Culture/Collective Memory

(Archival stuff from course weblogs that I am closing down--already compiled so I'm putting it here for others to browse)

12 Gauge (Literary zine based out of Brooklyn, NY—in operation since 1995)

Aesthetics and Visual Culture

African Philosophy Resources

Agenda (A journal about women and gender originating out of South Africa. See this article for a brief history)

AK Press ["Our goal is to make available radical books and other materials, titles that are published by independent presses, not the corporate giants, titles with which you can make a positive change in the world. The sorts of books we stock are less and less available from the corporate publishers, booksellers & websites."]

All Songs Considered (NPR’s signature music show that has a wealth of music tracks and background on the artists—for instance they made available tracks from Nirvana’s Box Set on the day it was released: Listen Here)

Alternative Press Review (Left perspective magazine that collects the best of alternative presses. Originates from Arlington, VA)

American Studies at the University of Virginia (Huge archive of links and resources)

Anderberg, Kirsten. Lonely Amidst Applause (Posted at personal website: January 2005) ["Opening your life up to the public sets one up for at least two lives. There is the public person, that side that the public sees and then expands with their own imaginations, creating personal relationships, albeit one-sided ones, with public entities. Then there is the public personality's private life, that only those in closest proximity to the public person know about. Sometimes there is a third level that only the public person her/himself knows about. These levels of reality are more marked than in normal daily separation of environments, it seems, as the fame aspect follows you through all realms in a way that one's roles at normal work environments would not."]

Art and Politics ["Recent criticism has demonstrated that the museum is not a neutral institution, but is complicit in maintaining the existing social, political, and economic hierarachies."]

ASLE: Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment [Articles, annotated bibliographies, reviews, biographies, study guides and other sources]

Azizah Magazine ( Based in Georgia (US). Self-description: “a magazine that reflects the experiences and perspectives of Muslim women living in North American society.”)

Barrelhouse (Self-description: “In our pages you'll find fiction and poetry from new and established writers, as well as essays and interviews on everything from art to music to reality television.”)

Baseball Directed by Ken Burns. PBS (2003) [""Baseball," the poet Donald Hall told us in a filmed interview, "because of its continuity over the space of America and the time of America, is a place where memory gathers." It was our intention to pursue the game — and its memories and myths — across the expanse of American history. We quickly developed an abiding conviction that the game of baseball offered a unique prism through which one could see refracted much more than the history of games won and lost, teams rising and falling, rookies arriving and veterans saying farewell. The story of baseball is also the story of race in America, of immigration and assimilation; of the struggle between labor and management, of popular culture and advertising, of myth and the nature of heroes, villains, and buffoons; of the role of women and class and wealth in our society. The game is a repository of age-old American verities, of standards against which we continually measure ourselves, and yet at the same time a mirror of the present moment in our modern culture — including all of our most contemporary failings. But we were hardly prepared for the complex emotions the game summoned up. The accumulated stories and biographies, life-lessons and tragedies, dramatic moments and classic confrontations that we encountered daily began to suggest even more compelling themes. As Jacques Barzun has written, "Whoever wants to know the heart and mind of America had better learn baseball."]

Benton, Michael. “Moonshine Clans of the Alphane Mountains.” In the Fray (June 3, 2004)

"Bhutan: The Last Place." Frontline World (PBS: May 2002) ["the impact of television on a remote Buddhist kingdom in the Himalayas. After centuries of self-imposed isolation, Bhutan legalized TV in 1999 -- the last country in the world to do so."]

Biography Project (Website introduction: “Welcome to the Biography Project. This reference tool is an ongoing effort to catalog and document the contributions of authors, artists, scientists, film makers and other culturally influential individuals on underground culture in its various forms. This is direct response to the unfortunate *lack* of accurate and comprehensive information on the net regarding 'popsubculture'.”)

Black Table (Literary/cultural journal)

Booknotes (Website description: “C-SPAN's signature author interview program, has served as a forum for books about history, politics and public affairs for a dozen years. C-SPAN's unedited, commercial-free format, allows for an in-depth discussion with an author distinct from other author interview programs. The format is simple: one author, one book, one hour. For a full hour every Sunday night, fifty-two weeks a year, an author discusses their recently-released work of non-fiction. Beyond the book's subject matter, authors are also queried about the writing process, about how and why they came to write their book and their own lives and influences. Authors may appear on Booknotes only once in their writing career.” )

Bookslut (website description: “Bookslut is a monthly web magazine and daily blog dedicated to those who love to read. We provide a constant supply of news, reviews, commentary, insight, and more than occasional opinions.” Also “named one of the 50 best websites by Time, one of the best literature websites by The New York Times.”)

Bookworm (website description: “A must for the serious reader, "Bookworm" showcases writers of fiction and poetry - the established, new or emerging - all interviewed with insight and precision by the show's host and guiding spirit, Michael Silverblatt.”)

Byzantine Studies on the Internet

Cabinet Magazine ("Cabinet is an award-winning quarterly magazine of art and culture that confounds expectations of what is typically meant by the words "art," "culture," and sometimes even "magazine." Like the 17th-century cabinet of curiosities to which its name alludes, Cabinet is as interested in the margins of culture as its center. Presenting wide-ranging, multi-disciplinary content in each issue through the varied formats of regular columns, essays, interviews, and special artist projects, Cabinet's hybrid sensibility merges the popular appeal of an arts periodical, the visually engaging style of a design magazine, and the in-depth exploration of a scholarly journal. Playful and serious, exuberant and committed, Cabinet's omnivorous appetite for understanding the world makes each of its issues a valuable sourcebook of ideas for a wide range of readers, from artists and designers to scientists and historians. In an age of increasing specialization, Cabinet looks to previous models of the well-rounded thinker to forge a new type of magazine for the intellectually curious reader of the future. Cabinet was named "Best New Magazine" of 2000 by the American Library Association's Library Journal and "Best Art and Culture Magazine" for 2001 and 2003 by the New York Press.")

California Authors ["Squinting westward, New York publishing seems to see us dimly. California. Somewhere. Out there at the end of the Pony Express line, indefinable on the dusty horizon. But from here, under the bright western sky, Pacific crashing at our feet, California shows up in crisp detail. It is generous, even lavish: rich in literary tradition, the nation's largest book market, home to the readers who create best-sellers, home to the eloquent voices who are defining the best in American publishing. It’s all so clear to us. Here. And because being here counts, we are building CaliforniaAuthors.com — creating an online literary hub for the West Coast's finest writers and their readers. We began with a deep understanding of the publishing industry and the West Coast media–works, an expanding online library, a commitment to supporting literacy and freedom of expression, and a real desire to share California's literary riches with the world. Even New York. Visit daily to check out the latest Left Coast literary news, reviews and new releases — and see why the San Francisco Chronicle calls us “increasingly essential” reading. Browse fresh writing in our collection of essays and excerpts, and enjoy our gallery of premier author websites. You’ll find many of your favorite California writers, along with some wonderful new voices, in our Author Directory. We make it easy to keep up on literary events statewide and cruise the West Coast's eclectic independent booksellers online."]

Calvin and Hobbes (An intelligent, imaginative, and insightful comic strip)

Chelsea Green Publishing ["Chelsea Green sees publishing as a tool for effecting cultural change. Our purpose is: to stop the destruction of the natural world by challenging the beliefs and practices that are enabling this destruction and by providing inspirational and practical alternatives that promote sustainable living. We seek to promote better understanding of natural systems as a global commons. We seek to empower citizens to participate in reclaiming the commons, to serve as its effective stewards, and to help mitigate worldwide social and environmental disruptions. We seek to build a community of new voices that will empower and inspire individuals to reduce their ecological impact and to participate in the restoration of healthy local communities, bioregional ecosystems, and a diversity of cultures."]

China Mieville: 50 Science Fiction and Fantasy Works That Every Socialist Should Read

"The Civil War." Directed by Ken Burns. PBS (2002) ["Nearly 20 years ago, on Christmas Day, 1984, I finished reading a book that literally changed my life – a wonderful, historical novel called The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara. It told the story of the most important battle in our nation's history: Gettysburg. I remember closing that book and telling my father, "Now I know the subject for my next documentary. It's going to be the Civil War."]

Clamor Magazine ["Clamor Magazine's mission is to provide a media outlet that reflects the reality of alternative politics and culture in a format that is accessible to people from a variety of backgrounds. Clamor exists to fill the voids left by mainstream media. We recognize and celebrate the fact that each of us can and should participate in media, politics and culture. We publish writing and art that exemplifies the value we place on autonomy, creativity, exploration, and cooperation. Clamor is an advocate of progressive social change through active creation of political and cultural alternatives."]

Contemporary Cultural Studies Resources

Continental Philosophy Resources

Conversations With History: Research Galleries. Institute of International History, University of California—Berkeley (Extensive online video and audio archive of interviews broken down into easily browsed categories.) Main Catalogue by Subject and Most Recent

Cooke, Rachel. "Emails From the Edge." Observer (January 16, 2005) ["A female architect's poignant and witty dispatches about living with her mother-in-law in the West Bank have become a surprise publishing success, revealing the absurdity and adversity of everyday Palestinian life."]

Critical Theory Resources

Django Reinhardt Talk of the Nation (PBS: December 8, 2004) ["Django Reinhardt is a legend of jazz guitar whose shadow still looms over performers 50 years after his death. A new book sheds light on the life of Reinhardt, who rose to stardom in just 43 years."]

Django Reinhardt: The Biography by Alain Antonietto ["The poet Serge evokes the scene as it was then : “Down there in the Gypsy camp a banjo was jiggling with a popular melody.., one had the impression of distant dance music, dizzying waltzes one the sweetness of an accordion. Camp fires were everywhere, each with its cooking pot. Everywhere chickens were stewing and banjos going wild...” This was the setting in which Django grew up - in a world that today has become the stuff of legend, the world of the bohemian and the vagabond on the doorstep of a great city : caravans and horses on the waste ground, wooden fences, weedy ditches for brawling children and bony dogs to roam in, Gypsy women with their kiss-curls and long flowing dresses, black- moustached men in striped waistcoats and broad- brimmed hats, men with dancing bears and performing goats, chair-menders, horse-copers, ragpickers, scrap-metal merchants, basket-makers, tinkers and musical-instrument makers - a whole world lost for ever under the bulldozers, leaving behind only a wisp of smoke from a camp-fire, the notes of a guitar drifting on the wind..."]

Ellis, Joseph. "His Excellency: George Washington." Booknotes (January 1, 2005) ["Joseph Ellis talks about his biography of George Washington, "His Excellency," at the Massachusetts Historical Society in Boston. The author explains Washington's position on several issues, including expansion and slavery. Author Bio: Joseph Ellis is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of "Founding Brothers," and "American Sphinx," his biography of Thomas Jefferson."]

Fish, Stanley. One Univeristy Under God? Chronicle of Higher Education (January 7, 2005) http://chronicle.com/cgi2-bin/printable.cgi?article=http://chronicle.com/jobs/2005/01/2005010701c.htm

For a Student Researching the Holocaust

From Holler to the Hood

Garcia, Manuel, Jr. "God and Country." Swan Commentary (January 17, 2005) ["To criticize religion is unkind, like ridiculing a child's thumb sucking and security blanket. Then why discuss it, since for many, discussion is equivalent to critique? Because concepts of God are at the root of attitudes about community, security and power, and these in turn affect our shared external reality -- country. Church and State, God and Country, they are never far apart. The ideal would be to keep our Gods contained within ourselves so they do not destroy what we enjoy together. Reality is otherwise."]

Ghost Town [This is a motorcycle diary of Elena's, aka Kid of Speed, trip through the nuclear deadzones within Eastern Europe. A great reminder as we recently passed the 25th anniversary of the Three Mile Island Incident in the U.S. and the Nuclear Energy Institute continues to tell us that there is no longer anything to worry about. This story reminds us of some of the worst abuses of the corrupt communist bloc and the continuing lies of our own capitalist system regarding the danger of nuclear power.]

Globalist Person of the Year 2004: Commoner Joseph Darby's Uncommon Courage The Globalist (January 7, 2005) ["In selecting a person of the year, magazine editors often look to heroes and strong leaders. And yet, some of the world’s most remarkable individuals are people who are virtually faceless and nameless. The Globalist’s “Person of the Year 2004” is an American whose courageous actions reaffirmed the world’s belief in America’s true ideals in troubled times."]

"Graphic Novelist with a Comic Sensibility." National Public Radio (January 8, 2005) ["When Derek Kirk Kim's debut graphic novel Same Difference and Other Stories appeared in 2003 as a self-published paperback, it drew little notice. Now it has won the top three awards of the comic world." The comic that won the awards is available online ]

The Great Chicago Fire: Web of Memory Chicago Historical Society and the Trustees of Northwestern University. (1996) ["The exhibition is divided into two main parts. The first, represented by an image of the burning city taken from a contemporary Currier & Ives lithograph, is titled The Great Chicago Fire. Its five chronologically organized chapters focus on the conflagration and the city's recovery. The second part is called The Web of Memory. Its governing image is a doll named Bessie, which was saved from the flames by six-year-old Harriet Peabody when her family gave up their home for lost. The six chapters in The Web of Memory examine a half dozen ways in which the fire has been remembered: eyewitness accounts, contemporary journalism and popular illustrations, imaginative forms such as fiction and poetry and painting, the legend of Mrs. O'Leary, souvenirs of various sorts, and previous commemorations by civic groups and by the Historical Society. In both The Great Chicago Fire and The Web of Memory, each chapter consists of three integrated sections: thematic Galleries filled with electronic images of a great range of artifacts, a Library of relevant texts, and an Essay that provides a context for both the Galleries and the Library."]

A Guide to Anna Deavere Smith's Play Twilight: Los Angeles ("To Anna Deavere Smith, Twilight: Los Angeles is a tragedy. It is a crisis of community to some; a riot to others, a war or an “urban explosion” to still others. It is linked to other outbursts of violence in our nation’s history. Yet it is contemporary, linked most recently to the explosion in Cincinnati in 2001. In 1992, a nation listened to the verdict in the first trial of the Los Angeles police officers indicted for the beating of Rodney King. That beating was broadcast throughout the nation and around the world. All who watched became witnesses. In the hours that followed the acquittal, acts of violence erupted in Los Angeles and angry words of rage were expressed by friends and strangers everywhere. Journalist Richard Rodriguez said of the violence, 'It was the worst moment for Los Angeles. It was also the first moment, I think, when most people in L.A. realized they were part of the whole. The city that the world mocked for not being a city, for lacking a center, having only separate suburbs, separate freeway exits—L.A. realized that it was interconnected." Americans—not only those in the streets but also millions of others who watched on TV—saw rioters drag Reginald Denny from his truck at the corner of Florence and Normandie and beat him. Facing History resource speaker and author Greg Alan-Williams has written about a similar moment when he and others stepped forward to save a life. When students view Twilight: Los Angeles, they ask: Why didn’t more people try to stop the violence? Why didn’t more help? They ask about the causes of the rage and relate stories of injustice and discrimination from their own experiences. Anna Deavere Smith’s Twilight: Los Angeles directed by Marc Levin examines the event from a variety of perspectives. She has collected fragments of monologues that both invite and provoke conversation. Together they raise questions about race, power, truth, and justice. They reveal how myths, misinformation, and misunderstanding can lead not only to prejudice and stereotyping but also violence. “Strangers turned against strangers” energized by rumor, propaganda, rage, and for some, a sort of mindless entertainment—an outlet for misplaced energy and anger. Their experiences deepen our understanding of the importance of listening to one another’s stories and to understanding one another’s point of view. But listening is not enough. Although the looting and burning damaged nine out of every ten Korean-owned businesses in South Central Los Angeles, the tragedy lay in the deaths of 51 human beings. This study guide, both in print and on our website—facinghistory.org—is designed to help teachers and students discuss the difficult and controversial issues raised by the film. It suggests the complexities of Los Angeles’s history or that of any other community in crisis. It also reveals the importance to a democracy of the kind of education that equips students to negotiate those complexities.")

Guide to Philosophy on the Internet

A Guide to the Film Schindler's List ("Schindler's List, the award-winning film directed by Steven Spielberg from a screenplay by Steven Zaillian based on the book by Thomas Keneally, tells the story of Oskar Schindler, a war profiteer and member of the Nazi party who saved over 1,000 Jews during World War II. The movie explores the human capacity for monumental evil as well as for extraordinary courage, caring, and compassion. And by revealing how fragile civilization truly is, it turns history into a moral lesson. No lesson is more needed in our schools today. As Spielberg recently told members of Congress, "History has to cease being facts and figures, stories and sagas from long ago and far away about them or those. In order to learn from history, rather than just about it, students need to rediscover that those people were just like us." Hannah Arendt, one of the foremost political philosophers of our time, explained why the teaching of history must have a moral component when she argued that we can put past evils into the service of a future good only by squarely facing reality. She wrote, "The methods used in the pursuit of historical truth are not the methods of the prosecutor, and the men who stand guard over the facts are not the officers of interest groups - no matter how legitimate their claims - but the reporters, the historians, and finally the poets." And, she might have added, the film-makers. The facts - no matter how horrifying - must be preserved, not "lest we forget," but so that we may judge. Preservation and judgment do not justify the past but reveal its meaning. Several years ago, Steven Spielberg was asked to choose an image that summarized all of his films. He chose "the little boy in Close Encounters [of the Third Kind] opening the door and standing in that beautiful yet awful light, just like fire coming through the doorway." That "beautiful yet awful light" is knowledge and it offers both promise and danger. In Schindler's List, Spielberg encourages us to take a step toward the light - "toward what we don't understand and what we don't know about and what scares us.")

Hispanics Critique American Girl Doll ["Some residents of Chicago's largely Hispanic Pilsen section are upset over a new doll in the popular American Girl series because her storyline says the Mexican-American youngster and her family left the "dangerous" neighborhood for a better life in the suburbs."]

Honor the Legacy: The Memory of Martin Luther King Jr. [An online documentary. Martin Luther King was a pacifist in that he preached change through non-violent protest, but he was not "passive" when confronted with the need to address injustice and oppression. His words were a rallying cry for a re-vision of the United States of America... now that he has a holiday, streets, and schools named for him it is easy to forget how he, and other strong souls, fearlessly spoke truth to power.]

Ideology of Discovery

Images of Authority ["Leaders have long seen the power of images. From Ancient Egypt with the images of the Pharaoh to the images of George W. Bush in government offices, the image of the political leader has been understood to signify the authority of that leader."]

Ireland, Doug. The Howard Hughes Scorsese Doesn't Tell You About." Direland (January 27, 2005) ["Martin Scorcese deserves an Oscar--but not for his mendacious film The Aviator, which glorifies the odious Howard Hughes. Scorcese, of all people, ought to know better than to have done so."]

Internet African History Sourcebook

Internet Ancient History Sourcebook

Internet East Asian Sourcebook

Internet Global History Sourcebook

Internet Histories Sourcebooks Project

Internet History of Science Sourcebook

Internet Indian History Sourcebook

Internet Islamic History Sourcebook

Internet Jewish History Sourcebook

Internet Medieval Sourcebook

Internet Modern History Sourcebook

Internet Women's History Sourcebook

Jazz. Directed by Ken Burns. PBS (2004) ["Jazz has been called the purest expression of American democracy; a music built on individualism and compromise, independence and cooperation."]

Kirsten's BUSKING & PERFORMANCE PAGE ["My main interest is street performing aka busking, as it is not documented properly for some unknown reason, thus I aim to document part of that culture. I also want to leave a road map for others who would like to start busking. But my busking career overlapped with careers playing in swing bands, performing with vaudevillians, etc...so this is a catch all page for performing information I have accumulated over the decades, through the eyes of a solo woman busker, for the most part. I enjoy busking, it is very different than other entertainment venues. It is very antiauthoritarian and a good use of the public square, in my opinion. Busking also helps keep free speech in exercise."]

Lang, Lang: Piano Prodigy 60 Minutes (January 9, 2005) [The 22-year-old Chinese musical prodigy has been called one of the greatest classical pianists of his generation.]

Lois Lowry's The Giver ("To the Nazis, music was the “most German of the arts.” To the Jewish composers confined in Terezín, a concentration camp in what is now the Czech Republic, it was the most universal. In Terezín, they openly created and played music that was censored in other parts of Nazi-occupied Europe. Through that music, writes historian Ruth Bondy, a survivor of Terezín, they “opened a window into another world, different from the reality of the ghetto. Listening with closed eyes to Bernard The Giver by Lois Lowry—a futuristic novel that explores the relationship between past and present, between identity and memory. The Central Question: How do our individual and collective memories shape who we are today and influence our futures?")

Matters of Race ("My mother is a beautiful woman. In times of crisis as a child, I remember looking up at her knowing she had the answers to questions I found so hard for my young mind to grasp. Her words would always relax the moment’s pain and confusion when once again I was reminded that my brown skin, wooly hair, and full lips made me different to my classmates at my Irish Catholic grade school. Her voice, always gentle but firm, would say, “we’re all just human-beings, we’re all equal,” but she never said, “race didn’t matter.” I share this story because in Matters of Race we tried to show, through the stories of everyday people from Hawaii to New York, from South Dakota to North Carolina, that race is something we all live with everyday. It is a real part of our lives that keeps us guessing. “Is it race or is it me?” “Was that an insult because of who I am or just because…?” We might not be aware of it everyday but it only takes a look, a word, an inappropriate action, or an overt denial of basic rights or privileges to make race present, felt, and therefore real. In Matters of Race, we seek to explore our separate, as well as shared, past and present. In these stories of our individual and collective lives we see people grappling with race and its meaning in American society. Through these various narratives, we begin to learn about shared experience. And while that which keeps us together can be the burden of the past, that which unites us is also the challenge and the promise of mutual respect, which we gain through knowledge and the greater appreciation for our differences. The films challenge us to find a way to not just tolerate difference, but respect it. Our nation is a nation of many different cultures, and many different peoples wearing many different colors. While we strive to be a nation of people united with a common purpose, ideals and destiny, we are still a people who come from many places from around the world. We all strive to preserve some of the things that uniquely connect us to those far and varied places of origin. Whether a recent immigrant, native descendent or one who came by force or by choice, we all live here today cherishing our right to express our identity and ourselves as we choose. Our promise to protect and allow difference is what draws many to our shores. But the critical question that writer John Edgar Wideman challenges us to consider in Matters of Race is, “If we are different, who determines the meaning of difference, who benefits from its meaning? Who shall create its form and who will benefit from it?”)

Memory, History and Memorials

Metaphysics Resource Page

Montagne, Renee. Unforgivable Blackness: Jack Johnson's Saga PBS (January 17, 2005) ["In 1908, Jack Johnson made history by becoming the first black heavyweight boxing champion of the world, stunning crowds in Sydney, Australia, by knocking out Tommy Burns. Many whites were outraged by the win -- and soon Johnson found himself squared off with retired heavyweight champ Jim Jeffries, who became known as the "Great White Hope."]

My Hero Project

Mysticism Resources

The National Security Archives [Materials are available online. "The National Security Archive combines a unique range of functions in one non governmental, non-profit institution. The Archive is simultaneously a research institute on international affairs, a library and archive of declassified U.S. documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, a public interest law firm defending and expanding public access to government information through the FOIA, and an indexer and publisher of the documents in books, microfiche, and electronic formats. The Archive's approximately $2.3 million yearly budget comes from publication revenues and from private philanthropists such as the Carnegie Corporation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Ford Foundation. As a matter of policy, the Archive receives no government funding. The National Security Archive was founded in 1985 by a group of journalists and scholars who had obtained documentation from the U.S. government under the Freedom of Information Act and sought a centralized repository for these materials. Over the past decade, the Archive has become the world's largest non governmental library of declassified documents. Located on the seventh floor of the George Washington University's Gelman Library in Washington, D.C., the Archive is designed to apply the latest in computerized indexing technology to the massive amount of material already released by the U.S. government on international affairs, make them accessible to researchers and the public, and go beyond that base to build comprehensive collections of documents on specific topics of greatest interest to scholars and the public."]

Neary, Lynn. "Moral Values Seemingly at Odds with Popular Culture." Morning Edition (PBS: January 3, 2005) ["Many Americans say they voted for moral values in the presidential election, but sex and violence in the entertainment industry is as popular as ever."]

“Niall Ferguson.” Book TV (August 28, 2004) ["Niall Ferguson joined Book TV for a conversation about his life and work. Mr. Ferguson teaches Financial History at the Stern School of Business at New York University. He is also a Senior Research Fellow and Visiting Professor of History at Jesus College, Oxford University, and a Senior Fellow of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. He is the author of five books: "The Pity of War: Explaining World War One," "The House of Rothschild" (in two volumes, "Money's Prophets" and "The World's Banker"), "The Cash Nexus: Money and Power in the Modern World, 1700-2000," "Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the Lessons for Global Power," and "Colossus: The Price of America's Empire," which publishes in April 2004. Mr. Ferguson and his family have homes in New York and Oxfordshire, England."]

NPR 100 {"The most important American musical works of the 20th century." Listen to the music and hear the stories behind the music.]

Ozeki, Ruth. “Creating Novel Life Forms—Literally.” Satya (May 2003):

Palahniuk, Chuck. “Diary.” Bookworm (KCRW: November 6, 2003): (website description: “Palahniuk takes on some rather aggressive questions about American culture and the artist. Can an artist survive popularity? Cult adoration? Commercialism? His answers may surprise you.”)

People With a History: An Online Guide to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans History

Philosophy and Culture

Philosophy and Religion

Philosophy Resources

Philosophy, Technology, and Environment (archive of sources)

The Reasoning Page (Resources on rhetoric, argumentation, reasoning, logic, etc…)

Propaganda Nation

Remembering the Past NewsHour with Jim Lehrer (PBS: April 9, 2004) ["Two people who have survived periods of horrific genocide have teamed up to speak about their experiences in the Holocaust and Rwanda, with the hope of preventing such acts from happening again. Jeffrey Brown speaks to David Gewirtzman and Jacqueline Murekatete about their experiences and how they met."]

Ricky Gervais, A Hit at the Office." National Public Radio (January 25, 2004) ["In The Office, British comedian Ricky Gervais plays David Brent, a buffoonish, self-involved but affable office manager at a dismal paper supply office in the London suburb of Slough. Gervais created the faux documentary and co-writes and directs the series, for which he won a Golden Globe Award."]

Slavery and the Making of America PBS (2004) ["The first were bought in 1619. The last freed in 1865. In the intervening 250 years slaves labored to make America what it is today."]

Smith, Carl. Urban Disorder and the Shape of Belief: The Great Chicago Fire, the Haymarket Bomb, and the Model Town of Pullman. (Book excerpt: University of Chicago Press, 1994) ["Urban Disorder and the Shape of Belief is cultural history at its finest. By utilizing questions and methodologies of urban studies, social history, and literary history, Smith creates a sophisticated account of changing visions of urban America and provides insightful analyses of the process of shaping historical memory and structuring social meaning."—Robin F. Bachin, Journal of Interdisciplinary History]

The Social Construction of Gender ["To be born a man or a woman in any society is more than a simple biological fact. It is a biological fact with social implications. Women constitute a distinct social group, and the character of that group, long neglected by historians, has nothing to do with feminine "nature." "Gender" is the term now widely used to refer to those ways in which a culture reformulates what begins as a fact of nature. The biological sexes are redefined, represented, valued, and channeled into different roles in various culturally dependent ways. An American anthropologist has put it well: a "Sex/gender system [is] a set of arrangements by which a society transforms biological sexuality in to products of human activity, and in which there transformed sexual needs are met."]

Solnit, Rebecca. “The Silence of the Lambswool Cardigan.” Alternet (July 21, 2003) (on the importance of knowing the origin of everyday things)

Survivors of the Holocaust ("Between 1933 and 1945, the Nazis targeted and systematically murdered millions of children, women, and men solely because of their ancestry. Those murders are collectively known as the Holocaust, a Greek word that means “complete destruction by fire.” The word Holocaust evokes the crematoria of Auschwitz and other death camps where the bodies of many victims were burned. This event is also known as the Shoah, the Hebrew word for catastrophe. Immediately after World War II, Nazi leaders were brought to trial at Nuremberg, Germany for “crimes against humanity” and other war crimes. At those trials, the world heard evidence solely of what the per­petrators did. The voices of victims were not given full expression until decades later. Survivors of the Holocaust brings some of their voices to the classroom. Steven Spielberg, in association with Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation and Turner Original Productions, offers viewers a unique opportunity to hear the story of the Holocaust from the perspective of the survivors.")

Terry Tate: Office Linebacker ESPN (2004) [Brief video spoof--a classic!]

"This is Not Sex!: A Web Essay on the Male Gaze, Fashion Advertising, and the Pose." ["It is now routine to speak critically of the way that women are depicted in our popular visual media. There's too much sex in movies, television and magazines, people say. And this is often coupled to complaints that the media represent women as sex objects, provide unrealistic beauty standards, or focus only on women's outer beauty, instead of the more important attributes of character and accomplishment. There is truth in all of this. But often these claims seem to imply that there is an obvious "thing" called beauty or sexual attractiveness, and that the question is simply whether or not the media should display so much of this "thing." The following web essay casts doubt on the belief that there is such a simple, self-evident "thing" as beauty. It looks at beauty as a cultural construct, at how beauty is defined, at how fashion magazines cultivate a very particular notion of what it means to be attractive or beautiful. And it suggests that this particular notion may be less about sex, less about actual human sexual behaviors, than it is about power."]

Thomas Ligotti: Literature is Entertainment or It Is Nothing

A Touch of Greatness: One Good Teacher Can Change a Child's Life Independent Lens (PBS: 2005) ["In the 1960s, Albert Cullum rejected Dick and Jane for Shakespeare and Sophocles in his elementary school classroom, where students swam down the Mississippi River and hurled themselves from the walls of Troy--all without leaving school grounds. This portrait of one of America's most influential educators shows how cullum ignited the imagination of a generation of children, teaching them how to find their own inner greatness."]

Turner, Jack. The Abstract Wild." (First Chapter from the Book of the Same Name: University of Arizona Press, 1996) ["The contrast between that long weekend and my job appalled me. I knew I wanted to have more experiences like that, even if I couldn't explain what 'like that' meant. There was the adventure and the wilderness, of course, but what interested me was something more. Two months later we went back."]

"Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson." Directed by Ken Burns. PBS (January 2005) ["Johnson in many ways is an embodiment of the African-American struggle to be truly free in this country — economically, socially and politically," said Burns. "He absolutely refused to play by the rules set by the white establishment, or even those of the black community. In that sense, he fought for freedom not just as a black man, but as an individual."]

Vaeth, Chris. "Dr. King: The Remix." AlterNet (January 17, 2004) ["Sure, we know that he was born in Atlanta and became a timeless orator and national martyr. But many in the hip-hop nation have yet to be introduced to the radical Martin Luther King Jr."]

The Weimar Republic: The Fragility of Democracy (“The History of the Weimar Republic in Germany (1919-1933) illuminates one of the most creative and crucial periods in the twentieth century and serves as a significant case study of the critical issues of our own time. Many of the questions asked about the Weimar Republic are relevant to problems individuals and societies face in the twenty-first century.”)

What is Culture? ["Culture is not easily defined, nor is there a consensus among scholars, philosophers and polititicians (nor, probably, among the rest of us) as to what exactly the concept should include. We hope, here, to outline some of the broad-ranging debates which have gone on about the concept of culture during the past century. Furthermore, we hope to offer some insight into what the culture debate means in our own lives and to provide some examples of how cultural meanings are formed, maintained, and changed."]

White, Lynn, Jr. The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis Science (March 10, 1967): 1203-1207. ["Written in 1967 and published in Science magazine, this essay is just as important now, especially in White's understanding of how "Human ecology is deeply conditioned by beliefs about our nature and destiny--that is, by religion."]

Who's Who in the History of Mysticism

Williams, Saul. Tuning In: Musings of a Conscious Artist. Satya (May 2003)

Women Artists of the American West: Past and Present Co-developed by Susan Ressler, Purdue University (Concept developer, editor) Jerrold Maddox, Penn State University (Web developer) (A beautiful, engaging, and illuminating collection of art/writings by/about Women Artists of the American West. A very important site/project. Also produced as a book in a longer form. Divided into four sections at the bottom of the page—click on the links.)

Women at Work ["The following images represent a collection of images I have collected focusing on the theme "Women at Work." Consider these images and articulate the cultural codes the designers draw upon. Whenever possible I have identified the source for the image. See how the designer has adapted the image for the defined audience."]