Bbenzon
Description
Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. Intellectually, I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
MY BLOGS
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New Savanna
http://new-savanna.blogspot.com/
Humankind got its start on the African savannas some hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of years ago. At various times in our cultural history we’ve moved to distinctly new cultural ground, as it were. And so we are moving now, and have been for the past half century. This blog is how I see that move. I'm broadly interested in culture and the brain. Within that compass, anything could show up here. Literature and films (including animation), certainly, music as well, and graffiti. But, other things may show up as well. It's a blog, don't you know, it moves.
LATEST ARTICLES ( 7812 )
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Theme and Variations, but Not a Bérubé
Posted on 12 October 2016
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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Jamie’s Investigations, Part 4: Concentrics, Letters, and the Problem of...
Figure 1: Concentrics Let’s look at two closely related sets of sheets. One of them consists of concentric circles that have been colored-in, almost target... Read more
Posted on 11 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Across Cultures, Bodily Integrity is More Valued Than Civil Liberties
Wade M. Cole, Human Rights and the Individual: Cross-Cultural Variation in Human Rights Scores, 1980 to 2010, Social Forces (2016) doi: 10. Read more
Posted on 11 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Jamie’s Investigations, Part 3: Towers of Color
Example 1 Here’s what Michael says about these sheets: I originally wanted Life as Jamie Knows It to include, between chapters, samples of these towers, but... Read more
Posted on 10 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Jamie’s Investigations, Part 2: On Discovering Jamie’s Principle
To be honest, I was feeling pretty good after my first post in this series, Jamie’s Investigations, Part 1: Emergence, for it seemed to me that I’d pulled a... Read more
Posted on 09 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Why I Am Not a Semiotician, Some Crude Notes
I was exposed to semiotics early in my undergraduate years at Johns Hopkins (where, of course, Pierce once held an academic post). Read more
Posted on 09 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
On Learning to “Read” a Text – But What’s Next?
From my notes, an out-take from Signposts for a Naturalist Criticism, which I've edited a bit. When Moretti talks of “distant reading” he is using “reading” in ... Read more
Posted on 07 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Friday Fotos: Epiphany on the Hudson
Posted on 07 October 2016
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
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Demographic Anxiety is Not Racism
From Tyler Cowen's interview with Ezra Klein: COWEN: Absolutely. Now Putman, let me ask you about Putnam, and how Putnam relates to Donald Trump. Read more
Posted on 06 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Jamie’s Investigations, Part 1: Emergence
Example 1: Overall This is the first in a series of posts about the art of Jamie Bérubé, who has Down syndrome. He is the son of Michael Bérubé, who has just... Read more
Posted on 06 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Japanese Innovation on Steroids: Robot Babies
In The Guardian: A baby robot designed to “invoke an emotional connection” has been unveiled in Japan, where plummeting birth rates have left many couples... Read more
Posted on 05 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Notes on the Unreality of Fictional Characters
Another working paper is online. Title above, downloads, abstract, contents, and introduction below. Academia.edu:... Read more
Posted on 05 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Space, Our Destination, to Boldly Go...
Freeman Dyson reviews three books about space travel: The Green Universe: A Vision (NY Rev of books). He opens with a story about what he'll come to call... Read more
Posted on 04 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Consult the Text, the Varieties of Criticism: Remarks from a Dialogue Between...
Zhang Jiang and J. Hillis Miller, Exchange of Letters About Literary Theory Between Zhang Jiang and J. Hillis Miller, Comparative Literature Studies, Vol. 53,... Read more
Posted on 04 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Deconstruction, as American as Apple Pie
Gregory Jones-Katz in The Boston Review: If one had to pinpoint ground zero for the eruption of deconstruction onto the American stage, it would have to be Yale... Read more
Posted on 04 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Shedding Light on Those MacArthur "Genius" Grants
Writing in 3:AM Magazine, Steve Light has much the same view on the MacArthur Foundations "Big Mac" awards that I do: of macarthur grants, regimes of... Read more
Posted on 03 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Theory of Literature and Theory of Criticism, Now Distinctly Different?
One of the things that happened during the 1970s and 1980s is that the distinction between the theory of criticism and the theory of literature collapsed and... Read more
Posted on 03 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Jonathan Culler on Literary Criticism at Harvard in the 1960s and Other Things
One of my interests here at New Savanna is the emergence of interpretation as the centerpiece of academic literary criticism. To that end I’ve quoted J. Read more
Posted on 03 October 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Hunting the Wild Myth, Cultural Phylogeny
Julien d'Huy, Scientists Trace Society’s Myths to Primordial Origins, Scientific American, 29 September 2016; here's the opening: The Greek version of a familia... Read more
Posted on 30 September 2016 CULTURE, PHILOSOPHY, SOCIETY -
Friday Fotos: Naked Tree, Down by the River
Posted on 30 September 2016
CULTURE,
PHILOSOPHY,
SOCIETY
