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Reading Wednesday
Mar. 4th, 2020 07:38 pm I'd have forgotten if @frenzy hadn't posted and reminded me. Ooops!
Just finished: The Girl Who Grew a Galaxy by Cherie Dimaline. Yeah, go read this one if you haven't. It's so good. Basically no plot happens beyond girl grows up weird, most of her family dies, she goes to New Orleans and meets a cool astronomer who's possibly the love of her life. That's it, that's the book, and that's not a spoiler because it's on the back cover. The brilliance is all in the character study, a vividly drawn portrait of a woman with OCD and anxiety and Dimaline's ability to put into magic realist metaphor the amorphous feelings of terror that mental illness brings. I fell hard and instantly for the character and adored every word. I'm hard-pressed to decide which of the three books I've read by her is my favourite now—this was definitely the one that resonated with me the most, though I think Marrow Thieves is the one I think everyone needs to read ASAP and Empire of Wild is the most interesting as literature. Basically I'm in awe of this author.
Antisocial: Online Extremists, Techno-Utopians, and the Hijacking of the American Conversation by Andrew Marantz. I started reading this on a 7-day hold and then it expired and I had to wait a few months to get it on hold again. Absolutely worth the wait. This is a chilling look into the connections between the alt-right, the alt-lite, and the world of Big Tech; kind of like a less-occulty version of what Elizabeth Sandifer did with Neoreaction a Basilisk. There are a lot of interviews with major players in the far-right, including a story of someone who entered and was able to exit. It's like watching a trainwreck where you know that the outcome is going to kill a crapton of people, but you still can't look away.
Currently reading: Contemporary Art and Multicultural Education, edited by Susan Cahan, Zoya Kocur. This is exactly what it says on the tin—reflections, examples, and lesson plans about art education for social justice. It's American and written in 1996 (and it's depressing how things seem to have gone backwards since) but still a very useful resource and relevant to my interests. I could do without the artist statements but that's how I feel about artist statements in general. Regardless, it has material that I'll definitely be using in my classes.
Just finished: The Girl Who Grew a Galaxy by Cherie Dimaline. Yeah, go read this one if you haven't. It's so good. Basically no plot happens beyond girl grows up weird, most of her family dies, she goes to New Orleans and meets a cool astronomer who's possibly the love of her life. That's it, that's the book, and that's not a spoiler because it's on the back cover. The brilliance is all in the character study, a vividly drawn portrait of a woman with OCD and anxiety and Dimaline's ability to put into magic realist metaphor the amorphous feelings of terror that mental illness brings. I fell hard and instantly for the character and adored every word. I'm hard-pressed to decide which of the three books I've read by her is my favourite now—this was definitely the one that resonated with me the most, though I think Marrow Thieves is the one I think everyone needs to read ASAP and Empire of Wild is the most interesting as literature. Basically I'm in awe of this author.
Antisocial: Online Extremists, Techno-Utopians, and the Hijacking of the American Conversation by Andrew Marantz. I started reading this on a 7-day hold and then it expired and I had to wait a few months to get it on hold again. Absolutely worth the wait. This is a chilling look into the connections between the alt-right, the alt-lite, and the world of Big Tech; kind of like a less-occulty version of what Elizabeth Sandifer did with Neoreaction a Basilisk. There are a lot of interviews with major players in the far-right, including a story of someone who entered and was able to exit. It's like watching a trainwreck where you know that the outcome is going to kill a crapton of people, but you still can't look away.
Currently reading: Contemporary Art and Multicultural Education, edited by Susan Cahan, Zoya Kocur. This is exactly what it says on the tin—reflections, examples, and lesson plans about art education for social justice. It's American and written in 1996 (and it's depressing how things seem to have gone backwards since) but still a very useful resource and relevant to my interests. I could do without the artist statements but that's how I feel about artist statements in general. Regardless, it has material that I'll definitely be using in my classes.
