My learning journey at Stanford continued over the summer with an extremely intense course on “the archive”, an artifact of great fetishization in the humanities. Here is a quick overview.
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Many years ago, as the final capstone project for a learning journey at my alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, I wrote something best described as “creative non-fiction”. It combined elements of autobiography with some ruminations on cricket and Indian identity. That project is presented below, unchanged.
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Last week I put out an announcement about a new role I am taking on at my alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania. I thought I’d write a few more lines on my higher education involvement. The purpose is to explain the slightly demented fervor with which I approach that involvement.
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The second year of my MLA program ended with a bang in the form of a course on poems. Here I thought it’d be interesting to lay out an abridged version of my response to Blue Swallows by Howard Nemerov.
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In this essay I want to talk briefly about how most affluent people live in “gilded cages.” Just like bullshit jobs, gilded cages promise meaning and fulfillment, but more often deliver a sense of dissatisfaction and emptiness.
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There is much research out there on peer group dynamics, and I am not going to rehash it. But I’ve been thinking about this for a long time, and spend a fair amount of my mentorship time hectoring folks about avoiding peer group pressure, so here are some thoughts.
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I’ve been thinking and writing about Iain M. Banks recently, in the context of a learning journey I am on at Stanford. Reflecting on his work in an academic setting was a different experience and got me thinking — thinking about how we think about the future.
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In life — work, home, relationships of all kinds — there are people who “brung ya to the dance.” Sometimes we forget them, and this is a mistake. It is essential to remember them, both because gratitude is a noble emotion and so you also remember to pass it on.
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In which I speak about science fiction and fantasy, and the universality of all fiction. And some book recommendations!
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