Making Pozole and Memorializing Mexico’s Disappeared

Food Reunites Families With Lost Loved Ones

“Food can be a strong place to talk about things we don’t want to talk about,” Zahara Gómez Lucini said at last night’s special Zócalo program, “Do We Need More Food Fights?” The event, presented in partnership with LA Cocina de Gloria Molina and California Humanities, was part of Zócalo’s 20th birthday series “What Connects Us?”

Gómez Lucini is the photographer and creator of Recetario para la memoria (The Memory Recipe Book), a cookbook that collects recipes from the families of desaparecidos—the tens of thousands of people who have disappeared in …

by Talib Jabbar | September 15, 2023

Finding L.A. in Food Splatters and Spiral Bindings

Three Centuries of Cookbooks from Clubs, Churches, and Other Groups Chronicle How the City Has Lived, Worked, and Eaten

by Suzanne Joskow | September 13, 2023

This piece publishes alongside the Zócalo/LA Cocina de Gloria Molina/California Humanities program “Do We Need More Food Fights?” tomorrow, Thursday, September 14, at 7PM …

The 2024 Zócalo Book Prize Honors Nonfiction on Connectedness and Social Cohesion

Recognizing Authors Whose Work Enhances Our Understanding of Community

September 8, 2023

Zócalo Public Square’s annual book prize honors the U.S.-published nonfiction book that best enhances our understanding of community and the forces that strengthen or undermine human connectedness and social cohesion. …

Where I Go: Becoming a Pokémon Champion

For the Last 15 Years, These Cute Digital Creatures Have Helped Remind Me That I Can Overcome Any Challenge That May Come My Way

by Rithwik Kalale | August 10, 2023

Most kids are obsessed with things—fantasies, foods, films—that they eventually outgrow.

It’s only natural. Our taste ages as we do.

But for me, it’s been 15 years since my parents got me …

There Is No ‘I’ in the Climate Crisis

Connection and Interdependence Can’t Capture Carbon But Can Get to the Root of the Problem

by Sarah Jaquette Ray | June 1, 2023

The environmentalist Paul Hawken says, “The most complex, radical climate technology is the human heart and mind, not a solar panel.” What would it mean to imagine the heart and …

The Fight to Save Stockton

In the Once-Bankrupt City, a Stanford Scholar Finds That People Are Poor Because Their Governments Are Poor

by Joe Mathews | May 30, 2023

If California wants to curb poverty, its local governments must become richer.

That may be the most important lesson of the recent history of Stockton, as recounted by Stanford Law School …

Finding L.A. in Food Splatters and Spiral Bindings

Three Centuries of Cookbooks from Clubs, Churches, and Other Groups Chronicle How the City Has Lived, Worked, and Eaten

How Concentration Camp Prisoners Found Comfort in Imaginary Feasts

From Ravensbrück to Mao’s Labor Camps, Inmates Recited Family Recipes to Preserve Their Humanity

How Recipe Cards and Cookbooks Fed a Mobile, Modernizing America

Scientific Methods and Rising Literacy Were Key Ingredients for a Culinary Revolution

Our Favorite Public Programs of 2023

It Was a Year of Hard-Hitting Conversations, a Traveling Public Square, and Even a Dance Party

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