Researchers in Budapest using fMRI machines found very different activity in different parts of the brain when dogs heard Spanish, Hungarian, and nonsense words. This is the first study in which such an ability has been found in a non-primate species. - CNN
OK, let’s just says awards season actually starts now. The SAG Awards nominations, voted on by two panels of 2,500 randomly selected SAG-AFTRA members (one for film, another for TV), offer a reliable indication of how the Oscar acting races will take shape. - Los Angeles Times
The decorative cement tiles were used in most residential buildings that went up from the late 19th-century construction boom to 1950, and they became a Barcelona trademark. But as those buildings are remade into luxury apartments, the tiles go into dumpsters — whence Joan Moliner rescues them. - The Guardian
Names like Dwayne Johnson believed to be among those on their wish list. Popular former hosts such as Chris Rock also have been approached we hear though securing someone is proving challenging during the pandemic. - Deadline
The work, titled Thaw and conceived by physical theatre company Legs on the Wall and Alaskan composer Matthew Burtner, "features an acrobatic performer balancing, grasping and watching her frozen home melt away." (Yes, it's about climate change.) - The Sydney Morning Herald
The gap between global challenges and responses is large and growing. And the resources needed to turn things around – especially collective will and skillful diplomacy – are in short supply. - Project Syndicate
"Those struggles can be seen in water-stained walls, amid the brick piles of a bulldozed neighborhood or on the tattered carnival tents of The Humans, West Side Story and Nightmare Alley. We spoke to the production designers of those movies about (those) solemn, living backdrops." - The New York Times
The idea of artworks as portals to other worlds dates back several centuries, and it has become a commonplace way of talking about our experiences with art. - Psyche
The audio-based social media app has been dissed by First Worlders as a glorified telephone and outflanked by Twitter and Facebook adding audio. But in South Asia, groups are gathering on Clubhouse to do things like chanting a classic Sanskrit hymn and reciting Urdu verse. - Rest of World
Starting in the "Freedom Summer" of 1964, impromptu libraries (the majority in Mississippi) using donated materials opened up at homes and churches, providing places where Black patrons could read and browse, things they weren't allowed to do in public libraries. - JSTOR Daily
"By making the mistake, no matter how well-intentioned, of chaining works of art to politics or demanding that they address issues of social justice, we have 'failed to account for their free-standing value.'" - The New York Times
To put it succinctly, she's responsible for "turning ENB from a respected but unexciting touring company into a news-making organisation." - The Guardian
It was an even uglier, more dishonest project than some of us had realized. (At least Elgin was heavily criticized for it at the time, even within Britain.) - Smithsonian Magazine
For four years, ever since his conviction in a case many think was trumped-up, he's been directing theater in Europe via teleconference. Last week he arrived in Hamburg to finish work in person on his staging of Chekhov's Black Monk. (But will Russia let him come home?) - Deutsche Welle
The Grapevine Gathering in the Hunter Valley wine region and Unity Forever on the coast southeast of Melbourne have been called off, as have the touring punk festival Full Tilt's dates in Adelaide and Brisbane. Promoters have begged the federal government for a COVID cancellation insurance plan. - The Guardian
