This year's Best American Magazine Writing features articles on politics, culture, sports, sex, race, celebrity, and more. Selections include Ta-Nehisi Coates's intensely debated "The Case For Reparations"
(The Atlantic
) and Monica Lewinsky's reflections on the public-humiliation complex and how the rules of the game have (and have not) changed (
Vanity Fair
). Amanda Hess recounts her chilling encounter with Internet sexual harassment (
Pacific Standard
) and John Jeremiah Sullivan shares his investigation into one of American music's greatest mysteries (
New York Times Magazine
).
The anthology also presents Rebecca Traister's acerbic musings on gender politics (
The New Republic
) and Jerry Saltz's fearless art criticism (
New York
). James Verini reconstructs an eccentric love affair against the slow deterioration of Afghanistan in the twentieth century (
The Atavist
); Roger Angell offers affecting yet humorous reflections on life at ninety-three (
The New Yorker
); Tiffany Stanley recounts her poignant experience caring for a loved one with Alzheimer's (
National Journal
); and Jonathan Van Meter takes an entertaining look at fashion's obsession with being a social-media somebody (
Vogue
). Brian Phillips describes his surreal adventures in the world of Japanese ritual and culture (
Grantland
), and Emily Yoffe reveals the unforeseen casualties in the effort to address the college rape crisis (
Slate
). The collection concludes with a work of fiction by Donald Antrim, exploring the geography of loss. (