All Society
- No, the Irish were not slaves in the Americas
Despite efforts to debunk the falsehood, the notion of 'Irish slaves' continues to circulate online, clouding discussions about racism and further complicating relations between Irish-Americans and African-Americans.
First LookSalt Lake City cafe employs homeless youthMaud's Cafe, a new coffee shop in Salt Lake City, hires homeless youth as baristas, through an initiative by Volunteers of America-Utah. The coffee shop and the nonprofit's resource center provide young people with a trusted community and job training.
The Explainer'Chief Wahoo' out: the mascot debateThe Cleveland Indians will no longer display 'Chief Wahoo' on team uniforms or in their home stadium starting in 2019. But fans will still be allowed to buy and wear the logo, stirring a long-simmering debate over the use of Native American sports mascots.
First LookA 1968 school walkout holds lessons for #NationalSchoolWalkoutParticipants of a 1968 high school walk out in East Los Angeles see their movement echoed in the actions of Parkland, Fla., students. Though the 1968 walk out began over poor school conditions, both movements feature students speaking out when they felt no one was listening.
First LookVeterans find community, healing through outdoor sportsThe Front Country Foundation organizes skiing and surfing trips for veterans struggling to reintegrate into civilian society. Through the excursions, the foundation aims to cultivate a sense of closeness and solidarity between those who've experienced trauma.
First LookChanges in sick-leave laws allow workers to care for 'chosen family'The terminology has quietly been gaining political recognition over the past two years as a number of US states and cities have passed laws allowing workers to use sick days to care for anyone who's like family to them.
First LookWith war back home, Yemeni immigrants deepen roots in USFor decades, migrants from Yemen have come to the US temporarily to pursue greater economic opportunity. Now, with a massive civil war in the Middle Eastern country, many newcomers are staying – and bringing a sense of cultural pride with them.
Cover StoryTwo mothers, a son’s death, and the struggle for forgivenessGiselle Mörch realized how much the concept of forgiveness had always been an abstraction for her. But now, confronted with the call to forgive in a way she could never have imagined, it has become something more wrenching and tumultuous, she says.
Cover StoryCan schools help rid the world of sexual harassers and abusers?From Iceland and Israel to Mexico and South Korea, schools around the world increasingly see rooting out sexism as their domain, before it takes hold and expresses itself in workplace abuse or domestic violence. Part 8 of Reaching for Equity: a global series on gender and power.
FocusKentucky tests how much to demand of Medicaid recipientsIn July, Kentucky will become the first state to enforce work and community engagement requirements for some Medicaid recipients. The debate centers on fundamental questions: Does work make you healthier, or do you need to be healthy to work? And is health care a benefit or a right?
First LookStudy finds racial inequality persists 50 years after Kerner ReportThe report's authors recommend federal and state governments spend more on early childhood education, push for a $15 minimum wage, and mortgage lending oversight, among other strategies for eradicating systematic racism.
First LookTrail Sisters want more women hiking on trailsTrail Sisters is an initiative meant to help women and girls feel more comfortable taking hikes. By inviting women to join walks lead by a female ranger the group hopes to dispel fears of being vulnerable in the woods.
Cover StoryTexas's colonias: solution to housing crisis or moral blot on rich nation’s conscience?
Focus'Arm the good guys'? Kentucky and other states weigh adding guns to schools.Five school shootings so far in 2018 have resulted in serious physical injury or death – including the fatal shooting of 17 students and teachers in Florida.
Billy Graham: a counselor of presidents who eschewed politicsIn the pantheon of evangelists from the Apostle Paul to Billy Sunday, no one preached the gospel to more souls than Graham, who used stadiums and mass media as no one before or since.
'Calls From Home': How one Kentucky radio station connects inmates and familiesEvery week, WMMT broadcasts recorded messages from friends and family members of the more than 5,000 men incarcerated in the six federal and state prisons within range of Whitesburg, Ky.
First LookTown library starts newspaper after local paper shutteredA small New Hampshire town library offers a model of how others can step in to provide information for communities in 'news deserts.'
Can alt-weeklies write a future for themselves in a digital era?Just last week, Nashville's The Scene shuttered. In 2017, the Baltimore City paper folded, the LA Weekly cut most of its editorial staff, and the Village Voice axed print. But supporters say the need remains for vigilant reporters intensely focused on local news.
First LookUp close and personal: NFL players and racial profilingFor decades, professional black athletes have used their public platform to voice issues of social injustice. NFL players kneeling during the national anthem is the latest iteration of this kind of protest. An AP survey reveals many players have experienced racial profiling firsthand.
Cover StoryThe lawman and the outlaw: How cattle rustling and drugs are roiling rural AmericaThis is a story of two men – a lawman and an outlaw – and of promising lives shattered, of families betrayed, and, maybe, just maybe, of redemption. It is a story of a crime as old as the country (cattle rustling) and of a scourge as new as last night’s news (methamphetamine use).
