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“If there is one thing we appreciate it is a faction that splinters into smaller factions.” A report from inside Syria: “We in the Middle East have always had a strong appetite for factionalism. Some attribute it to individualism, others blame the nature of our political development or our tribalism. Some even blame the weather. […]

Massively Open Online Courses, or MOOCs are currently being heralded as the future of affordable education. But what kind of education will it actually provide? “Everybody loves the idea of lowering the barriers of entry to education; it’s the easiest sell in the world, and Khan Academy, a nonprofit, pushes all the right buttons. Khan’s […]

A look at the rights of same-sex parents after a mother abducts her daughter and heads to Nicaragua after a civil union dissolves: “Isabella’s tumultuous life has embodied some of America’s bitterest culture wars — a choice, as Ms. Miller said in a courtroom plea, shortly before their desperate flight, ‘between two diametrically opposed worldviews […]

A writer of made-for-TV movies reflects on his middling successes and near-misses from a career of steady but not spectacular work in Hollywood: “On occasion during my 30-year screenwriting career, the amount on these checks has been life-changing, enough money to buy a car or temporarily pay off our credit cards. But I don’t really […]

An artist recreates Gettysburg with a lifelike cyclorama—and the painting changes how many people viewed the battle: “‘No person should die without seeing this cyclorama,’ declared a Boston man in 1885. ‘It’s a duty they owe to their country.’ Paul Philippoteaux’s lifelike depiction of the Battle of Gettysburg was much more than a painting. It […]

In my study of African American history, the Civil War was always something of a sideshow. Just off center stage, it could be heard dimly behind the stories of Booker T. Washington, Ida B. Wells, and Martin Luther King Jr., a shadow on the fringe. But three years ago, I picked up James McPherson’s Battle […]

So the Great Depression runs through Little House in the Big Woods like a big three-hearted river. Perhaps most striking, however, is that the book’s central theme is made most conspicuous not through the events and details described in its pages but by the things that aren’t there. There’s no Depression in the Big Woods. […]

Unemployment as a recurring feature of the social landscape only caught American attention with the rise of capitalism in the pre-Civil War era. Before that, even if the rhythms of agricultural and village life included seasonal oscillations between periods of intense labor and downtime, farmers and handicraftsmen generally retained the ability to sustain their families. […]