Today, I would like to discuss a dilemma created by cyber-communication (and, yes, it is ironic that I am writing about this topic in a blog). Like many people, I text, post on Facebook, and use other cyber-tools because they are easy, fun, and help me stay connected. But I’ve been thinking about what is [...]
Ok, this is pretty cool, so I have to break my vow of blogger’s silence to mention that Doc Martens, the British shoe company that has been in step (couldn’t resist) with so many pop music trends in the UK, and sometimes the States, is celebrating its fiftieth birthday by commissioning contemporary bands to record [...]
I am known as one of the more technologically engaged/addicted faculty members at Middlebury. Luckily, it ties directly into what I teach: media studies, focused on contemporary popular culture, television, and digital media. So the hours I spend on my MacBook Pro are mostly part of my broader “field research,” whether it’s Facebook social networking, [...]
I was in the midst of transferring my blog from its old home on WordPress to this new space on the Middlebury website when I start messing around with this post, which highlights a gadget I recently purchased (more on that in a moment) but also speaks more generally to the pleasures of digital convergence. [...]
Last year around this time, we posted a list of favorite albums of 2007. I say “we” because the post included input from my friend, Matt Jennings (editor of Middlebury Magazine), with whom I host a radio show on WRMC (Friday afternoons from 3:30 to 5:00 p.m.). We thought it would be fun to do [...]
Since Isaac Hayes’ death on August 11, I have been searching the Internet in vain for news stories that mention his visit to Vermont in November of 2005. It’s a weird and irresistible aspect of cyber-culture that you can google your way to history, but even the world’s greatest search engine has limits. We brought [...]
As I mentioned in an earlier post, I am lucky to have a radio show on WRMC. It’s a lot of fun, and this year I am co-hosting the show with Matt Jennings, editor of the Middlebury Magazine. Our musical tastes are similar, which makes for some great overlap (though we prepare our set lists independently). Anyway, [...]
Even without doing the research, I feel pretty safe in saying that the history of Martin Luther King day tells us a lot about how Americans have engaged the issue of diversity during the last twenty years or so. As a federal holiday, MLK day has been around since the mid 1980s; as a state [...]
This week, I’ve been following two stories in the popular music scene. The first concerns Bruce Springsteen’s just-released album “Magic.” I’ve listened pretty faithfully to Springsteen’s music since 1973 — when, as a sophomore in high school I saw him perform at the Allen Theater in Cleveland — so every time he makes new music, [...]
