The Philosophy of Posthumous Art
For some creators, death isn’t the end of their career. How should we think about completing and releasing their work afterward?
Policing the Bodies of Women Athletes Is Nothing New
For women who play sports, there's often no way to win.
The Permanent Crisis of Infrastructure
Ever since it entered public consciousness in the 1980s, infrastructure has been synonymous with decline.
For James McCune Smith, Racism Was All Over Anthropology
What if the creation story of anthropology isn't exclusively about white men classifying people as primitive?
The Back-to-School Shopping Tradition in History
As more women went to college, department stores catered to them by setting up pop-up "college shops" every September.
Asthma Tropes and the Kids Who Hate Them
Children with asthma respond to the movie executives who see them as weak people helped by magical inhalers.
Climate Change’s Dangerous Effects on the Boreal Forest
The forest's unique ecosystem protects the world's largest carbon sink—the Earth's permafrost layer. But for how much longer?
How Do Indigenous Athletes Fit into the Olympics?
Olympic athletes are divided into teams of nations. To Indigenous competitors, though, that can mean representing oppressive settler-colonial states.
How Blind Activists Fought for Blind Workers
The National Federation of the Blind was the first major group of its kind to be led by visually impaired people.
You’ll Never Believe Who Invented Curbside Recycling
Far from ushering in a zero-waste world, the switch from returnables to recycling provided cover for the creation of ever more packaging trash.