman and pulls her hair in an illustration for the murder scene in Edgar Allan Poe's short story 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue,' early 1840s. A victim lies on the floor, and a witness watches through a window.

“The Murders in the Rue Morgue” by Edgar Allan Poe: Annotated

Poe's 1841 story, arguably the first detective fiction, contains many tropes now considered standard to the genre, including a brilliant, amateur detective.

Politics & History

Washington Market, New York, 1872

Feeding a City the Municipal Way

Between 1790 and 1860, New York City’s food markets were public, sustained by active government involvement. What happened?
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.
Manual knitting machine.

The Vermont Knitters

A major labor law dispute simmered for decades. At its center? Women being paid to do piecework on knitting machines in their homes.

Interviews

C. Buddy Creech

C. Buddy Creech: Your Vaccine Questions Answered

Vaccinologist C. Buddy Creech on getting vaccinated, racial disparities, and the lessons we’ve learned after a year of COVID-19.
3D render of coronavirus

We Spoke to a Public Health Expert about COVID-19

He made us feel better.
Jill Lepore

Jill Lepore: How to Respond to the Crisis of Our Institutions

Lepore talks about presidential deceit, why women are often forgotten by history, and the “epistemological crisis” of our era.

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