“Certainty serves a powerful social identity function. Declaring a clear position, especially a strong one, signals belonging. … Certainty is rewarded not just with clarity, but with community. Ambivalence, by contrast, is lonely.” - Salon

And vice versa, of course. For instance: James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, and Oscar Wilde all found some freedom in France, but Charles de Gaulle? He loved Ireland. - Irish Times

There’s “a growing wave of collaborative projects in which Latin American LGBTQ+ communities preserve and share their struggles and triumphs. They digitize photos, collect testimonies, and build databases of letters, personal memories, and other items that have survived dictatorships, censorship, and stigma.” - Wired

“Most people aren’t posting, arguing, or fuelling the outrage machine. But because the super-users are so active and visible, they dominate our collective impression of the internet.” - The Guardian (UK)

As ancient civilisations began to need more reliable timekeeping mechanisms, the technology took an extraordinary leap forward with the advent of dependable water clocks, which would remain the best technology available for the next 1,800 years. - Aeon

For many Canadians, play has migrated from board games or the rec leagues to smartphone screens. It’s no longer confined to the weekend or even to a full hour of downtime. Instead, it creeps into moments between work calls, while waiting in line, or during that ambiguous half-hour between Netflix and sleep. - The Walrus

Part of the money would be paid to the government, people familiar with the matter said. White House officials said the deal also includes payments to individual students and professors whose rights allegedly have been violated. - The Wall Street Journal

He is the latest administrator to leave the performing arts center following the Trump takeover. Other administrators who also left included Renée Fleming, Shonda Rhimes and Ben Folds. - OperaWire

“Everyone deserves to go to work and do their job without their boss trying to have sex with them. … My goal is to help ensure that the next generation of actors and creatives don’t have to choose between their dreams and their dignity.” - Los Angeles Times (Yahoo)

A former winner of MasterChef says, ""I can't imagine what it would be like for people who've waited all this time, biting their nails, only to be told that no-one is going to see your achievements, your stresses, your growth. It would be awful.” - BBC

The Oakland City Council passed a budget on June 11 that eliminated its Cultural Affairs Manager position, citing budgetary concerns. But critics say money-saving justifications haven't been made in good faith. - San Francisco Chronicle (MSN)

Provisions in the new law raise unsettling questions about how the nonprofit world will be affected — and the answers may not be known for months or years. - Chronicle of Philanthropy

One of the highlights of this season has fallen victim to a baffling Venezuela travel ban. Gustavo Dudamel can no longer bring his Simón Bolivar Symphony Orchestra in August. That now means that Dudamel will spend only a single week at the Bowl during his penultimate summer as L.A. Phil music director. - Los Angeles...

The National Restaurant Assn. said its members pay an average of $4,500 per year to license music, or 0.5% of the average U.S. small restaurant’s total annual sales. “This may not seem like a large amount, but for an industry that runs on an average pre-tax margin of 3%-5%, this cost is significant." -...

The venue is stepping up the enforcement of its dress code this summer, reminding patrons via signs in the foyer to dress “in keeping with the decorum of the theater.” The underdressed will not be allowed inside, according to its policy, which is also printed on tickets, nor will they be reimbursed. - The New...

It’s not great: Subscriptions are down 36 percent. But “complicating things for a number of NSO supporters … is the energy surrounding the orchestra itself, which remains infectiously high, ascendant and alive with promise, especially following last season’s extension of music director Gianandrea Noseda’s contract.” - Washington Post (MSN)

Musicians dealing not only with tiny streaming payments but now software-created “musicians” that steal even that limited option say they need some legal support. - CBC

The tale is a wild, sad one, and what’s at fault? The California’s public employees’ retirement system. - San Francisco Chronicle

A decade ago, an employee stole 25 priceless documents from the Netherlands’ National Archives in the Hague. The trove included 16th-century records of clandestine government affairs, a 15th-century letter from a knight and documents from the Dutch East India Company. - Smithsonian

Shamim M. Momin is, most recently director of curatorial affairs at the Henry Art Gallery in Seattle and co-founder of Los Angeles Nomadic Division, succeeds Klaudio Rodriguez, who left his executive director post last August. - The New York Times

Created to house the museum’s permanent art collection, the David Geffen Galleries increase the total museum space from 130,000 square feet to 220,000 square feet. - Los Angeles Magazine

Sure, why not just take that fragile tapestry to the south coast and “reserve at least 1,066 tickets to the exhibition for people from Hastings.” - The Guardian (UK)

“When you have surgery to look like your best self as shown on a flat screen, the results in three-dimensional reality can be very odd indeed.” - The Guardian (UK)

 I wondered what it meant if the Greek water jar I had been so moved by, depicting a woman who may have been Sappho bent over a scroll, had in fact been a worthless copy. Did that make the experience any less real? - The Guardian

Creative professionals have long found themselves amid an existential crisis in a market where profits are slim and the vast majority of them will not make a living wage solely from their art. Those matters have become exacerbated tenfold by the speedy implementation of generative-AI technology within their spaces. - Paste

“I want to balance being a ‘ha-ha funny’ TikToker with academic credibility. It’s a little hard to strike that balance when you are talking about ‘Skibidi Toilet’ on the internet.” - The New York Times

Authors love to write, and some choose Beehiiv, Ghost, Buttondown and other alternatives to converse with a similarly word-obsessed public. Here are a few of the best. - The Guardian (UK)

Upon reading The Bell, she says, "I realised that a novel, if perfectly executed, could be about absolutely anything.” - The Guardian (UK)

“Penguin, publisher of The Salt Path, is delaying author Raynor Winn’s next book after reporting cast doubt over the truth of the 2018 memoir. The decision was taken to 'support the author.’” - The Guardian (UK)

“Perhaps the best way to understand Tingle’s career plot twist is as part of a trend in horror fiction that speaks to contemporary identity issues.” - Slate

These shows, and actors, may find out tomorrow at the Emmy nominations. - Los Angeles Times (Yahoo)

And Superman himself is hardly an icon of liberal values. Instead, he’s a white dude from Kansas struggling to make it, hiding who he is to survive. - Los Angeles Times (MSN)

Cow (as the cow character is known) “has become Mario Kart World’s breakout star, validated by her leading role in popular videos on Instagram and TikTok.” - The New York Times

Why in the entire heck did no one previously think of adding a dog? - The New York Times

Well, why not? “Every movie is a new chance for a popcorn bucket artist to shine.” - NPR

“Amid the streaming deluge, there are signs — small, tenuous and anecdotal, but real — of a rebellion.” - The New York Times

The issue with “turf toe” (a ligament stress, or tear) was ending careers - until a coach visited the New Zealand Ballet and asked pointed questions. - New Zealand Herald (Internet Archive)

“Because the policies that do exist vary so widely, dancers can be impacted in different ways depending on which company they’re a part of; whether they’re freelancers or full-time; and, in some cases, what their role is within the company.” - Elle

“Until recently, that audience lavished attention mostly on prestigious foreign companies that tour Japan regularly, such as the Paris Opera Ballet and the Royal Ballet. The country has struggled to build world-class companies and hold on to the top talent it trains. The National Ballet of Japan wants to change that.” - Financial Times

"Today’s young adults have also been through the Covid shutdown, and they’re starting their careers at a time of huge financial uncertainty." - ArtsATL

With an advanced acoustical system, plenty of fiber-optic cable, responsive lighting, spatialized audio capabilities, virtual/augmented reality infrastructure, and a trippy immersive exhibition called “Dancing the Algorithm” in its gallery, the theater should be thrilling visitors at its opening this week. - The New York Times

“Some 14,000 state-run schools in Kerala have been asked to organise daily Zumba sessions as part of an anti-drug campaign launched by the government last month. The decision has been bitterly opposed by some Hindu and Muslim organisations in the state, who say the dance is a form of ‘cultural invasion’.” - BBC

“Gale didn’t coin the term ‘think global, act local,’ but that’s what Sodality does: Gale’s stories imagine an anti-capitalist vision of ‘sodality’ that could extend across the world, if only women were in charge.” - LitHub

The venerated, invaluable theatre incubator is facing, like so many performance-related sites, money trouble. - The New York Times

Days over 100°F are no longer rare, with serious effects on audiences and workers. … Recent changes include eliminating performances between 2:00 and 5:00 p.m., the hottest hours, … (and) a new rule for international artists: If you’re coming from overseas, you must have other touring dates in Europe. - The New York Times

"We, in the nonprofit theater world, rely on a model that is really not working for anybody. It wasn’t working before the pandemic. The warning signs were there. Nonprofit theater relies on subscribers and grants to invest in a season before it opens." - KQED

The 1879 play Vera; or, The Nihilists is about a young woman and her band of radicals who plan to kill the tsar. Its 1881 London premiere was cancelled after Tsar Alexander II was actually assassinated, and the play has been neglected ever since. - The Guardian

Richard Thompson, who joined the playhouse in January 2023, has been a mainstay of Twin Cities theater for decades, including directing shows at the Children’s Theatre Company and Penumbra Theatre. - The Star-Tribune (MSN)

He managed the Paul Taylor Dance Company and Meredith Monk, and he produced modern dance festivals in New York, but “it was as the director of American Dance Festival that Mr. Reinhart had an outlet commensurate with his ambitions.” - The New York Times

“From the beginning, the Earth Room drew pilgrims, like the woman who visited a few decades ago and would stand silently for a bit and then start to laugh. Or the pre-med student who changed her major to soil studies after her first visit.” - The New York Times

The former Monty Python star: “I’ve had a green card for about 28 years. I’d be proud to be thrown out because I’d be in very select company. The last English comedian to be thrown out of America for political reasons was Charlie Chaplin.” - The Guardian (UK)

Some clay pipe fragments dug up from his backyard garden in Stratford-upon-Avon and dating from the time he lived there were found to contain cannabis residue. Okay, technically this evidence is circumstantial: there’s no proof that Shakespeare himself left those pipes there. (Maybe they were planted by the Earl of Oxford.) - Literary Hub

Martin, an adventurous independent publisher who brought out the raucous work of the poet Charles Bukowski, as well as the writing of other offbeat literary rebels like Paul Bowles, John Fante and Wyndham Lewis, died on June 23 at his home in Santa Rosa, Calif. - The New York Times

“Pat was seventy-four and knew she was about to die. ... I was trapped in her world with her, trembling. She had weeks left to live and had spent so much time writing about how to get away with murder. I fantasized that she might try to kill me.” - The Yale Review