Not Betsy Rosses Not Betsy Rosses
For a while I thought about designing a flag. Something bigger, blurrier than "nation." I imagined a hovering planet on a field of blue, and "United We Stand" could be written un...
Feb 21, 2002 / Books & the Arts / Eileen Myles
Denmark Vesey: A New Verdict Denmark Vesey: A New Verdict
A historian questions whether he led a slave revolt, but his heroism still stands.
Feb 21, 2002 / Books & the Arts / Jon Wiener
Following Doctors’ Orders Following Doctors’ Orders
It's the largest profession in healthcare. It's the largest female profession in America. But despite its tremendous importance and impact, most people know very little about con...
Feb 14, 2002 / Books & the Arts / Suzanne Gordon
Lost in America Lost in America
"When I write, I bid farewell to myself," Jimmy Santiago Baca said in 1992. "I leave most of what I know behind and wander through the landscape of language." This is a memorable...
Feb 14, 2002 / Books & the Arts / Ilan Stavans
Black Mischief Black Mischief
On East Capitol Street a few years ago, I was in a taxi when a car pulled suddenly and dangerously across our bow. My driver was white, with a hunter's cap and earmuffs and an inde...
Feb 14, 2002 / Books & the Arts / Christopher Hitchens
Hoisting the Black Flag Hoisting the Black Flag
As the World Economic Forum met in New York City recently, the American media were much more concerned with what protesters were doing in the streets than with what they were say...
Feb 7, 2002 / Books & the Arts / Karen Rosenberg
Society of the Spectacle Society of the Spectacle
The slogans scrawled across the walls of Paris in May 1968 suggest possibilities most of us have forgotten or that were long ago deemed preposterous. "Never work!" said one sloga...
Feb 7, 2002 / Books & the Arts / Jeremy Smith
Our Collective Bargain Our Collective Bargain
The fortunes of American unions have taken a turn for the worse. Thanks to terrorism and recession, union members are reeling from a series of economic and political setbacks. Ne...
Feb 7, 2002 / Books & the Arts / Steve Early
Pierre Bourdieu, 1930-2002 Pierre Bourdieu, 1930-2002
The death on January 23 of the French philosopher and sociologist Pierre Bourdieu came as the American chattering classes were busy checking the math in Richard Posner's Public I...
Jan 31, 2002 / Books & the Arts / Katha Pollitt