Fool: In Search of Henry VIII’s Closest Man September 28, 2023 In some portraits of Henry VIII there appears another, striking figure—a gaunt and morose-looking man with a shaved head and, in one case, a monkey on his shoulder. Read More
Myisha Cherry on Failures of Forgiveness September 28, 2023 Forgiveness is one way at repair. It is not the only way. Forgiveness can never reach repair by itself. It requires work from community members as well as victims and wrongdoers. Read More
Renewing the civic bargain September 27, 2023 Democracy today is in trouble: we see free governments wobbling, political tribalism everywhere, and rising authoritarianism. America, once the showcase of democracy done right now seems a system gone wrong. Read More
Listen in: The Darkened Light of Faith September 20, 2023 Listen to a sample chapter from The Darkened Light of Faith – a powerful new account of what a group of nineteenth- and twentieth-century African American activists, intellectuals, and artists can teach us about democracy. . Read More
The joke’s on whom? September 19, 2023 Amidst the uproar that ensued after the incident at the Oscars ceremony last year, there were writers and reporters who pointed out that Chris Rock was exercising the age-old tradition of the “fool’s license.” If we actually go to the historical record on court and household fools, then we find an even more interesting, but also more complex, backdrop to the discussion on whether it is right or not to get angry at a comedian for making a joke. Read More
Democracy’s real deal September 15, 2023 Was the US Consitution a masterpiece? The common answer has frequently been an unabashed “yes,” but many critics now complain that the Constitution was fatally flawed from the beginning. Read More
Listen in: To Build a Black Future September 14, 2023 Listen to a sample chapter from To Build a Black Future – an incisive portrait of how the new Black politics can forge a future centered on collective action, community, and care. Read More
Bill Clinton’s failure September 13, 2023 By 1995 Bill Clinton was fighting to remain “relevant” to the politics of his day. Many would soon label Clinton a “Democratic Eisenhower,” leading a party whose electoral success was predicated upon a wholesale accommodation to the ideologies of its opponents. Read More
Insect intelligence September 13, 2023 You don’t need spaceships or psychoactive drugs for journeys into alien worlds. I invite you to come into the cockpit of an insect, and view the world through its strange senses. You will discover that inside their exquisitely miniaturized brains, there are surprising levels of sentience and intelligence. Read More
How Uber disrupted Washington, D.C. September 11, 2023 The first city to fight back against Uber, Washington, D.C., was also the first city where such resistance was defeated. It was here that the company created a playbook for how to deal with intransigent regulators and to win in the realm of local politics. Read More
PUP Speaks: Emily Hund on the rise of the influencer industry September 11, 2023 The rising popularity of the social media influencer has significantly reshaped culture, the flow of information, and the way we relate to ourselves and each other. Read More
24/7 Politics September 07, 2023 As television began to overtake the political landscape in the 1960s, network broadcast companies, bolstered by powerful lobbying interests, dominated screens across the nation. Read More
In Praise of Good Bookstores September 07, 2023 Jeff Deutsch—the director of Chicago’s Seminary Co-op Bookstores, one of the finest bookstores in the world—pays loving tribute to one of our most important and endangered civic institutions. Read More
Emily Hauser on How Women Became Poets August 24, 2023 Women, as Virginia Woolf recognized, need rooms of their own to write. So, too, have women writers throughout history needed a term to describe what it is they do. Read More
To see a world in a beam of light August 24, 2023 On July 11, 2022, U.S. President Biden revealed the First Official Image obtained with the James Webb Space Telescope. It was a terrific way to start a press event—but where were the exoplanets? Read More
