Humanities & Society

The Neidorff Family and Centene ­Corporation Dean of the Brown School, Mary McKay, discusses her career-long commitment to social justice, and the impact that bringing public health, social work and public policy together in the Brown School can have on its students.

The U.S. Supreme Court on June 14 struck down a ban on clothing with political messages being worn inside polling places. Greg Magarian, professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis and an expert on free speech and the law of politics, says the court’s decision in the case was very narrow.

The U.S. Supreme Court on June 11 upheld Ohio’s efforts to purge its voter rolls. The move spreads voting discrimination across America, argues a constitutional law expert at Washington University in St. Louis.

Foodborne illness is a serious and preventable public health problem, affecting one in six Americans and costing an estimated $50 billion annually. As local health departments adopt new tools that monitor Twitter for tweets about food poisoning, a study from Washington University in St. Louis is the first to examine practitioner perceptions of this technology.

While this week’s U.S. Supreme Court decision siding 7-2 with bakery owner Jack Phillips in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission was “far from explosive,” it still sends important signals on how such cases will be handled in the future, said a legal scholar at Washington University in St. Louis.

Our daily lives revolve around the internet, whether it’s personal contact, news or the sharing of political views. As such, there remains significant work to do so the internet can deal with the real challenges it faces, rather than ones it fails to consider, an internet privacy expert at Washington University in St. Louis said.

On May 29, ABC cancelled its “Roseanne” revival after an ugly tweet from the show’s eponymous star. Film scholar Gaylyn Studlar examines the dangers of Twitter, the speed of cancellation and the influence of diversity in the boardroom.

Child care, parenting and child health/health care are important factors in improving the lives of children in low-income families, according to a new study from the Brown School, which surveyed 211 helpline staff.

Philip Roth, who died May 22, was among the most influential American writers of the 20th and 21st centuries. He was also a playful yet unsparing and often provocative critic of American culture, said Matthew Shipe, lecturer in English in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis.

President Donald Trump, in a long-awaited speech May 11, took aim at reducing drug prices in America. But there was little in the speech or the administration’s plan that takes direct aim at industry, says an expert on drug policy at Washington University in St. Louis.