Comic-Conned: Gender Norms in a Carnivalesque Atmosphere

San Diego’s Comic-Con feels like a huge, five-day carnival. Diverse attendees gleefully snap pictures, brave the crowds, and willingly wait in long (sometimes overnight) lines in this annual atmosphere of fantasy, science fiction, geekdom, and celebrity. The creative costumes and … Read More

Of Carbon and Cash

As Andy Ross told us, climate debt refers to the harmful carbon emissions created by countries like the United States and the grave effects that climate change is having on poorer, developing countries in the Global South. First … Read More

Andrew Ross on the Anti-Debt Movement

By now, it’s clear that in the United States and around the world, debt has come to shape people’s lives. Some use debt to get ahead, others buy debt to make a profit, and still others find their choices constrained … Read More

Old Narratives and New Realities

Editor’s Note: This is the third in a series: Has Borrowing Replaced Earning? Economic Decline and the American Dream Old Narratives and New Realities The simple narrative of who gets ahead in America is in … Read More

Economic Decline and the American Dream

Editor’s Note: This is the second in a series: Has Borrowing Replaced Earning? Economic Decline and the American Dream Old Narratives and New Realities  The 2008 – 2010 recession in the United States was the worst … Read More

Has Borrowing Replaced Earning?

Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series: Has Borrowing Replaced Earning? Economic Decline and the American Dream  Old Narratives and New Realities  Click on any image to expand. Since the 1980s, corporate profits … Read More

Deep Play and Flying Rats, with Colin Jerolmack

You can listen to the Office Hours interview with Colin Jerolmack here. “Pigeons are believed to be the first domesticated bird and perhaps one of the first domesticated animals—between five and ten thousand years ago. There’s a lot of … Read More

Violence and the Transformation of Ethno-Racial Categories in Rwanda

Twenty years ago this spring, the world watched with horror as genocide unfolded in Rwanda. In one hundred days, up to one million people were killed. As Hutu militias and ordinary citizens killed their Tutsi neighbors, the international press described … Read More

Coded Chaos and Anonymous

The word “anonymous” has come to mean more than a solitary, unknown person. Now, it gets capitalized—Anonymous—and it’s recognized as a loosely connected collective of hackers, activists, and Internet “trolls.” Together, this disparate group is affecting global politics, influencing off-line … Read More

Music and the Quest for a Tribe

In her book, Banding Together, Jennifer Lena introduces readers to a typology of over 60 popular music genres, from bluegrass to rap to South Texas polka. While most musical histories focus on the creativity of individual performers, Lena emphasizes … Read More