The Origin Of Love--Aristophanes via Hedwig, Socrates, Diotima, and Will Farrell

The clip below is from the rather bizarre musical Hedwig and the Angry Inch. It more or less tells the story of Love as Aristophanes imagined it.



And the following is from some students who read the dialogue between Socrates and Diotima aloud. Not much to watch, but it's nice hearing two voices and imagining a young Socrates being tutored by his wise friend.



Finally... One last take on just what love is...

Good Times with Golda

Thanks to the Global Scholars who joined me at the UWM Library on Saturday. I know it was helpful and I know that some students were able to further narrow their topics after spending a few minutes doing research. We explored the stacks and then I took everyone to the basement level Media and Reserve Library where we learned how to use the comprehensive periodical database collection. If you didn't take advantage of the library this week, you'll want to come next weekend. I'll be there from 10:00-12:00.

Austerity is for Losers

Here's an article from Joseph Steglitz, explaining why efforts to recover from the recession by cutting public spending are totally misguided.

Disillusionment over Europe

One of the texts we're going to read this spring is a brief essay by Fareed Zakaria, "The Rise of the Rest", wherein he encourages Americans to embrace, rather than fear, the inevitable loss of global hegemony we face in this era of globalization (and economic crisis). We face grim economic times and the wealth gap in our country hasn't been so wide since the 1920s. What does that mean for a people who are accustomed to so much material wealth? What's more, a decade of war has drained our treasury and undermined our self-confidence. How could it be that we're bogged down Afghanistan, with no conventional "victory" in sight? At what cost? Finally, we now go begging to the Chinese, pleading with them to liberalize their currency. They ignore us.

From New York Review of Books

In "The Fading Dream of Europe", Orhan Pamuk seems genuinely melancholy to be waking from his "rose colored dream" of Europe. He reflects on his own childhood, when he and his Turkish classmates studied the history of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment, when their teachers emphasized the central importance of separating religion and the state. In the 50s and 60s, Turks wanted to adapt to Europe and assume its successful institutions, not to mention its growing prosperity. Now, however, fewer Turks (and my extension--non-Western peoples more generally) look to Europe as an ideal.

In accounting for his disillusionment, he points at European support for Bush's "illegitimate and cruel war" in Iraq (surprising since most Americans believe that the Europeans [France and Germany mostly] turned their backs on us) and the fact that France spearheaded an effort to block the Turks from joining the EU. The greatest source of frustration for Pamuk, however, is his belief that Europe is "destroying " its own "core values" by rejecting multiculturalism and embracing anti-immigration politics, policies, and prejudices.

Ethnic Tensions Visible in Russia as Well

Russia has been a hotbed of anti-immigrant--and even neo-nazi--activism since the fall of communism. Today's story in the New York Times about nationalist violence on the streets of Moscow should surprise nobody.

Suicide Bombing in Stockholm

It appears that the suicide bomber in Sweden was a second generation Iraqi immigrant who had received his education in Britain.

Drama over Mosques and Islam in Moscow, Too.

The place of Muslims in civilizations that have traditionally been Christian/secular promises to be the single most important issue of the next decade. Just last weekend, the New York Times ran a profile on Pamela Geller, an "outrageous" blogger who has made the intellectual/propaganda war on Islam her own personal crusade. More recently, Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, declared that the dream of a multi-cultural Germany is "dead" and that Muslims will need to integrate more fully into their adopted country, learning German and assimilating as fully as possible to the culture around them. Today, I stumbled across this article in Spiegel online: Russian nationalists are challenging the construction of a mosque in a Moscow suburb. The Muslim community in Moscow has a long history, but the past 15 years have seen an ongoing insurgency in Chechnaya as well as terrorist attacks in Moscow itself. Here's the story at the Washington Post.

Dresden, Memory, and Skinheads

Over the weekend a major march in Dresden resulted in street violence. The Jungen Landsmannschaft Ostdeutschland (JLO-- Youth National Association of East Germany) intended to use the annual anniversary of the Angl0-American bombing of Dresden as an opportunity to draw attention to their cause. The JLO has been commemorating the 1945 firebombing of the East German city for the past 12 years. They seek to re-frame the historical debate around German guilt for the destruction of WWII. These young neo-Nazis emphasize the suffering Germans experienced during the war.

Over 10,000 counter-protesters showed up to confront approximately 5000 neo-Nazis and formed a human chain around the "brown hordes". Despite the presence of 5000 policemen, violence erupted between neo-Nazis and the "Linksautonomen"--we would refer to them as anarchists here. Ultimately, the Nazis couldn't march.

The image above, from Spiegel Online (Getty Images), shows anti-fascist demonstrators in action behind the police blockade.

Wait! Neo-Nazi Violence DROPPED!

The Local reported on January 5th that the BKA registered a reduction in Neo-Nazi violence during the past year. How does that compare to the earlier story in Time? I guess the important thing is the mere fact that the Neo-Nazis are laying off a bit.

The Pants Stay On--Snowball Fight Instead

Improv Everywhere is up to their old Shenanigans--yesterday it was the 9th annual "No-Pants Subway Ride" in NYC and--increasingly--globally. If you don't know about Improv Everywhere, you should watch some of their brilliant spontaneous musical numbers in public places--like the food-court.

This year, the "Hosen Runter" ride in Berlin was a FAIL. There weren't enough participants to make it work. Instead, they took advantage of a freakishly snowy January to engage in a giant snowball fight.