Canon Australia wants to sell cameras. This soft-sell video flatters the creative ambitions of customers in order to make them want to invest money in a fancy camera. We should be critical of the premise, because the video is not an art project or a psychological study. Still, this is good storytelling, and helps make a…
What if universities stopped buying academic journals, and put the money towards hiring editors who helped their faculty publish their scholarship in their own free, open-source journals? I don’t know how much labour goes into running a prestigious journal, but let’s say all the universities that really need those specialised mathematics journals sat down and…
No Christians in my social media feed care about the design of that cup. Lots of people in my social media feed have reposted stories critical of the silly Christians who get all worked up about the design of the cup. Full disclosure: I don’t drink coffee. [C]ontrary to a few breathless media reports, most Christians…
Similar:Touch Me Now: York Plays 2025A cast of hundreds participated in a pub…AcademiaPuns really matter to us over here in English.I swore I would wield my powers only for…AcademiaThe Myth of North America, in One PaintingFascinating art history — a thoughtful …AestheticsJuror's CreedWhile researching my obligations for #ju…CultureIn January, 2002 I was blogging about… A…
This is probably the first time in history that young readers themselves are demanding protection from the disturbing content of their course texts, yet reading has been seen as a threat to mental health for thousands of years. In accordance with the paternalistic ethos of ancient Greece, Socrates said that most people couldn’t handle written…
A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Similar:Chess with my son. As usual, it didn't go well for me.GamesChipping away at the total as the final submissions pour in.PersonalOne of my undergrad lit papers. Dot-matrix printed, with hand-written instructor annotatio…AcademiaVoiceover artist Gayanne Potter urging ScotRail to remove her voice from new AI announceme…When I was working in radio…
The story of Play-Doh began when Kutol, a Cincinnati based soap company, was about to go under in the late 1920s. Cleo McVicker, just 21 years old, was tasked with selling off the company’s remaining assets, which at the time comprised mainly of powdered hand soap. Once that was done, the company would be too. …
Carolyn started rehearsals for PICT Classic Theatre’s Oliver Twist this week. She’s playing a member of Fagin’s gang. Last year in Great Expectations, she split a role; this year there is no double-casting, so she’s in every performance. I’ll be doing a lot of driving. This is not the musical Oliver; it’s the director’s original…
The conventional wisdom is that humanities majors are wasting all that tuition money and dooming themselves to lives of underemployment. The conventional wisdom is wrong. Humanities degrees are actually worth well more than the cost of college. […] The present value of the extra earnings that graduates in humanities majors can expect over their lifetime…
“We at The Recorder strive to ensure that every piece of writing we publish contains timely and thoroughly reported information, and because each sentence of this article contains at least one factual error, we made the call to kill it,” said editor-in-chief Hannah Lowry, noting numerous “red flags” in the article that included an incorrect…
Tonight, when I got home after all the evening’s ballet and piano lessons were over, I was plugging in my laptop at my desk and knocked down a little framed picture — it’s a photo my wife took of me on our first date. (On that same occasion, I also took a picture of her,…
Students in my Shakespeare class will be attending this play. Student actors at Seton Hill University are off on a journey through one of William Shakespeare’s most popular romantic comedies, “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Not even the writing style of the Bard — sometimes difficult to master for those new to the playwright’s poetic verse…
When I publish as a scholar, my goal is not to make money, but to share my intellectual creation. That’s part of my job description, so my university writes my paycheck with the expectation that I will publish. My publications will have more impact if more people read them. Hiding them behind subscription paywalls will…
As my freshman writing students assemble sources for their term research paper, I will point them towards this article, which raises ethical concerns about using fear as a persuasive tool. (Aristotle said that the appeal to fear, like that of lust, reaches our baser emotions; appeals to love, justice, patriotism, etc. are harder to create,…
I am not sure what I think of this. I’m guessing it will feature new characters in the rebooted universe, but I don’t see any info on that. Who exactly was the audience for this vague announcement? The new Star Trek will introduce new characters seeking imaginative new worlds and new civilizations, while exploring the dramatic…
I read this book for the first time just recently. Was totally freaked out by the chapter that moves us from a realistic YA world to a fantasy/SF world, and then even more freaked out by further twists. I can only imagine the impact it must have had in 1963. It’s a fantastical story featuring interstellar…
Similar:Given a chance to explain his support for a YouTuber who warns about alien DNA, Trump abru…After mounting a half-hearted defense of…Current_EventsI am very happy for these folks, who spent 20 or so years tweaking an insanely complex, co… AwesomeExplorers (#StarTrek #DS9 Rewatch, Season 3, Episode 22) Sisko builds an ancient Bajoran s…Rewatching ST:DS9 With…
Similar:Before the haircut. PersonalStar Trek: The Next Generation Rewatch I was in college and grad school dur…CultureBackstage opening night.PersonalYou come very close to successfully combining argument and explication here… I recently came across a box of old wr…AcademiaWhy scientists should care about artMy artsy daughter loves stories about sc…ArtRespect the Text: Teaching Textual Primacy to Non-English…
Similar:Children of Eden (Stage Right, April 2014)My wife and I in Biblical costumes for C…CultureDance Nation @barebonesblackboxCultureLeftovers from the food my colleagues brought in to bribe/reward those few students who sh… Leftovers from the food my colleagues b…AcademiaNo filter October mist as I walked up from the parking lot. Not a bad view. AestheticsDrinking…
The disorder is in the system which requires them to attempt curriculum and demonstrate behaviors far beyond what is appropriate for their age. The disorder is in the system which bars teachers from differentiating instruction meaningfully, which threatens disciplinary action if they decide their students need a five minute break from a difficult concept, or…