Cerbera odollam: “The Suicide Tree” That Harms and Heals
Even before The White Lotus, people feared the poisonous pong-pong tree, Cerbera odollam. But there's another way to look at the plant and its effects.
Art Deco: 100 Years Since the Paris Exhibition That Revolutionized Modern Design
The landmark event displayed competing interpretations of “the modern” in design, art, and architecture.
She’s the Very Model of a Modern Militant Woman
A gun-toting killer seems like an unlikely heroine for a nationalist classic novel, but that’s the story of Luang Wichit Wathakan’s Huang rak haew luk.
Electric Fish and the First Battery
Allesandro Volta invented the voltaic pile, the earliest electric battery, in part because of his investigations into the torpedo, an electric ray fish.
Social Mobility and the “Class Ceiling” in the UK
People from working-class backgrounds in the UK bump up against a "class ceiling" analogous to the glass ceiling women face in the workplace.
Bringing Turkish Style to Europe
In seventeenth-century Europe, architects adopted styles from the Ottoman empire to create new kinds of social spaces including public baths and coffeehouses.
What Veterans’ Poems Can Teach Us About Healing on Memorial Day
A scholar and military veteran proposes that poems written by veterans that focus on honoring those who have died in service can help heal an ailing nation.
A Primer on Settler Colonialism
What is this “settler colonialism” that’s become all the rage? Let’s take a closer look.
When History is a Matter of “National Security”
Since the mid-1990s, Russian authorities have insisted on particular understandings of some parts of the country’s history as a matter of national security.
The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850: Annotated
The Fugitive Slave Act erased the most basic of constitutional rights for enslaved people and incentivized US Commissioners to support kidnappers.