Cultural Criticism and Analysis

December 28, 1973: Alexsander Solzhenitsyn’s ‘Gulag Archipelago’ is Published

December 28, 1973: Alexsander Solzhenitsyn’s ‘Gulag Archipelago’ is Published December 28, 1973: Alexsander Solzhenitsyn’s ‘Gulag Archipelago’ is Published

“The duty is not only to memorialize the fallen, it is also to confront the living.”

Dec 28, 2015 / 150th Anniversary / Richard Kreitner

Donald Trump speaks before a crowd of supporters.

The Dickensian Politics of Trump and His Fellow Scrooges The Dickensian Politics of Trump and His Fellow Scrooges

Political misers still refuse to make it their business to improve the lot of the working poor.

Dec 24, 2015 / John Nichols

December 21, 1892: Rebecca West Is Born

December 21, 1892: Rebecca West Is Born December 21, 1892: Rebecca West Is Born

“Pleasure is not arbitrary; it is the sign by which the human organization shows that it is performing a function which it finds appropriate to its means and ends.”

Dec 21, 2015 / 150th Anniversary / Richard Kreitner

December 16, 1901: Margaret Mead Is Born

December 16, 1901: Margaret Mead Is Born December 16, 1901: Margaret Mead Is Born

“The Samoan girl leads a busy, unconscious existence in which impulse and duty appear to play pleasantly correlative roles.”

Dec 16, 2015 / 150th Anniversary / Richard Kreitner

December 15, 2011: Christopher Hitchens Dies

December 15, 2011: Christopher Hitchens Dies December 15, 2011: Christopher Hitchens Dies

“Posterity is unlikely to deal kindly with his willingness to be a singer in the camp of George W. Bush.”

Dec 15, 2015 / 150th Anniversary / Richard Kreitner

A representative holds an “impact-absorbing” helmet at NFL Headquarters in New York.

There Is No ‘War on Football’ There Is No ‘War on Football’

The idea that concussion research is a liberal conspiracy is toxic and will hurt kids. It has to stop.

Dec 10, 2015 / Dave Zirin

Tyra Banks

‘America’s Next Top Model’ Wraps After 22 Seasons of Bigotry ‘America’s Next Top Model’ Wraps After 22 Seasons of Bigotry

Exotic Asians, hot-tempered Latinas, and the original angry black woman—we owe all of these reality TV tropes to Tyra Banks’s fake-empowerment series.

Dec 8, 2015 / Jennifer L. Pozner

Interned Japanese American Sammy Kimura (Telly Leung) and camp nurse Hannah Campbell (Katie Rose Clarke) perform in Allegiance.

Pacific Overtures on Broadway Pacific Overtures on Broadway

At its best, the Japanese-internment musical Allegiance seethes with righteous anger beneath its perkiness and platitudes.

Dec 7, 2015 / Alisa Solomon

A scene from the New York Metropolitan Opera’s production of Alban Berg’s ‘Lulu’.

An Opera of Permanent Catastrophe, and of Hope An Opera of Permanent Catastrophe, and of Hope

A new production of Alban Berg’s Lulu reveals the explosive powers still manifest in modern art.

Dec 3, 2015 / Books & the Arts / Peter E. Gordon

Myanmar nationals hold up their passports outside the embassy of Myanmar in Singapore

Flattened for a Price Flattened for a Price

In her new book The Cosmopolites, Atossa Araxia Abrahamian explores the evolution of citizenship and the rise of a new form of statelessness.

Dec 2, 2015 / Fatima Bhutto

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