Gray is Beautiful, Part 1

On the Social Condition and Fractured Society in Donald Trump’s America

This is the first part of a three-part post, originally drafted as a lecture, drawn from my published and unpublished writings over the past decade, to be presented to Democracy Seminar participants in Gdansk, Warsaw, Budapest, and Berlin (to a group of Turkish exiles). Because of the coronavirus pandemic, the ...
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Gray is Beautiful, Part 1

The Gray Beauty of Christine Hallquist

Transgender, the non-binary and the Radical Center

Last Friday, I came across an intriguing profile of a particularly attractive woman, Christine Hallquist, the transgender Democratic Party candidate for Governor of the state of Vermont. She is running behind in the polls. Nonetheless, how she is running, as well as who she is, I find luminous. “My whole life has been ...
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The Gray Beauty of Christine Hallquist

Confronting the Human Condition and the Pressing Problems of the Day

An introduction to a course on social interaction (syllabus included)

I have been teaching courses on social interaction for my entire career, most often indirectly, most recently, directly. In the past, I taught a wide variety of topical courses: on bureaucracy, the arts, culture, politics, media, publics and much more, and while I reviewed with the students the relevant literatures, ...
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Confronting the Human Condition and the Pressing Problems of the Day

The View From My Sick Bed

Reflections on an Illness, a Family Photo, the Social Condition and Public Seminar

I have not been feeling well recently. I don’t believe it’s serious. But I am moved today, on yet another hot and humid New York Friday, to use my maladies to think out loud about their connection with some of my theoretical concerns, taking advantage of the perspective my mini-health ...
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The View From My Sick Bed

Making Room for Democracy

On the beauty of gray, the social condition, and individual and group responsibility

In my Friday posts, I have focused on the beauty of gray, presenting arguments for the good over the ideal and for openness to people and principles other than our own. I have argued, further, that these are preconditions for acting together against the dark forces of our times, and ...
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Making Room for Democracy

The Radical Center and The Politics of the Gray

Notes on the implications of the social condition for an understanding of politics

Over the past three months, I have been publishing weekly Gray Friday posts, reflecting on the events of the day and enduring human problems, and considering how contributions to Public Seminar inform my appreciation of the beauty of the gray. Today, I will begin to explain the political implications I ...
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The Radical Center and The Politics of the Gray

A Gray Post on a Sunny Friday Afternoon

Democracy and the Social Condition

It’s sunny this morning here in New York. Nonetheless, from this day forward, and retroactively, I am going to label my weekly posts “Gray Friday.” I am doing so because all of my posts have been informed by my appreciation of the beauty of the gray, and because I see ...
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A Gray Post on a Sunny Friday Afternoon

To Write Poetry after Auschwitz is (NOT!) Barbaric

A lecture prepared for presentation at the University of Virginia

I am very pleased to join you today and share my reflections on the importance of, not only poetry, but art more generally, as it helps us confront the social condition of collective memory in dark times. I am especially grateful for Irit Dekel’s invitation to give this presentation. First as ...
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Hannah Arendt on American “Social Slavery”

A few years after fleeing the fascist tidal wave in Europe and finding refuge in New York City, Hannah Arendt penned a letter to her mentor and confidant Karl Jaspers, commenting briefly on the peculiarities of American politics and society. She remarked, “The fundamental contradiction of the country is political ...

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Hannah Arendt on American “Social Slavery”