Society

‘To my old master’ – a freed slave answers the request to return to his old plantation

7 minutes

Poverty is not permanent

By understanding the pernicious myths surrounding poverty, we can make progress towards a lofty goal: dignity for all

Anirudh Krishna & Dirk Philipsen

Villagers struggle to keep their beloved, endangered ape population afloat

19 minutes

A very American fear

Moral panics about erotica have coursed through the country’s history. Why do so many Americans think of porn as harm?

Rebecca L Davis

Passion and Palestine

More than any other conflict, Israel/Palestine has provoked extraordinarily fervent emotion throughout the world. Why?

Derek Jonathan Penslar

Hearts and brains

Humans always end up with clogged arteries, right? That’s not what the lives of the Tsimane in the Amazon basin tell us

Ben Daitz

‘Astonished and somewhat terrified’ – Victorians’ reactions to the phonograph

36 minutes

The end of neoliberalism?

The case of Mexico shows that, despite a proliferating discourse that it is over, neoliberalism is as relentless as ever

Inés Escobar González

Prosperity versus liberation

How Pentecostalism’s prosperity gospel replaced Catholic liberation theology in Latin American life

Elle Hardy

Are zoos and natural history museums born of a desire to understand, or to control?

57 minutes

What’s an ancient Greek brick doing in a Sumerian city? An archeological investigation

16 minutes

There are no pure cultures

All of our religions, stories, languages and norms were muddled and mixed through mobility and exchange throughout history

Inanna Hamati-Ataya

From Afghanistan to Virginia – the Muslims who fought in the American Civil War

22 minutes

Why history is always political

In his work on republicanism as a living idea, J G A Pocock showed that contesting history is part of a robust civic life

Rosario López