Culture

Horrified by the overturning of Roe v Wade, a Latina consoles herself with a re-imagining of Medusa and axes.

Tenderness teaches us that if we consider softness with enough rigor, if we consider ourselves with enough softness, a wound is a portal, not an end. 

Myriam Gurba maps her sexual miseducation in California schools, homes, and medical offices.

Jonathan Russell Clark debuts a monthly column for Tasteful Rude detailing the choicest selections from his book-obsessed life. His current apartment resembles a used bookstore almost more than it does an ordinary living space, and he plans to write about whatever he finds on those shelves that tickles his fancy.

Alejandro Herredia debuts his new Tasteful Rude column with a meditation on the word opacity.

The university store where Bimpe Alabi sells snacks and drinks at the park is usually crawling with customers. Since University of Ilorin's lecturers have gone on strike, this has changed. Alabi stands outside, inviting passersby. Her profits have shrunk, pushing her family into hardship.

I think of my abuelita's stories. These tales often began with a declaration that she’d been born four months after the Titanic set sail. With a laugh, she’d swirl her ever present cup of coffee and add that the ship sank five days later. Meanwhile, she persevered. She said that it was coffee that kept her going.

To our delight, Grandma Clara's pie blended fresh eggs, fresh lemons from her tree, C&H sugar, real butter, and a lard crust. Endowed with otherworldly powers, she whipped up fluffy meringue with mere egg beaters. The toasted meringue resembled the melting snowpack of the Sierra Nevadas, defiant seams of brown in foamy white.

In his book "The Nineties", Chuck Klosterman is not interested in what’s conventionally understood or easily graspable but in the layers that either exist deep underneath or hover loftily. It’s what makes his essays and books so fun—it allows us to reconsider accepted wisdom.

My mother knew I loved rearing livestock, chickens especially. When I was young, she bought a goat for me. Three days after we brought it home, the animal died. "Your nature might not align with the goat," she said. "Does that mean I can't rear any livestock?" Sadness encroached. "Don't worry. Let's try a hen."

With wit, and a dash of horror, a Black caregiver in the Bay Area suburbs reflects on the surreality of elder care during a pandemic.

Weed culture is fascinated with feminine eroticism. Sex sells and often goes hand in hand with drugs. This has harmed many women who work in the marijuana industry, where being sexually exploited is part of the job.

Organizers of Giovanni's Room unite to honor literary ancestors

A Latina calls out the city of Seattle for its social chilliness.

From “Bad Art Friend” to the Miya Marcano murder to reports of femicide, writers shy away from a crucial word: stalking.