{"id":2073,"date":"2013-01-17T07:59:37","date_gmt":"2013-01-17T12:59:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/?p=2073"},"modified":"2013-01-17T12:20:01","modified_gmt":"2013-01-17T17:20:01","slug":"the-curse-of-the-generic-topic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/artfulmanager\/main\/the-curse-of-the-generic-topic.php","title":{"rendered":"The Curse of the Generic Topic"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Brown<\/a>

SOURCE: Flickr user TheBeachSaint<\/p><\/div>\n

You may have noticed (or may not have, which is cool) that I’ve been away from blogging for a rather long while. And when I WAS blogging, the posts were few and far between. Part of that gap, I’ve come to recognize, was because my brain is still moving. My body and my business location moved five months ago to Washington, DC, and American University. My brain is still moving, thanks to my new environment, my fantastic new faculty colleagues here at AU, and my deep dive into tenure-worthy research. Pardon the dust.<\/p>\n

But here, I think, is where my brain is moving: through the generic and into the specific. I’m increasingly discovering that, for me, generic topics about the business of arts and culture aren’t particularly productive. Generic topics generate lots of noise, but not much signal. Lots of heat, but not much light.<\/p>\n

For example, here are a few generic subjects that I will work very hard NOT to discuss in generic terms in 2013:<\/p>\n