Arts & Culture
Here we cover the latest and most uplifting exhibitions, creative movements, and imaginative design to keep you inspired throughout your day.
AI and robots team up to piece together ancient Pompeii frescoes
The Roman city of Pompeii was buried in ash by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in A.D. 79, and has fascinated archeologists since its discovery in the 1700s. Unfortunately, piecing this ancient city back together is no easy feat. To more efficiently reconstruct the ancient city, researchers from the Read More...
The Optimist Daily Update Transcript: Mariella Satow & Sign Up
This is an ASL interpretation and transcript of the December 10, 2021 episode of The Optimist Daily Update titled "Mariella Satow: Sign Up." Transcription: Summers: Hello, universe. Welcome to the Optimist Daily Update. I'm Summers McKay. Kristy: And I'm Kristy Jansen, and we are part of the Read More...
Kids on the Nice List
“If we wish to create a lasting peace we must begin with the children.” - Mahatma Gandhi Christmas is just around the corner, and we heard that even Santa Claus is bidding adieu to coal this year. That’s right, Santa is going green, but we have it on good authority that he’s ditching Read More...
How much would you pay for an Einstein original?
Albert Einstein was undoubtedly one of the greatest scientists that has ever lived. The German-born theoretical physicist is famous for his work developing theories about gravity, quantum mechanics, and importantly, his unruly hairstyle. In November 2021, a 54-page manuscript written by Einstein Read More...
Senegal's only circus troupe helps homeless children get off the streets
Senegal has exactly one circus troupe: Sencirk—and it was founded by a former child beggar named Modou Touré. Before taking his place as ringmaster of his own circus, Touré, at the age of seven, was sent to a Quranic school. As punishment for learning the Islamic holy book too slowly, he was Read More...
Bread and Roses uses floristry to empower refugee women in London
Rebuilding a life in a foreign country as a refugee is not an easy task. This is especially true for women, who often face more barriers than men as they are less likely to have had formal work experience and are not able to consistently attend language classes because of child-rearing obligations Read More...
Italian garden installation shows us how much CO2 trees store
Trees are the lungs of our planet—we know that trees are needed because they sequester dangerous CO2 emissions, but do we really know how much we depend on them to clean the air we breathe? We don’t see trees and plants absorbing emissions as we trek through the forest or sit in our gardens, so Read More...
Community school model gaining traction in Los Angeles Unified School District
Following a teachers’ strike in 2019, the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUDS) has approved funding to turn 30 schools into community schools to better meet the needs of teachers, students, and their families. According to LAUSD, “This approach evolves the school site into a hub for Read More...
Le Robert is the first major French dictionary to add non-binary pronouns
The well-known French dictionary Le Robert has made a move toward inclusion by adding an entry for the non-binary third-person pronouns iel (singular) and iels (plural) last month. The definition reads “Third person subject personal pronoun—singular and plural—used to refer to a person of Read More...
The innovative ways the UK is repurposing red phone boxes
The classic red phone boxes that dot the United Kingdom have been a symbol of British culture for generations, however, with the introduction of smartphones, their usage has dropped by almost 96 percent. That said, many people are still fond of the red phone boxes and don’t want to see them Read More...