Category: Text

How Do Dogs Sniff Out Diseases?

A brown dog's nose pointed upward against a yellow background.
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Dogs know the world through their exquisitely sensitive noses, and humans have been relying on dogs’ sense of smell to help with many different kinds of tasks (not always benevolent) for a long time. Dogs are trained to sniff out contraband at airports and international borders; dogs are instrumental in finding black truffles and other valuable wild mushrooms; and dogs are also trained to detect an imminent epileptic seizure before it occurs . Presently, scientists are developing training programs for dogs to sniff out COVID. In this July 2021 Discover Magazine report, science journalist Leslie Nemo analyzes the procedures that trainers and researchers follow to teach the necessary skills to the dogs. 

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The Bootleg Fire, the Nation’s Biggest, Gives Scientists an Unexpected Experiment

An airplane drops a cloud of red powder over a forest.
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It’s not often that we encounter good news about wildfires, but here is a report that comes close. This July 2021 Associated Press report presented by NPR recounts some of the moderate successes in wildfire mitigation efforts that scientists have been able to observe with the Bootleg Fire in Oregon.

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Breaking the Grass Ceiling: More Women Are Playing College Baseball Than Ever Before

A female baseball player wearing a grey and light blue uniform prepares to hit a ball.
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The US has a woman vice president, and there are now women referees on NBA courts and in the broadcast booths. Have women fully broken the glass ceiling? Not quite. In this June 2021 Sports Illustrated report, sports journalist Michael Rosen addresses the “grass ceiling” encountered by women baseball players, specifically, women on collegiate baseball teams.

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Amazon’s Warehouses, Bezos’s Worldview, and Elite Higher Education

A large warehouse filled with hundreds of boxes organized into different shelves and cubicles.
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Articles and editorials about Amazon, its warehouses and fulfillment centers, and its working conditions appear in probably hundreds, if not thousands, of newspapers and magazines every month. Local and regional newspapers cover the company, of course, as do general interest magazines, and you wouldn’t be surprised to find that business periodicals have a lot to say. Would you expect to find an essay about the company in a periodical that focuses exclusively on issues of higher education? Well, here’s one: Dartmouth University administrator and sociologist Joshua Kim poses some questions about Amazon in this June 2021 Inside Higher Education essay. (His essay mentions and links to a New York Times article, and we suggest that you take a look at that piece, too.) 

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Evanston, Illinois, Approved Reparations. Except It Isn’t Reparations.

Black Lives Matter lawn sign in the front yard of a large white house.
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The Chicago suburb of Evanston, Illinois, has received a lot of national attention for initiating a plan that they’re calling “reparations.” The plan acknowledges and takes steps toward redressing the town’s complicity in a long history of housing practices that have knowingly and intentionally discriminated against Black people, who currently comprise 16% of the town population, according to census data. Arts consultant A. Kirsten Mullen and economist William A. Darity Jr., authors of the 2020 award-winning book From Here to Equality, wrote this March 2021 essay on Evanston’s plan for the Washington Post.

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How Covid-19 Gave Me Back My Southern Accent

A drawing of a set of dentures wearing a cowboy hat and cowboy boots.
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We already know all about how the world around us changed in 2020, how we had to modify, adjust, and adapt along with it. We’ve read and discussed all the effects, all the angles; we know all about it. One major aspect of life, though, may have gone unexamined: language habits. Journalist and culture critic Tracy Moore is surprised to notice a change in her own speech, and she relates her experience with it in this March 2021 Washington Post essay.

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For Political Cartoonists, the Irony Was That Facebook Didn’t Recognize Irony

A political cartoon about vaccines is being drawn on a tablet.
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Have you ever made an ironic remark and had it misinterpreted or misunderstood? Us, too. It happens. In a real-time conversation, you might be able to explain and repair the conversation. Indeed, when the context and intention are clear enough, many potential misunderstandings don’t happen in the first place. On social media, though, things can get more complicated, and ironic intent may not be recognized. New York Times technology correspondent Mike Isaac wrote this March 2021 report on Facebook’s ironic irony problem.

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After a Century of Dispossession, Black Farmers Are Fighting to Get Back to the Land

A man stands inside a greenhouse, looking directly at the camera without smiling.
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Racism and agriculture—are they related? Do squirrels climb trees? Using historical background, current statistics and trends, and descriptions of Black farmers and organizations, Tom Philpott presents a detailed report of a complicated situation. Philpott is an award-winning journalist and Mother Jones food and agriculture correspondent; his report is from the May+June 2021 edition of the magazine.  

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