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☐ ☆ ✇ The Scholarly Kitchen

Off for the US Holiday — More Grammar

By: David Crotty — July 3rd 2023 at 09:30

We are off today and tomorrow for the US Independence Day holiday. Also included, a song that hews carefully to archaic rules about prepositions at the end of sentences.

The post Off for the US Holiday — More Grammar appeared first on The Scholarly Kitchen.

☐ ☆ ✇ The New Yorker

The Ever-Radiant Ayodele Casel

— April 7th 2023 at 10:00
For City Center’s “Artists at the Center” series, the tap dancer has programmed several short works and an extended version of her 2021 piece “Where We Dwell.”
☐ ☆ ✇ ECOLOGY WITHOUT NATURE

How Wham! Made Us Ecstatic

By: Timothy Morton — March 25th 2023 at 14:33

My Jamaican stepdad Maurice was a reason why the 1990s did not cause implode. So was a little tablet called MDMA. What's good enough for PTSD soldiers in the US army is good enough for me, says I.

1983. I'm painting in the art room at school. My paintings have DO NOT DISTURB scrawled on the back in deliberately insane looking script. 

1983. So George Michael returned from DJ Alfredo's Amnesnia in Ibiza and wrote this perfect ad for MDMA. 

Club Tropicana drinks are frEeeeeeeeeee....

First rule of advertising: you sell the user to the product. Never say "MDMA is great." Pump that shit through something familiar. 

Michael had an almost frightening genius for writing lyrics that were perfectly ordinary sentences: 

Club Tropicana, drinks are free, fun and sunshine, there's enough for everyone. All that's missing is the sea, but don't worry: you can suntan. 

All that's missing is the sea: this is an artificial paradise, not just an inland club, but something you swallow. Pack your bags...don't miss the flight: swallow the capsule. The birds and crickets on a loop at the start...the crescendo like coming up on E.

"Let me take you to the place ... where strangers take you by the hand," says MDMA, destroying two decades of Roger Waters-induced Meddle misery ("Strangers passing in the street...Do I take you by the hand...")

But don't worry, you'll feel like your birthright as a lifeform is being given the best massage. The birds and crickets on a loop at the start...

Let me take you to the place / Where membership's a smiling face / Brush shoulders with the stars. Yeah, those stars. 

The song has a perfect surface of "Rapper's Delight" fused with tropical Latinx-ness multiplied by the four to the floor of techno hidden beneatrh the Ibizan jollity. And ends with the mystic cool of Yoruba philosophy that every American has deliberately or accidentally downloaded. 

Freakin love this tune. 



☐ ☆ ✇ FIT IS A FEMINIST ISSUE

Renaissance Dancing for Fun and Fitness

By: Dianeharper — March 23rd 2023 at 18:00
Last weekend I went to an event sponsored by a local medieval club and found myself sucked into the rabbit hole of dancing. I’m usually too busy in the kitchen or working on crafts to think about dancing, but this time it was a small event, I had plenty of time, and someone was teaching… Continue reading Renaissance Dancing for Fun and Fitness
☐ ☆ ✇ NYT > Education

Why Is TikTok Being Banned?

By: Sapna Maheshwari and Amanda Holpuch — March 3rd 2023 at 15:17
Governments have expressed concerns that TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, may endanger sensitive user data.
☐ ☆ ✇ The New Yorker

Spring Dance Preview

By: Marina Harss — March 3rd 2023 at 11:00
Alexei Ratmansky’s sea-adventure ballet for New York City Ballet, new works for Kyle Abraham’s A.I.M, Martha Graham Dance Company, and more.
☐ ☆ ✇ Boing Boing

Less whaling means less whale wailing

By: Thom Dunn — February 19th 2023 at 09:37

A new study published in the journal Nature Communications Biology suggests that whale songs may actually just be nature's emo croon. Using an 18-year dataset of humpback whale behavior, the researchers noticed that whale song had become an increasingly less successful mating tactic for the male humps as populations have recovered from the height whaling. — Read the rest

☐ ☆ ✇ Salon.com

"Magic Mike’s Last Dance" is a film about female desire that never fully grasps "what women want"

By: Katy Pilcher — February 18th 2023 at 17:59
A researcher on male strip shows and women customers analyzes what's missing from Channing Tatum's latest gyration

☐ ☆ ✇ NYT - Education

Auburn Banned TikTok, and Students Can’t Stop Talking About It

By: Sapna Maheshwari — January 21st 2023 at 07:05
The school’s prohibition brings a geopolitical fight front and center for TikTok’s biggest fans: young Americans.

Ansley Franco, a senior at Auburn, said TikTok was a key way for Greek organizations on college campuses to promote themselves.
☐ ☆ ✇ Salon.com

"Slow" director on creating an intimate, asexual romance: "We wanted this film to be very corporeal"

By: Gary M. Kramer — January 21st 2023 at 19:59
A dancer begins a relationship with a sign-language interpreter in this Sundance film that rethinks expectations

☐ ☆ ✇ Salon.com

"It is a civil war": "Heroic" director on how the Mexican military makes ordinary men into killers

By: Gary M. Kramer — January 20th 2023 at 16:30
David Zonana's latest film is an indictment on the power imblance that forces Mexican men to turn on their own

☐ ☆ ✇ Salon.com

From "Cat Person" to "Little Richard," here are 12 Sundance Film Festival titles to watch online

By: Gary M. Kramer — January 19th 2023 at 19:57
Biopics, docs, thrillers and more – over 75 feature films are available to check out from home

☐ ☆ ✇ NYT > Education

Auburn Banned TikTok, and Students Can’t Stop Talking About It

By: Sapna Maheshwari — January 15th 2023 at 10:00
The school’s prohibition brings a geopolitical fight front and center for TikTok’s biggest fans: young Americans.
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