Issue No. 12 | Father Figures
Boys to Men
Freud be damned: there is perhaps no family role more fraught than that of a father. Men are expected to play the role of protector, provider, politician, peacemaker, or even punisher. But what about those men who never had the luxury of being properly fathered—or those for whom their own experience of fatherhood has been destructive? This month we focus on dads, literal and figurative, and the legacies they leave behind. Anchored by the powerful feature documentary The Work, our June issue includes a story about a daughter’s inheritance from her fisherman father, musings from a stay-at-home dad, and a long-form feature about Warrior Week, a grueling self-help retreat for men.
Monologue
Ta-Nehisi Coates: Dreams of a Father
The best-selling author reflects on his youth and how parenthood made him the man—and the writer—that he is today.
America’s Floundering Fathers
They wanted to start a revolution, not win Parent of the Year.
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Outside Voices: Life After The Work
For these ex-convicts, participating in the Inside Circle program made life beyond prison look like something worth living for.
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Like Father, Like Sons: The Family Behind The Work
How creating a documentary about their father’s prison program became a journey for the McLeary brothers.
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Mao’s face is still everywhere in modern China. But now Xi Jinping is ready for his close-up.
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My Old Man and the Sea
A third-generation trap fisher on how her dad got her hooked on the family business.
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The Warrior Pose
Side by side with the recruits of Warrior Week, who are prepared to do whatever it takes to become better men.
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Mixtape
Father Figures Mixtape
6 Parts | 1 hr 20 min Six stories of dads—the ones who stay, the ones who leave, and the ones who are out for blood.
The Ballad of Rich & EJ
A photographer documents a father and son for nearly 12 years following the loss of the boy’s mother.
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Fathers Out of Order
4 Parts | 19 min Confessions from the priests who usually receive them.
My Kid Plays Soccer
Meet the Beverly Hills parents who scream from the sidelines—and the ref who’d like to kick them out.
A stay-at-home dad finds brief solace in the quietude of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood.
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Kings
A man who grew up without a father finds fulfillment in mentoring another.
Making a ‘Monologue’: A Conversation with Lyndon J. Barrois
A conversation with the animator who reimagined Ta-Nehisi Coates’s interview with Topic.
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Off Topic
Who’s Your Daddy?
How televised paternity tests became a racialized American spectacle.
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Off Topic
The Snip Trip
Rob and Marcos are friends who share everything, including getting a vasectomy.
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Off Topic
Father’s Days
After her child is born, a mother learns that equal parenting means giving dad a chance.
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Off Topic
Dad Material
After choosing a sperm donor instead of a partner, a mother discovers a new kind of genetic family.
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Off Topic
Japan’s Vegetable-Eating Men
A nation of suit-wearing salarymen educates its first generation of stay-at-home dads.
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About the Cover: Father Figures
Marc Aspinall discusses his midcentury-style cover art for Topic’s June issue.
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