Flat vector illustration created from paper cut elements, hand drawn doodles and textures depicting mass surveillance and thin line between privacy and security concept.

Aspymmetrical Powers: Economic and Cyber Espionage

The lack of global governance over some acts of economic and cyber espionage is likely an intentional choice, one with varying benefits for state actors.
Sandy Hook Lighthouse

To the Lighthouses: A Path to Nationhood

Instilling confidence among merchants and ship captains was an area in which most agreed the new federal authority could and should act.
Mark Zuckerberg

Who Wants the Metaverse?

What exactly is the “metaverse,” and what could it be, beyond an overused, hyper-trendy prompt in marketing copy?
Bromus diandrus and Bromus tectorum in Zion National Park

The Greening of the Great Basin

The growth of grass in a desert might not seem problematic, but the introduction of invasive species can disrupt plant, animal, and human inhabitants.
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.