Arts, Humanities, & Social Sciences

Cartoon montage of a protest, a raised fist, a gun, and a masked African American individual.

In These Times: Black lives and the call for justice

The first two episodes of the Omnia podcast’s second season discuss the Black Lives Matter movement and the lasting impact of slavery and colonialism on the laws and policies that have governed Black lives throughout history.

illegal immigration displaced persons camp concept of little boy in black and orange clothes holding fence with barbed wire in desert on state border

Locked down: Global mobility and COVID-19

At Perry World House’s 2021 Global Shifts Colloquium, Filippo Grandi, the United Nations high commissioner for refugees, addressed how limits on human movement during the pandemic have affected refugees and asylum seekers.

Kristen de Groot ・

Alice Paul in her graduation gown and a handwritten page from her dissertation.

Alice Paul’s mysterious manuscript

Heather J. Sharkey and three students transcribed a hand-written manuscript of the doctoral dissertation by Alice Paul, who earned her Ph.D. from Penn in 1912. As part of a virtual symposium, they joined John Pollack of the Libraries to discuss their efforts.

Louisa Shepard ・

Newsstand featuring three publications, two of which are covid-related.

How news messages affect views on vaccination

News coverage of expert scientific evidence about vaccine safety is effective at increasing public acceptance of vaccines, but the positive effect is diminished when the expert message is juxtaposed with a personal narrative about real side effects.

From the Annenberg Public Policy Center ・



In the News


The New York Times

Unemployment is high. Why are businesses struggling to hire?

Ioana Marinescu of the School of Social Policy & Practice co-authored a study that found that every 10% increase in unemployment benefits received corresponds to a 3% decline in jobs applied to. “Right now what seems to be happening is that job creation is outpacing the search effort that workers are putting forth,” she said.

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The New York Times

Zoom burnout is real, and it’s worse for women

Emily Falk of the Annenberg School for Communication said the results of a recent Stanford study, which found women scored higher than men on all types of fatigue associated with video calls, were unsurprising but that Zoom itself may not be fully responsible for burnout. “It’s correlational data, and there could be other potential variables at play here,” she said. “When we’re feeling exhausted right now, how full is our emotional or mental tank to begin with?”

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The Guardian

Study reveals alarming trend in US death rates since 2000

Samuel Preston of the School of Arts & Sciences spoke about rising mortality rates in the U.S. over the last two decades. Preston and his colleagues attribute the shift in part to this country’s lack of a universal health care system.

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Time

‘Haunted countries deserve haunted stories.’ How America’s history of racial housing discrimination inspired Amazon’s new horror series THEM

Camille Z. Charles of the School of Arts & Sciences spoke about how discriminatory housing practices like redlining shaped U.S. neighborhoods in the 20th century. “If you take the redlining maps that were used before the passage of fair housing legislation and overlay them on present-day maps of pretty much any major city in the U.S., and certainly any city that has any meaningful Black population, they look really similar in the sense that Blacks are still largely shut out of those neighborhoods that they were legally shut out of during that time period,” she said.

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Business Insider

7 ways to prevent ‘Sunday Sads’ and end your weekend on a high

Cassie Mogilner of the Wharton School said doing chores on Saturday and scheduling recreation for Sunday can help combat dread about the weekend ending, creating “moments of unencumbered joy” on Sundays.

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