Intersections of the American public and its academy are too rare. This is for myriad reasons. College is expensive and exclusive. The individual research of professors—especially in the humanities—is too obscure to have much traction with the small share of Americans who actually read books. And perceptions of the ivory tower/elitism owe a good deal to that expense and exclusion and obscurity.
Geoffrey Nunberg isn’t exactly a household name—no academic is. But Nunberg is known, his writings on language appearing in The New York Times and other publications, his voice heard often on NPR’s Fresh Air. Of course, The Times and public radio have very specific audiences. But with that proviso in mind, it’s clear that Nunberg’s been able to branch out of academia more than his fellow linguists.
Enter Ascent of the A-Word: Assholism, the First Sixty Years, Nunberg’s charming and comprehensive study of the history, usage, and culture of the word asshole. If ever there were a word to unite Americans—academics, steelworkers, etc.—in 2012, it’d be asshole, for its common usage and what it evokes: our worries about our declining civility. But Nunberg’s work isn’t meant to sound the alarm about anonymous people being dicks in line at Cosi or pregnant women being forced to stand on public transportation. Rather, he’s more interested in its origins, rise, and definition. Continue reading
Lost in the election-year drudgery that is America’s current foreign policy discussion is a fact most won’t dispute: The Ali Khameini regime in Iran has been brutal at home and abroad, restricting human rights within its borders and supporting murders and assassinations around the world. While the right-wing saber-rattling has been nothing short of irresponsible and misguided, a naturally broad rebuttal against their IRAN IS ALL-POWERFUL AND BAD FOLKS argument leads to a denial of the total shittiness of Khameini and his clerical thugs, granting the terrible leaders of post-Shah Iran the clemency they don’t deserve. (And while we’re on the subject of who deserves what: the Iranian people don’t deserve Khameini, et al.)
Around this time last year, Matt Taibbi included a little snippet in his mailbag that stuck with me, and seems especially relevant when talking about Peter Beinart’s new book, The Crisis of Zionism.
