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Black and white photo of a 1920s flapper girl.
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Flappers: Precursors to Modern-Day Social Media Influencers?

A 1923 article in a fashion magazine shows the connection between flappers and social media youth organizers today.

Inventing Solitary

In 1790, Philadelphia opened the first American penitentiary, with the nation’s first solitary cells. Black people were disproportionately punished from the start.
Protesters holding anti-War on Drugs signs with a red target printed over them

How the Drug War Dies

A few decades ago, the left and the right, politicians and the public, universally embraced the criminalization of drug use. But a new consensus has emerged.
A crowd watches a roller skater dance at block party in the Bronx.

The Stories of the Bronx

"Urban Legends: The South Bronx in Representation and Ruin" is a vibrant cultural history that looks beyond pervasive narratives of cultural renaissance and urban neglect.
Photos of Civil War veterans showing injuries and amputations.

America’s First Opioid Crisis Grew Out Of the Carnage Of The Civil War

Tens of thousands of sick and injured soldiers became addicted.
A television news reporter in a segment from the 1990s on juvenile crime

Superpredator

The media myth that demonized a generation of Black youth.

Everything You Know About Mass Incarceration Is Wrong

The US carceral state is a monstrosity with few parallels in history. But most accounts fail to understand how it was created, and how we can dismantle it.
Cell block at Riker's Island

Is It Possible for New York City to Get Jail Design Right?

Rikers Island jails were supposed to be the more humane model when they were built. New York City has the same lofty goals as it plans Rikers’ replacements.

Quacks, Alternative Medicine, and the U.S. Army in the First World War

During WWI, the Surgeon General received numerous pitches for miraculous cures for sick and wounded American soldiers.

Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Mass Incarceration

The rise​ of mass incarceration in the early 1970s was fueled by white fear of black crime. But the fear of crime wasn’t confined to whites.
Eastern State Penitentiary, c. 1876.

A Brief History of Solitary Confinement

Dickens, Tocqueville, and the U.N. all agree about this American invention: It’s torture.

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