Overview of the experimental achievements in nucleon and meson polarizabilites

An overview is presented of recent measurements of (i) proton and neutron scalar polarizabilities $\alpha_{E1}$ and $\beta_{M1}$, (ii) proton spin-polarizabilites $\gamma_{E1E1}$, $\gamma_{M1M1}$, $\gamma_{E1M2}$, and $\gamma_{M1E2}$, and (iii) charged and neutral pion scalar polarizabilities. The experiments completed, in progress, or in preparation are at Compass (CERN), HIGS, GlueX (JLab), Lund, and Mainz A2. These experiments span a range in beam energy from 100 MeV to 190 GeV, and target mass number from A=1 to 208