Arlene Goldbard

The French have a saying I love: even a broken clock is right twice a day. Our court system is broken in so many ways, perhaps chiefly owing to judicial appointments’ use as political tools. But even so, sometimes they get it right and those times are worth noting with appreciation. Here are two of [...]

I’ve been chewing on a thought for days: that nearly all the violence in our society is grounded in the perpetrators’ felt sense of powerlessness.
This speaks to an existential paradox: although our days are filled with choices and decisions, in an ultimate sense we are at the mercy of forces far larger than ourselves, [...]

The last six months have been some of the most interesting of my life as a writer and speaker. Since New Creative Community was published in November, I’ve been visiting conferences and campuses, giving talks and workshops to artists, activists, funders, policy-makers and students. I’ve met hundreds of people, seen all kinds of work, had [...]

I’m in Appalachia, watching snow fall on daffodil buds and the new green leaves of day lilies that will bloom, I am told, on the first day of summer. Once again, I’m working with the Thousand Kites project, artists and activists using theater, film and computer media to surface the emerging story of our nation’s [...]

This morning’s New York Times reports protests from members of Congress over the FBI’s repeated abuses of the Patriot Act to spy illegally on citizens. Glenn A. Fine, the inspector general of the Justice Department, reported that the use of “national security letters,” authorizing warrentless spying, had escalated:
There were 8,500 in 2000, the year before [...]

What does it take to heal social trauma?
Like a lot of Jews of her generation, my maternal grandmother (may she rest in peace) was so repelled by all things German that she refused even to ride in a Volkswagen. She’d emigrated to this country long before World War II, but when that war was over, [...]

More and more, the things I care about seem to turn on a single question: can we human beings choose our actions, or are we in some very real sense controlled by other forces (whether our own brain chemicals or the commands of those in authority)?
The oft-cited behavorial studies of Stanley Milgram in the [...]

This week I dug out the light box I bought when we lived in Seattle, where darkness falls before 4 pm each day and persists till nearly 9 in the morning. The box generates an intense light that helps overcome the malaise some people experience in the season of darkness. For some reason, even though [...]

“Man was born free,” wrote Jean-Jacques Rousseau 250 years ago, “and he is everywhere in chains.”
As Thanksgiving approaches, Rousseau’s words have been cycling through my mind. I am thankful for the tremendous freedom of movement, association and speech I have as a citizen of this country (even as I join others in fighting to [...]

In 1963, when I was a junior in high school, the late, great Nina Simone released a powerfully angry song called “Mississippi Goddam.” “The name of this tune is Mississippi Goddam,” the song began, “And I mean every word of it.”
Here’s the last stanza:
You don’t have to live next to me
Just give me my [...]