ArtsJournal: Arts, Culture, Ideas

ISSUES

What Taylor Swift Studies Teach; Madonna Studies Were First

Humanities professors, for their part, have already begun enlisting Swift as a silent partner. The organizer for the first international academic “Swiftposium,” to be held in February with the backing of seven Australian and New Zealand universities, began as a “half-serious tweet.” - LA Review of Books

France’s New Culture Minister Is A Combative, Controversial Conservative From The Sarkozy Days

"'Everyone knows I like fighting. Don’t be afraid of me,' Rachida Dati announced upon her arrival to the ministry. … She is known for her sleek style and forthright, no-nonsense approach, having returned to work just five days after her first child and, reportedly, declared that maternity leave is for 'wimps.'" - Artnet

Magic Bullet Syndrome: These Kinds Of Solutions Don’t Exist

If a magic bullet was truly effective in solving this problem, there would be no need for many different proposed solutions. But today, that is precisely what we have: many explanations for what has caused the problem and many prescriptions for bringing audiences to live events. - Nightingale Sonata

Trust In Universities Is Plummeting. There Are Good Reasons For That

The most recent debacle at Harvard, in which large swaths of academia seem to have conveniently forgotten what the term plagiarism means so they don’t have to admit that Claudine Gay engaged in it, is only the latest example of the lying that is endemic on campus. - The Atlantic

People, Including University Presidents, Shouldn’t Get Fired For Making Explicit Videos In Their Free Time

Conor Friedersdorf on the fired University of Wisconsin-LaCross president: "First Amendment law can tell us only so much. How should Gow’s superiors have responded to this exhibitionist sexagenarian’s pornography? They should simply ignore it." - The Atlantic

The ‘Ghoulish’ And ‘Creepy’ Fake George Carlin Special

"Ahead of the special, a voice calling itself 'Dudesy the comedian AI' tells viewers that what they are about to hear is not Carlin, but instead, an impression." Carlin's family is not impressed. - CBC

Marvel Introduces Two Indigenous Female Characters, And There’s An Immediate Backlash

A Marvel critic "called the two characters 'repetitive' because both are of Native American descent and have similar powers" - you know, just as a critic would worry when Marvel introduced two white male superheroes. - Los Angeles Times

Bill O’Reilly Apoplectic At His Own Books Being On A Removal List In Florida Schools

The former FOX News host who hard-core supported this very book censorship legislation wrote on X/Twitter, "Things are getting crazy with book banning in #Florida." - Yahoo News (Salon)

Indiana University Cancels An 87-Year-Old Artist’s Retrospective

Why cancel Yale School of Art professor Samia Halaby's show? Well, she's Palestinian, and she's vocal in her support of the Gazans under attack from Israel. If that isn't the reason, she wonders, "Why did they not speak up during the three long years of preparation?" - Hyperallergic

“Memorization” Could Force AI Companies To Rest And Start Over

Although it would set generative AI back in the short term, a responsible rebuild could also improve the technology’s standing in the eyes of many whose work has been used without permission, and who hear the promise of AI that “benefits all of humanity” as mere self-serving cant. - The Atlantic

Why McGill University Is Contemplating Leaving Quebec

The announcement, last October, that out-of-province students would see their annual tuition fees double comes on the heels of repeated government efforts to chip away at the English community’s long-standing academic institutions. - The Walrus

Officials Back Off Plan To Remove Statue Of William Penn From Site Of His House In Philadelphia

"Last Friday, the National Park Service (NPS) announced plans to remove the statue, as well as a model of Penn’s original home, from Welcome Park, ... located a few blocks from the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall. That decision was met with swift criticism, which eventually reached President Joe Biden." - Smithsonian Magazine

Algorithms Are Increasingly Choosing Our Culture. Here’s How They Fail

To build algorithms that more effectively predict user preferences and better enhance consumer well-being and social welfare, organizations need to employ ways to measure user preferences that take into account these biases. - Harvard Business Review

OpenAI, Deluged By Copyright Lawsuits, Says That Artificial Intelligence Would Be Impossible Without Copyrighted Material

"OpenAI, the organization behind ChatGPT and text-to-image generator DALL-E, … (told Britain's House of Lords that) 'limiting training data to public domain books and drawings created more than a century ago might yield an interesting experiment, but would not provide A.I. systems that meet the needs of today’s citizens.'" - Artnet

Thousands Of Berlin’s Arts Workers Protest City’s Decision To Require Arts Funding Recipients To Accept An Antisemitism Clause

The authors of a petition signed by more than 4,000 people "are concerned the addition of this clause as a prerequisite for funding will silence critics of the state of Israel and undermine freedom of expression." - Artnet

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