What the Berlin Wall Means to a New Generation

Its fall once represented the enduring spirit of American freedom. A new documentary shows how that myth is being undone.

Sophia Steinert-Evoy

The Disabled Community Doesn’t Want Your Pity

Why former telethon participants are protesting the return of the Muscular Dystrophy Association’s most famous fundraising effort.

Sara Luterman

Aaron Sorkin Sanitizes the Chicago 7

The centrist filmmaker captures the drama of the 1960s, but tries too hard to make radicals palatable to contemporary liberals.

Jeet Heer

Fraudulent Indigenous Art Is Flooding Museums

After untold exploitation and erasure, Native artwork is being undermined by fraud.

Chris O’Connell, Savannah Maher and The Texas Observer

Synthesizing Sound and Self

The vexed legacy of electronic music pioneer Wendy Carlos.

Sasha Geffen

The Myths of Martin Scorsese’s Mob Magnum Opus

Glenn Kenny’s critical study of Goodfellas untangles the complicated impact of the 1990 film.

Adam Nayman

Stanley Crouch, 1945–2020

Even many of those who at times wanted to throttle Crouch will miss him now that he’s gone.

Gene Seymour

Kendrick Lamar’s Poetic Awakening

How an encounter with a creative writing teacher changed the LA rapper’s life.

Marcus J. Moore

John Luther Adams’s Songs for a Vanished World

A conversation, conducted via satellite phone, with the legendary composer about his new memoir, Silences So Deep, and the music of his life.

Rumaan Alam

After Abolition

Kyle Carrero Lopez