Essays & Commentary

When the Gestapo took his daughter in for questioning, Freud — the patriarch whose theories helped end patriarchy — felt the full vulnerability of fatherhood, writes Mark Edmundson, a professor of English at the University of Virginia.
Sigmund and Anna Freud. (Photograph © Hulton-Deutsch Collection, Corbis)

Gun control is a policy and cultural issue that goes far beyond debate over the Second Amendment. Acknowledging that is the first step in curbing gun violence, writes Mark V. Tushnet, a professor at Harvard Law School.

Sometimes, a campus can seem like a road to nowhere. But then when you're on the road next to your old campus, it suddenly looks like somewhere, says Frankie Gamber, a writer in Baltimore.

How should secularists and atheists treat sacred texts? asks Carlin Romano, critic at large for The Chronicle.

Al Qaeda offers one rationale for its actions to Western audiences, but another to Muslims, writes Raymond Ibrahim, editor and translator of The Al Qaeda Reader.

Eventually gender studies was bound to notice men. The results aren't pretty, writes Camille Paglia, a professor of humanities and media studies at the University of the Arts.

The four-decade-old student-loan system doesn't need tweaking. It needs reinventing, write Frederick M. Hess, director of education-policy studies, and Juliet Squire, a research assistant, both at the American Enterprise Institute.

Japanology has lost one of its giants, writes Anthony H. Chambers, a professor of Japanese at Arizona State University.

Colleges and universities should think globally, and act globally, to confront deepening humanitarian crises. There are worthy precedents for such bold plans, writes David J. Skorton, president of Cornell University.

CRITICAL MASS: Mearsheimer and Walt redux.

The Arts

Give Scott Fife an X-Acto knife, a paintbrush, some trash, and construction materials, and he'll give you a world.
Clarence Darrow, defense attorney, 2001-3 (archival cardboard, glue, screws), by Scott Fife.

Ken Burns started his mammoth project in peacetime. Iraq makes his recounting of American involvement in World War II look strange to us in some ways, but sadly familiar in others, writes Marianna Torgovnick, a professor of English at Duke University.