Uncategorized Archives - Page 3 of 47

Democracy

The United States Is in Recovery

What Texas, white supremacy and coronavirus can teach us about American history

February 18, 2021 • by Heather Cox Richardson

"In the exchange, Americans saw a president who cared, and a government that finally, after its previous leaders had told them to get out of a terrible catastrophe on their own, responded to their needs."...

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Bernie’s Mittens

This, we imagine, is how Bernie really is (or at least looks) no matter where he is, and this image of reality strikes us and amuses us like a common dandelion growing amidst a swathe of bougainvillea

February 2, 2021 • by Gwenda-lin Grewal

The image of Bernie Sanders at the 2021 presidential inauguration already seems to have launched more ships than Helen of Troy. Senator Sanders, or more casually chic, “Bernie,” appeared wearing repurposed Fair Isle mittens made by a Vermont school teacher, Jen Ellis, and a very practical coat from the Vermont-based ...

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Dear Kobe Bryant: a Threnody

Wake up. Grind. Repeat. Become Better.

January 26, 2021 • by Anna Reagan

I. All the instruments we have agree, the day of your death was a foggy grey day. The day before you died, I was rescuing my sister-in-law from her drug dealer’s house. It was very early in the morning because addiction is never convenient. On the 5 Freeway as I drove past ...

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Vesna Kesic

In memoriam

December 31, 2020 • by Elzbieta Matynia

Photo: taken by Stephanie Damoff (provided by Elzbieta Matynia). Elzbieta Matynia is a Professor of Sociology at The New School for Social Research and Director of the Transregional Center for Democratic Studies.

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The Adultification of Santa Claus

He’s not just for children anymore — and never has been

December 17, 2020 • by Yvonne M. Vissing

During the pandemic lock-down I needed something to lift my spirits and went to my go-to place of childhood happiness — Santa Claus. As a mom and child rights policy chair with an international group of human rights scholars, I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out what ...

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Mourning Maradona

Football, populism and Argentina’s civic religion

December 3, 2020 • by Mitchell Abidor

Diego Armando Maradona, the controversial and brilliant Argentine football star, died on Wednesday, November 25, 2020 in a Buenos Aires hospital. One of the defining figures in international soccer during the 1980s, Maradona is the stuff of legend. In his performance against England in the 1986 World Cup, he invoked ...

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Dancing is my Amazing Grace

How art taken up as a child has shaped the rhythm of my life

November 25, 2020 • by Katherine Huggins

Dance is my catharsis: when I dance, the rest of the world fades away. I could not be more grateful for my dance education—it has propelled me to unimaginable heights and unexpected friendships. I’ve traveled the country to better my dancing, and in the process I’ve befriended people from all over ...

Fashion

Will Covid-19 Be My Fashion Therapist?

Reexamining the vastness of fashion in the confined pandemic habitiation

October 21, 2020 • by Sanem Odabaşi

We are the beginners of a new life All we know is reforming --Cemal Sureya As soon as the Covid-19 pandemic started, survivability became one of our biggest concerns. We had to welcome all ideas on how to strengthen our immunity, concerning what we had and what "things" might do to us. Covid-19, ...

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Against Biopolitics

Compensation and Confinement: Entombing the Academic Left

September 25, 2020 • by Angel Octavio Alvarez Solis and Gonzalo Bustamante Moya

Biopolitics rules, but does not govern. Even if some thinkers have insisted on describing its explicative limits or have tried to grasp the implications of accepting its truth, biopolitics is still the main tone that characterizes contemporary public opinion. What is so fascinating or productive about explaining pandemics in biopolitical ...

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Is America Going Down Like Custer?

When defiance is the coin of the realm

September 24, 2020 • by Deanne Stillman

These flags are not just warnings posted in their front yards or near fences at the edge of their property. They are a statement of identity, a definition of self, one that manifests whenever it feels threatened or is called forth. And now, that thing we all learned in third grade ...

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The Gymnast, the Pianist, and the Choreographer

June 9, 2020 • by Dvora Meyers

But it wasn’t always like this, at least not on the floor exercise. Up until the late 1980s, when a gymnast stepped out onto the mat, she wasn’t alone: there was another person performing with her, perhaps out of the spotlight, but part of the performance nonetheless. I’m talking about the ...

The Gymnast, the Pianist, and the Choreographer

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Be Strong

An Open Letter to My Students, Children, and Grandchildren

May 14, 2020 • by Eli Zaretsky

Be strong: The virus has laid bare the complete lack of leadership in both political parties and to a great extent in the media as well. Bernie Sanders is the only figure in recent times that one can call a visionary leader, proposing a future that you all will need ...