All stories

Members of a girls’ rugby team pose together with arms linked over each other’s shoulders, starting straight at the camera.

Consumer Culture Won’t Lead to Body Positivity

An anthropologist in the U.S., struggling with how the fashion industry shapes her daughter’s self-image, turns to insights about bodies and self-worth from her fieldwork with Indigenous Kichwa women in Ecuador.
An aerial picture shows a hill covered with grazing animals, a large group of people in colorful clothing, and a line of armed police officers facing them.

When Carbon Credits Drive People From Their Homes

The Alto Mayo Conservation Initiative in Peru is supposed to be an environmental success story. On the ground, it is mired in conflict.
A large group of tourists surround tall stone structures.

Six Reasons to Save Archaeology From Funding Cuts

Amid government plans to drastically reduce funding for archaeology programs in the U.K., an archaeologist explains what the discipline has to offer students—and our societies.
skin whitening - Salons like this one in Johannesburg, South Africa, offer facials that make use of skin lightening products.

The Dark Side of Skin Whitening

A desire for lighter skin tones is deeply entrenched in many parts of the world, but it comes with equally deep risks to health and society.
Tax - In Cochabamba, Bolivia, people’s acceptance of taxes owed varies widely.

Tax Season Woes Have Complex Roots

From Bolivia to the U.K. to Sweden, how people perceive their financial relationship with the state depends on everything from local culture—and history—to what the taxes and benefits are called.
People collect water from a pump in a small village in Mozambique.

How Austerity Unravels Social Ties

The experiences of tight-knit neighborhoods in Mozambique suggest that strict belt-tightening often frays a nation's social fabric.

The Dream of the Green Hog Revolution

Throughout North Carolina, more and more farmers are choosing to raise free-range pigs and sell pasture-fed pork. Will that solve the problems caused by industrial meat production?
Madagascar Vanilla beans are dried in the sun as part of the curing process.

Bracing for the Vanilla Boom

Some of Madagascar’s farmers, made wealthy by this year’s vanilla crop, will spend their cash in crazy “hot money” sprees. But their profligate spending may not be as illogical as it first appears.

Can Cryptocurrency Revolutionize the Rituals of Money?

Some people are turning their backs on traditional banks in favor of cryptocurrencies. Beneath the financial and technological conversations surrounding this shift is a story about how trust shapes the culture of money.
Teotihuacan

An Homage to Teotihuacan

One modern Mexican artist is making souvenirs that shed light on the ancient peoples of this city and continue their aesthetic traditions.
The bright-red cuchi wila quinoa has a bitter-tasting outer coating, called saponin, that protects the plant from predators and houses a black seed. This heritage variety of quinoa is increasingly difficult to find, even though it has been used for thousands of years for recipes like the fermented beverage chicha.

Cooking Up an International Market for Quinoa

In Peru, a chef and an agronomist are using the kitchen of a five-star hotel to create an appetite for threatened varieties of a traditional crop.
Hobby Lobby Antiquities

Hobby Lobby’s Antiquities Trouble

The president of the arts and crafts company purchased thousands of antiquities from Iraq for his family’s museum—but he could have met his goals without running afoul of the Department of Justice.
Native American design

Native by Design

Indigenous people in the U.S. are increasingly challenging widespread stereotypes as well as the practice of cultural appropriation.

The Flipside of Counterfeit Goods

While imitation electronics bearing brand names like Apple are often illegal, partaking in these forbidden fruits may not be as sinful as it appears.
Uber and other ridesharing services such as Ola are part of a larger trend in India toward the “gig-economy”—an economy partially powered by self-employed workers on short-term jobs. While it offers flexible schedules for its drivers, it can also come with long hours and income instability.

India’s Uber Dilemma: Entrepreneurship or Exploitation?

Trendy ride-sharing services may revolutionize travel in the country’s congested cities. But uncertainty and lack of trust are defining features of the growing gig economy.
work remotely

The Water-Cooler Problem

Company success and employee satisfaction depend on social ties that are hard to forge in a globalized era.