The Conversation

This course uses crime novels to teach critical thinking

Written by Sally C. Harris, Distinguished Lecturer in English, University of Tennessee

Fictional books on private investigators hold invaluable clues about justice and how the world works. iStock / Getty Images Plus

Uncommon Courses is an occasional series from The Conversation U.S. highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching.

Title of course:

Whodunit?: Detective Stories

What prompted the idea for the course?

I had just finished...

Trump’s comeback victory, after reshaping his party and national politics, looks a lot like Andrew Jackson’s in 1828

Written by Spencer Goidel, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Auburn University

Donald Trump speaks to supporters early on the morning of Nov. 6, 2024.AP Photo/Evan Vucci

As the nation prepares for a second Donald Trump presidency, some history-minded people may seek understanding in the idea that it wasn’t until Richard Nixon’s second presidential term that the serious consequences arrived.

But as a scholar of...

What is ‘ballot curing’? Election expert explains the method for fixing errors made when voters cast their ballots

Written by Paul Gronke, Professor of Political Science and Director, Elections & Voting Infomation Center, Reed College

An imperfect signature on an absentee ballot can necessitate ballot 'curing,' when election workers verify the voter's identity.Bill Oxford/iStock via Getty

Most Americans used to vote on Election Day, and a small percentage of voters cast their ballots as absentee voters through the mail. That changed starting in the late 1970s, when some states...

2024’s quick win for Trump will go down in the history books alongside 1964 and 1980 Election Day landslides

Written by Shannon Bow O'Brien, Associate Professor of Instruction, The University of Texas at Austin

Voters line up to cast their ballots at a voting location in Bethlehem, Pa., on Nov. 5, 2024. Samuel Corum/AFP via Getty Images

Election nights are always simultaneous moments of triumph and tragedy. One group of voters’ dreams are dashed, while another set of voters see their hopes realized.

Every election is also unique. The United States...

Will the lights go out on Cuba’s communist leaders? With fewer options to prop up economy, their future looks dimmer

Written by Joseph J. Gonzalez, Associate Professor, Global Studies, Appalachian State University

Cubans have endured days of blackouts since a grid failure in Havana on Oct. 18, 2024.Adalberto Roque/AFP via Getty Images

Cuba’s communist leaders are in the midst of crisis – and not for the first time.

On Oct. 18, 2024, the nation’s electrical grid failed, leaving Cubans without lights or refrigeration. Blackouts have persisted...

Kristallnacht’s legacy still haunts Hamburg − even as the city rebuilds a former synagogue burned in the Nazi pogrom

Written by Yaniv Feller, Assistant Professor of Religion and Jewish Studies, University of Florida

Commemorating the anniversary of the 1938 pogrom in Hamburg, on the former site of the Bornplatz Synagogue, in November 2018. Axel Heimken/DPA/picture alliance via Getty Images

Johanna Neumann was 8 when she witnessed a mob of local citizens and Nazis vandalizing the Bornplatz Synagogue in Hamburg. They were “shouting and throwing stones at...

Carl Sagan’s scientific legacy extends far beyond ‘Cosmos’

Written by Jean-Luc Margot, Professor of Earth, Planetary, and Space Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles

Carl Sagan at his Cornell University laboratory in Ithaca, N.Y., in 1974.Santi Visalli, Inc./Archive Photos via Getty Images

On Nov. 9, 2024, the world will mark Carl Sagan’s 90th birthday – but sadly without Sagan, who died in 1996 at the age of 62.

Most people remember him as the co-creator and host of the 1980 “Cosmos”...

Cells have more mini ‘organs’ than researchers thought − unbound by membranes, these rogue organelles challenge biology’s fundamentals

Written by Allan Albig, Associate Professor of Biological Sciences, Boise State University

Specialized compartments within cells carry out specific functions.Christoph Burgstedt/Science Photo Library via Getty Images

Think back to that basic biology class you took in high school. You probably learned about organelles, those little “organs” inside cells that form compartments with individual functions. For example,...

Only 5.3% of welders in the US are women. After years as a writing professor, I became one − here’s what I learned

Written by Jo Mackiewicz, Professor of Rhetoric and Professional Communication, Iowa State University

The author welds a headboard.Jo Mackiewicz

Although I have a good gig as a full professor at Iowa State University, I’ve daydreamed about learning a trade – something that required both my mind and my hands.

So in 2018, I started night courses in welding at Des Moines Area Community College. For three years, I studied different types of...

Beefing up Border Patrol is a bipartisan goal, but the agency has a troubled history of violence and impunity

Written by Ragini Shah, Clinical Professor of Law, Suffolk University

With U.S. voters across the political spectrum strongly concerned about border security, presidential candidates Kamala Harris and Donald Trump have been trying to one-up each other on who can reduce migration at the nation’s southern border fastest and most effectively.

Trump’s rhetoric is more extreme: He’s called the U.S. a...