Explainers
Explainer
Investing
From Gosling to GameStop, ‘shorting’ is having a moment. But what exactly is it?
Shorting someone of change is pretty clearly a bad thing – but what about “shorting” a company?
- by Millie Muroi
Latest
Explainer
LGBTQ
What are the stages of puberty and are they a good measure of sporting power?
New rules affecting transgender women athletes in elite swimming have sparked controversy. What do they have to do with the stages of puberty? And what does the science say?
- by Wendy Tuohy
Explainer
Food culture
Why do people queue for brunch?
On weekends across Australia, you’ll see them: the long queues outside feted eateries. Some cafes try to make long queues happen on purpose. What are they thinking?
- by Osman Faruqi and Carla Jaeger
Explainer
Energy
Our fast guide to the energy crisis and what you can do about it
How did we get here? Will price caps help households? And where will it end?
- by Nick O'Malley and Angus Thomson
Explainer
US politics
What are the Capitol riot hearings all about?
The hearings aim to show that Donald Trump was central to a conspiracy to overturn the 2020 US election results. But how do they work?
- by Farrah Tomazin
Top picks from the explainer desk
From world politics to sport and time travel, national explainer editor Felicity Lewis offers these recommendations for winter reading.
- by Felicity Lewis
Explainer
Gas
Where did all the power go? What caused the east coast energy crisis?
A combination of forces has sent energy prices soaring. And now there’s talk of blackouts too. How did it come to this?
- by Josh Gordon
Explainer
Inflation
What’s stagflation, and what would it mean for you?
Big in the ’70s and ’80s, talk of stagflation has reared its head again. What is it, and are we heading for a new era of it?
- by Clancy Yeates
Explainer
Monkeypox
What is monkeypox and should we be worried?
Monkeypox has been recorded in Australia for the first time. What is it?
- by Sherryn Groch
Explainer
Coronavirus pandemic
We’re now in the ‘age of pandemics’. Can we stop the next one?
What needs to happen to avert another virus-borne global tragedy? We ask the scientist who helped discover Ebola, a Nobel laureate, and the man who first published COVID-19’s genetic code.
- by Sherryn Groch
Explainer
Sri Lanka
Food shortages, violence, economic ruin: How did things get so bad in Sri Lanka?
How bad is the crisis in Sri Lanka? And what lies ahead for the island nation?
- by Chris Barrett