Carmen Bugan: Secret Police Records and The Language of Memory - Nieman Storyboard

Carmen Bugan: Secret Police Records and The Language of Memory - Nieman Storyboard:

Reading my personal “biography” in the secret-police speak of the files sends me back to a self I both recognize and don’t, creating another place of writing, which I could not have imagined before. I am caught in the conflict between the free, fluid language of memory and the shackled, impersonal language of surveillance reports.

The Slow Death of the University - The Chronicle of Higher Education

The Slow Death of the University - The Chronicle of Higher Education: From Cape Town to Reykjavik, Sydney to S�o Paulo, an event as momentous in its own way as the Cuban revolution or the invasion of Iraq is steadily under way: the slow death of the university as a center of humane critique.

The Real Reason College Tuition Costs So Much - The New York Times

The Real Reason College Tuition Costs So Much - The New York Times: a major factor driving increasing costs is the constant expansion of university administration. According to the Department of Education data, administrative positions at colleges and universities grew by 60 percent between 1993 and 2009, which Bloomberg reported was 10 times the rate of growth of tenured faculty positions.

What Happened When Sam Harris Tried (and Failed) to Embarrass Noam Chomsky | Alternet

What Happened When Sam Harris Tried (and Failed) to Embarrass Noam Chomsky | Alternet: Harris shares the perverse belief that pervades the corridors of power, “people are going to be killed, many of them women and children – and unlike our enemies it appalls us so that makes it okay.”

Daily Maverick Chronicle: #FeesMustFall – Violence at the Gates of Parliament | Daily Maverick

Daily Maverick Chronicle: #FeesMustFall – Violence at the Gates of Parliament | Daily Maverick: When students stormed Parliament's grounds on Wednesday afternoon, SHAUN SWINGLER was there to document the police's brutal response. It is an upsetting but important video.

Shooting Feet: Israel Targets Palestinian Soccer Players | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community

Shooting Feet: Israel Targets Palestinian Soccer Players | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community: One more God-awful chapter in the ongoing God-awful narrative that is Israeli occupation: Israeli forces attacked two teenage Palestinian cousins and soccer players, Jawhar Nasser Jawhar, 19, and Adam Abd al-Raouf Halabiya, 17, shooting them repeatedly in the feet and legs - ten bullets into Jawhar, two into Adam - before unleashing attack dogs and finally beating them in what critics call another egregious targeting of Palestinian athletes in a place where "soccer is politics."

Here’s How Facebook’s News Feed Actually Works | TIME

Here’s How Facebook’s News Feed Actually Works | TIME:

Facebook is injecting a human element into the way News Feed operates. The company’s growing army of human raters help the social network improve the News Feed experience in ways that can’t easily be measured by “Likes.” A new curation tool launching Thursday, for instance, called “See First” will let any user choose which of their friends they want to see at the top of the feed, rather than having the decision dictated by an algorithm.

John Pilger: Fascism and a new holocaust beckon if we remain silent - Stop the War Coalition

John Pilger: Fascism and a new holocaust beckon if we remain silent - Stop the War Coalition:

Had the Nazis not invaded Europe, Auschwitz and the Holocaust would not have happened. Had the United States and its satellites not initiated their war of aggression in Iraq in 2003, almost a million people would be alive today; and Islamic State, or ISIS, would not have us in thrall to its savagery. They are the progeny of modern fascism, weaned by the bombs, bloodbaths and lies that are the surreal theatre known as news.

Neoliberalism and Higher Education - The New York Times

Neoliberalism and Higher Education - The New York Times:

...neoliberalism is a pejorative way of referring to a set of economic/political policies based on a strong faith in the beneficent effects of free markets. Here is an often cited definition by Paul Treanor: “Neoliberalism is a philosophy in which the existence and operation of a market are valued in themselves, separately from any previous relationship with the production of goods and services . . . and where the operation of a market or market-like structure is seen as an ethic in itself, capable of acting as a guide for all human action, and substituting for all previously existing ethical beliefs.” (“Neoliberalism: Origins, Theory, Definition.”)

Zuroff: What happened in Srebrenica does not fit definition of genocide | InSerbia News

Zuroff: What happened in Srebrenica does not fit definition of genocide | InSerbia News:

BELGRADE – It is absurd to compare the Holocaust, genocide in Rwanda and the crimes committed in Srebrenica, said Director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center Efraim Zuroff from Israel as one of the most famous Nazi-hunters.

Stanford scholar upends interpretation of philosopher Martin Heidegger

Stanford scholar upends interpretation of philosopher Martin Heidegger: After a lifetime of studying the German philosopher's groundbreaking works, Stanford Religious Studies Professor Thomas Sheehan concludes that Heideggerians' obsession with Being misses the point.

ReligiousLeftLaw.com

ReligiousLeftLaw.com:

Germany will be able to export much more than it otherwise would, since its currency — the euro — is undervalued as a German currency. It also means Greece will have much more trouble exporting than it otherwise would, since its currency — the euro — is overvalued as a Greek currency. So Germany will tend to rack up huge trade surpluses, and Greece will tend correspondingly to incur deficits and debts — all thanks to the nature of their shared currency in relation to their very different economies.

Almost Everything You've Heard About The Anti-Gay Sweet Cakes Wedding Cake Case Is (Probably) Wrong - The New Civil Rights Movement

Almost Everything You've Heard About The Anti-Gay Sweet Cakes Wedding Cake Case Is (Probably) Wrong - The New Civil Rights Movement:

the Oregon DOJ sent Cryer's consumer complaint to the Kleins, with a cover letter requesting that they respond to the complainants. It was an attempt to encourage reconciliation.

Instead, Aaron Klein posted the discrimination complaint to Facebook (not taking the precaution of redacting the couple's name and address from the document). "This is what happens when you tell gay people you won't do their 'wedding cake,'" he posted.

The Kleins then took to the news and media. They cozied up to anti-gay hate group Family Research Council, campaigning at appallingly anti-gay hate rallies, for their business' totally-fictional right to discriminate against LGBT people.

After filing the discrimination complaint, the Bowman-Cryers became the victims of death threats — as well as outrageous and horrific claims by conservative media outlets and anti-gay groups.

The Evolutionary Mystery of Left-Handedness and What It Reveals About How the Brain Works | Brain Pickings

The Evolutionary Mystery of Left-Handedness and What It Reveals About How the Brain Works | Brain Pickings:

So what can the brain reveal about handedness? One of the first scientists to ponder the mystery of left-handedness was pioneering French surgeon Paul Broca, whom Wolman calls “the closest thing the religion of Southpaw has to a prophet.” In 1861, just two years after Darwin had discovered the principles of evolution, Broca encountered two patients who stumped him profoundly. One was an epileptic man named Leborgne but known as “Tan,” nicknamed after the only syllable he was capable of uttering. Leborgne was able to understand spoken language but couldn’t articulate his thoughts in speech — something that perplexed Broca enormously, doubly so given that one of Leborgne’s first symptoms was a weakening of function in the right side of his body, which progressed to more loss of motor control and eventually the loss of sight and some of his mental faculties.

This Is How Hillary Loses the Primary - The Daily Beast

This Is How Hillary Loses the Primary - The Daily Beast:

Hillary Clinton has supported every U.S. war since Vietnam. She supported not only DOMA, which her husband signed, but a travel ban on those who were HIV positive. She supported welfare cuts (remember her husband’s efforts toward “ending welfare as we know it”?). She supports the death penalty and campaigned in her husband’s place during the 1992 New Hampshire primary when he left to oversee the execution of an African-American man whose suicide attempt left him brain damaged.

Greece referendum result and the meaning of debt - Business Insider

Greece referendum result and the meaning of debt - Business Insider:

To pay back debt, you have to have a growing economy. That's a basic law of economics. It's how credit cards work. It's how mortgages work. And it is how sovereign/central-bank debt works. But Greece's economy was never in a position to benefit from debt, because it has been shrinking for years:

Thomas Piketty accuses Germany of forgetting history as it lectures Greece - The Washington Post

Thomas Piketty accuses Germany of forgetting history as it lectures Greece - The Washington Post:

A number of prominent economists have raised concerns about Germany's approach to the Greek debt crisis, which Germans say reflects a need to force changes in Greece's economy so that it never again has such a crisis.

But in the interview with Die Zeit, Thomas Piketty went even farther, saying that the Germans are only in the strong economic position they are today because they benefited from the forgiveness of their neighbors after World War II.

This 200,000 Year-Old City in South Africa Could Rewrite Human History | The Mind Unleashed

This 200,000 Year-Old City in South Africa Could Rewrite Human History | The Mind Unleashed: A giant stone city was discovered in South Africa, approximately 150 km west of port Maputo, Mozambique. By calculating the erosion rate of the dolerite, it became possible to assess the age of the site. It was estimated that the 1500 square-kilometer metropolis was constructed between 160,000 and 200,000 years ago!

Dylann Roof’s racist manifesto: ‘I have no choice’ - The Washington Post

Dylann Roof’s racist manifesto: ‘I have no choice’ - The Washington Post: Authorities said Saturday that the man accused of killing nine African Americans in a venerable Charleston, S.C., church left a racist manifesto targeting blacks, Jews and Hispanics on his Web site, a white supremacist broadside that also appears to offer a rationale for the shootings.

The lengthy declaration, loaded with offensive racial characterizations of blacks and others, includes the conclusion that “someone has to have the bravery to take it to the real world, and I guess that has to be me.”

“I have no choice,” states part of that final section, titled “An Explanation.” “I am not in the position to, alone, go into the ghetto and fight. I chose Charleston because it is [the] most historic city in my state, and at one time had the highest ratio of blacks to Whites in the country.”

A Letter From a White South African to White America�|�Bronwyn Lea

A Letter From a White South African to White America�|�Bronwyn Lea: I know there are many differences between America and South Africa's histories: they are complex narratives, woven in blood and ink. I do not write this as an expert analyst, or as a political pundit -- but as one confessing there is so much I don't know and understand. But, I offer the little I've learned living in a country which shed tears and blood over race, and now living in another doing the same: