Portside

The following excerpt is the Foreword to America's Addiction to Terrorism. Portside is pleased to share this with our readers. In the U.S. today, the term "terrorism" conjures up images of dangerous, outside threats: religious extremists and suicide bombers in particular. Harder to see but all the more pervasive is the terrorism perpetuated by the United States, itself, whether through military force overseas or woven into the very fabric of society at home.

This new book argues that W. E. B. Du Bois was the first of the USA's modern sociologists. Du Bois's empirically-based studies of African Americans at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries are models of sociological research. Aldon Morris details this legacy, which academic Sociology still does not universally acknowledge. In this review, Monica Bell considers the significance of Morris's argument.

The National Education Association President Lily Eskelsen Garcia said her members helped elect Secretary Hillary Clinton in various states. She also blasted "hateful rhetoric" from Donald Trump.

The Oscars aren’t just a competition for cultural value: They double as an assessment tool that helps pick the industry’s economic winners and losers.

Thousands of attorneys perform tasks so routine that some believe they should get the same protections as the rest of the hourly workforce.

A farmland mapping project by a UC Merced professor indicates that most areas of the country could feed between 80 percent and 100 percent of their populations with food grown or raised within 50 miles. The study immediately generated comment, including positive accolades from author and influencer Michael Pollan (also a UC professor). Many have noted the importance of the study in filling a research gap about local food.

Despite a crackdown on labor activists there, Chinese workers continue to strike. The strike wave continues to grow, and strikes are not only in the private sector or in companies that manufacture for export. Last year saw a large wave of teacher strikes, and as this article shows, nurses in public hospitals are also striking.

Instead of playing musical chairs among hospitals in hopes of finding better working conditions, Philadelphia-area nurses are ready to raise standards throughout the city.

The sitcom aired a powerful episode centered entirely around a family discussion of race and the criminal-justice system—a too-rare event for network TV.

"The University of Missouri System has chosen to take the hard route, and we are willing to do it that way," said Senff to the Maneater. "We want to be able to enact our constitutional rights. A collectively bargained contract is the only thing that will make us feel secure in our position at the university."