“In the opening scene of the play Cyrano de Bergerac by Edmond Rostand, first performed in 1897, ‘orange girls’ at a Parisian theater in the 1640s make their way through an audience of soldiers, society ladies, noblemen, and riffraff, selling orangeade, raspberry cordial, syllabub, macarons, lemonade, iced buns, and cream puffs. The handsome soldier Christian de Neuvillette and his friends sample their wares, drink wine, and eat from a buffet. A poet and pastry cook named Ragueneau banter-barters an apple tartlet for a verse. ...”
‘We Are Still in Shock’: A Month Trapped in a Basement by Russian Forces
“YAHIDNE, Ukraine — More than two months after the residents of Yahidne kicked down the bolted basement door where the Russian army had held them hostage, the village is being rebuilt but the memories remain fresh — and deeply painful. On March 3, eight days after the full-scale invasion began, Russian forces swept into Yahidne, a village on the main road north of Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv. For nearly a month, until March 31, when Ukrainian troops liberated the town, more than 300 people, 77 of them children, were imprisoned in several rooms in the dank basement of the village school — a human shield for the Russian troops based there. Ten of the captives died. Among those held inside were a baby and a 93-year-old, Ukrainian prosecutors said. ...”
Trenches dug by Russian soldiers outside the school they used as a base, while holding more than 300 civilians prisoner in its basement throughout most of March.
‘Trump Was at the Center’: Jan. 6 Hearing Lays Out Case in Vivid Detail
“The House Select Committee to Investigate the Jan. 6 Attack on the United States Capitol opened a landmark set of hearings on Thursday by showing video of aide after aide to former President Donald J. Trump testifying that his claims of a stolen election were false, as the panel laid out in meticulous detail the extent of the former president’s efforts to keep himself in office. Over about two hours, the panel offered new information about what it characterized as an attempted coup orchestrated by Mr. Trump that culminated in the deadly assault on the Capitol. The panel’s leaders revealed that investigators heard testimony that Mr. Trump endorsed the hanging of his own vice president as a mob of his supporters descended on Congress. They also said they had evidence that members of Mr. Trump’s cabinet discussed invoking the 25th Amendment to remove him from office. ...”
Ukraine war: Five ways Russia's invasion may play out
“Wars ebb and flow. Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine is no exception. Early fears of a swift conquest were succeeded by Russian retreat and Ukrainian resistance. That has now been met by a more focused Russian offensive in the east. But 100 days on, where might this war go next? Here are five potential scenarios - they are not mutually exclusive, but all are within the bounds of plausibility. ...”
Residents look for belongings in the rubble of their home after a Russian strike in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donbas
Jan. 6: The Story So Far
“Like 9/11, Jan. 6 needs no year attached to convey its dark place in American history. On that Wednesday afternoon, 64 days after Election Day 2020, a mob of supporters of President Donald J. Trump assaulted the Capitol, resulting in what Vice President Mike Pence had refused to do: disrupting the ceremonial certification of the electoral votes confirming that Joseph R. Biden Jr. would be the next president of the United States. ... Over the past year and a half, much has come to light about how they went about it, embracing one tactic after another in a way that led a federal judge to conclude that elements of it likely amounted to a criminal conspiracy. ...”
A crop that changed the world
“In the last pages of her debut book, Slaves for Peanuts: A Story of Conquest, Liberation, and a Crop That Changed History (2022, New), journalist Jori Lewis breaks the fourth wall to bring readers into the present and share a story from her reporting process. The archives she had mined were rich with stories of a village called Kerbala—an outpost of French control on the westernmost coast of Africa which thrived at a time when France controlled all of what is now Senegal and much of West Africa. Kerbala had been a haven for freed slaves who had escaped bondage further inland in the 19th and early 20th centuries. But more than a century after its heyday, the village had very nearly disappeared into the landscape. ...”
The Fight to Survive Russia’s Onslaught in Eastern Ukraine
“Russia’s war in Ukraine is not the same conflict that it was earlier this spring. The Russian Army’s initial campaign, in February and March, was a three-front invasion with little coherence or military logic. Ukrainian troops mounted small-unit ambushes and used rocket-propelled grenades, antitank weapons, and drones to destroy Russian troop formations and armor. Viral videos show their direct strikes, with tanks disappearing in flame and smoke. Now the Russian military has regrouped its forces for a more targeted assault in the Donbas, in eastern Ukraine, drawing on its advantages in artillery and airpower. ...”
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visits a position of Ukrainian service members, as Russia's attack on Ukraine continues in Soledar, Donetsk region, Ukraine, June 5, 2022.
Soccer in Sun and Shadow - Eduardo Galeano (1993)
"Eduardo Galeano — the famous Uruguayan writer, journalist, and political activist — passed away Monday at the age of 74. He was most widely celebrated (and defamed) for his incisive critiques of Western imperialism and capitalism, as well as his lilting, graceful prose. ... Soccer fans will know him as the author of El fútbol a sol y sombra, or Soccer in Sun and Shadow. The book offers a cultural history of the beautiful game, using his trademark poignant verse to shape history and politics and economics and personal experience into a sort of paper sculpture— beautiful, unexpected, and somewhat transient. There’s a lot of darkness in the story Galeano tells—the 'shadow' in the book title, as it were—yet he unfurls and shares his joy and love for the sport throughout. ..."
2015 April: Eduardo Galeano (3 September 1940 – 13 April 2015), 2018 August: The Pan American, 2019 April: Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent (1971), 2021 July: Memory of Fire: Genesis (1985)
Karl Jaspers
“Karl Theodor Jaspers (... 23 February 1883 – 26 February 1969) was a German-Swiss psychiatrist and philosopher who had a strong influence on modern theology, psychiatry, and philosophy. After being trained in and practicing psychiatry, Jaspers turned to philosophical inquiry and attempted to discover an innovative philosophical system. He was often viewed as a major exponent of existentialism in Germany, though he did not accept the label. ... Most commentators associate Jaspers with the philosophy of existentialism, in part because he draws largely upon the existentialist roots of Nietzsche and Kierkegaard, and in part because the theme of individual freedom permeates his work. ...“
Plan to ship grain out of Ukraine dealt blow due to mines
“A plan mediated by Turkey amid a global food crisis to open shipping corridors out of Ukrainian ports has been dealt a blow as officials in Kyiv said it would take six months to clear the coast of Russian and Ukrainian mines. As Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov arrived in Ankara on Tuesday, Turkey’s defence minister, Hulusi Akar, said in a statement that his government was making progress with the UN, Russia and Ukraine on reopening ports under Russian blockade in the Black Sea. The ships leaving Ukrainian ports would potentially be given safe escort by Turkish naval vessels under the proposal under discussion. ...”
UbuWeb at 15 Years: An Overview
By Kenneth Goldsmith: “It's amazing to me that UbuWeb, after fifteen years, is still going. Run with no money and put together pretty much without permission, Ubu has succeeded by breaking all the rules, by going about things the wrong way. UbuWeb can be construed as the Robin Hood of the avant-garde, but instead of taking from one and giving to the other, we feel that in the end, we're giving to all. UbuWeb is as much about the legal and social ramifications of its self-created distribution and archiving system as it is about the content hosted on the site. In a sense, the content takes care of itself; but keeping it up there has proved to be a trickier proposition. ...”
Eddie Palmieri With Harlem River Drive – Recorded Live At Sing Sing (1972)
“For a time in the late 1960s and early '70s, Latin music legend Eddie Palmieri's output had a political edge to it. This was clearly showcased on 'Recorded Live At Sing Sing', which includes many songs about economic and racial injustice. Backed by his Harlem River Drive ensemble, this performance at the upstate New York prison also reveals the culmination of Palmieri's experiments in funk, jazz and fusion. The combination of relentless ethnic grooves and hard-hitting funk workouts is truly impressive. Here it is the classic record Eddie Palmieri did with his Harlem River Drive band recorded live at the Sing Sing Prison in 1972. ...”
2014 March: Harlem River Drive - Harlem River Drive (1971), 2017 December: Nu Yorica: Culture Clash In New York City - Experiments in Latin Music 1970-77, 2018 December: Latin Underground Revolution: Swinging Boogaloo, Guaguanco, Salsa & Latin Funk from New York City 1967-1978, 2017 June: Eddie Palmieri - Unfinished Masterpiece (1976), 2018 July: The Soul Of Spanish Harlem / El Barrio: Sounds from the Spanish Harlem Streets, 2022 January: East Harlem/Spanish Harlem/El Barrio
Battered by Russian Shells, a Monastery Remains Loyal to Moscow
“SVIATOHIRSK, Ukraine — Of the hundreds of battle sites all across Ukraine, the Sviatohirsk Monastery of the Caves surely ranks among the most incongruous.The sprawling complex of onion-domed churches built into a high bank of the Siversky Donets River is considered one of the five holiest sites in the Russian Orthodox Church. Yet it is directly in the line of fire of the Russian Army in its advance in eastern Ukraine.Russian shells aimed at Ukrainian troop positions regularly go astray and strike the monastery, with terrifying shrieks and metallic booms that echo through the churchyards. They tear through building walls and leave gaping holes in the grounds; at least four monks, priests or nuns have been killed, Ukrainian police say. ...”
A monk in the doorway of a building heavily damaged by Russian artillery at the Sviatohirsk monastery complex on Friday.
The Story Behind The Song: New Order’s pioneering ‘Temptation’
“Few songs capture the essence of New Order like their groove-laden and joyous single ‘Temptation’. Written in the wake of Ian Curtis’ tragic death, this 1982 offering stands in stark contrast to the sepia-tinged tones of their previous singles ‘In A Lonely Place’ and ‘Ceremony’, both of which carry the imprint of that dark period. ... ‘Temptation’ wouldn’t have existed without two important influences: Martin Hannett and New York club culture. Hannett had shown New Order how to use studio technology, allowing them to craft their increasingly synth-dominated songs without the need for a producer. This new knowledge coincided with a trip to America in 1981, during which the band were introduced to the synthetic beats of Italian disco pioneers like Giorgio Moroder. ...”
2009 February: New Order, 2011 May: Movement, 2011 October: Low-Life, 2011 December: Brotherhood, 2012 May: Unknown Pleasures - Joy Division, 2012 September: Power, Corruption & Lies (1983), 2015 June: Believe In A Land Of Love: New Order's Low-Life 30 Years On, 2015 November: True Faith (1987), 2016 March: New Order, olden style: A unique take on Blue Monday, 2020 August: The Perfect Kiss (1985), Bizarre Love Triangle (1986), Blue Monday (1983), Confusion (1983)
It’s Happening at the Bushwick Collective: Mr. June, Ligama, Mr. Blob, Cody James, Ashley Hodder, 1.4.4.0 and More
“As the Bushwick Collective readies for its 11th Annual Block Party, a first-rate array of artists from near and far have been busy at work around Troutman and St Nicholas Avenues and its surrounding blocks. Pictured above is the Dutch artist David Louf aka Mr. June working on a small section of his new huge, hugely impressive mural. Several more images of newly-fashioned murals captured in the rain yesterday evening follow. ...”
On the Dangers of Greatness: A Conversation with Svetlana Alexievich
“An escape from history seems impossible for 2015 Nobel laureate Svetlana Alexievich. After chronicling the Soviet Union through her ‘documentary novels,’ her own genre often mistaken for oral history, since 1985, she had begun working on two new books, one on love and another on aging and death. She saw these topics as an opportunity for something different, untethered to the history of what she calls the ‘Red Person’ in the former Soviet Union. But following the explosive 2019 revolution in Belarus, her subsequent flight into exile (her second in a little more than two decades) in which she had to abandon her manuscripts, and the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russia in February 2022, she realized that her project is not yet over. ...”
A Russian gold processing plant in the desert outside al-Ibediyya, 200 miles north of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum.
LAFMS: The Lowest Form Of Music (1996)
“... Long out of print huge box, The Los Angeles Free Music Society was a complete screwball fringe music collective that peaked in the true heart of darkness -- America in the mid 70s. They self-released LPs, 7"s and cassettes in the dawn before real independent distribution and the myth that surrounds those sacred pressings has in recent years become feverish. Mixing pure sonic weirdness, musique concrete, free improv blare, fringe-noise-nonsense and much more, the musicians involved with LAFMS created a unique bounty of individualistic art. This unbelievable box of 10 CDs, which took a number of years to finally assemble, creates an awesome overview of this inspired, largely ignored scene. Features music by Le Forte Four, The Doo Dooettes, Airway, Tom Recchion, Rick Potts, Dennis Duck, Fredrik Nilsen, Joe Potts, Chip Chapman, Monique et Aviv, John Duncan and CV Massage, and more. ...”
Half-Earth Socialism: A Plan to Save the Future from Extinction, Climate Change and Pandemics
“Without revolutionary change, humanity confronts a dystopian future of global heating, epidemics, and mass extinction. Yet, the mainstream ‘solutions’ on offer are either too modest or too risky, such as toothless cap-and-trade programmes, dangerous geoengineering schemes, lab-grown meat, luxury electric cars, and wildlife conservation bankrolled by billionaires. ... The mainstream discussion on the environmental crisis is predicated on the belief that a few painless reforms would allow business as usual in our capitalism society to continue. It can’t. Half-Earth Socialism criticizes such tepid solutions and offers instead a countervailing vision for the future....”
A Farmer Holds On, a Fraying Lifeline for a Besieged Corner of Ukraine
“SIVERSK DISTRICT, Ukraine — One of the few civilians still driving on a road leading toward the battle front, Oleksandr Chaplik skidded to a stop and leaned out the car window to swap information with a villager. He was taking supplies back to his village, one of a handful still in Ukrainian hands that lie in the path of the Russian advance. ‘We are surrounded on all sides,’ said Mr. Chaplik, 55, a dairy and livestock farmer. ‘It is the second month without light, without water, without gas, without communication, without the internet, without news. Basically, horror.’ ...”
“My nerves are cracking,” said Oleksandr Chaplik, a farmer who has kept his corner of Ukraine linked to the outside world.
Edmund Husserl (1859 – 1938)
“Edmund Gustav Albrecht Husserl (8 April 1859 – 27 April 1938) was a German philosopher and mathematician who established the school of phenomenology. In his early work, he elaborated critiques of historicism and of psychologism in logic based on analyses of intentionality. In his mature work, he sought to develop a systematic foundational science based on the so-called phenomenological reduction. Arguing that transcendental consciousness sets the limits of all possible knowledge, Husserl redefined phenomenology as a transcendental-idealist philosophy. Husserl's thought profoundly influenced 20th-century philosophy, and he remains a notable figure in contemporary philosophy and beyond. ...”
Why Boxwood, a Perennial Favorite, Needs a New Approach
“It’s time for boxwood-loving gardeners to learn the abbreviation B.M.P. — best management practices — and get with the program. Boxwood needs our informed attention and care to do its job as the indispensable landscape element it has become since the first Buxus were planted in the United States in the mid-17th century. It is hard to think of another plant that lends such year-round structure to a design as boxwood, defining spaces with its evergreen presence, while holding little interest for hungry deer — another big plus. ...”
Boxwood flanks an entrance at Jardin de Buis, or garden of boxwood, in Pottersville, N.J. Although the plants are pruned less severely to help reduce disease pressure from boxwood blight, they still offer evergreen formality.
100 days in, Russia’s war is now a brutal offensive in eastern Ukraine
“One hundred days into the war in Ukraine, Russia has turned its siege tactics on Sievierodonetsk, the last major city in Luhansk still outside its control. Ukraine is still gripping the city, as Russia seeks to take it by leveling it to nothing. Almost 90 percent of Sievierodonetsk’s buildings, and all of its critical infrastructure, have been destroyed, said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. A few thousand people remain in the city, without access to food, water, electricity, medicine. ... Sievierodonetsk represents the current phase of Russia’s war in Ukraine — a grinding, brutal, and unforgiving offensive in the Luhansk and Donestk oblasts (or administrative regions) where Russia seeks to take towns and territory, inch by inch, often relying on indiscriminate shelling and bombing that leaves the region a wasteland. There is no clear end to this campaign. ...”
Children walk among buildings destroyed during fighting in Mariupol, in territory under the government of the Donetsk People’s Republic in eastern Ukraine on May 25.
Strut reissues Sun Ra Arkestra’s 1983 Egyptian sessions with Salah Ragab and the Cairo Jazz Band
“London’s Strut Records concludes it’s exploration into Sun Ra Arkestra’s historic recordings in Egypt with a reissue of the 1983 collaborative album with great Egyptian percussionist and drummer Salah Ragab and his large ensemble, The Cairo Jazz Band. The incredible five-track recording came together while the Arkestra when the band returned for their second stint of performances in Egypt in 1983. ...”
Georges Perec - Récits d'Ellis Island, Part 1: Traces, Part 2: Mémoires (1978-1980)
“In 1978, Robert Bober and Georges Perec set out to in the search of traces of Ellis Island, that is, as Georges Perec put it, of ‘the very site of exile, the place of the absence of place, the non-place, the nowhere.’ They traveled to New York to film what was left of this ‘Golden Gate’, nicknamed ‘the Island of Tears’ by the immigrants. One of the objectives of the filmmaker and the writer was to gather testimonies of survivors who, as children, passed through Ellis Island. ... As a result, Récits d'Ellis Island are more than a document; they are also a profound reflection on exile, wandering, and hope, as well as on the symbolic power of places of memory, contrasted with the ineffectiveness of isolated objects. ...”
U.S. Technology, a Longtime Tool for Russia, Becomes a Vulnerability
“WASHINGTON — With magnifying glasses, screwdrivers and a delicate touch from a soldering gun, two men from an investigative group that tracks weapons pried open Russian munitions and equipment that had been captured across Ukraine. Over a week’s visit to Ukraine last month, the investigators pulled apart every piece of advanced Russian hardware they could get their hands on, such as small laser range finders and guidance sections of cruise missiles. The researchers, who were invited by the Ukrainian security service to independently analyze advanced Russian gear, found that almost all of it included parts from companies based in the United States and the European Union: microchips, circuit boards, engines, antenna and other equipment. ...”
In April, Russian missiles struck a storage facility in Odesa, Ukraine, that housed petroleum products.
For Ukraine the World Cup looked unthinkable. Now they’re 1 game away after spirited win over Scotland
“GLASGOW, Scotland — Ukraine are 90 minutes away from the World Cup. For a country that is fighting for its very existence following Russia’s invasion in February, to even think about the insignificance of qualifying for a football tournament is difficult to comprehend, but Ukraine’s 3-1 win against Scotland in their World Cup play-off semifinal on Wednesday sent a message to the world that theirs is a country of incredible spirit and resolve. …”
Anthology Of Post Industrial And Experimental Music From Italy
“The latest entry in the Unexplained Sounds Group sound mapping project is a compilation of outside music from Italy. While often synth-driven and a cultural cousin of sorts to Kosmiche and dark ambient, Italy’s post-industrial scene is a more diverse and unique animal. These pieces are influenced less by western rock music and are instead reflective of modern innovations in electronics, noise sculpting, musique concrete, and cinematic composition. As such, many of these recordings include sound collages of samples, environmental noises, voices, and processed rhythms, as well as more traditional instrumentation....”
Will more countries want nuclear weapons after the war in Ukraine?
“On a certain level, many of today’s most pressing U.S. national security problems are really just variations of one problem: how to manage the risk of armed conflict in a world with nuclear weapons. The questions haunts American foreign policy on multiple fronts. In Ukraine, the key question the U.S. and its allies are facing is how much military support they can provide without risking an all-out NATO-Russia war that could end civilization as we know it. President Joe Biden’s trip to Asia last week was interrupted by multiple missile tests from nuclear-armed North Korea and overshadowed by his vow to defend Taiwan with military force if it were attacked by China, a scenario many analysts have projected could easily go nuclear. ...”
How Did Cartographers Create World Maps before Airplanes and Satellites? An Introduction
“Regular readers of Open Culture know a thing or two about maps if they’ve paid attention to our posts on the history of cartography, the evolution of world maps (and why they are all wrong), and the many digital collections of historical maps from all over the world. What does the seven and a half-minute video above bring to this compendium of online cartographic knowledge? A very quick survey of world map history, for one thing, with stops at many of the major historical intersections from Greek antiquity to the creation of the Catalan Atlas, an astonishing mapmaking achievement from 1375. ...”
On-U Sound Present Reggae Archive Volume 1, Volume 2
“Original reggae recordings from 1977 - 1981 including tracks from the pre-On-U Sound label, Hitrun. Featuring Creation Rebel, Carol Kalphat, Clint Eastwood, Doctor Pablo, Bim Sherman, Errol Holt & Prince Far I. ... Originally released in 1994, a very popular compilation featuring some of the most crucial reggae cuts in the On-U catalogue. Deadly Headly, Singers & Players, Bim Sherman and Lol Coxhill. ...”
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