Asian South America
The migration of Asian people—from India, from China, from Japan—to South America and the Caribbean began as early as the sixteenth century.
American as Apple Pie
How marketing made guns a fundamental element of contemporary boyhood.
The Story Behind “This is Your Brain on Drugs”
How did the campaign behind the Partnership for a Drug Free America’s iconic commercials develop, and why were its products so memorable?
Grief, Animism, and the Bestseller List
Well-researched stories from The Atlantic, Public Books, and other great publications that bridge the gap between news and scholarship.
Gender, Meat-Eating, and British Colonialism
As the power of the East India Company grew, British writers embraced the idea that the (alleged) passiveness of Indians was due in part to vegetarianism.
The Imperative to Buy the Best Stroller
The baby stroller is only the most visible symbol of the ethos of consumer capitalism that saturates American pregnancy and parenthood.
The Reverse Freedom Rides
The White Citizens’ Councils used the transportation of Black Americans to Northern states as a way to embarrass liberal critics and rally segregationists.
Framing Degas
The French painter Edgar Degas was Impressionism’s most energetic and inventive frame designer.
The Contrary Journalist: Lady Elizabeth Rigby Eastlake
One of the sharpest female journalists of Britain’s Victorian era, Eastlake considered Jane Eyre an exercise in rudeness and vulgarity.
Out of the Card Catalog Closet
Librarians gathered in 1970 to challenge Library of Congress classifications and catalog subject headings that aligned homosexuality with deviance.