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Photographs of historian Zachary Schrag and his father Philip Schrag in front of a Nuclear War plan background

Two Generations of Nuclear Hopes and Nuclear Fears

A conversation with historian Zachary Schrag and his father Philip Schrag about their multi-generational encounters with nuclear threats.
by Alex Wellerstein via Doomsday Machines on October 4, 2024
"Neighborhood of Fear" book cover

Abolishing the Suburbs

On Kyle Riismandel’s “Neighborhood of Fear: The Suburban Crisis in American Culture, 1975–2001.”
by David Helps via Los Angeles Review of Books on April 13, 2021
Suburban cul de sac.

How Fear Took Over the American Suburbs

On the rise of suburban vigilantes and NIMBYs in the late 20th century and their enduring power today.
by Kyle Riismandel, Sarah Holder via CityLab on January 14, 2021

The Long, Winding, and Painful Story of Asylum

An ancient concept, asylum has become just another political tool in the hands of our government.
by John B. Washington via The Nation on April 20, 2020
Exhibit

Fear Itself

We're not generally at our best when frightened. It's no surprise, then, that some of the ugliest episodes in American history (but also, some pretty great films) have been driven by fear.

The Great Fear of 1776

Against the backdrop of the Revolution, American Indians recognized a looming threat to their very existence.
by Jeffrey Ostler via Age of Revolutions on September 23, 2019
Dr. Strange Love, from the Stanley Kubrick film of the same name

Watching the End of the World

The Doomsday Clock is set to two minutes to midnight. So why don't we make movies about nuclear war anymore?
by Stephen Phelan via Boston Review on June 11, 2019

Evangelical Fear Elected Trump

The history of evangelicalism in America is shot through with fear—but it also contains an alternative.
by John Fea via The Atlantic on June 24, 2018

Mapping a Demon Malady: Cholera Maps and Affect in 1832

Cholera maps chart the movement of the disease, and the terror that accompanied it.
by Sarah Schuetze via Commonplace on September 25, 2016
Martin Luther King Jr stands behind a podium.

5 Lessons From the Real Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

This Juneteenth we need to discard the caricatures of King that we so often see and learn from what he actually did and believed.
by Jeanne Theoharis via The Nation on June 19, 2025
A guard watching prisoners at CECOT prison in El Salvador in 2025.

The Roots of Bukele’s Gulag

Understanding why Trump is using El Salvador to test the limits of illegal deportation requires returning to the US’s long history of outsourcing violence.
by John E. Washington via New York Review of Books on June 1, 2025
Donald Trump speaking at a rally

Witch Hunt Nation: The Endurance of a Metaphor That Burned

A brief look at the usage of "witch hunt" in American politics through the centuries.
by Alexis Coe via Study Marry Kill on May 28, 2025
Ryan White

The True Story of an Indiana Teen Barred From School Over His AIDS Diagnosis

Ryan White changed perceptions of the disease in the United States.
by Paul M. Renfro via Teen Vogue on April 8, 2025
The ruins of Ft. Ticonderoga, and a note left in a knapsack a soldier carried in battle there.

A Knapsack’s Worth of Courage

Now, and for some years to come, we will need a lot less Paul Weiss, and a lot more Benjamin Warner.
by Eliot A. Cohen via The Atlantic on March 31, 2025
Joseph McCarthy with a map.

Joseph McCarthy in Wheeling, West Virginia: Annotated

Senator Joseph McCarthy built his reputation on fear-mongering, smear campaigns, and falsehoods about government employees and their associates.
by Joseph McCarthy, Liz Tracey via JSTOR Daily on March 24, 2025
Black and white Washington DC.

Between Existential Fear and Isolationist Exhaustion: The United States on the Eve of the Cold War

Dean Acheson, President Truman’s prim, patrician undersecretary of state, was sitting in his office on February 21, 1947, when he received a visitor.
by Clay Risen via Literary Hub on March 21, 2025
Front entrance of the abandoned Florida Solite plant.

The Machine in the Garden

After decades of unchecked hazardous waste pollution, a Florida hamlet fights the developers eager to build homes there anyway.
by Jordan Blumetti via Oxford American on March 18, 2025

How the Red Scare Reshaped American Politics

At its height, the political crackdown felt terrifying and all-encompassing. What can we learn from how the movement unfolded—and from how it came to an end?
by Beverly Gage via The New Yorker on March 10, 2025
"Rip Van Winkle Awaking from His Long Sleep," painting by Henry Inman (1823).

Bewilderment as a Way of Understanding America’s Present – and Past

Circumstances in which people are feeling extreme disorientation are potent breeding grounds for people who are willing to exploit it in moments of crisis.
by Robert G. Parkinson via Commonplace on February 18, 2025
Three identical pictures of the explosion of an atomic bomb with different coloring.

How Literature Predicted and Portrayed the Atom Bomb

On Pierrepoint B. Noyes, H.G. Wells, and the “Superweapons” of early science-fiction.
by Dorian Lynskey via Literary Hub on January 28, 2025
Police officer, yellow tape, and abandoned bikes and lawnchairs after the Highland Park shooting.
partner

How Gun Violence and the Supreme Court Have Shaped Second Amendment Rights

Supreme Court rulings on gun laws highlight the struggle to balance individual rights and public safety.
via Retro Report on January 24, 2025
Depictions of possible causes of apocalypse through war, disaster, and climate change.

Apocalypse, Constantly

Humans love to imagine their own demise.
by Adam Kirsch via The Atlantic on December 31, 2024
Spock and Kirk in a scene from Star Trek.

Star Trek’s Cold War

While America was fighting on the ground, the Federation was fighting in space.
by Tom Nichols via The Atlantic on December 26, 2024
Ku Kluz Klan imperial wizard Hiram Wesley Evans.

Making Sense of the Second Ku Klux Klan

Understanding the reemergence of the Ku Klux Klan in the early twentieth century gives insight into the roots of today’s reactionary activists and policymakers.
by Chad Pearson via Jacobin on December 22, 2024
Rep. Stephen Horn, examines a chart showing his grades for each agency's progress on the Y2K computer problem.
partner

What to Know About Y2K, Before You Watch 'Y2K'

The Year 2000 computer problem continues to nag at us 25 years later.
by Zachary Loeb via Made By History on December 18, 2024
Illustration of an octopus with a "no talking" symbol, with its tentacles around the globe.

How Cancel Culture Panics Ate the World

A set of peculiarly American anxieties has spread across continents.
by Samuel P. Catlin via The New Republic on November 25, 2024
A painting of a group of Puritans walking through a snowy forest, with the men carrying rifles.

The Puritans Were Book Banners, But They Weren’t Sexless Sourpusses

From early New England to the present day, censors have acted out of fear, not prudishness.
by Peter C. Mancall via Zócalo Public Square on November 25, 2024
Men sitting in a bar, drinking and smoking in suits, implied to be members of the Mafia.

How Black Workers Challenged the Mafia

A story of intrigue and power involving union organizers, Black laundry workers, the Mafia, and the FBI in 1980s Detroit.
by Keith Kelleher via The Forge on November 19, 2024
Photo of Kamala Harris speaking at a moderated conversation with Liz Cheney.
partner

Why People Should Stop Comparing the U.S. to Weimar Germany

Those who draw a line from today to that infamous historical moment when democracy slid into authoritarianism are missing a key difference.
by Christine Adams via Made By History on November 5, 2024
Leatherface swinging a chainsaw branded with the American flag.

It Might Be the Scariest Movie Ever Made. There’s Never Been a Better Time to Watch It.

The vibes right now are very "Texas Chain Saw Massacre."
by Emily C. Hughes via Slate on October 29, 2024
Haitian gang members carrying assault rifles, standing in the center of a stylized rifle sight.

Haiti’s Agents Of Fear

Haitians are caught between the grip of violent gangs and the messy legacies of foreign intervention.
by Matthew J. Smith via Noema on October 29, 2024
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