And posting this podcast today is quite apropos, I find.
To listen to my piece on the Text of Clothing, click here.
This podcast will be added to my iTunes series, Gendering the Media with Brikena Ribaj on the 18th of March.
I often write and podcast about the boredom bug which is so easily caught in Heteronormative-landia where one is bound to drown one’s self in curls of tweed, polyester, and high-priced leather.
Such bug, however, had no business in my space this weekend.
I was in the presence of rich textuality this weekend.
Certain kinds of clothing and color coordinations are so effective in grabbing my attention that I am utterly powerless when it comes to resisting my verbal need to address them.
I saw a friend of mine this weekend. I had not seen my friend in well over a decade. She looked like a whole decade had forgotten to pay her a personal visit.
I felt proud. Proud that my friend's aesthetics seemed so ignoring of time.
The memory I had of my friend was one of sophistication.
I revisited a memory of sophistication when she appeared in a tailored light green coat, an orange shirt, and urban pants cut in a timeless a-la-Katherine Hepburn style.
The cornucopia of colors was accompanied by the warm brown of her city purse.
“Wow!” I think to myself.
Nothing says ‘welcome’ the way a warm palette of colors does.
My sociality filters kicked in and I resisted doing what the good half says is what I tend to do naturally: look at things I react to aesthetically the way I do a Rembrandt at the Portland Museum of Arts.
My friend is now a formally trained designer.
In her case the professional choice makes full sense as she has married what she can do instinctually well with formal training.
As she is telling me about her professional pursuits, a thought comes to mind and I remember having an urge to write said thought down. It would be rude, however, to do what I generally do in my environment, i.e., write whenever the writing instinct wants to be sated. I tell myself to remember the thought. It basically said:
Eat your heart out, Rachel Zoe.
So, today, I write proudly yet again. I'm proud and grateful to have been in the presence of the kind of style where form is solid because it's rooted in healthy content.
As I am about to depart I ask:
"So, how can you gauge which colors are 'in' for which year?"
"I don't pay attention to time. What looks good, looks good." Says my friend.
"How Jackie O. meets modernity" I say.
And what made the experience so enjoyable was the fact that its fecundity gave me such productive food for thought.
Thank you for the creative space, friend.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
The Text of Pink
This is what I saw last time I was up in Chicago.
It begged for attention and I had to give in. The text of pink, I call it.
The preponderance of pink is code for something here, I find.
This is a color/textile/aesthetic choice which this particular wearer finds apropos for quotidianity.
Mesmerizing.
How would you read this?
Saturday, March 7, 2009
U2
The new Rolling Stone cover is wicked good.
If only the critics' take of U2's new album matched the aforementioned cover.
I am not looking forward to this as much as U2 served me well as an undergraduate.
Or maybe I just respect a couple of rock journalists enough to let them influence me over things Bono.
Friday, March 6, 2009
New Podcast: On Love
As I announced a few days ago, production has started on a new podcast series. The first podcast series, Gendering the Media with Brikena Ribaj will continue to have new pieces added to it every Friday. Most of these pieces will be on modern applications of literary theory.
This new series, De Amore: On Love, will, for the most part, be on the literature of the Middle Ages. The literature of the Middle Ages is what I am formally trained in and it is that which fuels the majority of my interests, professional and personal.
For there is nothing new under the sun, folks.
And, no, we don't know better in modernity.
Far from it.
The new series will be available on iTunes soon.
In the meantime, you may listen to it here.
This first podcast is a general introduction to the concept of love as "minne," the Middle High German word for courtly love, and "caritas/cupiditas/prima voglia" as Dante refers to it in his own work. The two authors I evoke in this first piece are Hartmann von Aue and Dante and their respective works to which I pay tribute are diu klage, Gregorius, Convivio, and the Divine Comedy.
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Conference, I
Taken a few hours ago today in Albuquerque, New Mexico where today I presented on my research on the creation of the alternative third gender model in the work of Hildegard von Bingen.
Title: "Constructing a Third Gender in Hildegard von Bingen’s Scivias, Hartmann von Aue’s Der arme Heinrich, and Dietrich von der Glezze's der borte."
The conference is the annual Medieval Association of the Pacific. Many literary scholars, historians, art historians, and musicologists who focus on the Middle Ages present their new research. It's my most favorite conference as every year it happens in a new Western urban center.
Brikena Ribaj, Albuquerque, New Mexico, University of New Mexico Campus, 3/6/2009
See the program here.
Now, I am not a fan of posting pictures of mine on my page as I tend to find that practice too unnecessarily egocentric. But I am posting one here. It's not about me, it's about that colorful piece standing proud behind me. The colors are unmistakably New Mexico and the text quite gendered.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Why Kitsch Sells, II
There is a story behind everyone's taste.
That is at the core of Carl Wilson's book Celine Dion's Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste.
I first blogged about this a couple of years ago. See that post here.
Carl Wilson was on the Colbert Report this week promoting the same book.
It's a short read. Give it a try. I am almost certain that you also know people who strangely like things like Celine Dion's music or Paulie Shore movies. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
Maddow on Leno
Here's Rachel Maddow on Leno. She discusses AIG, Wall Street, and as most everybody else these days, Rush.
New Podcast Series
HetPer is proud to announce a second podcast series called De Amore: On Love. This series will focus on the concept of courtly love in the Middle Ages and how it is transmitted and received in later times.
These podcasts will be strictly literary in nature and the majority of the direct and indirect literary and historical references will come out of the European Middle Ages. The focus will mostly be on German, French, and Italian texts.
Stay tuned for the upcoming first episode which should become available in a few days.
These podcasts will be strictly literary in nature and the majority of the direct and indirect literary and historical references will come out of the European Middle Ages. The focus will mostly be on German, French, and Italian texts.
Stay tuned for the upcoming first episode which should become available in a few days.
Detroit and Music
Just saw this via Twitter. R. Florida is quoted in here. As is Mitch Albom.
A bit says:
'"Bare in Mind..... We All Find Behind, From Time To Time", is a popular quote from dance rockers, LCD Soundsystem and although these lyrics are uttered carefree, they conjure the sense of profound clairvoyance from the perspective a Detroiter.'
Seeing that I am an LCD Soundsystem loyal fan, I rarely find their lyrics carefree. But that is beside the point here. Having lived in Detroit myself for about half a year, I have often wondered about the sorry state of affairs in this city that once had so much promise. And the difficult economy has only made things harsher for this city.
Here's to hoping that the car industry fares better and that Detroit can re-capture the magic that it once was.
The link is here.
A bit says:
'"Bare in Mind..... We All Find Behind, From Time To Time", is a popular quote from dance rockers, LCD Soundsystem and although these lyrics are uttered carefree, they conjure the sense of profound clairvoyance from the perspective a Detroiter.'
Seeing that I am an LCD Soundsystem loyal fan, I rarely find their lyrics carefree. But that is beside the point here. Having lived in Detroit myself for about half a year, I have often wondered about the sorry state of affairs in this city that once had so much promise. And the difficult economy has only made things harsher for this city.
Here's to hoping that the car industry fares better and that Detroit can re-capture the magic that it once was.
The link is here.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
New Music Review: Lily Allen, Franz Ferdinand, and Morrissey
Lily Allen's new album It's Not Me, It's You is what it needs to be, typically Lily.
To resort to a textile analogy, it's kind of like that nice, light t-shirt to wear underneath Autumn-like layers on a day that promises to get warmer. And as the sun comes out, you can remove the layers and enjoy the levity the little t-shirt has to offer.
That is what Lily Allen's new album It's Not Me, It's You is like.
And, coincidentally, my t-shirt today was, de facto, a white Lily Allen which I did use as a layering base. And the shirt analogy was truly coincidental.
Franz Ferdinand's new album Tonight: Franz Ferdinand is one project that made me somewhat happy. Now I can finally think about their music when their name pops up and not their cropped pants and novel hairstyles (not that there is anything wrong with that, of course).I mostly listen to this album when I'm doing cardio as the sound lends itself to a relatively quick pace. Tracks like Can't Stop Feeling, No You Girls, and Turn It On may become high-frequency tracks with some measure of ease. Tracks like Katherine Hit Me feature just enough 80's BritPop references to make one hunger for some Depeche Mode. It made me think of Enjoy the Silence and house music at the same time. This track also evoked some Bravery and, strangely enough, some Ladytron too.
Then tracks like Lucid Dreams and What She Came For are as old-school as the Beatles and the Stones.
I have always wanted Franz Ferdinand to succeed, especially after they gained much popularity for their fashion style as opposed to their musical relevance.
I think this album puts them on the right track.
If Lily Allen's album is a nice, light t-shirt, Tonight: Franz Ferdinand would be a comfortable pullover.
Morrissey's Years of Refusal is superb.Let me try and explain why.
First, I wasn't always an active Morriessey fan. Morrissey used to be to me what a nice cocktail dress continues to be to me: great for a black tie but closeted the rest of the year.
Someone very special turned me on to Morrissey a while back and I have not looked back since. He's the dress I now wear, so to speak. Morrissey's been outed. And I like him. A whole lot.
Morrissey became truly relevant to me as a musician when the indie film New York Doll came out. Morrissey is featured in the soundtrack as well but what makes him stand out to me is his poetic presence in the telling of the story of Arthur Kane, the late New York Doll. Morrissey, the man, came across as human, relatable, cognizant of the human plight, and supportive of fellow artists who have encountered hard times. There's a kind of generosity of spirit that this artist oozes and that is precisely what makes his music so intimate, I find.
Morrissey's music features the kind of sensitivity, set of dilemmas, and quotidian pain that few artists have the gravitas and ability to capture and portray. It takes guts to truly like Morrissey because his music is gut-rippingly honest yet edifying. Morrissey is for brave souls.
His newest album, Years of Refusal displays the kind of musical savoir faire that only a true professional possesses. A truly rock song like Something is Squeezing My Skull almost makes one optimistic even though in it, Moz says things like:
"Oh, something is squeezing my skull
Something i just cannot describe
There is no love in modern life
Oh, something is squeezing my skull
Something i cant fight
There are no friends in modern life
Diazapam...valium...tarmazpam...lithium
Ect...hrt...how long must i stay on this stuff?"
Morrissey's voice is the stuff of the days when being talented meant carrying a tune without the crutches of computers and voice manipulation. When Moz sings, Moz SINGS. I cannot think of a track that does justice to his voice better than
"When Last I Spoke to Carol I Said"
In it, Morrissey's typically existential tone manages to come out seemingly effortlessly.
Yes, you definitely should listen to Morrissey's new album.
If Lily's album was the t-shirt, Frand Ferdinand's was the pullover, and Morrissey's Years of Refusal is that timeless jacket that goes with everything, because it is cool like that.
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