Podcast Listen in: The Making and Breaking of the American Constitution July 21, 2026 The Making and Breaking of the American Constitution is a provocative new history of America's constitution and an urgent call to action for a nation confronted by challenges its founders could never have imagined. Read More
Essay Game, scam, cult: The many faces of QAnon July 17, 2026 When viewed within the corpus of 4953 similar posts that accreted over the months between October 2017 and December 2020, Drop #199 was nothing out of the ordinary. Read More
Essay Jaws (1975): A study of American masculinity June 30, 2026 When I first saw Jaws聽in the 1980s, I was probably about 9 or 10 years old, and I was plum terrified. I was terrified of the shark, obviously, but even more terrified of the water鈥攖he idea that the monster could be right underneath you or your boat, but you couldn鈥檛 access him or see him. Read More
Reading List Reflecting on America鈥檚 250th anniversary: Rupture and reconstruction June 22, 2026 Moments of rupture have repeatedly forced Americans to rethink the nation鈥檚 political, social, and moral foundations. This list explores how periods of crisis鈥攆rom revolution and civil war to reconstruction and reform鈥攈ave redefined the principles of American democracy. Read More
Reading List Reflecting on America鈥檚 250th anniversary: An experiment in democracy June 22, 2026 American democracy has always been an experiment鈥攃entering ideas about individual freedom and collective responsibility. This reading list explores how those ideas evolved, and were interpreted by thinkers and reformers who tried to understand what democracy could mean in practice. Read More
Reading List Reflecting on America鈥檚 250th anniversary: First Peoples June 22, 2026 Long before the founding of the United States, Indigenous peoples shaped the lands and cultures of North America. This reading list centers their perspectives, examining encounter and dispossession across centuries of American history. Read More
Reading List Reflecting on America鈥檚 250th anniversary: Amendments XIII, XV, and XIX June 22, 2026 The 13th, 15th, and 19th Amendments marked sweeping efforts to redefine freedom and political participation in the wake of slavery. This reading list explores those constitutional transformations alongside the moral and social struggles that complicated the pursuit of equality in American democracy. Read More
Reading List Reflecting on America鈥檚 250th anniversary: Land and empire June 22, 2026 Land has played a central role to the making of the United States; especially its economic and political power. This reading list explores relationships to land and wilderness, while offering necessary critique of an empire built through territorial expansion. Read More
Reading List Reflecting on America鈥檚 250th anniversary: Revolution, the Constitution, and the founders June 22, 2026 This reading list revisits the Revolution, the Constitution, and the Founders to examine how their ideas were forged, contested, and continue to shape the American experiment. Read More
Reading List Reflecting on America鈥檚 250th anniversary: Immigration, citizenship, and belonging June 22, 2026 Immigration has been integral to the United States from its conception and continues to redefine belonging today. This list explores what it means to be an immigrant and how the politics of immigration control have impacted the quest for citizenship. Read More
Reading List Reflecting on America鈥檚 250th anniversary: The First Amendment June 22, 2026 Freedom of speech has been a cornerstone of American democracy, as well as the focus of ongoing discussion over dissent and the limits of power. This reading list explores the First Amendment and years of debate over who gets to speak, and why it matters. Read More
Essay When folk horror goes beautiful: You Won鈥檛 Be Alone (2022) May 18, 2026 This is a folk horror witch film about severe, abject child abuse. And as we鈥檒l also see, it鈥檚 about resistance to that kind of abuse, and the desire to find meaning and beauty in life, even with the knowledge that horrific, monstrous evil exists. Read More
Essay Bones and All (2022), or, When Horror Goes Beautiful II May 14, 2026 Something must have been in the air in 2022. In the same year that You Won鈥檛 be Alone聽came keening gloriously out of Macedonia, Bones and All聽loped its achingly beautiful way out of Hollywood. Film essay by Eleanor Johnson, whose book Monstrous Bitch is forthcoming. Read More
Interview Peter N. Miller on Conservation as a Human Science April 22, 2026 Conservation can be understood as a form of knowing; conservators extract meaning about the past from what remains, while noting what is missing and sometimes repairing it. In this erudite and virtuosic book, the historian Peter N. Miller imagines the outlines of a new, expansive notion of conservation that links the world around us鈥攏atural and man-made鈥攖o the world inside us鈥攐ur genome, our memories. Read More
Interview Catherine Fletcher on The Firearm Revolution April 22, 2026 Catherine Fletcher explores the emergence of firearms in Renaissance Italy and beyond, describing the social transformations that accompanied the evolution of the handgun from innovative military technology to widely used personal accessory. Read More
