Cultural Studies

"Culture is an instrument wielded by professors to manufacture professors." — Simone Weil

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  A Romance You Watch in Secret

  The Russian-language reception of Crave’s ‘Heated Rivalry’ shows how tenderness, desire, and character complexity shape a phenomenon that transcends borders.

  Olga NechaevaMar 14

  • Television

  • Cultural Studies

  • Gender & Sexuality

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  This Is My War

  On Iran, the experience of home, and a conflict that is ‘doubly mine.’

  Hooman MajdMar 11

  • Politics

  • Cultural Studies

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  Reading (and Shopping) with Angela McRobbie

  A reflection on the Birmingham School cultural studies scholar’s vision of girlhood.

  Rose Higham-StaintonMar 2

  • Gender & Sexuality

  • Cultural Studies

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  Social Mobility and Stagnation

  How the university entrance exam and residency permits structure life for in China.

  Susan Blumberg-KasonFeb 16

  • Cultural Studies

  • Education

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  The Crisis at the Heart of Modernity

  Terry Eagleton’s recent book employs his trademark witty style in an attempt to say something new about the era that birthed modernism.

  Arleen IonescuFeb 9

  • Cultural Studies

  • Literary Criticism

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  What Comes First, the House or the Haunting?

  ‘Silk & Sinew: A Collection of Folk Horror from the Asian Diaspora,’ a new anthology edited by Kristy Park Kulski, uses storytelling to demonstrate why ‘the ghosts of our futures cannot just be entities that lurk in the background.’

  Jered MabaquiaoFeb 7

  • Fiction

  • Cultural Studies

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  Mama Don’t Take My Chromophobia Away

  Pantone’s 2026 Color of the Year is selling us a white fantasy.

  Lida Zeitlin-WuFeb 4

  • Art & Architecture

  • Cultural Studies

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  The End of Psychiatry (Kind Of)

  Neurologist Pria Anand lauds Khameer Kidia’s new dissection of Western psychiatric imperialism.

  Pria AnandFeb 3

  • Science & Technology

  • Cultural Studies

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  Sister Acts: Why Nuns Are Showing Up Everywhere

  What’s familiar and what’s new about our current fascination with the figure and the mystery of the nun, from Rosalía to self-help books.

  Alexandra VeriniJan 28

  • Philosophy & Religion

  • Cultural Studies

  • Gender & Sexuality

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  Toward a More Creative Vampirism

  Radu Jude’s ‘Dracula’ shines sunlight on the vampirism of cinematic AI and the ways studios have bled the vampire IP dry.

  Ryan BedsaulJan 26

  • Film

  • Cultural Studies

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  Tricksters and the Spirit World

  Julian Brave NoiseCat discusses ‘We Survived the Night,’ his genre-bending revival of the ‘Coyote epic,’ with Leila Nadir.

  Leila NadirJan 24

  • Cultural Studies

  • Environment

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  Opposition Party

  In 2025, television offered a primer in principled dissent.

  Elizabeth AlsopJan 22

  • Television

  • Cultural Studies