Ganesa writing the Mahabharat, dictated by Vyasa. Page from an illustrated manuscript of the Mahabharata

The South Asian Human Rights Tradition

Human rights discourse drawing on ancient Sanskrit texts focuses more on the responsibilities of individuals and states than on the rights themselves.
Lyrebird

Best of Suggested Readings 2022

Well-researched stories about globalizing chickens, portable soup, imperial horrors, and more from publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.
U.S. Weather Bureau Balloon, c. 1909-1920

Long Before Sputnik: An Explosion of Federal Science

The National Academy of Sciences was created by the United States Congress during the American Civil War. The timing wasn’t coincidental.
Lester Young playing at a charity concert held at the Philharmonic Hall, 1953

The Scholars Charting Black Music’s Timeline: Douglas Henry Daniels & Paul Austerlitz

Daniels and Austerlitz tell the story of jazz, from its origins in the blues, gospel, and funk to its impact on music around the world.
Close-up Vintage Wooden Hourglass on Wooden Background, Sand running through the bulbs for measuring the passing time

Editors’ Picks of 2022

Poetry, Polonius, and Prison: a collection of this year’s greatest hits from JSTOR Daily.
An illustration of mermaids from Puck, 1911, by Gordon Ross

Mermaids: Myth, Kith and Kin

Ariel epitomizes mermaids now, but these beguiling creatures precede her by millennia, sparking imaginations the world over with a hearty embrace of otherness.
A Hundred Years Peace: The Signature of the Treaty of Ghent (Belgium), 1814

The Treaty of Ghent: Annotated

The Treaty of Ghent ended the War of 1812, an oft overlooked conflict that continues to shape the politics and culture(s) of North America.
Winter: Skating Scene (From Set of Four Seasons) from Balloch Castle, Scotland

Fighting for the Right to Party at Christmas

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the Reformed Kirk of Scotland tried to shut down holiday celebrations. The Scottish people didn’t give up easily.
An image from a manuscript from the 9th century AH/AD 15th century (Safavid dynasty)

Music and Gender in Medieval Islamic Court

As Islam spread across the Arabian peninsula and the Mesopotamian region, it changed the relationship between gender and musicianship.
Anna te Drieën, 1528

Who Was Jesus’s Grandma?

Canonical scripture never mentions the parents of the Virgin Mary, but the body of St. Anne was vital to Christianity in the Middle Ages and Renaissance.