It Takes a Lot of Money to Look This Cheap
From Dolly Parton to J.D. Vance, rags-to-riches stories obscure as much as they inspire, reinforcing the notion that poverty can be solved by dreams and gumption.
Fall 2024
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Indecent Exposures
Oliver Stone’s Hollywood retelling of the Snowden saga ends up depicting surveillance as little more than an inconvenience that might threaten our sex lives.
The Savage Entertainer
To win the country back from the likes of Donald Trump, the left needs to better appreciate the toxic charm of right-wing talk radio personalities like Michael Savage.
I’ll Take Care of You Tonight
Emerging alongside the growth of the service industry is a new interest in the literary expression of this kind of labor, with the female worker at its center.
The World of Adrienne Rich
Adrienne Rich’s politics developed over many years because she came by them as an artist—which may be what allowed her to become, unusually, both more self-questioning and more combative as she aged.
Not All the Single Ladies
The optimism of Rebecca Traister’s All the Single Ladies is encouraging, but the book’s blindspots illuminate the limitations of contemporary liberal feminism.
Murder, They Wrote
The new wave of true crime series has spawned an entire online subculture of amateur sleuths—not to mention vigilantes. But where do we draw the line between journalism, protest, and entertainment?
Painting with Oil 
Oil magnate David Koch stepped down from the board of the American Museum of Natural History on December 9, 2015. His departure came only months after dozens of scientists signed a letter calling on the science museum sector to sever …
Country Music Capital
When Nashville was anointed the capital of country music, a true American icon was born.
Back to the Future
Pulsating with racial and national anxieties, cyberpunk icon William Gibson’s future America is not so different from the one we know.
Phantom Public
Have we lost the deeply democratic vision that animated the early internet?
A Mind of One’s Own
The American marketplace of “wisdom” is booming again. A long tradition of feminist thought reveals how flawed it is—and what true wisdom might look like instead.
The Protest Poets
Our nation’s language when it comes to race is exhausted. These poets are forging a new one.
Museum of the Future?
By any comparison with the old Whitney, the new museum is a triumph. But can the interest shown by the wealthy in paying for museums be shifted elsewhere?
The Beautification Bureau
On the vacant, vertical concrete walls of Tehran, street artists fight for free expression, and with each other.
