NPR Staff

Some Latin American countries are calling on women to postpone getting pregnant. Women's rights activist Monica Roa thinks that's "naive and ineffective."

Sahr and Nyumah were barely teenagers when rebel soldiers from the Revolutionary United Front stormed their villages in Sierra Leone. The two friends fled with their families and neighbors — Sahr to the bush and Nyumah to the road leading to Guinea. But both were captured.

Rebel soldiers forced Nyumah ...

The Social Life of DNA is a new book that explores what cutting-edge DNA testing technology means for African-Americans who lost their history in the slave trade.

At Amalgam Comics & Coffeehouse in Philadelphia, owner Ariell Johnson says diversity isn't just an afterthought. She tells NPR's Michel Martin that new faces keep the heroics interesting.

Negotiations to restructure the U.S. territory's significant debt hit a speed bump Friday. As Congress considers its next step, economist Rosario Rivera explains the origins of the financial crisis.

The Old Vic Theatre in Bristol, England, is celebrating its 250th anniversary. And the festivities involve bringing back some old theatrical tricks — including one number called the "Thunder Run."

It's 1977 and an 11-year-old dancer named Mira is struggling to find her place in the competitive world of New York City ballet. Dance is her escape from her parents' failing marriage — but instead of a sanctuary, Mira finds the opposite: a dark threat intermingled with her dreams of ...

One of the world's most inventive guitarists and composers has recorded a tribute to some of his favorite music from TV and film. Bill Frisell's When You Wish Upon a Star covers the screen from Bonanza to The Godfather to the poignant themes of To Kill a Mockingbird. ...

In front of one of the colleges at Oxford University, a statue of Cecil Rhodes stands overlooking the campus. Rhodes, a South African businessman, started the De Beers diamond company and went on to become the namesake of the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship.

He was also a colonialist who believed in ...

Musician Brooke Waggoner was on a 6 a.m. coffee run when she got a worrisome text from a friend, whose husband was apparently dealing with a life-threatening heart problem. The news gave her a shiver — and an idea.

"I don't know if it was the early morning, the kind ...

Often when big storms strike, so does an uptick in births — to the tune of a 2 percent increase nine months later. But be careful: With the most severe storms, births in the area actually decrease.

Lee Siegel, author of Groucho Marx: The Comedy of Existence, wanted his biography to uncover the real man behind the iconic mustache. What Siegel found, he says, was "a thoroughgoing misanthrope."

Julia has a gift — or is it? Ingrid Betancourt's new novel, The Blue Line, is about a woman in 1970s Argentina who can see the world through the eyes of others. Usually what she sees are terrible events, and that makes her different from the millions of Argentines who ...

Have you spent most of this election cycle trying to ignore it? We don't blame you. With the Iowa caucuses just a week away, it might be time to get plugged in.

NPR's campaign reporters have spent months on the trail listening to and analyzing the candidates' movements, speeches and ...

Just say the name — his one name — and you know we're talking about one of the most popular recording artists ever. Yanni's resume includes more than 40 platinum and gold albums since the 1980s and epic concerts from some of the world's most historic sites, including The Forbidden ...

On Sunday, the FBI's Fox Mulder and Dana Scully will once again start taking on unsolved cases of the paranormal kind. That's right: The X-Files is back.

Actors Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny are reprising their roles of Scully and Mulder in six new episodes. The show is being revived ...

With about a week left until the Iowa caucuses, the NPR Politics Podcast team discusses the emerging rifts between GOP candidates and the return of a certain Alaskan politician — and her endorsement of Donald Trump.

Special guest Ari Shapiro, host of All Things Considered, joins the podcast this ...

When Marine Cpl. Zach Skiles returned from Iraq, he couldn't sleep, hold down a job or pay rent. Last year, he and his father sat down to talk for the first time about his life after the war.

In the past year, Zika virus has emerged as a serious health risk, linked to severe birth defects in Brazil. NPR's South America Correspondent Lourdes Garcia-Navarro and Global Health Correspondent Jason Beaubien will answer your questions on this mosquito-borne disease in a live YouTube web stream on Tuesday, ...

The new BBC America show, written by author Tom Rob Smith, opens with a gay couple falling in love. Then one of them mysteriously disappears.