1. A colleague who is currently chair of his department remarked [on the current structure of meetings for department chairs] 2. This interested me because I would say the same about the current structure of meetings for [my committee] 3. Both this colleague’s observation and mine bespeak the situation described in [JL’s piece], on the … More Outline for an opinion piece
One does, in fact, need large blocks of time for work. Not for the work itself — that can be done in little pieces. One needs big blocks of time because the work has to be couched in rest and recreation, in which one is not working at breakneck speed on other things, but is … More One more brilliant, contrarian post
This is my idea for the IILI conference at the Colegio de México. It would build on a piece I am giving here. It would revisit Schwarz’ concept of “misplaced ideas” — which may be somewhat outdated or limited or something, such that it is worth discussing and revising. The concept really does apply to … More Cecilia Valdés y las ideas fuera de lugar
Here are some things to think about. 1. Mireille’s article on appropriations of Aimé Césaire. I read it and thought of Vallejo appropriations, and I did not yet know about Jonathan’s book on Lorca appropriations. Now I find Mireille’s prose irritatingly unclear but I want to bring the piece up again since it is about … More Research never ends
It is the condescending tone, the supposition that one has no experience writing, and the assumption that one does not like to write; most of all it is the insistence that all you need is discipline. Nicole and Maggie claim that if you do not need the basic advice Boice gives, you should be able … More More on my allergy to Robert Boice and the Boiceans
Today I had a leisurely breakfast with my guest and took her to the station, after which I did some errands. I came home and started laundry, looked at e-mail and did some financial things, and then it was noon. I had lunch and sat down to write, taking short breaks to wrap packages, make … More Le lundi
Ahora bien. Tomorrow I will start writing it in English and it will, as we have said, begin with Bolívar and then go on to Doris Sommer. Next it will talk about Goldberg and da Silva (and mention Sanjinés and Lund). The point is that mestizaje and the nation are old topics but race, modernity … More Race and the state…
♦ There is little distance between exogamy and incest since Don Cándido is everyone’s father (as it were). ♦ There is no compatibility between the hierarchical, slaveowning society and the bourgeois, modern one. The secrets that must be kept from the bourgeois society cause problems: it cannot be said that Cecilia is Leonardo’s sister, so their romance … More Cecilia Valdés, again
I do not like to lose things, especially not things in which I have invested a piece of my identity, but I do it. This year so far I have lost two rings, a cell phone, and now a Mycra Pac raincoat, which is the worst loss. It was this cool nickel color and was … More Mycra Pac
The most memorable sentence in his (also favorable review) is about Latin America, of which he asks: “Where else, after all, has interracial sex been a more important source of national identities?” This 1992 review is in HAHR. As you can see, even while working a festival and spending the entire morning taking tourists around … More J. C. Chasteen on Sommer
coldhearted scientist وداد 