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Cliopatria

  • Mar 19, 2005

    A Lifelike Death

    by Cliopatria

    A few weeks ago my Ancient Civ class discussed Antigone. I though it was the perfect play to assign to the class. Women’s roles, legitimate authority, fate and man’s agency. Moreover, the play perfectly complimented the previous week’s reading, the Book of Esther. Antigone also resonated with me personally because it dealt with familial deference and obligation.

    The class discussion stalled on Kreon’s arbitrariness: his decree that no one may bury Polyneices. Leaving aside the
  • Mar 18, 2005

    Some Noted Things ...

    by Cliopatria

    Objectivity: In the Chronicle of Higher Education (scroll down), Robert J. Norell of the History Department at the University of Tennessee argues that"objectivity" is the most misunderstood concept in history. The difference between the historians' understandings of it and the public's understandings of it, he argues, feed the distrust between academic historians and the public and limit our capac
  • Mar 18, 2005

    Take-home Assignments

    by Cliopatria

    1. Discuss intelligently: 2001-2002 Ph.D. recipients in History average time-to-degree rose to 9.3 years, which"now surpasses every other discipline." [Yes, I know the March issue of Perspectives is now on-line, but the February issue just arrived on the slow boat]
    2. Quick Quiz: Why do both Irish Americans and Jewish Americans eat corned beef? [
  • Mar 18, 2005

    While the Biological Clock Ticks

    by Cliopatria

    When I was an undergrad at North Texas I took a couple of classes from Bill Painter, a fine teacher. He amazed me one day by arguing that most of the psychoses identified by Freud were in a way created by him or, more precisely, by the combination of his peculiar genius and the contemporary culture of Vienna. He agreed that Freud’s patients had problems but argued that the society shaped both the problems and their responses. Freud, with unconscious creativity, looked for universals in those
  • Mar 17, 2005

    Images and the Past

    by Cliopatria

    If archaeologists are right, 5000 years ago, someone in China carved constellations onto a ritual stone knife. I’m not sure how the archaeologists know they are constellation. At least when I look at the picture I don’t see them. But it is a fascinating looking knife, almost a sort of mask. It speaks of a different world.

    The other night on cable I caught part of “Fellini Satyricon.” When I first saw i
  • Mar 17, 2005

    Strength Abroad, Weakness at Home: The Bush Vision

    by Cliopatria

    Like him or hate him, President Bush acts decisively--ok, often recklessly--abroad, giving the impression of "strength," whatever that really means.

    But at home he is weakening the country.

    Remember in the 1990s when Bob Rubin would say the "fundamentals" are strong? The fundamentals today are weak. And it's because of policies the administration has deliberately put in place.

    I don't need to enumerate the ways in which the economy is
  • Mar 17, 2005

    History Carnival #4

    by Cliopatria

    is up at Blogenspiel. Another Damned Medievalist has gone to some lengths to make the Carnival something more like an essay this time, on the"relevance" of history and historians. Given the diverse material she had to work with, I say she did a lovely job.

    And, if that's not enough, here's a quick roundup of history-related disputes between Chin

  • Mar 16, 2005

    The tournament

    by Cliopatria

    Just a few ideas about the greatness to come on Thursday: Number ones are not sacrosanct. At least two will go down by next weekend.

    That said, predicting upsets makes you look clever if you get them right. You will almost always get them wrong. Believe me -- I've had plenty of pools die on the shores of hunches. Just keep in mind that there have been exactly four national champions that have come from teams seeded below #3 -- NC State in 83, Villanova in 85, Kansas in 88, and Arizona a

  • Mar 15, 2005

    Noel Malcolm: Review of John Lukacs's Democracy and Populism

    by Cliopatria

    Noel Malcolm, in the Sunday Telegraph (3-13-05):

    IN 1838 THE American novelist James Fenimore Cooper published a caustic little book about the vulgarisation of public life. The new tendency, he wrote, was for interested parties "to simulate the existence of a general feeling in favor of, or against, any particular man or measure; so great being the deference paid to publick opinion, that men actually yield their own sentiments to that which they believe to be the sentime

  • Mar 15, 2005

    And now for something, er, differentish.

    by Cliopatria

    Steven Levy, in the Newsweek, asks Does the blogosphere have a diversity problem?. Levy concludes:
    Is there a way to promote diversity online, given the built-in decentralization of the blog world? Jenkins, whose comment started the discussion, says that any approach is fine—except inaction."You can't wait for it to just happen," he says. Appropriately enough, the best ideas rely on individual choices. MacKi