Culture

“NAZA” and Israel’s History of Automated Warfare “NAZA” and Israel’s History of Automated Warfare

As violent technologies like spyware, predictive targeting algorithms, and 2,000-pound warheads become ordinary instruments of military rule, once-abhorred practices become routin…

Sophia Goodfriend

Who Was Emily Brontë? Who Was Emily Brontë?

A new biography tries to reconstruct her everyday life.

Books & the Arts / Sarah Chihaya

The Bookstore Revolution in Taiwan’s Conservative Heartlands The Bookstore Revolution in Taiwan’s Conservative Heartlands

After Taiwan legalized same-sex marriage, gender-themed bookstores are working to build the social acceptance that the law alone couldn’t deliver.

StudentNation / Kelly Kong

Books

William Gass’s Brilliant and Maddening  Magnum Opus

William Gass’s Brilliant and Maddening Magnum Opus William Gass’s Brilliant and Maddening Magnum Opus

Long out of print, The Tunnel returns with a timely exploration of the fascism of the heart.

Books & the Arts / John Semley

Who Was Emily Brontë?

Who Was Emily Brontë? Who Was Emily Brontë?

A new biography tries to reconstruct her everyday life.

Books & the Arts / Sarah Chihaya

The Many Lives of Janet Malcolm

The Many Lives of Janet Malcolm The Many Lives of Janet Malcolm

A new biography tells the story of one of America’s great masters of reportage.

Books & the Arts / Alana Pockros

Film

Who Was Emily Brontë? Who Was Emily Brontë?

A new biography tries to reconstruct her everyday life.

Books & the Arts / Sarah Chihaya

The Clarion Call of “NAZA” The Clarion Call of “NAZA”

Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor’s new film not only documents the horrors of the present but gives us a glimpse of a possible future too.

Books & the Arts / Ahmed Moor

How the Skydance Merger Will Remake Hollywood and the News Business How the Skydance Merger Will Remake Hollywood and the News Business

The Ellison family’s $110 billion deal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery means more top-down control, and less room for dissent.

Ben Schwartz

The Misremembered ’90s of “The Backrooms” The Misremembered ’90s of “The Backrooms”

The Gen Z filmmaker presents the decade not as it was but as reproduced via nostalgic threads on Internet forums.

Column / Kate Wagner

Television

An image protesting the Skydance-Warner Bros. merger projected on Jazz at Lincoln Center during the News and Documentary Emmy Awards last May.

How the Skydance Merger Will Remake Hollywood and the News Business How the Skydance Merger Will Remake Hollywood and the News Business

The Ellison family’s $110 billion deal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery means more top-down control, and less room for dissent.

Ben Schwartz

Road Trip to Nowhere

Road Trip to Nowhere Road Trip to Nowhere

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy’s reality show is an ungainly mix of corporate corruption and MAGA agitprop.

Henry Burke

The New York premiere of “Girls,” 2012.

Growing Up With “Girls” Growing Up With “Girls”

Lena Dunham and her generation enter midlife.

Books & the Arts / Grace Byron

Architecture

Trump at the White House Ballroom construction site in May 2026.

The Architectural Follies of Trump’s Washington, DC The Architectural Follies of Trump’s Washington, DC

The president plans to remake the capital in his own image, but is all he is doing destroying what’s already there?

Books & the Arts / Karrie Jacobs

The Karl-Marx-Hof public housing project in Vienna, Austria.

Red Vienna Is Still Alive Red Vienna Is Still Alive

The Austrian capital chose not to privatize the commons, and it shows.

Kate Wagner

The Obama Presidential Center in Chicago, Illinois, on July 29, 2026.

The Obama Center as a Tomb of Neoliberalism The Obama Center as a Tomb of Neoliberalism

Kate Wagner on architecture and public memory.

The Time of Monsters / Jeet Heer

Music

The First Amendment Applies to Concert Stages Too The First Amendment Applies to Concert Stages Too

Protests like that of Macklemore on Palestine should never be silenced by billionaire owners.

John Nichols

Treat Spotify Like a Public Utility Treat Spotify Like a Public Utility

Music streaming platforms have way too much control over musicians and music lovers. It’s time to rein them in.

Ramsay Eyre

Justice for Macklemore Justice for Macklemore

The rapper has been dumped from Ed Sheeran’s tour for saying “free Palestine.” That’s a disgrace.

Dave Zirin

Dolly Parton Understood That Working 9 to 5 Doesn’t Really Pay the Bills in Today’s America Dolly Parton Understood That Working 9 to 5 Doesn’t Really Pay the Bills in Today’s America

Social mobility has ground to a halt. Why that’s lousy for American music.

Katrina vanden Heuvel

Publishing

John Edgar Wideman’s American Vernacular

John Edgar Wideman’s American Vernacular John Edgar Wideman’s American Vernacular

The master novelist offers a view of a United States defined by its cultures of improvisation.

Books & the Arts / Walton Muyumba

Illustration of an office worker in a suit standing on a red typerwriter.

Daniel Poppick’s Novel of White-Collar Work Daniel Poppick’s Novel of White-Collar Work

The first novel by the poet asks us what fantasies get us through the day.

Books & the Arts / Julia Case-Levine

Richard Lingeman, longtime executive editor of The Nation, at the magazine’s copy office sometime in the 1990s.

Paying Tribute to Richard Lingeman—Longtime Executive Editor and a Quiet Force at “The Nation” for More Than Three Decades Paying Tribute to Richard Lingeman—Longtime Executive Editor and a Quiet Force at “The Nation” for More Than Three Decades

A man of few spoken words, on the page he was a marvel.

Obituary / Nation Contributors

Latest in Culture

Nevada Governor Joe Lombardo delivers remarks as President Donald Trump listens during an event at Red Rock Casino Resort and Spa on August 5, 2026, in Las Vegas, Nevada.

GOP Election Deniers Running for Governor— Plus John Berger’s “Ways of Seeing” GOP Election Deniers Running for Governor— Plus John Berger’s “Ways of Seeing”

On this episode of Start Making Sense, Harold Meyerson analyzes Democrats’ key campaigns for governor, and John Powers comments on critic and writer John Berger.

Oct 14, 2026 / Jon Wiener

A crowd gathered around a 12-foot cardboard version of Claes Oldenburg’s lipstick sculpture to protest their university and government.

Yale’s Protest Tradition Is Back Yale’s Protest Tradition Is Back

For the first time in more than 50 years, Yale students gathered around an iconic sculpture to protest their university and their government.

Oct 7, 2026 / StudentNation / Zachary Clifton

Women at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, August 28, 1963.

Black Freedom in an Age of White Oligarchy Black Freedom in an Age of White Oligarchy

Justin Leroy’s The Lowest Freedom points toward the limits of liberty under racial capitalism.

Oct 1, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Aaron Ross Coleman

“In Minor Keys,” 61st Venice Biennale, 2026, installation view featuring Éric Baudelaire.

The Carnival of Venice Biennale The Carnival of Venice Biennale

That so much of the art of “In Minor Keys” is muted in effect is ironic, because so much of it is overproduced, aspirationally eye-catching, and so big.

Sep 30, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Barry Schwabsky

A view of the US flag on the field during the national anthem before a game between the New York Giants and the Dallas Cowboys at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas, on September 20, 2009.

America Without the NFL America Without the NFL

Chuck Klosterman’s Football is a eulogy for the sport on the eve of its decline.

Sep 24, 2026 / Books & the Arts / Zito Madu

American rapper Macklemore at Lollapalooza in Paris on July 19, 2025.

The Ed Sheeran Controversy The Ed Sheeran Controversy

In a society that claims to promote free speech, what crosses the line from controversial to unacceptable? Who gets to define where the line begins and ends?

Sep 21, 2026 / Peter Dreier

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