Contexts Blog

wishing you a restful new year!

The Freedom Revolution, Awakened Ancestral Roots of a New Generation, and a Population Moving as One

In many ways, Gen Z Iranians are a combination of the very best and the most important learning experiences of their previous generations. They are marked by their perseverance and their refusal to use old modes of protective denial in order to navigate the impact of the paradoxes of life in, as their parents and grandparents did before them. They will continue to form a collective self through their agentic, adversarial approach to effecting change. For all these reasons, “The Women of Iran” are the right choice for Time Magazine’s 2022 Heroes of The Year. Read More

Facial Difference, Social Disability (Or, Why I Didn’t Mind Masking)

Finalizing my divorce, searching for a new place to live, re-evaluating the possibility of a family—I was stressed out in November of 2009. Then my … Read More

“Woman, Life, Freedom” and the Progressive Academe

On September 13, 2022, a 22-two-year-old Kurdish woman named Jina (Mahsa) Amini was arrested by “Morality Police” in Tehran, Iran, with the charge of defying … Read More

Another mass killing in a gay bar

Journalists don’t contact me when new bars open, when they set new fundraising records, or when their events send queer joy spilling into the streets. Read More

Teaching Exercises: Our Hard Days’ Nights

Thanksgiving is almost upon our U.S. readers, and whether it’s the long drives, visiting a childhood home, couch dozing after a winter walk, or getting … Read More

Climate Change, Redlining, and Our Institutions’ Blue Roofs

Dilapidated homes, unoccupied with boarded windows. Overgrown patches of land, acres of empty parking lots with vines slowly reclaiming the space. Big box … Read More

Home-Working’s Covid Comeback

Working from home was on a long, downward slide until the 1980s, when sectoral shifts and information technologies triggered a reversal. For a couple of … Read More

Review Questions: Tax Myths

As voters in the U.S. weigh their ballot options, we’re looking back to Lane Kenworthy’s Summer 2009 Contexts article, “Tax Myths.” In four sections, Kenworthy … Read More

Pitch Your Feature!

Incoming Contexts editors Amin Ghaziani and Seth Abrutyn, both sociologists at the University of British Columbia, invite your feature story pitches—now accepted through mc.manuscriptcentral.com/contexts! … Read More