Touching an “Authentic” Swastika
[7 minute read] CW: Nazism, Neo-Nazism, Swastikas I’m currently writing this blog post from a hotel room in Durham, N.C. I’m here over Spring Break to do some archival research at the Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library. The Abraham Joshua Heschel Papers live here, and it is an overwhelming and expansive collection. The collection guide
Time and Authenticity in Visions and Images of Abraham Joshua Heschel
[7 minute read] “Can we have snack right now? When we get back to the classroom?” “We usually have snack at 10:00 or 10:30am. It’s only 9:30am now. Don’t you think you’ll want it later?” I ask one of my students doubtfully, walking beside him as we head towards the seventh-grade classroom at Temple Concord. We
Shipwrecked Courtier: Nostalgia and Courtiership in Twelfth Night and The Book of the Courtier
[7-10 minute read] Above my fortunes, yet my state is well. I am a gentleman. – Viola, Twelfth Night Viola, the shipwrecked woman of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, finds herself separated from her twin brother in a foreign land. Vulnerable, she must find means for supporting herself and dons the disguise of a eunuch named Cesario to
New Netherland Colonial Beavers
[10 minute read] The seventeenth century was a moment of exploration and imperial expansion for European powers; the Dutch were of no exception. In 1609, Henry Hudson landed in the New World after the East India Company’s failed attempt to find passage to India. Years later, the West India Company (WIC) would be founded in 1621,
Gainsford’s “Glorious” England
[5-7 minute read] A quick look at popular TV programming might lead a person to think that Americans are obsessed with Britain. We watch sci-fi shows like Dr. Who? to feed our imaginations about the possibilities of alien life and technology, as well as shows like The Great British Bake Off that combine culinary delights with
Spatial Representations
[5-7 minute read] When going on vacation these days, we take our cameras (or phones) with us to commemorate the places we visited, and the adventures that we embarked on. Contemporary phones and photos offer a way to share our experiences with friends and loved ones in a manner that allows them to imagine they
The Eco-Zombie: Using Biology to Imagine Zombies Beyond the Human
[10 minute read] In this month’s posts on Metathesis, I have discussed the metaphorical uses of contagious disease and examined the figure of the zombie in some popular late twentieth and twenty-first-century texts. In my final post of the month, I would like to turn to a unique sub-genre of the zombie narrative that unsettles the
‘Build That Wall!’: Studies in the 21st-Century Plague Zombie
[10 minute read] In this month’s posts for Metathesis, I have been looking at how the metaphorical deployment of epidemic disease operates, and how we might understand the metaphorical function of plague zombies in contemporary texts. Why is it that the figure of the plague zombie features so prominently in the twenty-first-century imagination? If the plague
Messages of Power: Epidemic Disease and Metaphor
[10 minute read] Culture has been infected. From the largest spheres of government and media to the mundane exchanges of everyday living, a small but resilient particle of an idea has perforated the social fabric of our lives and buried deep in our collective imagination. This noxious notion exists unnoticed in many parts of society, a