Monthly Archives: December 2012

Plugged in Trees (Nature-Technology)

Posted on December 23, 2012 by zjb

Columbia University lights up the trees on its main campus-walk along what used to be 116th St. for the entire winter season, from November through March. A neighbor called my attention to the individual outlets for each individual tree, which … Continue reading →

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(Religion &) LSD (Allen Ginsberg)

Posted on December 22, 2012 by zjb

My mom clipped me an essay in the New Yorker by Zadie Smith about Joni Mitchell with reference to Abraham, Isaac, and Kierkegaard. The essay reflects on this thing called literary taste, and the kinds of shifts to which it … Continue reading →

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ALTERNATIVE MODERNITIES?

Posted on December 21, 2012 by zjb

ZJB: One of the many things done well over at Alan Brill’s blog are the interviews with scholar-colleagues. This one is with Eli Stern about his just published book about the modernity of the Vilna Gaon. I’m not sure I’m … Continue reading →

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My Jewish Friends, My Christian Friends (Parochials and Lonely Knights of Faith)

Posted on December 21, 2012 by zjb

(Synagoga and Ecclesia at Notre-Dame de Paris) I wasn’t going to post this, but maybe I will, but please take it with a grain of salt because I don’t mean a word of it,  not really. It’s just being back … Continue reading →

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Repetition (Chicago High Rise)

Posted on December 20, 2012 by zjb

(more pictures from Chicago) i like the way the white frames to the railing repeat themselves in groups of threes up and down the face of the building. they remind me of this piece by Sol LeWitt, Cubic Construction, 1971  

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Authority of Authority (Talya Fishman & Haym Soloveitchik) (The Jewish Review of Books, the Tivkah Fund, and Conservative Jewish Thought)

Posted on December 20, 2012 by zjb

About a year ago, I penned online at Zeek Magazine a vicious attack on the Tikvah Fund and the Jewish Review of Books, which is funded by the Fund. In it, I attempted to expose the Tikvah Fund as a … Continue reading →

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Open Urban Spacing (Chicago)

Posted on December 19, 2012 by zjb

I’ve been to Chicago only once before and never really noticed hope open-spaced and far apart the buildings downtown are from each other. They stand in marked contrast to the more densely packed grid space of New York. I think … Continue reading →

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Worlds (Affect) (Suffering) (Connecticut)

Posted on December 19, 2012 by zjb

[Robert Rauschenberg, White Paintings (Three Panel), 1951] Just back from the Association of Jewish Studies Conference; three days with no news, no internet, no Facebook, no Jewish Philosophy Place. I liked and always like the bubble space of an academic conference, but … Continue reading →

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A Gun Control Petition

Posted on December 14, 2012 by zjb

Please consider signing this petition. http://signon.org/sign/gun-control-now-1.fb23?source=s.icn.fb&r_by=6392740  

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Hanukkah (Meta-Kitsch)

Posted on December 14, 2012 by zjb
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