Homemade Air Fryer potato chips in a paper lined wire basket on dark background

The Fakelore of Food Origins

Where did potato chips come from? How about clams casino? Are the origin stories for these foods true, or do they fall into the category of “fakelore”?
Woman Drinking Coffee by Léon Étienne Tournes, part of the collection of the Gothenburg Museum of Art

The Swedish-American Coffee Tradition

For many Swedish immigrants to the United States, coffee was a key to hospitality and a way to signal prosperity.
Chinese astronauts from China's Manned Space Agency, left to right, Tang Hongbo, Nie Haisheng, and Liu Boming wave at a departure ceremony before launch of the Senzhou-12 at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on June 17, 2021 in Jiuquan, Gansu province, China.

Challenging the Hegemoon: the Geopolitics of Space Infrastructure

Cooperative space initiatives between non-US powers such as China and South America are under-explored in scholarship and misunderstood in popular politics.
The interior of a Chinese pharmacy in Los Angeles, 1907

The Allure of Chinese Medicine 

Capitalizing on stereotypes earned Chinese-American practitioners patients, but it also helped keep them confined to the margins of American society.
From the cover of the September, 1990 issue of The Angolite, a newspaper published by the inmates of Louisiana State Penitentiary

The Fatal Current: Electrocution as Progress? 

The electric chair was promoted as civilized and at the same time imbued with the technological sublime, the mystery of electrical power harnessed by humans.

What Can Native American People in Prison Teach Us About Community and Art?

An exploration of creativity, ingenuity, and resilience using the American Prison Newspapers collection and JSTOR. The second curriculum guide in this series.
The Devonshire Manuscript facsimile 6v

The Devonshire Manuscript

The sixteenth-century handwritten collection of poetry and commentary offers a glimpse of intellectual life at the court of King Henry VIII.
The cover of the September, 1990 issue of The Angolite

Cold War Flames on US Soil: The Oakdale Prison Riot

In the 1980s, Cold War tensions led to thousands of Cubans languishing in American prisons, unable to be released or repatriated. Uprisings followed.
An elections poster of the General Jewish Labour Bund hung in Kiev, 1917. Heading: "Where we live, there is our country!"

How the Jewish Labor Bund Changed After World War II

For those thousands involved with the Bund, the group played an important role in a era marked by trauma, displacement, and resettlement.
Taylor Swift Credit: Taylor Swift/Vevo

Desperately Seeking Taylor Swift

The lyrics, the music, and the metaphors of the pop star of the moment.