The Ongoing Obsession with Shakespeare’s True Identity

I’ve never been all too keen on Shakespeare authorship conspiracy theories, and I find students often get distracted by their belief that the default way to get the “right answer” about literature is to look for connections between the author’s life and the author’s work. For example, I was disinterested in “Shakespeare in Love” because…

Furious Trump orders officials to boycott correspondents’ dinner

Trump spent the morning insulting the news media on Twitter, calling MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough a “Psycho” and musing about New York Times reporters getting “down on their knees” to apologize to him after his 2020 re-election victory. Around the same time the president was tapping out those tweets, White House Cabinet Secretary Bill McGinley, who…

John Dewey: Portrait of a Progressive Thinker: His ideas altered the education of children worldwide

“You can concentrate the history of all mankind into the evolution of flax, cotton, and wool fibers into clothing,” asserted Dewey. He described a class where students handled wool and cotton. As they discovered how hard it was to separate seeds from cotton, they came to understand why their ancestors wore woolen clothing. Working in…

Happy Easter 2019

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Prime Stage – “Twelfth Night” – Carolyn Jerz (“Viola”)

The wife and I both got shout-outs in the girl’s interview. Looking forward to seeing this show, the first two weekends in May. Twelfth Night at Prime Stage. Similar:Updated a "Gender Neutral Language" handoutMTV recently ditched the “Best Actor/Act…AcademiaMore #blender3d #steampunk #design. #blender3dart #aesthetics The officers’ conference roo…AestheticsWhat You Read Matters More Than You Might…

Arsenal of Freedom (TNG Rewatch, Season 1, Episode 21)

With an A-plot that comments on the Cold War arms race, a B-plot that tests LaForge’s command skills, and a C-plot that explores the Picard/Crusher dynamic, I wanted to like this episode more than I did. Yar wisely observes that it’s kind of pointless for the landing party to strategize against a system that has already wiped out all the intelligent life on a planet, yet the characters still peek through the bushes at the wobbly floating plastic menace, and leap out of the way of its space-zapper ray gun blasts, because TV.

Industriousness. Self-improvement. Thrift. And orange slime.

The girl amusing herself on our 70m commute to rehearsal, as we listen to the LibriVox “Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin.” Similar:Kirk's manly, sensitive advice to young CharlieIn popular culture, Captain Kirk from th…CultureUsing a Typewriter Simulator to Teach Media HistoryWorking on the syllabus for my “Media an…CultureTelevision is Now the Second Screen for Kids with…

Prime Stage Theatre to end 2018-2019 season with Shakespeare comedy Twelfth Night, May 3–12 at the New Hazlett Theater

2019 Pittsburgh Public Theater Shakespeare Monologue winner Carolyn Jerz of Greensburg cast as Viola (PITTSBURGH, PA – March 20, 2019) Prime Stage Theatre, a Pittsburgh theater organization that presents professionally produced plays based on works of classic and contemporary works of literature, will commence its 23rd consecutive season on a humorous note with one of…

Independence of the press: the “essential ingredient of liberty” (Alexis de Tocqueville)

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Heart of Glory (TNG Rewatch, Season 1 Episode 20)

Rewatching Star Trek: The Next Generation after a 20-year break. In “Heart of Glory,” we get our first real exploration of Worf’s backstory, as the Enterprise-D rescues some Klingons who can’t convincingly explain what they were doing on a battle-scarred freighter. It’s a good Worf story, and the guest stars are sufficiently elegiac, sympathetic, and…