Author Oscar Casares reviews the work of Juan Rulfo, who covered themes of violence and how it affected the behaviors of individuals in his writing. An excerpt from Rulfo’s The Burning Plain and Other Stories is included.
The world may seem chaotic today, in part due to the failure of the Arab Spring to live up to its great promise. Pulitzer-winning writer Thomas Friedman notes that one cause of this disorder may be inequality of freedom: Many of those who have won freedom from oppression have yet to gain freedom to conduct their lives as they wish.
In recent decades, South Africans who can afford it have erected ever more daunting walls around their homes to keep out crime. One South African writer argues that only removing or lowering the walls will improve the situation.
A study by the Pew Research Center shows a lack of Congressional representatives who are immigrants, and some think that an increase in that number would lead to a better understanding of complex immigration issues.
Digital expert Sue Thomas explains that humans have a genetic attraction to the natural world, but argues that digital representations of nature may satisfy our needs.
The passengers who thwarted an armed assailant on a European train didn’t just save dozens of lives. They also inspired hope and action around the world.
With migrants from Syria and other troubled locales flooding into Europe comes an opportunity for one nation to change its image.
Historian Helen Otfield argues that a statue of Vasco Núñez de Balboa should be erected in San Diego’s Balboa Park, and she provides some history of the Spanish explorer.
The first convention for women’s rights in the United States took place in Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848. Writer Michael Sainato remembers the people who met there and highlights the influence they had on those that followed.
Read this review of a recent collection of poetry by Wislawa Szymborska.
