A painting of John Donne

John Donne’s Listicle For the Well-Prepped Courtier

“The Courtier’s Library” is a list of books every courtier should know about, a cheat sheet for name-dropping in society. The trouble? Its books are imaginary.
A painting of Queen Eleanor by Anthony Frederick Sandys

Eleanor of Aquitaine’s “Court of Love”

Allegedly, the noblewomen of Poitiers solved the problems of love, lost and found. But was the court real, or was it just the fanciful invention of historians?
The Body Shop and ECPAT campaign at The Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand on March 29, 2012 in Bangkok, Thailand.

Creating a Safety Net: CST in International Law

Robust international partnership models that build capacity and trust can help fight child sex tourism and commercial sexual exploitation of children.
A Northern freeman enslaved by Northern hands

Kidnappers of Color Versus the Cause of Antislavery

Thousands of free-born Black people in the North were kidnapped into slavery through networks that operated as a form of “Reverse Underground Railroad.”
A young Native American boy learns the Eagle Dance in Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona, 1952

Understanding the Indian Child Welfare Act

The ICWA wasn’t implemented perfectly, but it reversed a centuries-old pattern of removing Native children from their families and their tribes.
Women strike for peace, picket march in front of state building in Los Angeles, 1961

HUAC versus Women Strike for Peace

American leftists were hamstrung by the Cold War’s domestic clampdown on communism, but in the 1960s, Women Strike for Peace re-wrote the book of dissent.
Lodgers in a Crowded Bayard Street Tenement. Photo by Jacob Riis

When Lodgers Were “Evil”

A wave of immigration from eastern and southern Europe transformed urban landscapes, creating crowded tenements that stoked humanitarian concerns.
A detail of an illustration depicting a husband and wife chained together and fighting in a courtroom

The Lost History of No-Fault Divorces

The regulation of divorce has changed a lot in the twentieth century. The National Association of Women Lawyers was instrumental in making that change happen.
College students work with archaeologists at "Koster Dig" in East Saint Louis

Grave Matters: Conflict in Reburial and Repatriation

The public is placing pressure on institutions to respect the concerns of Native peoples regarding the repatriation of human remains and grave-associated artifacts.
The cover page of The Introduction of Mesmerism into the Public Hospitals of India

The Mesmeric Dr. James Esdaile

The acceptance of mesmerism in colonial Bengal depended on the public performance of Western medicine couched in the wonders of a supposed “native” magic.