All stories
To Raise Children, We Must First Raise Parents
An anthropologist compares her early motherhood in London with child care experiences in a hunter-gatherer community of Central Africa.
An [un]Heroic Journey
A Tanzanian poet unseats the illusionist tale of the mission museum of the Archabbey of St. Ottilien in Germany.
Snapshots of Losing Jenna
An anthropologist offers a lens on how losses from war dramatically alter a family—and a society.
What Vietnam’s Scarred Lands Reveal About Modern Warfare
Fifty years on, Vietnam is still reckoning with the long-term ecological toll of U.S. warfare—a grim warning as Israel and Russia unleash similar destruction in Gaza and Ukraine.
Uncovering an Archaeology of U.S. Empire in Panama
An anthropologist investigates how archaeology helped the U.S. colonize the Panama Canal Zone—just as the current U.S. government threatens to retake it.
Descubriendo una arqueología del imperio estadounidense en Panamá
Una antropóloga investiga cómo la arqueología ayudó a Estados Unidos a colonizar la Zona del Canal de Panamá —justo cuando el actual gobierno estadounidense amenaza con retomarla—.
Why Do Swallows Fly to the Korean DMZ?
An anthropologist discovers diasporic flights—including her own—that begin at and return to the waters of the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea.
¿Por qué vuelan las golondrinas a la DMZ coreana?
Una antropóloga descubre vuelos hacia la diáspora —incluido el suyo propio— que parten y regresan a las aguas de la zona desmilitarizada entre Corea del Norte y Corea del Sur.
Forest as Kin and Pantry in the Himalayas
In the Sikkim and Kalimpong Himalayas in Northeast India, supply chains are often interrupted by changing monsoon systems that damage highways. Responding to uncertainty, communities are reclaiming ancestral foodways—drawing inspiration from the past to move into the future.
How Societies Morph With the Seasons
An evolutionary anthropologist details seasonal changes among foraging communities—and distills how the fixed political structures of industrialized societies are an outlier in human history.
Shading U.S. Empire in Puerto Rico’s Ballroom Scene
A linguistic anthropologist explores the queer Ballroom scene in San Juan—and how performers are incorporating critiques of colonialism into the art form.
How Cultural Knowledge Sustained Desert Farms in the Ancient Andes
An archaeologist who studies past farming practices in the north coast of Peru argues these offer models for navigating current climate crises.
Earworm
A poet-anthropologist listens to an accidental field recording from Kashmir: What might be dismissed as noise becomes a way to unsettle the settled—making audible dispossession and theft, stealth and refusal.
Caring Across Distance—One Call at a Time
An anthropologist explores how a phone call home may seem simple but carries layers of meaning for migrating nurses and their families in India.
Excavating the Traces of Ice Age Foragers
A filmmaker showcases archaeologists unearthing tiny lithics that evidence the presence of hunters from 13,000 years ago in what is today Michigan.
Reclaiming Collective Life in a Fractured U.S.
After Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential election win, an anthropologist set out across the U.S. to understand the nation’s deepening divides. In the new book Something Between Us, he grapples with these rifts and how to repair them.