The Princess and the Brain
...Beheld. But by coming to this story as late as I have, the required reading is now beyond daunting. There are now not only Mantel's own well-regarded books, the speech,...
Post-coloniality Sells
...hand, readers pick on them quite effortlessly. Maybe it’s better not to be aware, though! For me, the comparison with Achebe is interesting because you’re doing something different. For example,...
Editors' Note, Vol. 34: California
...such real-estate bait-and-switches. People elsewhere are heavily invested in how the state appears, its lucrative fantasy coming to dominate and determine conditions on the ground. But the best real estate...
Loving Franko B
...share and explain why this inspires you... IT IS MOST DEFINITELY NOT obvious to me in the least bit... I don’t think he got Franko B. I certainly don’t think...
Double header
...shooter film, do have a bit in common. As a further application of this principle, Snow White & The Huntsman here shares double billing with its unofficial prequel, WET PAINT,...
What Was the Child?
Childhood as we currently understand it emerged with 20th century capitalism, but as the distinction between labor and leisure is breaking down, so too is the concept of childhood
You're Not Pretty Enough
...the argument with her then-husband that the book's title comes from—uttered unbelievably (except totally believably) in the midst of discussions about his inattentiveness and infidelity—prettiness doesn't make much of a...
The Stages of Not Going on T
From Something That May Shock And Discredit You
Hunger Gamesmanship
...and comfortably could now be saved by the factory owner, or spent on himself. Of course, he still needed workers to manage the machines. But only unskilled workers, and not...
The American Studies Association Goes to Politics
...opinions about the American Studies Association, you should come to terms with the “New American Studies” which began (more or less) in the early nineties—as an insurgent effort to change...
Particular Universals
...to be a bit of a hindrance anyway, as it can muddy the waters in terms of what we’re advocating for. As Nina Power wrote recently: “What is the relationship...
The Job of Consent
The Joy of Consent: a Philosophy of Good Sex (October 2023) tests the limits of consent as a heuristic for "good sex," exposing the wide berth between pleasure and what is legible to the law.
Sunday Reading
...Pardon me for being a bit fixated at the moment. How Not to Study Gender in the Middle East The Sorrows of the Affluent; or, Notes Toward a Speculative Romney-Fiction...
Melancholic Damage
...of good-girl resilience: Clarkson comes off as a bit more bruised and experienced, probably because she is older and more seasoned (and, notably, reads somewhat less bourgeois than Swift). Her...
Sunday Reading
...in Montreal Does Justin Trudeau really care about reconciliation? Kerim Friedman: US Army committed $6.5 trillion in accounting fraud in one year State Misogyny: France’s Colonial Unveiling History Against Muslim...
New World Anxiety
...uses us without relief. Our subjugated presence has been a primary economic security for the empire. Anti-Black violence has been mined for every bit of its worth to build the...