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Old picture of four Japanese American girls in Manzanar prison camp.

Preserving Memories of a Japanese Internment Camp

A poignant connection between the erosions of landscape and memory at a former Japanese internment camp in California.
by Emily Troil, Maya Castronovo via Directors' Library on May 1, 2024
An illustration of Lucinda Williams in a storm with debris in the air behind her.

Lucinda Williams and the Idea of Louisiana

An exploration of the family stories, Southern territory, and distortions of memory that Lucinda Williams' songwriting evokes.
by Wyatt Williams via The Bitter Southerner on September 5, 2023
Bessel van der Kolk.

How Trauma Became America’s Favorite Diagnosis

Psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk’s once controversial theory of trauma became the dominant way we make sense of our lives.
by Danielle Carr via Intelligencer on July 31, 2023
Martha Hodes (left) and her sister, Catherine, joint passport photo.

The Historian Who Lost Her Memory of a Hijacking

At 12 years old, Martha Hodes was on board a hijacked plane and was taken hostage for a week. How did she forget much of the experience?
by Jacob Bacharach via The New Republic on July 25, 2023
U.S. soldier in Iraq

Iraq Veterans, 20 Years Later: ‘I Don’t Know How to Explain the War to Myself’

Nearly 20 years after their deployment to Iraq, veterans grapple with their younger selves and try to make sense of the war.
by Petra Epperlein, Michael Tucker via New York Times Op-Docs on March 15, 2023
The author, as a young girl, standing in front of a wall.

As If I Wasn’t There: Writing from a Child’s Memory

The author confronts the daunting task of writing about her childhood memory, both as a memoirist and a historian.
by Martha Hodes via American Historical Review on September 19, 2022
Cora Tyson, 99, stands by the historic marker in front of her home in St. Augustine, Fla., on July 15.

The Hatred These Black Women Can’t Forget as They Near 100 Years Old

Three veterans of the civil rights movement fought segregation in St. Augustine, Fla., enduring violence and racism in America’s oldest city.
by Martin Dobrow via Washington Post on August 28, 2022
Picture of Senator Raphael G. Warnock

Sen. Raphael G. Warnock Remembers How the Police Killing of Amadou Diallo Sparked His Activism

"It didn’t make much sense for us to be talking about justice in the classroom if we weren’t willing to get in the struggle in the streets."
by Raphael Warnock via Literary Hub on June 16, 2022
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Extremism in America: Out of the Shadows

According to experts who monitor the radical right, the white supremacist ideology that police say drove the Buffalo gunman has begun moving into the mainstream.
via Retro Report on May 12, 2022
Photograph of a dilapidated mall from the rear parking lot.

Mallstalgia

Once derided as cesspools of Reagan-era consumerist excess, the shopping mall somehow became an unlikely sort-of quasi-public space that is now disappearing.
by Jason Tebbe via Tropics of Meta on November 29, 2021
Civil Rights March on Washington, people holding signs calling for integration

How White Violence Turned a Peaceful Civil Rights Demonstration Into Mayhem

Winfred Rembert on protesting in the Jim Crow South and getting arrested.
by Winfred Rembert via Literary Hub on September 7, 2021

In the Dead Archives

The comment section of a Grateful Dead concert archive offers a sometimes-dark glimpse into a dedicated fan community.
by Max Abelson via n+1 on August 20, 2021

Ashes to Ashes

Should art heal the centuries of racial violence and injustice in the US?
by Taylor Rees via Psyche on October 21, 2020
Beulah Melton, widow of shotgun-victim Clinton Melton, sits with her four children and talks with civil rights activist Medgar Evers

The Forgotten Story of Clinton Melton

An accomplice of Emmett Till's killers murdered a Black man in a neighboring town, and there were parallels in the trials.
via Radio Diaries on August 27, 2020
Photo of an elderly African American man seated on a wicker chair in front of a porch trellis..

The Living Son of a Slave

The child of someone once considered a piece of property instead of a human being, Daniel Smith is a flesh-and-blood reminder that slavery wasn't that long ago
by Sydney Trent via Retropolis on July 27, 2020

The Ladder Up

A restless history of Washington Heights.
by Carina del Valle Schorske via VQR on December 14, 2019

Race, History, and Memories of a Virginia Girlhood

A historian looks back at the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow in her home state.
by Drew Gilpin Faust via The Atlantic on July 18, 2019

The Lucky Ones

I told her we were brought over the Rio Grande on a raft. I never called it a smuggling.
by Adriana Gallardo via Guernica on February 19, 2019

The Premiere of 'Four Women Artists'

In this 1977 documentary, the spirit of Southern culture is captured through four Mississippi artists who tell their stories.
by Nicole Rudick via The Paris Review on May 29, 2018
Sinking of the Lusitania

Life Aboard the Lusitania

Reliving the Sinking of the Lusitania Through the Eyes of a Survivor-My Great-Grandmother
by Emily Walker via Slate on May 7, 2015
Family photo.

Where Do Children’s Earliest Memories Go?

Our first three years are usually a blur and we don’t remember much before age seven. What are we hiding from ourselves?
by Kristin Ohlson via Aeon on July 30, 2014
Avocados

Why Are We So Obsessed With Avocados?

Why are avocados everywhere?
by Sarah Allaback, Monique F. Parsons via Literary Hub on May 21, 2025
An iMac computer displays the starry night screensaver.

Recurring Screens

Reflections on memory, dreams, and computer screensavers.
by Nora Claire Miller via The Paris Review on May 20, 2025
David Souter

Justice David Souter Was the Antithesis of the Present

His jurisprudence has been overshadowed by that of his showier colleagues but was a model of principled restraint.
by Jeannie Suk Gersen via The New Yorker on May 15, 2025
Mark Twain sits in thought on stone steps surrounded by nature while holding papers

Twain Dreams

The enigma of Samuel Clemens.
by John Jeremiah Sullivan via Harper’s on April 29, 2025
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What Japan’s Atom Bomb Survivors Have Taught Us About the Dangers of Nuclear War

Japanese survivors recall the day the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, and warn of future risks.
via Retro Report on April 10, 2025
Green light in a dark sky.

On My Grandfather’s Novel: F. Scott Fitzgerald’s "The Great Gatsby" at 100

Reflections on the literary legacy of a timeless American novel.
by Eleanor Lanahan via Literary Hub on April 7, 2025

The US Used the Alien Enemies Act to Detain Their Families. Now, They are Watching History Repeat

During World War II, the law justified the imprisonment of thousands like Heidi Gurcke Donald.
by Isabela Dias via Mother Jones on March 18, 2025
Image of classified documents and Russia and US leaders shaking hands.

A Newly Declassified Memo Sheds Light on America’s Post-Cold War Mistakes

This remarkably prescient document holds several lessons about how to run foreign policy.
by Fred Kaplan via Slate on December 23, 2024
Gustav Mahler; Charles Ives.

Anchoring Shards of Memory

We don’t often associate Charles Ives and Gustav Mahler, but both composers mined the past to root themselves in an unstable present.
by Joseph Horowitz via The American Scholar on September 9, 2024
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