The New Republic

The responses to my post on Shakespeare have been interesting, and deserve response. Despite the predictable component of, shall we say, disagreement, most seem to agree on one thing: Shakespeare's language requires, at this distance from Elizabethan times, considerable effort to process in real time during performance. READ MORE >>

The roundtable on hiphop over at the Atlantic is interesting. A discussion on what's new on the hiphop scene? That'd make perfect sense to me - but then that alone would fall somewhat outside of the Atlantic purview and be more like a piece by Sascha Frere-Jones at the New Yorker. READ MORE >>

Reading the deserved critical huzzahs for the current production of August Wilson's Joe Turner's Come and Gone has me thinking about a bee always in my bonnet. Critics swoon over the "poetry" of Wilson's language--but Shakespearean language is equally poetic, and yet I suspect his poetry reaches far fewer of us across an entire evening than Wilson's can, and the reason is language change and how hard a time we have dealing with it.  READ MORE >>

There they go again. This week in Nature we learn of the discovery of a 35,000 year old erotic figurine in Germany, 5000 years older than previously known such work by early humans. READ MORE >>

Interesting moment the other night at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner when Barack Obama teased Republican National Party Chairman Michael Steele for his famous inclination towards slightly studious mouthings of hip hop slang. "Michael Steele is in the house. Or as he would say, "in the heezy ... " ... "Whassup?!?" READ MORE >>

William Saletan has responded to my comment on his discomfort with No Child Left Behind data being tabulated by race. READ MORE >>

It looks like William Saletan over at Slate learned his lesson too well. He was shot at like a varmint a couple years ago after writing some columns on evidence that black people are genetically less gifted mentally than whites. READ MORE >>

Last week I had the honor of debating the NAACP's Julian Bond (with whom I bonded, so to speak, over dinner despite our differences such as those aired here) and Columbia's President Lee Bollinger (who learned that night that I happen to be teaching as an adjunct at his school). READ MORE >>

Last Sunday was the fortieth anniversary of the famous Cornell Takeover, when black students took over a building demanding a black studies program among, other things. There were guns involved - first when white students attempted to wrest control of the building, then when the black protesters armed themselves in protection. READ MORE >>

If black firefighters in New Haven can’t make a decent showing on for a test that’s required for promotion, then the question is how we can help them do better, right?   READ MORE >>