Photographer Matthieu Paley was in Southeast Asia working on stories about the evolution of the human diet when he made this picture. "I was visiting traditional, self-sufficient communities to see how food shapes daily life. My host was named Marita. She was inside preparing food as I arrived."

When she governed the Moroccan coastal city of Tétouan, the Spanish accused her of organizing piracy, while at home she won respect from both Moroccans and post-1492 Andalusian émigrés. On land and sea, hers was a life charted by crisis.

That is how “Iqaluit” translates into English from the Inuit language. It’s the name of Canada’s smallest territorial capital, just 8,000 people on the chilly shores of Frobisher Bay, a town governing a polar archipelago half the size of Western Europe that is Canada’s largest—and newest—province, Nunavut. Once a frontier for fishing and hunting, later for whaling and the fur trade, Iqaluit today is a fast-growing outpost on the world economic stage. 

Late in his life, one of the most celebrated minds of the European Enlightenment, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, donned Turkish attire. It was a personal expression of the mobility between Western Europe and the Muslim world—and the new ideas these crossings engendered, which he articulated in writings that changed history.

Ocean currents and maritime traders first brought coconuts to nearly every tropical coast. Now global food producers are bringing them to nearly every grocery shelf. Heritage cuisine, health fad or a little of both? Five recipes from five lands can help you decide.

In 2008 Kathy Garms, a teacher in Elkader, Iowa, led the launch of a student essay contest in honor of her town’s Algerian namesake, Amir Abd el-Kader. In September this year’s seven winners received scholarships.