The Museum of Modern Art published the following great video on why people used to be able to marvel at very first movies made. We may think they were of pretty bad quality because we’ve only seen bad reproductions. But the originals must have looked startlingly realistic. Via Aeon.
Fun little historical tidbit on “hacking” of technology in eighteenth century France. Apparently there were some brothers who used the semaphore telegraph system for their own gain. They used a mechanism for correcting errors when messages were relayed to transmit information. With the help of some insider person they could use to transmit their own information about the stock exchange in Paris to Bordeaux which allowed them to make a lot of money! I read the translated article at Courrier international.
Having fun looking at two posts from Sociological Images on gendered products:
Watching a video with excerpts from the Chomsly-Foucault debate via Aeon.co. These shorts segments give a good quick look on the diverging view of Chomsky and Foucault and their views on power and human nature.
A TED talk from Emma Marris, a writer who focuses on environmentalism, where she proposes us to redefine what is considered nature. I particularly enjoyed the section where she urges to rethink how we look at wild nature (“novel ecosystems”) in for example abandoned places cities. Watch the whole talk on the TED website.
Exploring some videos on by forest ecologists on how trees communicate via Open Culture. The following is a short educational Ted-Ed video in which Camille Defrenne and Suzanne Simard explain how trees communicate through their complex root system and the symbiotic relationship with fungi.
It took me a while to find the time, but finally started listening to the new Big Thief album, “U.F.O.F.”. The lyrics are as curious as always with short mysterious vignettes filled with names, colours and animals. Overall the albums sounds magical, with some wonderful moments like the screams from the guitar in the song “Contact”. Favorite track of the albums currently is “Orange”.
Surprised to see an interview with Donna Haraway on The Guardian. In the interview she discusses the science wars and her current focus on climate activism. Read the full article here.
Claire Walkey from the Oxford Refugee Studies Centre writes about why we should rethink refugee registration. Registration is the first moment when asylum-seekers become known by the state, so we might assume that states will always want to implement registration procedures to monitor people. But her fieldwork in Kenya shows that this is not always the case as here the government actually stopped the registration procedures. According to her we therefore need to “look for answers in the meaning and politics of registration itself”, as registration can be a form of empowerment for refugees:
Fantastic lecture from Annemarie Mol “Where is my Body? Notes on Eating and Topology”. This lecture was organised by the Research Center of Social and Cultural Studies Mainz (SoCuM) as part of their yearly Georg Forster Lecture series. More excellent speakers have been invited of the years, and I’m curious to look at those lectures as well. A page with all the Georg Forster lectures can be found here. The following is the original abstract from the SoCuM website for the lecture: