Culture

Despite a Rosy Lens, Timbuktu Has Something to Teach Us About Resistance to Oppression

Abderrahmane Sissako’s Oscar-nominated film may be improbably beautiful and relatively apolitical, but it's worth seeing.

Michael Atkinson

Culture

Ai-jen Poo’s ‘The Age of Dignity’ Is a Wake-up Call for an Aging—and Unprepared—Nation

When it comes to providing care for an aging baby boomer population, Poo says, we need to think bigger.

Joanna Scutts

Culture

Fresh Off the Boat: At Last, a Show Where Asian-Americans Aren’t the Butt of the Joke

In a welcome departure from most depictions of Asian families, Fresh Off the Boat pokes fun at the ignorance and blandness of white American culture.

Julia Wong

Culture

Cuba’s Performance Problem

Havana closes down an open mic.

Coco Fusco

Culture

The War on Billie Holiday

The Bureau of Narcotics' strange obsession

Johann Hari

Culture

Portrait of the Artist as a Dying Class

Scott Timberg argues that we've lost the scaffolding of middle-class jobs—record-store clerk, critic, roadie—that made creative scenes thrive.

Joanna Scutts

Culture

American Sniper: Guns, God and Gallons of Testo’

Clint Eastwood treats Iraq like Iwo Jima. Will Americans really go for this horseshit?

Michael Atkinson

Culture

Drowning Cajun Country

Will the eaters of étouffée disappear along with the Louisiana bayou?

Kendra Pierre-Louis

Culture

Slacking Workers of the World Unite

We've made an art of wasting time at work. But to what end?

Lindsay Beyerstein

Culture

The 1950s: You Had To Be There

Post-WWII America was more complicated than we remember.

Jane Miller

Culture

Brother, Can You Spare a Euro?

By posing the choice between a coworker's job and 1,000 Euros, Two Days, One Night explores the state of worker solidarity.

Michael Atkinson

Culture

Land of the Free and Home of the Enhanced Interrogators

We need a truth and reconciliation commission to deal with our torture problem.

Chris Lehmann

Culture

A Girlfriends’ Guide to Rage

Girlfriends' Guide to Divorce has to stop trying so desperately to be a "women's show."

Jude Ellison Sady Doyle

Culture

Drug Shills Dispensing Pills

A psychiatrist questions Big Pharma's influence on her profession.

Jean Kim

Culture

Reports from Inside First Look Media Suggest That Maybe Silicon Valley Shouldn’t Manage Journalists

Feverish speculation surrounds First Look's recent troubles. But perhaps the most obvious culprit is its reliance on truckloads of tech money.

Chris Lehmann

Culture

Vampire Princess of Persia

Not your kid sister's vampire flick.

Michael Atkinson

Culture

Let Old Labor Die

With union membership declining, Tom Geoghegan has a radical prescription for labor.

Jeremy Gantz

Culture

On the Death of a Spouse

Karl has died.

Jane Miller

Culture

The Reporter Who Paid a High Price for ‘Contra Crack’

A new film, Kill the Messenger, shows how the CIA, the Washington Post and the LA Times conspired to discredit a journalist, and destroyed a life.

Jim Naureckas

Culture

Palestine Activist’s Confession Allegedly Obtained By Torture Leads to Immigration Conviction

Rasmea Odeh faces up to 10 years in a U.S. prison and deportation for failing to disclose a criminal history that was allegedly the result of physical and sexual torture.

Christa Smith

Culture

We Are All Sea Turtles Now

Can the Olive ridley sea turtle survive human meddling?

Molly M. Ginty

Culture

The Next Oil Spill

According to a new documentary, we're all responsible for the BP disaster.

Patricia Aufderheide

Culture

The Filmmaker Any Cinema-Literate Progressive Must Know

Finally, more of Chris Marker's work is becoming available in the U.S. Here's where to start.

Michael Atkinson

Culture

New Deal, Same Spiel

Ken Burns' documentary about the Roosevelts is heavy on fable but light on fact.

Chris Lehmann