RMWMTMBM Archive

When It’s Not Funny Anymore

A mere 37 days before leaving office, our Lame-Duck-in-Chief President Bush was all the news yesterday. During a press conference in Baghdad with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki, a Shiite Iraqi journalist (Muntadar al-Zeidi) stood up and threw one of his shoes– and then the other– at President Bush’s head, missing Bush by a hair…

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The M**ket

While just about everyone else is full of yuletide joy, this is a dreaded time of year for philosophers. It’s Job M**ket time. (The very word conveys so much Sturm und Drang that it feels like a profanity.) I imagine that this year is even more ulcer-inducing than years past because of the depressed economy…

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The “Public” Intellectual

Many of you probably read Daniel Drezner’s recent Chronicle of Higher Education article about the decline of public intellectuals (“Public Intellectual 2.0”), in which Drezner wants to contest the presumed Götterdämmerung that many–like Francis Fukuyama, Russell Jacoby and Daniel Bell— believe began in the 1950’s and has yet to abate. Specifically, Drezner takes to task…

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Memphis! We Got It!

A friend of a friend who is a student at MCA (Memphis College of Art) made this “promotional” video for our fair city. I love it.

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What I’m Listening To

One of the things that I miss in this insanely-busy-semester of mine is my regular Sunday night gig as the hostess of “Americana the Beautiful” on Rhodes Radio. When I was in grad school, I had a lot of music-loving friends with whom I could endlessly talk about and trade tunes. (Miss you, Kyle!) Now…

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Church, Memphis Style

I’m back. I’m also clearly making regular payments on some karmic debt these days. I can’t exactly pinpoint what I did to merit the utter mayhem of this year, but I suspect it has something to do with my remarking one too many times last year about how happy I was with my life back…

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President-Elect Barack Obama’s Victory Speech (November 4, 2008)

Still here…

Several of you have written to me recently inquiring after my absence here on the blog. So, I wanted to let you all know that I am, in fact, still alive. I was in a fairly nasty auto accident about a week ago. (See my poor, beloved, now “totaled” car to the left.) Short story:…

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Blogging in the Classroom

I’m trying out a new pedagogical technique in all of my courses this semester. I’ve set up a blog for each course and have required students, as a part of their grade, to contribute regularly to those sites. In one of my courses, blog posts and comments are the only writing students are required to…

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