Top 10 Works of Art Everyone Should See
Virtual Tourist

While not everyone agreed on the choices, most participants concurred that seeing a famous work of art in real life is a completely different experience from seeing a reproduction

Will Oscar Lose Its 'Crazy Heart' for Jeff Bridges
82nd Academy Awards Oscar Nominations

Jeff Bridges is vying against George Clooney (Up in the Air), Colin Firth (A Single Man), Morgan Freeman (Invictus) and Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker). To the millions who tune in to the Oscars on March 7, these terrific performances. Every one deserves an award. But this is Jeff Bridge's year. The same goes for Sandra Bullock. Here's why

Pink Flies High at the Grammys
Liz Smith

In some ways, I thought the Grammys belonged to Pink. Ten years after her initial surge to fame with 'Get This Party Started,' the soulful-voiced blonde, had one of those classic gasp-inducing performances -- I've rarely seen or heard anything as astonishing as Pink's rendition of 'Glitter.'

Hollywood Has Seen the Enemy ...
Jonah Goldberg

I do love movies and I'm fascinated by what they say about American life. Of course, movies don't always reflect or articulate what moviegoers are thinking. Often they merely express what Hollywood thinks Americans are thinking or what Hollywood thinks they should believe.

J.D. Salinger: Artist Who Never Wanted to Be an 'Idol'
Mitch Albom

When someone told me J.D. Salinger had died, I jokingly asked, 'How do they know?' It was dark humor and a tad disrespectful. But I was trying to be complimentary. Salinger, who was even more passionate about his privacy than his writing, had managed, at age 91, to die a legend in both areas.

America Through the Reality Lens
Jonah Goldberg

Culturally, this has been the decade of the reality show. And what do we have to show for it? Not much more than the contestants themselves.

National Building Museum

The World's Top Architecture Museums
Jonathan Lerner

Spending so much of our lives inside them, and surrounded by them, we often take buildings for granted. But architecture can help us understand history and grapple with the future. The following fascinating museums are dedicated to buildings, cities and landscapes

Taking the Kids To San Francisco's California Academy of Sciences
Eileen Ogintz

We're at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, which in the year since it has re-opened has emerged as the city's top cultural tourist attraction, drawing more visitors than Alcatraz

Political History of the Stars & Stripes
by Andrew Burt

The history of the American flag is the story of a nation struggling to find its identity, Woden Teachout argues in her new book, Capture the Flag: A Political History of American Patriotism. Teachout, a professor of graduate studies in history and culture at the online Union Institute and University, recently spoke about the evolving meaning of the flag in American culture.