Are you as confused as I am about how to comprehend and respond to the current political moment? Many people seem certain, far more certain than I, but what I notice is that they are certain of opposite things. Indeed, the mood of antagonism and polarization that currently saturates the United States lends itself to …
“Something is happening here but you don’t know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?” Bob Dylan “The law of unintended consequences is never broken.” I thought I would find many citations when I googled this, but since I found none, I’ll attribute it to myself. Quite a few people I know have been expressing …
On May 25th, I joined a group of artists and activists at Bluestockings Cooperative Bookstore in Manhattan for a panel discussion entitled, “Sustaining Arts Labor: Past and Present,” organized by City Lore and Artists Alliance Inc., and sponsored by Creatives Rebuild New York (CRNY). This was one event in a years-long project of research, dialogue, …
I’d never heard the term “moral injury” until I read about it last week in a New York Times article about a crisis among doctors precipitated by the accelerating treatment of healthcare as a privilege rather than a right, a profit center rather than a social good. (This phenomenon rhymes with much I’ve written about …
I’m suspicious of nostalgia, even though I’m not immune to it. A glancing reference to the Sixties and I’m off on a magic carpet ride of reminiscence. Despite all of our youthful excesses and errors, I’m as imprinted with that era as a baby duck is with its mama. The flavor of nostalgia that especially …
If I hear one more person (however grudgingly) admire the Republicans’ “long game” and compliment them on masterminding a fifty-year strategy to overturn a longstanding consensus on rights, bodily autonomy, guns and more, I’ll scream. In fact, I’ve screamed already. It’s not that the U.S. Right doesn’t long for a Big Daddy and eagerly follow …
This is the text of a talk I gave on 8 April 2022 at the Community Built Association conference held at the Kaneko Foundation in Omaha, NE. I began by telling the assembled community-based artists and designers that I’d found it easier to react than to think during the last two years. My aim in …
NOTE: This post is to introduce you to the ninth episode of François Matarasso’s and my monthly podcast, “A Culture of Possibility.” It will be available on 17 September 2021. You can find it and all episodes at iTunes along with miaaw.net’s other podcasts by Owen Kelly, Sophie Hope, and many guests, focusing on cultural …
Since the start of the pandemic, calls for new public-service job programs have been thick on the ground. A lot of smart people felt it was a no-brainer to call government in to employ folks who were out of work, paying them to do things for the public good. If you google “new WPA,” you’ll …
NOTE: This post is to introduce you to the seventh episode of François Matarasso’s and my monthly podcast, “A Culture of Possibility.” It will be available on 16 July 2021. You can find it and all episodes at iTunes along with miaaw.net’s other podcasts by Owen Kelly, Sophie Hope, and many guests, focusing on cultural …