I gave a couple of talks in a distant city a few weeks ago, one on each day of a two-day conference. That entailed being introduced several times, first as Goldfarb, then Goldberg. Everyone whose heritage diverges from this country’s uncannily persistent normative WASP-philia collides with prejudice on a regular basis. The garbling of my …
One key trope of sixties activism was “heightening the contradictions.” According to this concept, when social contradictions (such as huge accumulations of wealth in the midst of crippling poverty) became extreme enough, people would get fed up and revolt. I thought of this a couple of weeks ago as I had dinner with a young …
Almost all of what we have to say about nature is actually about culture. Trees in the wild are nature, but human beings’ relation to those trees is an artifact of culture as surely as a painting or a piece of music. That relationship varies greatly depending on place, time, systems of belief and symbology, …
I’ve become so addicted to podcasts that I feel antsy if I’m not caught up with my favorite ones. Currently, though, I have the opposite problem: WNYC’s Radio Lab, cohosted and coproduced by Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich, only has five episodes a year. It takes me a few short walks to listen to five …
We’re entering that time of the Jewish new year, the High Holy Days, when each person makes a cheshbon hanefesh—a “soul inventory”—in preparation for a new cycle of the calendar. Sometimes I feel that people are influenced by this period of reflection even if they aren’t aware of it. For instance, this fall, like the …
This coming Sunday there will be a huge “Summer of Love” 40th anniversary concert in Golden Gate Park, featuring everybody from Moby Grape to Jesse Colin Young (“C’mon people, now smile on your brother, everybody get together, try to love one another right now”). I was there for the first summer of love, although I …
I have a well-established habit of greeting passers-by. When I take my walk by the Bay, I like to smile or say hi to everyone I pass. I feel good when people cooperate. I sense a local lightening of the atmosphere, an infinitesimal exchange of positive energy. When people stare straight ahead or keep their …
The trip to London from which I’ve just returned was the first time I had visited that country since 1987, twenty years. I’d seen some of my English friends at international meetings or on visits to the U.S., but until this month, we hadn’t sat together for long, convivial chats, taking stock. I learned a …
Did you miss me? I missed you: I’ve been traveling pretty much nonstop since the beginning of July, and am glad to be home (in body at least—my spirit needs to complete the journey through nine time zones). I had speaking engagements in Barcelona and London, and in between, vast conversations about culture and politics. …
When the unknowable future unfolds (since it is unknowable, we may as well expect the Great Awakening as the Great Slumber), someone, sometime might ask you this: “How clueless were you guys back then, anyway?” You can tell that person: “This clueless,” and pull out the New York Times‘ report this week on the great …