The button—with its self-contained roundness and infinite variability—has a quiet perfection to it. Running a cascade of buttons through your fingers feels satisfyingly heavy, like coins or candy; ...

Is genetically engineered food dangerous? Many people seem to think it is. In the past five years, companies have submitted more than 27,000 products to the Non-GMO Project, which certifies goods that ...

When Josephine Anderson, a formerly enslaved Floridian, was visited by a white government interviewer in the fall of 1937, she told him a ghost story. Anderson described to Jules Frost a “white man” ...

The Internet, we’ve been told, is the greatest library in the history of man—immediate, boundless, constantly expanding. In practice, though, many of us experience the Internet more like history’s ...

Click the image below to enlarge. For the interactive map, see the desktop site. Click an illustration to learn more. X Share | Tweet Interactive by Chris Kirk Alabama Meatloaf Yes, Alabama, I know ...

Though it may look cool, the Herman Miller Rollback chair of 1977 is not the perfect office chair. Office chairs are like shoes, but not as much fun. We spend much of our time in them. They emphasize ...

Jesse Jackson at an event honoring Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech in Washington, D.C., in 1983. Leonard Freed/Magnum Photos Jesse Jackson first ran for president during the national ...

In 1996, the New Yorker published “Hating Hillary,” Henry Louis Gates’ reported piece on the widespread animosity for the then–first lady. “Like horse-racing, Hillary-hating has become one of those ...

Wikimedia Commons/White House Historical Association It’s a familiar chapter in our history, part of the triumphant narrative of westward expansion: In 1803, the United States bought a massive chunk ...

The classic American emergency exit sign—the bold red letters spelling out E-X-I-T—seems at first glance like an unimpeachable bit of sign design. The contrast between the letters and the background ...

Welcome to Slate’s celebration of all the things that went right this year! Good news is hard to find. One of journalism’s most important jobs is to call out what’s wrong with the world so we know ...

When John Travolta called Idina Menzel "Adele Dazeem" at the Oscars, he created a new standard for superstardom: You're no one until you've had your name mangled by a confused, squinting John Travolta ...