When a well-known person denounces a specific group of people—claiming for instance they don’t deserve full citizenship, or they are a threat to the nation—the result can be a violent act against any person perceived to be in the targeted group. How do we know this? Sadly, the answer emerges from the horrific mass murders […]

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sam sax is one of the most dynamic new voices in American poetry. His first book, Madness, was selected by Terrance Hayes for the National Poetry Series, and his second, bury it, garnered the prestigious James Laughlin Award for a second book. Laughlin Award judge Tyehimba Jess writes: “sam sax’s urgent, thriving excavation of desire […]

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Once upon a time in Italy, a prominent citizen declared: “It is unacceptable that sometimes in certain parts of Milan there is such a presence of non-Italians that instead of thinking you are in an Italian or European city, you think you are in an African city.” In case the message was not crystal clear, […]

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Martín Espada is a resourceful urban seer, alternately humorous, tender, and impassioned: a warrior poet who raises “dissidence” to a level of majestic art. An essayist, translator, editor, and former tenant lawyer, Espada is the author of more than a dozen collections, including The Republic of Poetry, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and most […]

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It was easy enough to find out what the pundits thought about the Sept. 12 Democratic debate, but what about the candidates themselves? How did they position their candidacies in the days that followed? A scroll through Instagram was instructive and also provided a glimpse of how that platform is being deployed as source for […]

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