John Brosio - Dinosaurs Eating A CEO (2013)

Kedarnath Temple caught against the backdrop of the Himalayas lit by the last rays of the sun.

luca guadagnino's old apartment in northern italy

A damaged lying Buddhist statue is pictured inside a pagoda following an earthquake in Mandalay, Myanmar, April 3, 2025.

Jewish women's bath in the Sar Chal neighborhood of Tehran, Iran, 1970s.

As a word and concept, "terrorism" has acquired an extraordinary status in American public discourse. It has displaced Communism as public enemy number one, although there are frequent efforts to tie the two together. It has spawned uses of language, rhetoric and argument that are frightening in their capacity for mobilizing opinion, gaining legitimacy and provoking various sorts of murderous action. And it has imported and canonized an ideology with origins in a distant conflict, which serves the purpose here of institutionalizing the denial and avoidance of history. In short, the elevation of terrorism to the status of a national security threat (though more Americans drown in their bathtubs, are struck by lightning or die in traffic accidents) has deflected careful scrutiny of the government's domestic and foreign policies. Whether the deflection will be longstanding or temporary remains to be seen, but given the almost unconditional assent of the media, intellectuals and policy-makers to the terrorist vogue, the prospects for a return to a semblance of sanity are not encouraging. - Edward Said

boxwood comb carved from a single piece of wood, france c. 1400s.

“Veil of Smoke” by Unknown Photographer ◇ Cigarette smoke caught between transparency and touch