The Conversation

Why literature matters in debate about race and immigrants

Written by Rajini Srikanth, Professor of English, College of Liberal Arts Dean, Honors College, University of Massachusetts Boston

The people who voted for Donald Trump did so for a variety of reasons, but chief among them was the sense of their having been economically abandoned for several decades. Trump has promised to restore their economic dignity. That is a laudable goal.

However, through his corrosive campaign rhetoric, Trump has also made it acceptable to speak in...

What China's 'export machine' can teach Trump about globalization

Written by Penelope B. Prime, Clinical Professor of International Business, & Director, China Research Center, Georgia State University

Chinese goods seem to be everywhere these days.

Consider this: At the Olympics in Rio this summer, Chinese companies supplied the mascot dolls, much of the sports equipment, the security surveillance system and the uniforms for the volunteers, technical personnel and even the torch-bearers.

Do you own a personal computer or air conditioner? Or a pa...

Mexicans are migrating, just not across the US border

Written by Jeffrey H. Cohen, Professor of Anthropology, The Ohio State University

Mexican migration to the U.S. is in decline. The Pew Hispanic Research Center has found that since 2009, more than one million native-born Mexicans living in the U.S. returned to Mexico. But many other Mexicans never crossed the U.S.-Mexican border in the first place.

Why are some Mexican migrants choosing to stay home? What does it mean for the...

Misinformation on social media: Can technology save us?

Written by Filippo Menczer, Professor of Computer Science and Informatics; Director of the Center for Complex Networks and Systems Research, Indiana University, Bloomington

Sharing election hashtags: Dots are Twitter accounts; lines show retweeting; larger dots are retweeted more. Red dots are likely bots; blue ones are likely humans.Clayton Davis, CC BY-ND

If you get your news from social media, as most Americans do, you are exposed to a daily dose of hoaxes, rumors, conspiracy theories and misleading news. When...

Dear Mr. Trump: Climate policy puts lives in your hands

Written by Travis N. Rieder, Research Scholar at the Berman Institute of Bioethics, Johns Hopkins University

Drought, which affects food production, will become more common as the Earth heats up, which can cause deaths and destabilize societies. cafodphotolibrary/flickr, CC BY-NC

President-elect Donald Trump has been unclear so far on how many of his campaign pledges he actually intends to see through. Hopeful Democrats and moderates have clung to this...

Why so many people regain weight after dieting

Written by Kenneth McLeod, Entrepreneur in Residence & Director - Clinical Science and Engineering Research Laboratory, Binghamton University, State University of New York

Metabolism can change after weight loss. Women measuring waist image via www.shutterstock.com.

Anyone who has tried to lose weight and keep it off knows how difficult the task can be. It seems like it should be simple: Just exercise to burn more calories and reduce your calorie intake. But many studies have shown that this simple strategy...

100 years of the 'gender gap' in American politics

Written by Anya Jabour, Regents Professor of History, The University of Montana

Men and women did not vote the same way in 2016.

In fact, the Donald Trump versus Hillary Clinton contest yielded the largest gender gap – the difference between women’s and men’s voting behavior – in U.S. history. Clinton won women by 12 points and lost men by the same amount – a 24-point gap. The gap is growing....

Here's how undocumented students are able to enroll at American universities

Written by Tanya Golash-Boza, Professor, University of California, Merced

President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to deport millions of undocumented people, beginning on his first day in office. In response, students and faculty from 100 campuses around the United States have launched a campaign to demand that their universities become “sanctuaries” for undocumented students.

About 30,000 undocumented students...

You should talk about politics this Thanksgiving – here's why, and how

Written by Stacy Branham, Lecturer of Information Systems, University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Seek to truly connect with each other at Thanksgiving.Group feast via shutterstock.com

After one of the most divisive presidential elections in American history, many of us may be anxious about dinner-table dialogue with family and friends this Thanksgiving. There is no denying that the way we communicate about politics has fundamentally changed...

Have reports of Black Friday's death been greatly exaggerated?

Written by Jay L. Zagorsky, Economist and Research Scientist, The Ohio State University

Black Friday is hyped as one of the biggest in-store shopping days of the year, with stores trumpeting giant sales and even bigger advertising campaigns.

Some pundits claim that Black Friday is dying and is no longer relevant. However, the National Retail Federation issued a strong denunciation of these articles and declared that Black Friday is...