Category: Uncategorized

Ron DeSantis banned AP African-American Studies. The President’s of Florida’s 28 state colleges announced they would not support “any institutional practice, policy or academic requirement that compels belief in critical race theory or related concepts such as intersectionality.” [Note: Taking a class on a topic does not compel belief. That’s not how education works. It … Continue ReadingDon’t say Race (in Florida schools)

On the morning of February 12 2013, I woke to the news that Pope Benedict XVI had retired. There hadn’t been a papal retirement in a few centuries, so reporters were rushing to wikipedia and the like and drawing analogies to Pope Gregory XII, the last to retire. But medievalists in my social media networks, especially the … Continue ReadingPope Benedict and the Middle Ages

The pitch from the publicist came by surprise, alerting me to a new book about pacifists and their struggles during WW2 and how resisting the “good war” shaped later efforts during the civil rights movement and the anti-Vietnam movement. “That’s my grandad,” I said, and quickly sent off a pitch to an editor at the … Continue ReadingOn Pacifism

In August 2021, the journalist Anne Applebaum, wrote an essay called “The New Puritans” about online speech. There are many things about the essay that are true! Online speech is complicated and many people behave really badly. And yet, I keep coming back to this thesis. After talking about repression in Turkey, Applebaum writes: In … Continue ReadingThe New Puritans

I’ve spent some of today trying to figure out whether, in fact, a Pennsylvania school district has banned the series Girls Who Code as was being widely reported. It seems that the book was banned in 2020-2021, the ban was reversed thanks to awesome local activism, but a new PEN AMERICA report on book banning … Continue ReadingBook Banning Works

I’ve been experiencing active symptoms of depression since 4th grade. I started getting them treated when I was 45. It’s been a terrible year, with the triggers directly linked to the beginning of the Fall 2021 semester (as I recovered from Covid, with some symptoms that lasted for months and had to go back to … Continue ReadingThe Depression Trap

Yesterday I took an electric leaf blower and blew out a layer of dead leaves, broken sticks, moldy mulch, and all the detritus of a too long winter out into the yards, then carted it away to the top of a hill and into the woods. It made way for us to plant flowers and … Continue ReadingPoem

Yesterday morning, I sat in my office at home and answered email, helped draft an essay, had a meeting with graduate students, and smelled cigarette smoke, as if someone in the next room had smoked perhaps an hour ago. I coughed, not because I had to cough, but because the smell of cigarettes tells me … Continue ReadingI guess I still have covid