White Pines in Cathedral Woods, Intervale, White Mountains, N. H

What the Trees Are Telling Us

Markers of both environmental change and periods of stability, trees have a lot to tell us about nature—but also about humanity.
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.
Employees of Ottenheimer on strike for poor treatment

Labor Day: A Celebration of Working in America

Our best stories about workers' rights, labor unions, and international movements to improve working conditions, from the factory to the farm.
Bill of Rights, 1791

The Bill of Rights: Annotated

Proposed as a compromise to ensure the ratification of the new US Constitution, the Bill of Rights has become a critical protector of civil liberties.
Clockwise: Agha Shahid Ali, Elizabeth Bishop, William Logan, Paisley Rekdal, Charles Fort, Tim Seibles.

10 Villanelles by Modern and Contemporary Poets

Read these recursive, nineteen-line poems by Elizabeth Bishop, Paisley Rekdal, William Logan, Agha Shahid Ali, and more.
Galen by Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller

We Love Libraries

Honoring the libraries and librarians that have shaped the way we live, learn, and fight.
Plaque of Marbury v. Madison at SCOTUS Building

Marbury v. Madison: Annotated

Justice John Marshall’s ruling on Marbury v. Madison gave the courts the right to declare acts and laws of the legislative and executive branches unconstitutional.
Close up girl with purple hair reading book

Assigned Readings: Questions to Ask Yourself

Choosing texts to assign next semester? An experienced instructor offers tips for deciding what to add to your syllabus—and what to let go.
A parent and child near windmills at sunset

Black Midwestern Studies: A Reading List

This primer on Black Midwestern Studies examines the factors shaping communities of color in America’s “flyover country,” long mistaken as a place of normative whiteness.
A collage of JSTOR Primary Sources

Lies, Damn Lies, and…Primary Sources?

An instructor shares her approach for teaching students how to evaluate historical materials and claims of veracity made by their originators.