Rumba under Fire: The Arts of Survival from West Point to Delhi

Published: 02/29/2016

A professor of poetry uses a deck of playing cards to measure the time until her lover returns from Afghanistan. Congolese soldiers find their loneliness reflected in the lyrics of rumba songs. Survivors of the siege of Sarajevo discuss which book they would have never burned for fuel. A Romanian political prisoner writes her memoir[…]

Staying Alive

Published: 10/21/2013

Staying Alive: A Survival Manual for the Liberal Arts fiercely defends the liberal arts in and from an age of neoliberal capital and techno-corporatization run amok, arguing that the public university’s purpose is not vocational training, but rather the cultivation of what Fradenburg calls “artfulness,” including the art of making knowledge. In addition to sustained[…]

Like a Radio Left On / On the Outskirts of Identical Cities: Living (with) Fradenburg

Figure 1. Aranye Fradenburg delivering her plenary address at the 1st Biennial Meeting of the BABEL Working Group, Austin, Texas [Nov. 2010] by EILEEN JOY . . . obscure / forces are at work / like a radio left on / On the outskirts of / identical cities. ~Ben Lerner, “Doppler Elegies” Like a radio[…]