Everyone in the Pool? No—Not Everyone

A site for fun and competition, the swimming pool has its own civil rights history—one that is not yet resolved

When you think about desegregation, do you think about schools? Buses? Lunch counters? How about that most innocent, necessary, and often taken for granted of summer recreation spots for hot kids and their parents—the public pool? Yet pools were, and are, a public facility, and because of that were segregated by ...
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Everyone in the Pool? No—Not Everyone

Cindy Hyde-Smith, or Mississippi God Damn!

Why the history of white supremacy matters for the last Senate election of 2018

On Tuesday November 27 -- tomorrow -- voters in Mississippi will go to the polls to choose their next U.S. Senator in a runoff election pitting incumbent Cindy Hyde-Smith, a far-right Republican and Trump supporter, against Mike Espy, a moderate Democrat who served as Secretary of Agriculture in the Clinton ...
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Cindy Hyde-Smith, or Mississippi God Damn!

Tiny Houses, Narrow Visions

Examining American inequality through the problem of teacher housing

This past December, the Vail School District, in the suburbs of Tucson, Arizona, stumbled briefly into the national spotlight when it announced a plan to build tiny homes for teachers who couldn’t otherwise afford to live in the district. Starting salaries for Arizona teachers are $36,000 a year, while the median income in ...
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Tiny Houses, Narrow Visions