“When it comes to bubble tea and Amy Tan, I’ve taken different stances, but the two have much in common. They’ve both become shorthands of some vaguely ‘Asian American thing.’”
essay
Posted inNonfiction
Binders Full of Men
In an excerpt from her new book on fertility, feminism, and queer family-building, Jennifer Berney explores the possibilities of sperm banks.
Posted inEditor's Pick
Screen Memories
“Screenshots are also proof of memory — proof that I was there, online at a moment in time.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
How Nothingness Became Everything We Wanted
“The culture of negation inspires a taste for nothingness and glorifies numbness.”
Posted inArts & Culture, Highlight, Quote Posts, Quotes
Quarantine Brain: How ‘the Internet Became More Internet’ in 2020
Nothing made sense in 2020 — unless you were on the internet.
Posted inNonfiction
Longreads Best of 2020: Arts and Culture
Our top editors’ picks in arts and culture writing this year.
Posted inCulture, Essays & Criticism, Highlight, Writing
The Secrets of a Hidden Diary
A hidden diary, a love story, and a mystery.
Posted inEditor's Pick
Illuminating Kirinyaga: Meaning and Knowing in Mount Kenya’s Forests
“Anyone can walk in the woods, but who truly knows them?” Tristan McConnell writes about the shrinking mountain forests of Mount Kenya, and the people there with a deep understanding of the land and the trees.
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Death and Life of the Greatest American City
“The city feels simultaneously attacked, abandoned, and bereft of competent leadership. It also feels very, very alive.” In an essay at GEN, Glynnis MacNicol explores New York City’s #NoFilter era.
Posted inEditor's Pick
Buying Myself Back
Emily Ratajkowski writes an essay on celebrity, objectification, and consent. “I’ve become more familiar with seeing myself through the paparazzi’s lenses than I am with looking at myself in the mirror. And I have learned that my image, my reflection, is not my own.”