http://www.rorotoko.com en ep@rorotoko.net Copyright 2010 2010-03-10T05:01:53+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/kenneth_pinnow_interview_lost_collective_suicide_promise_soviet_socialism/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/kenneth_pinnow_interview_lost_collective_suicide_promise_soviet_socialism/ Despite its universality, self-destruction has meant and continues to mean different things to different people. I first became interested in the problem of Soviet suicide after reading a footnote about a dramatic spike in suicides among Bolsheviks during the 1920s. Such an outburst of despair among the faithful was both jarring and puzzling. It clashed sharply with the triumphal and expectant image of the Bolshevik Revolution. But viewed through the lens of suicide the Soviet Union no longer appears simply as a product of Marxist ideology. The Soviet Union can be read more broadly as a social science state that was seeking to overcome the alienating effects of modern life.
Despite its universality, self-destruction has meant and continues to mean different things to different people. I first became interested in the problem of Soviet suicide after reading a footnote about a dramatic spike in suicides among Bolsheviks during the 1920s. Such an outburst of despair among the faithful was both jarring and puzzling. It clashed sharply with the triumphal and expectant image of the Bolshevik Revolution. But viewed through the lens of suicide the Soviet Union no longer appears simply as a product of Marxist ideology. The Soviet Union can be read more broadly as a social science state that was seeking to overcome the alienating effects of modern life.

]]> 2010-03-12T05:01:11+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/jeff_allred_book_interview_american_modernism_depression_documentary/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/jeff_allred_book_interview_american_modernism_depression_documentary/ The modernist element within Depression documentary was not merely aesthetic but intimately related to the turbulent politics of the Depression era. Perhaps the greatest legacy of the New Deal era is its intense focus on, in Franklin D. Roosevelt’s famous phrase, the “forgotten man at the bottom of the economic pyramid.” But New Deal discourse also depended upon a polarity, in which the “forgotten” are the passive, silent objects of social planning conceived and administered by a technocratic elite. The modernist strain of Depression documentary, while sharing the broad commitment to ameliorating poverty and oppression, radicalized the focus on the margins of society and thereby challenged the dominant New Deal rhetoric regarding “the people.”

The modernist element within Depression documentary was not merely aesthetic but intimately related to the turbulent politics of the Depression era. Perhaps the greatest legacy of the New Deal era is its intense focus on, in Franklin D. Roosevelt’s famous phrase, the “forgotten man at the bottom of the economic pyramid.” But New Deal discourse also depended upon a polarity, in which the “forgotten” are the passive, silent objects of social planning conceived and administered by a technocratic elite. The modernist strain of Depression documentary, while sharing the broad commitment to ameliorating poverty and oppression, radicalized the focus on the margins of society and thereby challenged the dominant New Deal rhetoric regarding “the people.”

]]> 2010-03-10T05:01:53+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/eric_gordon_book_interview_urban_spectator_american_concept_cities_kodak/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/eric_gordon_book_interview_urban_spectator_american_concept_cities_kodak/ When I walk down the street, enter a shop, talk with neighbors, I do not need, at the forefront of my consciousness, an understanding of the city as a whole, or what de Certeau calls the concept-city. I do not need to remind myself that I am in New York City each time I enter a store. However, despite the fact that I do not need to consciously contend with the idea of New York, it does influence my everyday interactions in very important ways. Each of the people on a typical Manhattan street corner, for instance, is interacting with their immediate urban spaces while their understanding of those spaces is framed by the evolving concept-city. Whether directly mediated or not, each practice of the city is embedded within some articulation of the concept-city.
When I walk down the street, enter a shop, talk with neighbors, I do not need, at the forefront of my consciousness, an understanding of the city as a whole, or what de Certeau calls the concept-city. I do not need to remind myself that I am in New York City each time I enter a store. However, despite the fact that I do not need to consciously contend with the idea of New York, it does influence my everyday interactions in very important ways. Each of the people on a typical Manhattan street corner, for instance, is interacting with their immediate urban spaces while their understanding of those spaces is framed by the evolving concept-city. Whether directly mediated or not, each practice of the city is embedded within some articulation of the concept-city.

]]> 2010-03-08T05:01:28+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/moshik_temkin_book_interview_sacco_vanzetti_affair_america_trial/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/moshik_temkin_book_interview_sacco_vanzetti_affair_america_trial/ We do not know—and never will know—whether Sacco and Vanzetti “did it.” But a lot of people still recognize their names. I’ve seen or heard them mentioned in The Sopranos and Sports Illustrated, in novels by Kurt Vonnegut and Phillip Roth, in random conversations. The largest pencil-producing factory in Russia was named after them, and generations of Russian children associated their names with the pencils and crayons they used. There was a film in Italy, a tango in Argentina, a song by Joan Baez and Ennio Morricone, a punk band in Germany, a brand of cigarettes in Uruguay. There are streets named after them in Italy and France. They often come up when people give examples of past injustices, or more facetiously, when people want to denote famous duos, as in Abbott and Costello, Jagger and Richards, Sacco and Vanzetti.
We do not know—and never will know—whether Sacco and Vanzetti “did it.” But a lot of people still recognize their names. I’ve seen or heard them mentioned in The Sopranos and Sports Illustrated, in novels by Kurt Vonnegut and Phillip Roth, in random conversations. The largest pencil-producing factory in Russia was named after them, and generations of Russian children associated their names with the pencils and crayons they used. There was a film in Italy, a tango in Argentina, a song by Joan Baez and Ennio Morricone, a punk band in Germany, a brand of cigarettes in Uruguay. There are streets named after them in Italy and France. They often come up when people give examples of past injustices, or more facetiously, when people want to denote famous duos, as in Abbott and Costello, Jagger and Richards, Sacco and Vanzetti.

]]> 2010-03-05T05:01:48+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/kirk_savage_monument_wars_washington_national_mall_transform_memorial_lands/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/kirk_savage_monument_wars_washington_national_mall_transform_memorial_lands/ America’s monumental core has been reshaped by the increasing prominence of war memorials on the west end of the National Mall and a new attention to historical trauma brought on by the nation’s increasingly fraught engagement with the rest of the world. In order to understand these changes I go back to their origins. The monumental core of America is an invention of the twentieth century. Space, which had been thought of as mere emptiness in the nineteenth century, acquired a positive agency in the twentieth. But aesthetic and political controversies plagued the memorial landscape from the founding of the nation. Americans have long had a love-hate relationship with the public monument. In the earliest debates Congress had on the subject of a memorial to George Washington, many argued that Washington needed no monument and that monuments were “good for nothing” in a democratic society.


America’s monumental core has been reshaped by the increasing prominence of war memorials on the west end of the National Mall and a new attention to historical trauma brought on by the nation’s increasingly fraught engagement with the rest of the world. In order to understand these changes I go back to their origins. The monumental core of America is an invention of the twentieth century. Space, which had been thought of as mere emptiness in the nineteenth century, acquired a positive agency in the twentieth. But aesthetic and political controversies plagued the memorial landscape from the founding of the nation. Americans have long had a love-hate relationship with the public monument. In the earliest debates Congress had on the subject of a memorial to George Washington, many argued that Washington needed no monument and that monuments were “good for nothing” in a democratic society.

]]> 2010-03-03T05:00:28+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/ana_siljak_angel_vengeance_girl_shot_governor_petersburg_age_assassination/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/ana_siljak_angel_vengeance_girl_shot_governor_petersburg_age_assassination/ Too often, terrorists are defined by what they oppose or what they hate. The hatred is real, of course, but most terrorists, even modern terrorists, are equally motivated by what they desire. The ultimate dream of Vera Zasulich, Russia’s first female terrorist, was a world of equality, prosperity, and peace—where all of the injustice of the present world would pass away. Socialism can be a faith like any other—with saints, martyrs, and even a vision of the kingdom of heaven on earth. Vera Zasulich was firmly convinced that to die for one’s faith was the highest aim toward which a person could aspire. She sought a socialist movement that would provide the dream of a radiant future, for which she would gladly kill, and gladly die.
Too often, terrorists are defined by what they oppose or what they hate. The hatred is real, of course, but most terrorists, even modern terrorists, are equally motivated by what they desire. The ultimate dream of Vera Zasulich, Russia’s first female terrorist, was a world of equality, prosperity, and peace—where all of the injustice of the present world would pass away. Socialism can be a faith like any other—with saints, martyrs, and even a vision of the kingdom of heaven on earth. Vera Zasulich was firmly convinced that to die for one’s faith was the highest aim toward which a person could aspire. She sought a socialist movement that would provide the dream of a radiant future, for which she would gladly kill, and gladly die.

]]> 2010-03-01T05:01:03+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/patrick_allitt_book_interview_conservatives_idea_personalit_america_history/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/patrick_allitt_book_interview_conservatives_idea_personalit_america_history/ Who are the real conservatives? There is no simple answer to that question. You could take the view that nothing has done more to transform the world in the last 200 years than industrial capitalism, and that to describe its supporters as “conservatives” is an obvious contradiction. But most defenders of capitalism do call themselves conservatives, largely because they see their job as to defend it against various forms of economic collectivism. My job as an historian is to be descriptive rather than prescriptive. If the champions of capitalism do in fact call themselves conservatives, I have to explain why, rather than try to contradict them.
Who are the real conservatives? There is no simple answer to that question. You could take the view that nothing has done more to transform the world in the last 200 years than industrial capitalism, and that to describe its supporters as “conservatives” is an obvious contradiction. But most defenders of capitalism do call themselves conservatives, largely because they see their job as to defend it against various forms of economic collectivism. My job as an historian is to be descriptive rather than prescriptive. If the champions of capitalism do in fact call themselves conservatives, I have to explain why, rather than try to contradict them.

]]> 2010-02-26T05:01:55+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/joshua_clover_book_interview_1989_bob_dylan_not_have_sing_about/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/joshua_clover_book_interview_1989_bob_dylan_not_have_sing_about/ Pop, which openly lives and dies by the logic of the commodity, is compelled to reduce everything down to bite-sized, easily sellable morsels. History itself increasingly drives toward this condition: toward the single image, the single instant. The end of the Cold War seems like a kind of acme of this, where this incredibly elaborate and unfinished historical process can be reduced to one image, five words: “the fall of the Wall.” And so history becomes pop, just as pop becomes the main purveyor of historical thought. But what do we lose by that condensation, compression, that amputation of complexity?

Pop, which openly lives and dies by the logic of the commodity, is compelled to reduce everything down to bite-sized, easily sellable morsels. History itself increasingly drives toward this condition: toward the single image, the single instant. The end of the Cold War seems like a kind of acme of this, where this incredibly elaborate and unfinished historical process can be reduced to one image, five words: “the fall of the Wall.” And so history becomes pop, just as pop becomes the main purveyor of historical thought. But what do we lose by that condensation, compression, that amputation of complexity?

]]> 2010-02-24T05:00:48+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/marc_egnal_book_interview_clash_extremes_economic_origins_civil_war/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/marc_egnal_book_interview_clash_extremes_economic_origins_civil_war/ There is no contradiction between a book that examines economy and society and a focus on individuals. In Clash of Extremes readers will encounter lawmaker Thaddeus Stevens, hobbled by clubfoot and with his red wig askew, frantically trying to stop the disenfranchisement of blacks in the Pennsylvania legislature. They will meet Dixon Lewis, who weighed over 400 pounds, campaigning for states rights at Alabama crossroads towns. They will also get to know women like Abigail Kelley, who had to harden herself to the abuse she received as she went door to door in Lynn, Massachusetts, collecting signatures on antislavery petitions. I also focus on African-Americans, like Frederick Douglass, and common folk, like Woodson May, an Alabama shingle maker.
There is no contradiction between a book that examines economy and society and a focus on individuals. In Clash of Extremes readers will encounter lawmaker Thaddeus Stevens, hobbled by clubfoot and with his red wig askew, frantically trying to stop the disenfranchisement of blacks in the Pennsylvania legislature. They will meet Dixon Lewis, who weighed over 400 pounds, campaigning for states rights at Alabama crossroads towns. They will also get to know women like Abigail Kelley, who had to harden herself to the abuse she received as she went door to door in Lynn, Massachusetts, collecting signatures on antislavery petitions. I also focus on African-Americans, like Frederick Douglass, and common folk, like Woodson May, an Alabama shingle maker.

]]> 2010-02-22T05:01:38+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/jan_birksted_book_interview_le_corbusier_occult/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/jan_birksted_book_interview_le_corbusier_occult/ Until the age of 30, Charles-Edouard Jeanneret, alias Le Corbusier, lived in La Chaux-de-Fonds, then the world’s leading watch-making town, where one exclusive club crossed religious and ethnic boundaries within the ruling and bourgeois classes: the Freemasonic lodge, La Loge L’Amitié. The municipal City architects, whom Jeanneret tried to cozy up to, belonged to it, as did the municipal City engineers. Jeanneret was friends with key lodge members such as Léon Gallet. The watch-enameling atelier of Jeanneret’s father was in the building next to the Masonic lodge. His aunt, Tante Pauline, lived next to the lodge too. Jeanneret wrote to Charles L'Eplattenier about becoming a member. His father, who was President of the Club Alpin Suisse (loosely comparable to the National Rifle Association), was invited there to speak at banquets. Jeanneret’s uncle, Sully Guinand, who played a key role in the finances of the Jeanneret family, was a lodge member.
Until the age of 30, Charles-Edouard Jeanneret, alias Le Corbusier, lived in La Chaux-de-Fonds, then the world’s leading watch-making town, where one exclusive club crossed religious and ethnic boundaries within the ruling and bourgeois classes: the Freemasonic lodge, La Loge L’Amitié. The municipal City architects, whom Jeanneret tried to cozy up to, belonged to it, as did the municipal City engineers. Jeanneret was friends with key lodge members such as Léon Gallet. The watch-enameling atelier of Jeanneret’s father was in the building next to the Masonic lodge. His aunt, Tante Pauline, lived next to the lodge too. Jeanneret wrote to Charles L'Eplattenier about becoming a member. His father, who was President of the Club Alpin Suisse (loosely comparable to the National Rifle Association), was invited there to speak at banquets. Jeanneret’s uncle, Sully Guinand, who played a key role in the finances of the Jeanneret family, was a lodge member.

]]> 2010-02-19T05:01:26+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/john_protevi_book_interview_political_affect_connecting_social_somatic/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/john_protevi_book_interview_political_affect_connecting_social_somatic/ Singular subjects arise from a “crystallization” or “resolution” of a distributed network of natural processes and social practices. So I start the book by laying out the theory of politically inflected affective cognition, bringing Deleuze together with dynamical systems theory and a number of positions in the affective, cognitive, and biological sciences. I then compare Aristotle, Kant, and Deleuze on the interchange of theology, biology and politics that has always haunted the philosophical treatment of the organism. Finally, I provide three case studies where the social-somatic connection that constitutes human nature results in the bypassing or at least the attenuation of consciousness. That is, I investigate instances where biologically inherited basic emotions result in, if not outright “takeovers” of behavior, at least strong unconscious biases. The three case studies are the Terri Schiavo case (empathy), the Columbine High School massacre (rage), and Hurricane Katrina (fear). Singular subjects arise from a “crystallization” or “resolution” of a distributed network of natural processes and social practices. So I start the book by laying out the theory of politically inflected affective cognition, bringing Deleuze together with dynamical systems theory and a number of positions in the affective, cognitive, and biological sciences. I then compare Aristotle, Kant, and Deleuze on the interchange of theology, biology and politics that has always haunted the philosophical treatment of the organism. Finally, I provide three case studies where the social-somatic connection that constitutes human nature results in the bypassing or at least the attenuation of consciousness. That is, I investigate instances where biologically inherited basic emotions result in, if not outright “takeovers” of behavior, at least strong unconscious biases. The three case studies are the Terri Schiavo case (empathy), the Columbine High School massacre (rage), and Hurricane Katrina (fear).

]]> 2010-02-17T05:01:19+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/mark_manger_interview_investing_protection_preferential_trade_agreements/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/mark_manger_interview_investing_protection_preferential_trade_agreements/ Trade policy seems like a dry subject, but for the people involved, livelihoods are at stake, giving the process a surprisingly colorful and emotional character. Yet “trade agreement” is actually a misnomer. Investing in Protection argues that North-South agreements are much less about exports and much more about foreign investment. The actors behind this story are multinational firms. In manufacturing industries, they move production into developing countries where labor costs are lower. In the services sector, they buy up recently privatized assets in order to enter markets. Because they provide jobs in both countries, they have greater influence over politicians than labor, consumers, and even conventional exporters.


Trade policy seems like a dry subject, but for the people involved, livelihoods are at stake, giving the process a surprisingly colorful and emotional character. Yet “trade agreement” is actually a misnomer. Investing in Protection argues that North-South agreements are much less about exports and much more about foreign investment. The actors behind this story are multinational firms. In manufacturing industries, they move production into developing countries where labor costs are lower. In the services sector, they buy up recently privatized assets in order to enter markets. Because they provide jobs in both countries, they have greater influence over politicians than labor, consumers, and even conventional exporters.

]]> 2010-02-15T05:01:03+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/catherine_cole_book_interview_performing_south_africa_truth_commision/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/catherine_cole_book_interview_performing_south_africa_truth_commision/ Words like “theatre,” “performance,” “spectacle” and “show” are often used pejoratively when applied to politics and the law. It was precisely the conflation of theatricality and justice that made Hannah Arendt so uncomfortable with Adolph Eichmann’s trial. Justice “demands seclusion,” she said. In a similar vein, a South African Inkatha Freedom Party leader dismissed the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Archbishop Desmond Tutu as “a sensationalist circus of horrors presided over by a weeping clown craving for the front stage spotlight.” In looking at the TRC through the lens of performance I neither see the commission negatively nor do I valorize it with romantic notions about the miraculous, cathartic, healing potential of performance. I simply assert that the commission was a performance—and that we need to understand how its performative dimensions operated.
Words like “theatre,” “performance,” “spectacle” and “show” are often used pejoratively when applied to politics and the law. It was precisely the conflation of theatricality and justice that made Hannah Arendt so uncomfortable with Adolph Eichmann’s trial. Justice “demands seclusion,” she said. In a similar vein, a South African Inkatha Freedom Party leader dismissed the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Archbishop Desmond Tutu as “a sensationalist circus of horrors presided over by a weeping clown craving for the front stage spotlight.” In looking at the TRC through the lens of performance I neither see the commission negatively nor do I valorize it with romantic notions about the miraculous, cathartic, healing potential of performance. I simply assert that the commission was a performance—and that we need to understand how its performative dimensions operated.

]]> 2010-02-12T05:01:21+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/pablo_piccato_book_interview_tyranny_opinion_honor_construction_public/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/pablo_piccato_book_interview_tyranny_opinion_honor_construction_public/ The political history of Mexico and other Latin countries has too often been told as one of the naked exercise of power by the elites over the subaltern. In these views, class exploitation, racial discrimination, foreign pressures are some of the forces that ultimately explain the permanence of inequality and authoritarianism. I hope to contribute to a growing body of Latin American historiography that, against these views, contends that Latin America was, from the beginning of independent life, a territory of struggle for democracy, full citizenship and freedom of speech. It is the permanence and modalities of that struggle that needs to be explained, rather than our superficial contemporary views about the region as an instance of failed modernity.

The political history of Mexico and other Latin countries has too often been told as one of the naked exercise of power by the elites over the subaltern. In these views, class exploitation, racial discrimination, foreign pressures are some of the forces that ultimately explain the permanence of inequality and authoritarianism. I hope to contribute to a growing body of Latin American historiography that, against these views, contends that Latin America was, from the beginning of independent life, a territory of struggle for democracy, full citizenship and freedom of speech. It is the permanence and modalities of that struggle that needs to be explained, rather than our superficial contemporary views about the region as an instance of failed modernity.

]]> 2010-02-10T05:00:04+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/kevin_mattson_book_interview_jimmy_carter_malaise_speech_change_america/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/kevin_mattson_book_interview_jimmy_carter_malaise_speech_change_america/ The Carter presidency should not be dismissed as a blip in time before Ronald Reagan assumed power in the 1980s. Carter had a unique vision for America’s role at home and abroad. His realization that America’s power is real but also evanescent, is crucial to rethinking what we should be today. In fact, President Obama’s inaugural address had many lines similar to Carter’s speech from 1979. Obama spoke of a “crisis of confidence” existing in America. He talked about the need to learn some hard truths about the state of our democracy. Like Carter, Obama has a deep interest in the theological teachings of Reinhold Niebuhr—who emphasized that humans are sinful and naturally self-interested.
The Carter presidency should not be dismissed as a blip in time before Ronald Reagan assumed power in the 1980s. Carter had a unique vision for America’s role at home and abroad. His realization that America’s power is real but also evanescent, is crucial to rethinking what we should be today. In fact, President Obama’s inaugural address had many lines similar to Carter’s speech from 1979. Obama spoke of a “crisis of confidence” existing in America. He talked about the need to learn some hard truths about the state of our democracy. Like Carter, Obama has a deep interest in the theological teachings of Reinhold Niebuhr—who emphasized that humans are sinful and naturally self-interested.

]]> 2010-02-08T05:01:42+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/stephen_destefano_book_interview_coyote_kitchen_door_wildlife_suburbia/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/stephen_destefano_book_interview_coyote_kitchen_door_wildlife_suburbia/ A friend who read the book thought that I may be too optimistic regarding our ability to understand our place in nature, formulate a land ethic, preserve open space and wildlife habitat, and live a more sustainable life. In the face of so many global crises, such as depleting oil reserves, climate change, an exponentially growing human population, and unending wars, it may be difficult to maintain a level of optimism. However, I have continually been amazed and impressed at the resourcefulness and ingenuity of people to seek and implement solutions. It is with that hope that I wrote Coyote at the Kitchen Door.


A friend who read the book thought that I may be too optimistic regarding our ability to understand our place in nature, formulate a land ethic, preserve open space and wildlife habitat, and live a more sustainable life. In the face of so many global crises, such as depleting oil reserves, climate change, an exponentially growing human population, and unending wars, it may be difficult to maintain a level of optimism. However, I have continually been amazed and impressed at the resourcefulness and ingenuity of people to seek and implement solutions. It is with that hope that I wrote Coyote at the Kitchen Door.

]]> 2010-02-05T05:01:32+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/jonathan_walker_book_interview_pistols_treason_murder_rise_fall_master_spy/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/jonathan_walker_book_interview_pistols_treason_murder_rise_fall_master_spy/ The conventions of professional historiography require abstraction, restraint, and decorum. Gerolamo Vano has no place within this regime, just as he had no place within the official rhetoric of political culture in seventeenth-century Venice. Vano demands instead exemplification, excess, and vulgarity. By exemplification, I mean that the way the story is told becomes a commentary on its subject, so that the form of the presentation itself embodies the argument. By excess, I mean that the presentation borrows Vano’s contagious enthusiasm, and echoes his violent disregard of all conventional pieties. By vulgarity, I mean a willingness to cross the divide between high and low culture, a divide that Vano also ignored.

The conventions of professional historiography require abstraction, restraint, and decorum. Gerolamo Vano has no place within this regime, just as he had no place within the official rhetoric of political culture in seventeenth-century Venice. Vano demands instead exemplification, excess, and vulgarity. By exemplification, I mean that the way the story is told becomes a commentary on its subject, so that the form of the presentation itself embodies the argument. By excess, I mean that the presentation borrows Vano’s contagious enthusiasm, and echoes his violent disregard of all conventional pieties. By vulgarity, I mean a willingness to cross the divide between high and low culture, a divide that Vano also ignored.

]]> 2010-02-03T05:01:56+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/gary_francione_interview_animals_persons_essays_abolition_animal_exploitati/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/gary_francione_interview_animals_persons_essays_abolition_animal_exploitati/ Consider the case of a severely mentally disabled human. We may not want to give such a person a driver’s license because of her inability to drive. But is her impairment relevant to whether we use her as an unwilling subject in a biomedical experiment or force her to become an organ donor? Many of us would argue that her particular disability means that we have a greater moral obligation to her; it certainly does not mean that we have a lesser one. Similarly, the fact that a dog’s mind is different from ours means that we do not give the dog a driver’s license, but it does not mean that we can use the dog for purposes for which we would not use any humans.
Consider the case of a severely mentally disabled human. We may not want to give such a person a driver’s license because of her inability to drive. But is her impairment relevant to whether we use her as an unwilling subject in a biomedical experiment or force her to become an organ donor? Many of us would argue that her particular disability means that we have a greater moral obligation to her; it certainly does not mean that we have a lesser one. Similarly, the fact that a dog’s mind is different from ours means that we do not give the dog a driver’s license, but it does not mean that we can use the dog for purposes for which we would not use any humans.

]]> 2010-02-01T05:01:14+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/robert_sullivan_book_interview_macaulay_tragedy_power/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/robert_sullivan_book_interview_macaulay_tragedy_power/ Seven years ago I was trying to write a probably unwriteable book on how, between ca. 1800 and 1950, a confidently modern, religiously emancipated elite derived spiritual sustenance from the ancient Greek and Latin classics. Because Macaulay was both an omnivorous classicist and an eminent post-Christian, I began reading his published works and letters in chronological order. A few pages into Sir William Temple (1838), Macaulay digresses on Oliver Cromwell’s invasion of Ireland in 1649. He misrepresents Cromwell’s slaughter of thousands of “aboriginal Irish” in wartime as a farsighted program of empire-building—regrettably never completed—and a model for later progressive, modernizing projects. Macaulay declares that, “it is in truth more merciful to extirpate a hundred thousand human beings at once, and to fill the void with a well-governed population, than to misgovern millions through a long succession of generations.”
Seven years ago I was trying to write a probably unwriteable book on how, between ca. 1800 and 1950, a confidently modern, religiously emancipated elite derived spiritual sustenance from the ancient Greek and Latin classics. Because Macaulay was both an omnivorous classicist and an eminent post-Christian, I began reading his published works and letters in chronological order. A few pages into Sir William Temple (1838), Macaulay digresses on Oliver Cromwell’s invasion of Ireland in 1649. He misrepresents Cromwell’s slaughter of thousands of “aboriginal Irish” in wartime as a farsighted program of empire-building—regrettably never completed—and a model for later progressive, modernizing projects. Macaulay declares that, “it is in truth more merciful to extirpate a hundred thousand human beings at once, and to fill the void with a well-governed population, than to misgovern millions through a long succession of generations.”

]]> 2010-01-29T05:01:52+00:00 http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/trysh_travis_book_interview_language_heart_cultural_history_recovery_moveme/ http://www.rorotoko.com/index.php/article/trysh_travis_book_interview_language_heart_cultural_history_recovery_moveme/ Unlike most of the writings on the topic, The Language of the Heart is neither “for” nor “against” recovery, and it’s important that people know that going in. Twelve-step groups like AA may work well for some people but not for others. The broader culture of recovery is in some ways insipid, banal, and politically reactionary, and in other ways profound, exciting, and progressive. Like any complex cultural phenomenon, recovery can’t be easily boiled down to a “good” or a “bad” thing, and people who come to the book expecting such blanket praise or condemnation will be disappointed. The Language of the Heart is intended to show that recovery is a diverse and evolving phenomenon whose complex history reflects the shifting ideas about gender and power that characterize contemporary America.
Unlike most of the writings on the topic, The Language of the Heart is neither “for” nor “against” recovery, and it’s important that people know that going in. Twelve-step groups like AA may work well for some people but not for others. The broader culture of recovery is in some ways insipid, banal, and politically reactionary, and in other ways profound, exciting, and progressive. Like any complex cultural phenomenon, recovery can’t be easily boiled down to a “good” or a “bad” thing, and people who come to the book expecting such blanket praise or condemnation will be disappointed. The Language of the Heart is intended to show that recovery is a diverse and evolving phenomenon whose complex history reflects the shifting ideas about gender and power that characterize contemporary America.

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