20th Century Women is such a lovely little movie. Part coming of age story. Part a story about aging. Part a story about male/female relationships that explores how difficult these are to navigate, particularly given our collective idiosyncrasies and brokenness. Recommended.
Tag: culture
Pace Yourself
Open Question: What does it mean to "pace yourself" in modern culture? Does it mean staying with something long enough, over time, to truly develop a relationship with the material and love it? "There’s a willingness, there’s a faith, there’s a very, very magical alchemy that happens when somebody looks at something with enormous love … Continue reading Pace Yourself
The Four Songs of Humanity
"In a specific society, songs differ depending on the context in which they are sung, such as lively celebrations or calmer events. But across all cultures, the team could identify four distinct, recurrent song types: dance tunes, healing songs, love ballads and lullabies."-"Vast musical database reveals common threads in songs around the world." Nature.com. November … Continue reading The Four Songs of Humanity
The 99 Things You Should Have Already Experienced On The Internet Unless You’re a Loser or Old or Something
Also, a listicle that will make those unfamiliar with certain elements of Internet culture feel like Kurtz in a few easy clicks. To ease you in, I'm going to suggest No. 7: Homestarrunner. Strong Bad Email is available on YouTube.
Agree to Disagree or Fight
"'I don't believe in argument," he said......'You don't?' Erens said, genuinely surprised. 'Shit, and I thought I was the cynical one."'It's not cynicism,' he said flatly. 'I just think people overvalue argument because they like to hear themselves talk.''Oh well, thank you.''It's comforting, I suppose.' ... 'Most people are not prepared to have their minds … Continue reading Agree to Disagree or Fight
Best Culture of the 21st Century
A collection of lists of best culture that includes: dance, theater, movies, comedy, art, architecture, TV, albums, opera, etc. —"Best Culture of the 21st Century." The Guardian. September 18, 2019
6, 92: Small cat
Hard to blockquote this missive by Charlie Lloyd and tell you what it's about: futures, atomic energy, infrastructure, photography, trains? I am only going to say it's amazing. Read it.
Amazon & The Cultural Landscape of Books
The small print publisher 404 Ink's discussion of their finances, particularly the portion on the cost to small press publishers to have their books sold via Amazon, is a bit of an eye-opener. On some level, I was aware that the discounts that Amazon is able to offer on books had to be squeezed from … Continue reading Amazon & The Cultural Landscape of Books
The Rating Rabbit Hole
Note: This was written in August of 2015, before cafebedouin.org existed. I rediscovered it recently and thought the point is still a valid one and worth sharing. tl;dr: Algorithms have a bias toward the status quo and present a threat to our cultural production. (2,600 words) Shortly after the start of the Afghanistan war, Osama … Continue reading The Rating Rabbit Hole
Cultural Good Ol’ Days
"I know people don’t read books like they used to, and they don’t think like they used to, but I struggle to care. Most of this talk is pure nostalgia, a kind of mostly knee-jerk, mostly uncritical (although not thoughtless) response to entirely rational fears about technological opacity and complexity (this nostalgia, of course, was … Continue reading Cultural Good Ol’ Days
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