Death by Ice Cream

In the late nineteenth century, ice cream, a popular but poorly understood dessert, brought illness and death to America’s fairs and festivals.
A statue of a refugee family marks the crossroads of Netaji Nagar

Kolkata and Partition: Between Remembering and Forgetting

In West Bengal’s capital city, suppressing the painful history of the 1947 Partition allows for the celebration of moments of endurance and success.
A 1961 advertisement for Cutex lipstick

Lipstick’s Complex History

From antiquity to the present, the laws governing the wearing of lipstick have been shaped by gender, class, safety, and religion.
Bales of clothing are ready to be put on the sales floor at a Goodwill Outlet Center on July 27, 2022 in Hackensack, New Jersey.

Clothes Overload, Shared Emotions, and Procrastination

Well-researched stories from The Atlantic, Slate, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.
An illustration from Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, 1831

The Hoax That Inspired Mary Shelley

In the hot summer of 1826, the British people—including science fiction author, Mary Shelley—embraced a fake and frozen Roger Dodsworth.

From Imperialism to Postcolonialism: Key Concepts

An introduction to the histories of imperialism and the writings of those who grappled with its oppressions and legacies in the twentieth century.
An electron microscopic image depicting a monkeypox virion

The Mpox 411

Although it’s less fatal and less transmissible than the related smallpox, there’s still serious cause for concern with the most recent outbreak.
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Madness_Network_News.png

How Mentally Ill People Fight for Their Rights

In the 1970s, a time of mass deinstitutionalization, former patients came together to found the Psychiatric Inmates Liberation Movement.
A Cane Toad is exhibited at Taronga Zoo August 9, 2005 in Sydney, Australia

Cane Toads, Dung Beetles, and Cork Hats

Predicting the effects of introducing a species into an ecosystem is difficult. Mitigating those effects later is even more so. Just ask Australia.
The Alamo by day with the Texas flag waving

How to Remember the Alamo?

A historian’s childhood visit to the Texas monument prompts questions about history, memory, and multiculturalism.