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Culture | History | PopCult | Psychology

A Shattered Nation Longs To Care About Stupid Bullshit Again

Painfully funny-because-it’s-true satire from The Onion’s original coverage of the 9-11 terror attacks. According to Georgetown University history professor Timothy Schuitt, our interest in stupid bullshit is what makes America great.

“The United States is a free country, a strong country, a prosperous country,” Schuitt said. “Many veterans gave their lives so we would have [...]

Academia | Design | Modding | Psychology

Awesome Modular Tables

Maura 331, where I’ll spend 6 hours a week teaching has been refitted with these awesome modular tables. Our great CIT folks took out the huge, blocky, immobile PC stations. Since students have their own MacBooks and iPads, there is no reason to clutter up the space.

I love the freedom this setup provides. It’s [...]

Aesthetics | Business | Culture | Current_Events | Ethics | Media | Psychology | Social_Software

Photographer Says No To Senior Pictures For Bullying Students – High School Playbook – Main News Story – WTAE Pittsburgh

Freelance photographer Jen McKendrick won’t take pictures of “ugly people” — that is, the high school bullies who were doing what bullies do on Facebook. “If you are ugly on the inside,” says McKendrick, ”I’m sorry but I won’t take your photos to make you look pretty on the outside!”

A WTAE-TV article explains it [...]

Health | Nature | Psychology | Science

Can a Playground Be Too Safe?

After observing children on playgrounds in Norway, England and Australia, Dr. Sandseter identified six categories of risky play: exploring heights, experiencing high speed, handling dangerous tools, being near dangerous elements (like water or fire), rough-and-tumble play (like wrestling), and wandering alone away from adult supervision. The most common is climbing heights.

“Climbing equipment needs to [...]

Academia | Culture | Journalism | Psychology | Writing

Collaboration and Ownership in Student Writing – ProfHacker – The Chronicle of Higher Education

Another great suggestion from Nick Carbone, via Techrhet. lau and Caspi learned two things: first, that in general students felt that collaborating with partners improved the quality of drafts. On the other hand, the students mostly felt that their edits improved other people’s drafts, whereas other people’s edits worsened their own drafts. Blau and Caspi [...]

Cyberculture | Media | Psychology | Science

Virtual Possessions Have Powerful Hold On Teenagers

This is one of those “duh” studies, like “doctors who are totally stoned more mistakes in the operating room than doctors who are not,” but I do understand the value of conducing formal research to quantify cultural information.

“A house is just a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get more [...]

Essays | Games | History | Psychology

T.M. Camp | Adventure

A touching, nostalgic look at “Colossal Cave Adventure.”

Books are words on a page, sure. We follow along and visualize our own version of things, as much as the author’s descriptions will allow us the freedom to do so. But even the movies can change those, though. Whether we like it or not. And [...]

Aesthetics | Cyberculture | Design | Games | PopCult | Psychology

The Escapist : Green Barrels Don’t Explode

Crates and barrels are 3-D versions of the dots that PAC-Man eats. They’re features of the gaming genre, not only because they are easy to generate, but because we already know what they do.

As gamers, many of us roll our eyes at the clichés that have sprung up within the industry. Every red barrel [...]

Books | Culture | Health | History | Literature | Psychology | Writing

Complicating Assumptions about Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper"

My students are usually captivated by “The Yellow Wallpaper,” and every time I teach it I get a paper or two with a thesis that argues the narrator’s husband is sexist, that the rest cure is demeaning, and/or that the narrator speaks for the author. That’s a bit like “proving” that the river is [...]

Academia | Culture | Drama | Education | Philosophy | Psychology | Rhetoric

Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior

What Chinese parents understand is that nothing is fun until you’re good at it. To get good at anything you have to work, and children on their own never want to work, which is why it is crucial to override their preferences. This often requires fortitude on the part of the parents because the child [...]