Rock Against Racism in Trafalgar Square, London, 1978

How British Teens Blended Pop and Politics

In the 1970s, the National Front blamed immigrants for the UK's economic problems. Anti-racist groups formed in response, with the help of pop music.
Supermassive black hole

Rotating Black Holes May Serve as Gentle Portals for Hyperspace Travel

Feel like visiting another star system or dimension? You can do this by traveling through a black hole.
A pair of pink high heels

The Inherent Drama of High Heels

How can a shoe communicate many different messages at once?
San Diego during the 1930s and the Canal Zone in Panama

A Glimpse at Women’s Periods in the Roaring Twenties 

A 1927 study by famed efficiency expert Lillian Moller Gilbreth revealed how American women dealt with menstruation -- and how they wished they could.
An Octagon House

A Phrenologist’s Dream of an Octagon House

Orson S. Fowler thought houses without right angles would offer a better life, but his own architectural experiments did not end well.
Two children looking at artwork hung on the wall

Taking Children’s Art Seriously

Are children’s drawings meaningless scribbles or serious creative work? Western scholars and child psychologists have debated this topic for years.
Hand with Skull Shaped Pill

Why Companies Swallow Poison Pills

Faced with a potential hostile takeover, companies may deploy a dramatic shareholder rights plan, colloquially known as a "poison pill."
An opossum feigning death

The Biology of Death-Feigning

Some animals, when faced with predators, play dead instead of trying to escape. But for death-feigning to work, a lot of things have to go well.
Diane Keaton in Looking for Mr. Goodbar, 1977

“No Unescorted Ladies Will Be Served”

For decades, bars excluded single women, claiming the crowds were too “rough” and “boisterous” and citing vague fears of “fallen girls.”
Berthe Morisot, “Woman at Her Toilette”

How Impressionist Berthe Morisot Painted Women’s Lives

Berthe Morisot never became as famous as her counterparts Claude Monet and Édouard Manet, but her work has an important place in art history.