Diana Ross Explored Black Music’s Rich History on ‘Red Hot Rhythm & Blues’
Thirty-five years ago, Red Hot Rhythm & Blues saw Diana Ross ambitiously and affectionately placing herself within the history of Black music.
Academia
Punk in the Classroom: Question Everything
Punk’s “question everything” attitude has always been suited to education, despite the forces that seek to contain its rabble-rousing trouble-making from the classroom.
The British ‘Idea of Europe’ Is Still a Mess
Shane Weller’s The Idea of Europe, hampered by an unconscious form of Euroscepticism, suggests that British critics are still not ready to listen to their neighbors.
Judge – or Let the Market Be the Judge
Michael W. Clune argues that a popular mantra about art – everyone’s judgment is equal – impedes our ability to imagine a world outside of the capitalist marketplace.
Seeing Through the Eyes of a Semiologist: A Tribute to Umberto Eco
Many of Eco’s observations read true in our hyperkinetic era of the Internet, the experience economy, the Disneyfication of entertainment, the mega-blockbuster.
Can Queer Studies Rescue American Universities?
Matt Brim's Poor Queer Studies underscores the impact of poorer disciplines and institutions, which often do more to translate and apply transformative intellectual ideas in the world than do their ivory-tower counterparts.
UbuWeb’s Kenneth Goldsmith Writes the Book on Internet Archiving
Kenneth Goldsmith's Duchamp Is My Lawyer, a tale of the creation and upkeep of the anti-internet internet, UbuWeb, is highly engaging and avoids the risk of ploughing down theoretical wormholes of limited interest.
What Has a Real Critic Got to Offer? On Stephanie Ross’ ‘Two Thumbs Up’
Stephanie Ross' book on aesthetic philosophy, Two Thumbs Up, can be used as a dissertation template. Just expect -- like a critic -- to argue with it, at times.
‘Egress’ Mourns and Celebrates the Life and Work of Theorist Mark Fisher
Mark Fisher's insights are often obscured in Matt Colquhoun's personal/academic hybrid, Egress, which ranges far and wide over philosophy and pop culture.
‘Going Stealth’: Trans Politics and Surveillance Practices
When activists cooperate with a repressive state, who gets left behind?
Critical Noir: Confessions of a ThugNiggaIntellectual
If you need to know what the boundaries of diction are, listen to my reformed ghetto-ass.