Confessions of an Instagram Influencer

Can an agency turn anyone into an Instagram star? Bloomberg Businessweek reporter Max Chafkin volunteers to find out.

Published: Nov 30, 2016
Length: 13 minutes (3,353 words)

Geek Love: On Nerditry as Salvation in ’70s Small-Town Canada

At The Walrus, Kevin Patterson writes on how his fraternal twin brother embraced nerditry to navigate the homophobia of small-town Canada in the ’70s.

Source: The Walrus
Published: Nov 30, 2016
Length: 12 minutes (3,080 words)

“They Went to Sea in a Sieve, They Did”

In 1969, Donald Crowhurst fooled the world into believing he sailed around the globe.

Source: Sportsnet
Published: Nov 23, 2016
Length: 14 minutes (3,680 words)

For Deaf Tennis Player, Sound Is No Barrier

South Korea’s Lee Duck-hee is 18 years old and ranked 143rd in the world in a sport where hearing the ball is considered crucial.

Published: Nov 22, 2016
Length: 13 minutes (3,480 words)

What’s Wrong with Literary Studies?

How a group of English scholars are trying to bring emotion and engagement back into the study of literature.

Author: Marc Parry
Published: Nov 27, 2016
Length: 13 minutes (3,380 words)

Truther Love

Uncovering the dating habits of conspiracy theorists and the challenges they face.

Source: Longreads
Published: Nov 29, 2016
Length: 18 minutes (4,602 words)

Fidel Castro Is Dead. What Will Cuban-Americans Like Me Do Now?

After Castro’s long reign, three tales of exile and identity examine the complicated relation of American-born Cubans to their families’ homeland.

Source: Narratively
Published: Nov 28, 2016
Length: 21 minutes (5,399 words)

How Spanish Immersion School Made All the Difference for One Family

A family spends 10 weeks in Mexico and Argentina trying to learn Spanish.

Published: Nov 4, 2016
Length: 9 minutes (2,354 words)

Pregnant in Panama

To celebrate the release of the 2016 edition of Best American Travel Writing, here’s one of the essays reprinted in the anthology. In it, writer Freda Moon visits her father in Panama on the cusp of having her first child. People kept telling her “having children will change everything,” but her traveling parents taught her that parenting does not spell the end of exploration and adventure.

Author: Freda Moon
Source: AFAR
Published: Oct 14, 2015
Length: 12 minutes (3,234 words)

Christine Who Fed the Hungry

An elegy for a much beloved volunteer chef and leader of the rest of the volunteers at a soup kitchen in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.

Source: The New Yorker
Published: Nov 24, 2016
Length: 10 minutes (2,601 words)