What We Lose When Philanthropy Becomes Bureaucratic And Safe
Over the past several decades, philanthropy has become much more bureaucratic: if you want a grant from one of these well-endowed foundations, you have...
The Idea Of Freedom Has A Long And Fraught History
"Freedom is neither a fixed idea nor a story of progress toward a predetermined goal. The history of American freedom is a tale of...
What Social Science Says About The Value Of Diversity
Whatever the fate of modern DEI programs in corporate America, diversity of experience, thought, and ideology is a meritorious goal for a company to pursue....
“Pragmatics,” The Linguists’ Term For The Words That Make Chatbots Sound Human
You may not recognize the term, but you use pragmatics all the time; we all do. John McWhorter explains what exactly they are, and...
The Flood Of AI Slop Online May Make People Turn Back To Established Media...
“Even as the subjects reported trusting online content less after the quiz, they still ranked (Süddeutsche Zeitung, Germany’s largest circulation broadsheet daily) highly and...
Once Again, Trump Orders That All Federal Buildings Be In “Classical And Traditional” Style
The executive order is titled “Making Federal Architecture Beautiful Again.” - The Washington Post (Yahoo!)
Rodion Shchedrin, Soviet Union’s Last Prominent Composer, Is Dead At 92
He and his wife, the Bolshoi ballerina Maya Plisetskaya, were high culture’s power couple in the late Soviet era; his works were staples of...
Atlanta Journal-Constitution Will End Its Print Edition
The Deep South’s largest daily is going digital-only and will print its last hard-copy newspaper in December 31, ending a run which began in...
Vermont’s Public TV/Radio Network Cuts 14% Of Its Staff
“The move follows last month’s congressional rescission of more than $1 billion in federal public media funding. Vermont Public CEO Vijay Singh said the...
Conductor Klaus Mäkelä Will Step Down From Oslo Philharmonic One Year Early
The busy 29-year-old maestro, soon to start music directorships at both the Chicago Symphony and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam, will relinquish the...
Bryan Singer Has Secretly Made A Movie About Israel’s Occupation Of Lebanon
The sometime-director of blockbusters hasn’t worked in Hollywood since getting fired from Bohemian Rhapsody in 2017. He moved to Israel several years ago and...
The Most Enduring Tune In History?
Why did this humble tune, first conjured by medieval farmers, capture so many people’s imaginations and even feature in The Addams Family? - BBC
“Enslurrification” — How Culture At Large Is Melting Together Into “One Half-Resolved Substance”
Ben Davis: “In the non-metaphorical world, slurry means an unresolved mix of liquid and solid. …. The word comes to mind with this very...
Hope For AI: Consciousness Across Generations
Might the relationship between humanity and artificial intelligence follow a similar logic—a hope of consciousness helping consciousness across generations? Perhaps the best thing that...
Steep Drop In International Students At US Colleges This Fall
Arizona State University reported a fall semester decline for the first time since 2020. Declines have been announced at universities in Texas, Missouri and Illinois. The state of Massachusetts is expecting about 10,000...
Compared To AI, CliffsNotes Look Pretty Good, Says Professor
“CliffsNotes for students who struggle to get through Brontë, Woolf, or Shakespeare seem laughably analog in the time of ChatGPT, but CliffsNotes offer genuine...
Museums Are Under Fire. Remaining Silent Is Not An Option
Museums serving audiences of color are becoming targets of immigration agents. Amid these changes, the voices of some directors and curators seem to have...
Trump Brings The Culture Wars To Museums And Parks
Those supporting Trump’s actions say they will restore national pride, but critics in the arts and parks, as well as a number of Democrats,...
He Bought Sotheby’s. Trouble Followed
For those caught up in the experiment, it has been torrid in the extreme. Since 2019, hundreds of employees have left Sotheby’s—up to a...
Joe Hickerson, A Key Figure In The Preservation Of American Folk Song, Is Dead...
“At the height of folk revival, Hickerson began what became more than a quarter-century tenure at the Library of Congress in 1963, swiftly establishing...
The Poet With An Inadvertently Brilliant Legacy Strategy
Unlike his contemporary and admirer T.S. Eliot, he didn’t see history as ending “with a whimper” but rather with a long, subsiding, pleasurable sigh...
Guess What? You Don’t Really Own That Movie You Just Bought
The problem is that you aren’t downloading the movie, to own and watch forever; you’re just getting access to it on Amazon’s servers –...
Netflix’s Algorithms Have Changed What We’re Watching
Algorithm movies usually exhibit easy-to-follow story beats that leave no viewer behind; under this regime, exposition is no longer a screenwriting faux pas. -...
Author Of John Williams Bio Clarifies That No, Williams Does Not Actually Dislike Film...
Tim Greiving: “As the recipient of those quotes, I want to try and clear it up. … It’s true that he said to me,...
Old Master Portrait Looted By Nazis Spotted In Real Estate Ad, Then Disappears
Portrait of a Lady, by Baroque artist Giuseppe Ghislandi, was part of the trove of works belonging to Amsterdam art dealer Jacques Goudstikker which...
