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The U.S. State Department has confirmed that an American was involved in carrying out a suicide attack. The man, who was fighting in Syria against President Bashar Assad's regime, had ties to Florida.

A man, a woman, a house and a pitchfork. Those four elements make Grant Wood's depression-era painting, American Gothic, instantly recognizable and easily mimicked. As part of the Present at the Creation series, NPR's Melissa Gray reports on the painting that launched a thousand parodies. Image at left courtesy Art Institute of Chicago.

Thomas Keneally talks about his new book examining the life of the rakish congressman who beat a murder rap after killing his wife's lover -- then went on to gain fame (and lose a leg) as a Civil War General. And let's not forget the affair with Queen Isabella of Spain. (American Scoundrel: The Life of the Notorious Civil War General Dan Sickles {Doubleday; ISBN: 0385501390}).

Each year, about as many elderly Americans are admitted to hospitals for alcohol-related problems as for heart attacks. The good news is treatment programs are getting results when they are set up specifically to help older adults. Find out more about these programs online.

A video posted on a militant Islamic Web site shows the beheading of a man identified as civilian contractor Eugene Armstrong. Armstrong was kidnapped along with one British and one American colleague from their house in Baghdad Thursday. Hear NPR's Peter Kenyon and NPR's Robert Siegel.

WNYC's Jim O'Grady shares his story from The United States of Anxiety, where he goes to Suffolk County with Chris Arnade, who has chronicled Donald Trump Country for years, even before it had a name

Native Americans make up an outsized percentage of the homeless in places like New Mexico.

One American soldier has died and four have been injured in an attack by insurgents in Somalia, marking the first known U.S. combat death in Africa since an ambush in Niger last year.

Most Cajuns, whose ancestors settled in southern Louisiana in the 17th century, spoke French up until World War II. But as Cajun culture is celebrated in music, film and food, only a fraction of the local population calls French its first language. NPR's Renee Montagne speaks with historian Shane Bernard about the Americanization of the Cajuns.

A sign in Springfield, Mass. warns young Latinos: "No Hangear" -- don't hang out on this corner. Spanglish -- a cross between Spanish and English -- it seems, is everywhere. NPR's Bob Edwards talks with Ilan Stavans, author of a new book, Spanglish: The Making of a New American Language. Hear a Spanglish translation of Don Quixote.