Author: TheConversation

By Art Jipson, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Dayton When shots rang out in Minnesota, targeting state Democratic politicians, the headlines quickly followed a familiar script: a mentally unstable suspect and the well-worn label “lone gunman.” According to media reports, the Minnesota gunman, Vance Luther Boelter, was a deeply religious anti-abortion activist and a conservative who supported President Donald Trump. The term lone gunman, routinely deployed in the aftermath of mass shootings and political violence, that the suspect was simply acting alone, so there’s no one or nothing else to blame, may offer a comforting explanation, but it’s...

By Lindsey Breitwieser, Assistant Professor of Gender & Women’s Studies, Hollins University Adriana Smith, a 30-year-old woman from Georgia who had been declared brain-dead in February 2025, spent 16 weeks on life support while doctors worked to keep her body functioning well enough to support her developing fetus. On June 13, 2025, her premature baby, named Chance, was born via cesarean section at 25 weeks. Smith was nine weeks pregnant when she suffered multiple blood clots in her brain. Her story gained public attention when her mother criticized the doctors’ decision to keep her on a ventilator without the...

By Allissa V. Richardson, Associate Professor of Journalism, USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism It has been five years since May 25, 2020, when George Floyd gasped for air beneath the knee of a Minneapolis police officer at the corner of 38th Street and Chicago Avenue. Five years since 17-year-old Darnella Frazier stood outside Cup Foods, raised her phone and bore witness to nine minutes and 29 seconds that would galvanize a global movement against racial injustice. Frazier’s video did not just show what happened. It insisted the world stop and see. Today, that legacy continues in the...

By Edward D. Vargas, Associate Professor, School of Transborder Studies, Arizona State University; Jason L. Morín, Professor of Political Science, California State University, Northridge; and Loren Collingwood, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of New Mexico Agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement conducted a series of raids throughout Los Angeles and Southern California in early June 2025, sparking protests in downtown Los Angeles and other cities, including New York, Chicago, and Austin, Texas. Some demonstrators expressed growing frustration with ICE by showcasing the Mexican flag, which has become the defining symbol of the protests in Los Angeles. The...

By Eran Ben-Joseph, Professor of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) In 1918, as World War I intensified overseas, the U.S. government embarked on a radical experiment. It quietly became the nation’s largest housing developer, designing and constructing more than 80 new communities across 26 states in just two years. These weren’t hastily erected barracks or rows of identical homes. They were thoughtfully designed neighborhoods, complete with parks, schools, shops and sewer systems. In just two years, this federal initiative provided housing for almost 100,000 people. Few Americans are aware that such an ambitious and...

By Abby Youran Qin, Ph.D. candidate at School of Journalism & Mass Communication, University of Wisconsin-Madison Why did your hometown newspaper vanish while the next town over kept theirs? This isn’t bad luck. It’s a systemic pattern. Since 2005, the United States has lost over one-third of its local newspapers, creating “news deserts” where corruption is more likely to spread and communities may become politically polarized. My research, published in Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, analyzes the factors behind the decline of local newspapers between 2004 and 2018. It identifies five key drivers − ranging from racial disparity to...