Books of imagination. Surreal art. fantasy painting. Books flying in the clouds.

Speculative Fiction: Beyond a Novel’s Entertainment Value

The classroom is a place to equip students to better understand the world as it was and is. Speculative fiction can help.
Cute tiny people reading different books, giant textbooks. Concept of book world, readers at library, literature lovers or fans. Colorful vector illustration in flat cartoon style

Speculative Fiction: A Reading List

Speculative fiction, from Afrofuturism to Star Wars, offers students tools and methods for analyzing social movements, power structures, and utopian thinking.
Lady Gaga speaks during the Spotify: Little Monster Press Conference in New York City, March 2025

Lady Gaga’s Return to Form

With Mayhem, Lady Gaga offers (again) utopia on the dance floor—but is there anyone left in the club to experience it?
A spread from a yearbook featuring a collage of black and white photographs of students around campus and Portland

Keep Portland Yearbook Photos Weird

Across thousands of images, Portland State University's yearbooks captured both society's upheaval and the city's cultural metamorphosis.
An illustration of meat marbling

Why Eat Like a Caveman?

To people who follow the Paleo plan, it can mean anything from embracing meat-eating as a feminist choice to seeking a balanced life with room for leisure.
Women walk on a bustling city street looking at store windows

Grand Illusions

By the time L. Frank Baum introduced the world to Dorothy and the gang, he’d already made his name as a shop window dresser par excellence.
Collage of books

What We’re Reading 2021

Mini book reports from your favorite bloggers and editors here at JSTOR Daily.
: A woman adjusting her dress, London, c. 1865

How to Dress for Dystopia

Some nineteenth-century novelists predicted horrible futures, with perfectly horrible clothing to match.
Still Life with a Peacock Pie

The Joy of Eating in Utopia

The early socialist Charles Fourier had grand ideas about food. The pleasure of eating was right up there with sex.
Photograph: Thousands march through the streets near City Hall during the 11th day of an ongoing teachers strike on October 31, 2019 in Chicago, Illinois. 

Source: Getty

Socialism: Foundations and Key Concepts

What is the political, philosophic, and economic system known as socialism? Some starting points for further study.