“[It] is a tool (like history and religious studies) for thinking about everything else, and every profession from law and medicine to motorcycle maintenance. It’s also one of the most competitive disciplines … [and is] institutionalized beyond academia in ways that history and literature are not, for example in bioethics programs.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
The Serial Killers Popular Culture Loves
“Now in its sixth season, Dexter has proved immensely popular and successful. Dexter is, however, not the first serial killer we have inexplicably found ourselves rooting for. We look back at some of TV and cinema’s ambiguous ‘heroes’.”
Don’t Romanticize Dexter, Says Novels’ Author
Jeff Lindsay, author of the novels that are the basis for the popular television series: “Some believe that Dexter cares about justice. Dexter doesn’t care about justice, he cares about killing. He’s attractive because he’s dangerous.”
Portland Art Museum Introduces A Very Pregnant Logo
PAM executive director Brian Ferriso determined that the museum needed to launch a major rebranding effort. So Ziba, a design firm that has worked with PAM on two recent exhibitions, created a new logo: a large, salmon-colored, filled-in letter P which the museum says looks like an Ellsworth Kelly painting. (Not everyone agrees.)
Jokes And Crisis – They Go Together
“Humor is not, as some believe, a coping strategy or an outlet for the frustrations that cannot be expressed in any other way … or at least it is not just that. At its best, it is the self-consciousness of crisis. Without changing anything in ‘objective’ reality, humor permits reality to laugh at itself, and in doing so, to stand outside of itself, to become other to itself.”
Five Things ‘Angry Birds’ Will Teach You About Life
“It isn’t just an addictive game, it’s an unexpected source of wisdom.”
A Cello Named ‘Carbon Baby’
Shauna Rolston has taken to touring with a shiny black cello made from carbon fiber. Carbon Baby can be banged around and dropped without damage, is impervious to humidity, and can be cleaned with Windex. Rolston and her colleagues insist that the instrument sounds at least as good as a traditional wooden cello.
Work Begins On New Home For Pennsylvania Ballet
“Two decades ago, the ballet company almost went out of business. It was drowning in debt and could no longer afford to keep its building at Broad and Washington, or maintain its own school.” This week the troupe broke ground “for a $17.5 million project that will feature five dance studios, offices, and facilities for a soon-to-return School of the Pennsylvania Ballet.”
British Equity Seeks Power To Go After Employers For Underpayment
“Equity is calling for the right to launch employment tribunal cases on behalf of members who have been underpaid, claiming individuals are too ‘afraid of damaging their employment prospects’ by taking action themselves.”
Theater And Horrifying Parents (A Beautiful Combo)
“There they go again, stealing the spotlight from their cowed and embittered progeny, the unforgivable but unforgettable monsters Mom and Dad. These Freudian demons have been showing up all over the place for ages, in recurring nightmares, best-selling memoirs and novels and, perhaps most deliciously, on the stage.”