Author: TheConversation

By Austin Kocher, Research Associate Professor, Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, Syracuse University The last residents of Mexico’s Matamoros refugee camp crossed the border into the United States on March 5 to request asylum. The migrants – many of them Central Americans fleeing endemic violence, poverty and corruption – will be allowed to stay in the U.S. as their cases move through the immigration court system. The exodus from the Matamoros camp, which once sheltered more than 2,500 asylum-seekers, marks the end of a Trump-era policy called the Migrant Protection Protocols. Commonly known as “Remain in Mexico,” the January 2019...

By Kate Cantrell, Lecturer in Writing, Editing, and Publishing, University of Southern Queensland; and Sharon Bickle, Lecturer in English Literature, QLD rep for Australian Women’s and Gender Studies Association, University of Southern Queensland “No one is ‘cancelling’ Dr. Seuss. The author, himself, is dead for one thing, which is about as cancelled as a person can get.” – Philip Bump Laying aside a multimillion-dollar publishing business, tattered copies of Dr. Seuss books clutter children’s bedrooms around the globe. Parents still grapple nightly with the tongue-twisters of Fox in Socks, Horton Hears a Who! or Hop on Pop, and try...

By David Cunningham, Professor and Chair of Sociology, Washington University in St Louis During his confirmation hearing in February, Attorney General nominee Merrick Garland pledged that his first order of business would be to “supervise the prosecution of white supremacists and others who stormed the Capitol on January 6.” On that day, thousands of Trump supporters – including members of white nationalist and militia groups – gathered to support and defend a series of fabricated and conspiracy-laden claims around the purportedly “rigged” 2020 election. As a social scientist who researches how white supremacist groups are policed, I understand both...

By Michael S. Jaffee, Vice Chair, Department of Neurology, University of Florida The clock springs forward one hour at 2:00 a.m. on March 14 for people in the United States. It is not an appealing thought for those who have suffered sleep problems because of the pandemic. Sleep this past year has been affected by a variety of factors, including anxiety, inconsistent schedules and increased screen time. This affects our health, as getting adequate sleep is important to assure our immune system can fend off and fight infections. Even before the pandemic, about 40% of adults – 50 to...