Relationships and Going Places

Imagine that a “time machine” allowed you to go back in time — back exactly 64,999,995 years ago, just five years before the crash of the meteor that marked the end of the Age of the Dinosaurs. You have just enough time to do your field work, analyze your data, and write your Ph.D. dissertation. more »

The 1940 Census is a unique Census in our history — the first to include questions that were asked only of a subset of the population, chosen through a near-random scheme. In addition to the questions on age, sex, race, and relationship to the householder were questions about the value of the home, living on a farm, marital status, attending school, highest grade of school completed, place of birth, and citizenship. For persons 14 years and older, there were additionally seven different questions on working status, current occupation and industry, number of weeks worked, and income. more »

Nilla Childs has framed Puzzled: 100 pieces of Autism in what she terms the 8 steps to completing a jigsaw puzzle; and learning how to give up "what does not work." Megan Bergman’s fine, fine collection of short stories, Birds of a Lesser Paradise, have both moral profundity and light-hearted humor. If you're looking for the next big page-turner, you've found it in The Expats. Chris Pavone is a dab hand at both mayhem and domesticity, something unusual in the business of flash-and-dash spy novels.  more »

There are several clusters of issues on which men and women divide, including views of government and its role. Yet gender differences do not follow a predictable pattern. On social issues, for instance, there is a wide gender gap in views of gay marriage, but not abortion more »