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Can we escape our national myths?
A history of violence
For years, Americans debated whether Trumpism was fascism. Yale historian Marci Shore explores the uses and misuses of historical comparison.
Why must comparison lighten responsibility? Is our understanding of others not dependent precisely upon analogy, metaphor, translation?
Dancing with death
Australia was founded on the idea of man doing battle with nature. Peter Salmon asks whether, with climate change, the nation has met its match.
It is no stretch to say that looming environmental collapse in Australia is intimately linked with its colonial history. If not all of Australia’s national identity can be explained by these acts of subjugation, the pattern of climate change denial is a recognisable one in a nation in many ways built as a riposte to climate itself.
Inside the city of the silenced
In a climate of worsening oppression, Turkey’s Kurdish population is still struggling for basic rights, as Sami Kent reports.
Mehdi, a street vendor in his 30s, is sitting in a café, bordered on one side by concrete and barbed wire. Beyond them, 500 metres away, is the district where he once lived, razed by the war. “Refugees in our own country,” he explains with a smile.
Also in this issue:
- Eliane Glaser advocates for a new form of "progressive elitism"
- Jonathan Moses on the phenomenon of inner voices. Can they ever be scientifically studied?
- A decade after the death of Christopher Hitchens, James Robins explores his complicated legacy
- Samira Ahmed on the virtues of working with the enemy
- Could GM crops be experiencing an ethical revolution? Rebecca Nesbit investigates
- Rowan Williams on the history of the western Roman empire
- What can children’s books tells us about philosophy? Tom Whyman on Peepo! and perception
- Yanis Varoufakis speaks to JP O'Malley about global capitalism, and why he's started writing sci-fi
- Caroline Crampton on WandaVision and the Marvel Universe
- Madeleine Goodall on the forgotten legacy of early humanist women
- PLUS: Columns from Michael Rosen, Laurie Taylor and Marcus Chown, book reviews, the latest developments in biology, chemistry and physics; cryptic crossword and Chris Maslanka's quiz
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