Category

Politics & History

JSTOR Daily Politics & History stories encompassing government, politics, social history, and other “quirky” topics, all featuring links to publicly accessible research on JSTOR.

Oil painting of a wet nurse holding an infant

The Lifesaving, Horrifying History of Wet Nurses

The history of wet nurses

Statue of Benjamin Silliman

The Soda Jerk and the Periodical

The history of scientific periodicals starts with Benjamin Silliman's upstart publication.

Stamp-shaped skull and crossbones

Stamping Out the Stamp Act

The history of the Stamp Act as it celebrates its 250th anniversary.

Still of women from "Gone With the Wind"

What Life Was Really Like for “Southern Belles” During the Civil War

What life was like for southern belles.

Signage outside of a Chinese Laundry advertising low prices

“White Power Laundries” and the Clash Over Asians in America

The dark history of white power laundry and asians in America.

The Ashley Madison website sign-up window

Adultery and Secret Lives Way Before Ashley Madison

Long before Ashley Madison, married people found ways to cheat.

Globe showing Iran and its surrounding areas

Iranian/Persian Americans

Iranian and Persian identity in America.

Viking ships at sail

L’Anse aux Meadows and the Viking Discovery of North America

Vikings traveled to the New World centuries before Columbus, setting up the establishment that is L'Anse aux Meadows.

Close-up of a dial pack of birth control pills

Birth Control’s Slow Path to the Mainstream

A look at changing public opinion of birth control.

Landing page for the International Monetary Fund website

Politics & Government

The IMF in Context

Governments and the IMF enter into an agreement for shadier reasons.

Editors' Picks

Politics & History

The Trouble with Reentry

Reentry of space junk in the 1970s forced First Nations communities into a reckoning with Cold War geopolitics and a burgeoning envirotechnical disaster.

Politics & History

Iran’s Protest Culture

A succession of authoritarian regimes birthed a strong tradition of collective action.

Tyler S. Sprague on the Intersection of Structure and Design

An interview with Tyler S. Sprague, a historian of the built environment whose work depends on multidisciplinarity and a deep knowledge of structure and materials.

12 Poems by Frank O’Hara

Plus his manifesto on Personism and writings about O’Hara by Ted Berrigan, Joseph LeSueur, and Joe Brainard.

Politics & History

How to be a Modern Autocrat

In the twenty-first century, dictators are less likely than their predecessors to use violence to suppress dissent, cultivating instead “informational autocracies.”