Benton, Michael. "Around the World in 15 Films (3)." Letterboxd (Future film course)
Biagetti, Samuel. "Myth of the Month 1: The Enlightenment." Historiansplaining (March 13, 2018) ["There was no Enlightenment. Steven Pinker’s new book, “Enlightenment Now,” is a classic re-statement of the myth of the Enlightenment which holds that in the 1600s and 1700s, Europeans threw off the tired dogmas of the Middle Ages and embraced a new philosophy of Reason, Progress, Science, and Humanism. In fact, the 1700s were a period of confusion, with no clear unifying ideas or trends: occultism, mysticism, and absolute monarchy flourished alongside experiments in democracy and chemistry. “The Enlightenment” forms one of the central pillars of Whig history, serving to re-affirm the notion that our present-day beliefs and values are rational and coherent."]
Braswell, Emory, et al. "Theater for the Mind." Imaginary Worlds (September 19, 2018) ["The "golden age of radio drama" may have been a stellar period for storytelling -- but the stories weren't all golden bright. Science fiction and horror were the ideal genres to explore the deep anxieties people felt from the Depression through the Cold War. And these radio dramas set the stage for fantastical stories that couldn't be told yet without advanced special effects. Dallas Taylor of the podcast Twenty Thousand Hertz co-hosts this episode as we hear from radio historians Neil Verma and Richard J. Hand, and radio drama veterans Dirk Maggs and Richard Toscan. Plus Emory Braswell recalls the day he thought Martians had invaded New Jersey."]
Greene, Liz. "(Not) Teaching The Elephant Man." The Cine-Files #13 (Fall 2017)
Partanen, Anu and Jay Tomlinson. "The Nordic Theory of Love." The Best of the Left #142 (March 1, 2019) [MB - A great discussion of how a more supportive society would actually strengthen and aid us in developing saner/stronger relationships and families that are not structured around co-dependency and domination.]
Phelan, Stephen. "Watching the End of the World." The Boston Review (June 11, 2019) ["The Doomsday Clock is set to two minutes to midnight—the same position it held in 1953, when the United States and USSR detonated their first hydrogen bombs. So why don't we make movies about nuclear war anymore? "]
Seitz, Matt Zoller. "Braid." Roger Ebert (February 1, 2019)
Shah, Kushbu. "They Look White But Say They are Black: A Tiny Town in Ohio Wrestles with Race." The Guardian (July 25, 2019) [A clear example of how racism is much more than just skin color (although that is an obvious and easy way for immediate enforcement), that who is considered to be "white"/"non-white" has evolved over time, and racism has always had a strong economic/class (hierarchy) function designed to keep certain peoples in their "place.". Check out Barbara Field's book Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality "Many residents in East Jackson were raised to identify as black. But what dictates race: where you live, your DNA, the history you’re taught?"]
Thompson, Ginger. "A Border Patrol Agent Reveals What It’s Really Like to Guard Migrant Children." Pro Publica (July 16, 2019) ["With the agency under fire for holding children in deplorable conditions and over racist and misogynistic Facebook posts, one agent speaks about what it’s like to do his job. 'Somewhere down the line people just accepted what’s going on as normal.'"]
"Weird Fiction." Horror Pod Class #2 (January 31, 2018) [Michael Benton -- They were discussing this just before Alex Garland's film Annihilation came out and Jeff Vandermeer's source novel (and the new weird genre in general) is also brought in, but what is very interesting is the idea that the "new weird" genre is speaking to a 21st Century dis-ease with the impossibility of truly knowing reality (fake news & official lies instantaneously and repeatedly disseminated through ubiquitous screen technologies, radically transforming science/technology/theories that even leave those that devote their lives to a particular discipline overwhelmed, and a general distrust of the general population in their traditional experts/leaders). This is played out vividly in Vandermeer's trilogy and Garland's film as the main characters struggling to understand/survive the transmutating Area X/The Shimmer are scientists/soldiers.]
Whistleblowers Dialogic Cinephilia (Ongoing Archive)
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