News
Enjoy articles from Time and Smithsonian from the last 30 days.
How the U.S. Is Spearheading Efforts to Thwart Chinese Cybercrime
The clear message from all this is that the U.S.-China rivalry is escalating
“We’ve Found the Enemy, and It’s Not Each Other.” Heather McGhee’s Quest to End America’s Zero-sum Thinking on Race
Heather McGhee was cooking dinner in her Brooklyn apartment in January as she opened a YouTube link to watch Joe Biden deliver his first speech on race as the President. As she bustled around the kitchen, Biden recited a line that seemed so familiar that she nearly dropped her wineglass. “We’ve bought the view that…
Addressing the Flaws in our Mental Healthcare System Could Save Young LGBTQ Lives
To say that the past year has been challenging is an understatement. The pandemic completely uprooted people’s lives and left many grappling with more fear and uncertainty than ever before—bringing conversations around mental health to the national stage. Yet, marginalized groups who have long faced disparities in the mental healthcare system like LGBTQ youth —especially…
Working for J. Edgar Hoover, I Saw His Worst Excesses and Best Intentions
Some people have tough bosses. Back in 1966, mine was one of the most feared men in America. J. Edgar Hoover had been running the FBI for an unfathomable forty-one years on the morning I was scheduled to report for duty as his assistant. Then only twenty-three years old, I was a bit nervous about…
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The Tokyo Summer Olympics: Smithsonian's Guide to the Games
Prepare yourself for the Tokyo Olympics with this comprehensive guide to the history, science, arts and thrills of the worldwide celebration
Companies Are Embracing Empathy to Keep Employees Happy. It’s Not That Easy
“Empathy is one of the values we’ve had from our founding.” That’s what Chelsea MacDonald, SVP of people and operations at Ada, a tech startup that builds customer-service platforms, told me when we first got on the phone for this story in June. When the company was in its early stages, with about 50 people,…
The Pandemic Reset the Balance Between Workers and Employers. How Bosses Respond Will Shape the Future of Work
“In order to attract and retain the workers they need, leaders are having to reassess their organizations’ practices”
National Trust Pledges $3 Million to Preserve Black History Sites Across the U.S.
A series of newly announced grants will support 40 African American landmarks and organizations
What Your Body Odor Says About You
When Annlyse Retiveau leaned in to sniff my armpits, I held my own breath as she inhaled. I’ve spent a vast majority of my life using products to avoid this precise critique—another human intentionally evaluating my armpit aroma. Yet, whether we like it or not, humans do smell each other, and we can glean useful…
Online Anonymity Isn’t Driving Abuse of Black Sports Stars. Systemic Racism Is
Forcing social media users to provide I.D. hurts people who genuinely need to stay anonymous, and won’t help solve racism
For 60 Years, Indigenous Alaskans Have Hosted Their Own Olympics
Athletes at the World Eskimo-Indian Olympics in Fairbanks test their mettle in events like the blanket toss, knuckle hop and ear pull
Security Guards to Curate First-of-Its-Kind Exhibit at Baltimore Museum of Art
Opening in March 2022, the show will feature hidden gems inspired by personal stories
Racism In America Should Not Take Center Stage in the Global Fight Against White Supremacy
Racism in the U.S. should not be at the center of global discussions on white supremacy
Tsar Nicolas II Thought Vodka Was Hurting Russians—But Banning It Helped Destroy His Empire
Prior to prohibition, no less than one-third of all state revenue of the mighty Russian empire came from selling vodka to its own people
How Far Has America Actually Come Since the Promises of the George Floyd Protests?
We’re more than a year out from the murder of George Floyd, which sparked a summer of national protests, rallies and dialogue for an end to police brutality and for racial justice writ large. To racial justice advocates and community organizers who have been fighting for decades to address embedded racism within our systems and…
The Story Behind TIME’s World’s 100 Greatest Places Cover
For our third annual list of the World’s 100 Greatest Places, we turned the cover into an illustrative world map by a London-based mapmaker Katherine Baxter. Baxter spent four weeks producing the illustration, meticulously crafting the colorful world map highlighting 31 of the 100 places on the list—from Talkeetna, Alaska to Sydney, Australia. “Mapmaking takes…
2020 Saw a Scary Increase in U.S. Drug Overdoses. We Must Take National Action to Help Communities at Risk
The rate of drug overdoses in the U.S. accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic, worsening an existing public health crisis, and the numbers are staggering. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently reported that more than 93,000 people died from drug overdoses in 2020, the most ever in a single year, and up nearly…
Alma Thomas' Boundary-Breaking Art Takes Center Stage
The first Black woman to headline a solo show at the Whitney, the artist created abstract paintings, marionettes and more
The Climate Crisis Is a Call to Action. These 5 Steps Helped Me Figure Out How to Be of Use
At the age of 16, perched on a ridge in western North Carolina, I scrawled these words into a handbound journal: Want to help the world. Be connected with the Earth. Change the way I live. My mother has always called the Appalachians “wise old mountains,” not as tall or dramatic as their younger brethren…
Why the Vegetable Seller in This 450-Year-Old Painting Isn't Smiling Anymore
Restoration revealed that a grin had been added to the original—and brought experts closer to identifying the work’s creator
My Father’s Life Was Shaped by Racism. So Was His Death
From the time he was sixty until he died, my dad lived on a ranch where, instead of using money to pay rent to the white couple who owned and lived on the property, he worked and helped to manage the land. They shack they offered him in exchange for his labor was down a…
What the Protests in Cuba Mean for the Future of Communism and U.S. Relations
COVID-19 has created an economic crisis in Cuba. In recent days, thousands of angry people have taken to the streets in cities across the island to protest shortages of food, medicine, and energy—and the Cuban government’s pandemic response. These are Cuba’s most significant demonstrations in decades. Cuba’s president, Miguel Diaz-Canel has blamed a U.S. “policy…
'Super Mario 64' Is Now the World's Most Expensive Video Game
A pristine copy of the 1996 game sold at auction for $1.56 million, breaking a record set by “The Legend of Zelda” just two days prior
Anxious About Returning to “Normal Life”? Try Emotional Vaccination
I’m feeling a bit confused this July. I can’t figure out if I am living a pandemic life, a post-pandemic life, or somewhere in between. And while I try to stay present in the moment, my mind keeps wandering to what the fall will be like. For a lot of us, September will bring a…
Fifty Years Ago, Berkeley Restaurant Chez Panisse Launched the Farm-to-Table Movement
‘Local, organic, sustainable’ are common buzzwords on American menus now, but it wasn’t always that way
The Tragic Life of Hansken, 'Rembrandt's Elephant'
A new show at the Rembrandt House Museum in Amsterdam explores the story of an animal who fascinated the Dutch artist
‘I Couldn’t Keep Putting Myself on Hold.’ In Losing Out on His Shot at the Tokyo Olympics, Skateboarder Leo Baker Found Himself
“When I was very young, I was like, ‘oh, I’m a boy. I just am,’” Leo Baker recalls of his childhood. For years, Baker tells TIME, he put questions about his gender on hold as he grew a successful career as a skateboarder, going on to win a series of international skateboarding competitions, including the…
Our Brains Make Us Way Too Optimistic About Meeting Deadlines. Here’s How to Work Around That
Not long ago, I visited a peculiar farm in southwestern Oregon. Year after year, Hastings Inc. produces a single crop: the Easter lily. Every Easter weekend, hundreds of thousands of lilies from this farm appear in supermarkets, big-box stores, and garden centers throughout North America. Each one has to look the same—a single stem, a…
Ridiculous Reviews of Some of the Best National Parks
A new book combines illustrations of the parks with laughably bad critiques from disgruntled tourists
Fingerprint Found on Renaissance Wax Sculpture May Belong to Michelangelo
Conservators at the V&A in London say fluctuating temperatures, humidity in storage likely revealed the long-hidden imprint
The Best Way for the World to Help Haiti in This Moment of Crisis
When Jovnel Moise, a deeply unpopular president of Haiti since 2017, was assassinated on July 7 by a squad of gunmen posing as DEA agents, the news stunned and horrified the world. Even Pope Francis weighed in with sadness, condemning “all forms of violence as a means of resolving crisis and conflicts,” and wishing for…
Meet the Woman Photographers Who Cataloged the 20th Century
A major exhibition at the Met and the National Gallery of Art spotlights 120 international artists, from Homai Vyarawalla to Lee Miller
Cook Up Delicious Feasts With These Culinary Legends
Cooking Up History programs share fresh insights into American culture past and present through the lens of food
How I Curbed My Late Night Insta Yearnings to Move to Another Country
The world is right around the corner
Archives of Groundbreaking Land Artist Nancy Holt Head to the Smithsonian
The papers illuminate the life of a woman whose career was often overshadowed by that of her husband, Robert Smithson
‘The Myth Itself Becomes a Stand-in.’ What Can the Alamo’s History Teach Us About Teaching History?
Less than a month after Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed into law a bill he described as “a strong move to abolish critical race theory in Texas”—which educators worry will limit how they can talk about the history of systemic racism and current events—the Republican leader put the issue back on the agenda for a…
Historians Identify 14 Living Relatives of Leonardo da Vinci
An ongoing effort to trace the artist’s male lineage may help researchers sequence his genome
The Conservative Case Against Banning Critical Race Theory
By the end of June, 29 Republican-led state legislatures had considered and nine had enacted laws to penalize schools or teachers teaching critical race theory (CRT). Whether or not such laws would stifle anything taught in public schools today is uncertain because existing legislative control over curricula is already extensive. But the war against CRT…
The Only Way for the U.S. to Reach Herd Immunity Is With COVID-19 Vaccine Mandates
To encourage more people to get a COVID-19 vaccine and reach herd immunity, U.S. government leaders and their corporate partners are now dangling many carrots to hesitant Americans. Free childcare, free car rides, even free beer has been offered. But new evidence is emerging in places like Ohio where, after state health authorities set up…
Judy Garland's Long-Lost 'Wizard of Oz' Dress Rediscovered After Decades
A lecturer at Catholic University discovered the rare costume wrapped in a trash bag in a drama department office