Culture

Brexit, Trump and What We’ve Failed To Learn From the 1930s

Perhaps dark undercurrents rest beneath every society, waiting for a depression or a demagogue to unleash them.

Jane Miller

Thomas Friedman’s Latest Book Is a Tour Through His Troubled, Neoliberal Mind

We read 500 pages of corporate platitudes and ungainly metaphor so you don't have to.

Chris Lehmann

The Hairdresser of Plaistow

The happy, often glamorous life of the man who cuts my hair.

Jane Miller

A Brief History of the Right’s Racist Hate: From 1885 to Trump

The road to Trumpism is paved with scapegoats.

Theo Anderson

From Collection to Community: The Transformation of Detroit’s Iconic, 30-Year Public Art Project

The Heidelberg Project is being partly dismantled, but hopes to live on as an artistic community.

Leyland DeVito

Inside the Tax-Avoidance Racket of “Wealth Management”

A sociologist's new book reveals how the ultra-rich starve public coffers and undermine democracy.

Chris Lehmann

The Stories We Live By: Why the White Working Class Votes Conservative

In Strangers in Their Own Land, sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild travels south to study what gives conservative ideology its power.

Theo Anderson

Big Data Isn’t Just Watching You—It’s Making You Poorer

Cathy O’Neil's new book, Weapons of Math Destruction, shows mathematical models aren't free of ideology.

Pankaj Mehta

Walking While Black

Encounters with police in New York City.

Garnette Cadogan

In Ixcanul, Guatemala’s First-Ever Oscar Entry, Feminism Erupts in a Small Mayan Community

Filmed entirely in Kaqchikel, Jayro Bustamante’s new movie explores a clash between reproductive rights and tradition.

Michael Atkinson

Can There Be a Party of the Left in Britain?

Party brass may not like it, but Jeremy Corbyn's popularity could herald a new era for Labour.

Jane Miller

Werner Herzog Wants To Know: “Does the Internet Dream?”

In Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World, the septuagenarian filmmaker explores online gaming, self-driving cars and soccer-playing robots.

Michael Atkinson

James Baldwin’s Many Heirs

In the essay collection The Fire This Time, a new generation of Black writers keeps Baldwin's flame alight.

Erin Aubry Kaplan

Sim City and the Worst Ways to End Homelessness

The neoliberal mindset doesn't compute with ethical public policy.

Rebecca Burns

These Newly Restored Indie Films from Cinema’s Early Days Show Black Life From a Black Perspective

A five-disc DVD set offers a glimpse into pre-civil rights era black culture.

Michael Atkinson

Filmmakers Adapt John le Carré’s Spy Novels for the Age of Snowden

The BBC miniseries The Night Manager and new film Our Kind of Traitor fumble with morality and power.

Jake Blumgart

Socialism for Beginners

The radical Left is becoming more mainstream—and conservatives are taking note.

Richard Seymour

Donald Trump’s Fingers Were Always Short

In business as in politics, there's never been much behind the splashy surface.

Chris Lehmann