thinking thursday.
MIND
I have long been interested in disappearing languages, and language in general. This man’s work fascinates me: “‘The concept behind this project was to take those qualities—to take the inflections and use those as the basis of music,’ James says. ‘Rather than most music is based on physics-how many divisions of a second can you make, and how do you count that time. And it’s regular, that time is regular you beat out a beat, you keep that beat, you can make it a little faster, a little slower. But when we speak, the inflection is much more fluid. And the same is true of the melodic aspects of a lot of language, in terms of how much register they cover.'”
Language matters in other ways, too. How are we using language now? David Brooks explores that in “What Our Words Tell Us,” tracking the use of words and what those changes might mean: “People see patterns they already believe in. Maybe I’ve done that here. But these gradual shifts in language reflect tectonic shifts in culture. We write less about community bonds and obligations because they’re less central to our lives.”
William Gaddis was a brilliant American novelist. Brilliant, I tell you. And I love this short piece about the recent publication of his letters.BODY
Dudes and dudettes, we need to play more to reduce our anxiety. We need to stop rejecting any form of non-productivity: “The real problem had been my state of mind. I’d become increasingly adept at rejecting any form of “non-productivity.” I couldn’t allow any form of play if it didn’t contribute to earning money or doing something “meaningful.” Even when I was with friends or doing something that was supposed to be fun, I couldn’t stop thinking about all the time I was wasting. I wasn’t being productive; I was losing valuable time. I had to get back to work!”
Misandry and not: “Unfortunately, the reason that ‘fem’ is a part of the word ‘feminism’ is that the world is not, currently, an equal, safe, and just place for women (and other groups as well—in its idealized form, intersectional feminism seeks to correct all those imbalances). To remove the gendered implications of the term is to deny that those imbalances exist, and you can’t make problems disappear just by changing ‘feminism’ to ‘humanism’ and declaring the world healed. That won’t work.”
22 ways to get your vegan snack attack on. Oh yes.Great question: Where are all the people with disabilities in the body positive campaigns that are proliferating?: “In the popular media, so-called ‘body positivity’ campaigns leave out disability to a remarkable extent. The body about which we are supposed to feel positive is nearly always the able body. That body might be fat or thin, white or black, Hispanic or Asian, tall or short, rich or poor, but it is almost always able.” Or, as my friends with disabilities like to call it, “temporarily able-bodied.”
10 more uncluttering things to do.
SOUL
These lost photographs of a segregated world are soul-stirring.
WORD
“It’s the friends you can call up at 4 a.m. that matter.” -Marlene Dietrich
(photo of peony taken with my iPhone in our back yard)
