Interesting Stuff to Read, Watch & Listen To

Experienced writers read widely in a variety of fields and deeply in fields of interest, seeking out information, viewpoints, and experiences with which to engage the world, solve problems, and get work done. Here’s a list of great sites on the web where you can find fascinating things to read, listen to, and watch.

Lecture Series at UNE

Smithsonian Open Access

  • Smithsonian Open Access – Where you can download, share, and reuse millions of the Smithsonian’s images—right now, without asking. With new platforms and tools, you have easier access to nearly 3 million 2D and 3D digital items from our collections—with many more to come. This includes images and data from across the Smithsonian’s 19 museums, nine research centers, libraries, archives, and the National Zoo.

Articles/Mixed Media

  • Medium.com – from the folks who brought you Twitter, Medium.com is a reading & writing platform featuring medium-length articles (7-15 minute reads) written by all kinds of writers – amateur, professional, experts, just-folks – about all kinds of topics. You can write for Medium, and ENG 122 students already have.
  • The Conversation – Engaging, smart, non-partisan journalism that covers conversations about arts & culture, economy & business, education, environment & energy, ethics & religion, health & medicine, politics & society, science & technology
  • Longreads – Aggregator of the best long-form writing featuring “in-depth investigative pieces, profiles, interviews, commentary, book reviews, audio stories, and personal essays.”
  • Longform – Like Longreads, an aggregator, but with different stuff
  • The Atlantic – news, politics, culture, society
  • The New Yorker
  • New York Magazine
  • The New York Times Magazine
  • The LA Review of Books
  • The Outline – interesting stories that too often are unseen, underreported, or dismissed
  • The Verge – covers the intersection of technology, science, art, and culture.
  • FiveThirtyEight – engaging statistics-based analysis of sports, pop culture, politics, and society
  • Vibe – feature writing on hip hop, black music and culture, and society
  • Spin – Vibe’s sister magazine covering music, pop culture, and society
  • Pop Matters – music, film, tv, comics, books, games, culture
  • Vulture – devouring culture
  • Wired – Technology, culture, ideas, business, science, security
  • Science News
  • American Scientist
  • Slate – News, politics, technology, culture, business
  • The Ringer – Sports, pop culture and politics
  • The Undefeated – Sports, culture and politics from an African American perspective
  • The Athletic – Sports and culture (subscription required)
  • Deadspin – Sports news and opinion
  • The Players’ Tribune – Articles by professional athletes on topics that matter to them
  • Open Culture
  • Vox – Vox explains the news.We live in a world of too much information and too little context. Too much noise and too little insight. And so Vox’s journalists candidly shepherd audiences through politics and policy, business and pop culture, food, science, and everything else that matters. You can find our work wherever you live on the internet
  • Narratively – Human stories; Boldly Told.
  • City Lab – Through sharp analysis, original reporting, and visual storytelling, our coverage focuses on the biggest ideas and most pressing issues facing the world’s metro areas and neighborhoods.
  • Aeon – Since 2012, Aeon has established itself as a unique digital magazine, publishing some of the most profound and provocative thinking on the web. We ask the big questions and find the freshest, most original answers, provided by leading thinkers on science, philosophy, society and the arts.
  • The Electric Typewriter – great articles by great journalists and writers
  • The Daily Beast

Podcasts

Videos

From an African American Perspective