Global Culture
By Joel L. Swerdlow
• Millennium Map Supplement: Culture

As old patterns make way for new, our thinking and our ways of life become more urban, more cosmopolitan, less diverse. An introduction to this special issue.

A World Together
By Erla Zwingle
Photographs by Joe McNally

With Internet use soaring and airfares falling, global exchange of information, products, and ideas has exploded. Will our cultural differences survive?

• Join the author in exploring Globalization.

Tale of Three Cities
By Joel L. Swerdlow
Photographs by Stuart Franklin

Alexandria, Egypt, at the start of the first millennium; Córdoba, Spain, at the beginning of the second; and New York, New York, at the dawn of the third: What do they tell us about cities past, present, and future?

• Explore our interactive timescape of life in these powerhouse cities.

Vanishing Cultures
By Wade Davis
Photographs by Maria Stenzel

Indigenous peoples have become the human equivalent of endangered species. Now many battle to save the things that define them: their lifeway, their language, and their land.

• Visit our gallery of cultures at risk.

Italy’s Endangered Art
By Erla Zwingle
Photographs by O. Louis Mazzatenta

In a place where Roman coins lie underfoot and Renaissance frescoes adorn countless ceilings, preserving art treasures from natural disasters and the ravages of time requires the effort of an entire nation.

The Power of Writing
By Joel L. Swerdlow
Photographs by Cary Wolinsky

An invention whose impact seems impossible to measure first appeared in Mesopotamia 5,000 years ago. Using systems of writing from Maya glyphs to Chinese calligraphy, humans have chronicled history, lobbied for freedom, and expressed the emotions of the ages.

• Read the complete NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC story.
• Share your thoughts in our forum.
• Solve the rebus.

Kashmir: Trapped in Conflict; Breitling Orbiter 3—Around At Last!; Masai Passage to Manhood; Olive Oil, Elixir of the Gods; Preserving the Sahara’s Art; Hunting with Eagles; Rodeos—Behind the Chutes; Galileo Mission.