Top 100 Liberal Arts Professor Blogs
Category Archives: Blogs, Socials
Once On My Way to the Blog
Things I’ve learned from blogging. Bill says he doesn’t worry about being cool any more, but that’s because he is cool. Cool people don’t worry about what’s cool. They just do it. (cue music – bom chicom chicom, bom chicom)
What Would Thomas Blog?
Will is blogging Aquinas now.
The further conclusion is evident that God is eternal. For everything that begins to be or that ceases to be, is affected in this way through motion or change. But we have just shown that God is absolutely immobile. Consequently He is eternal.
That’s what Thomas would blog, if he had been so blessed. I’ll stop before I get sacrilegious.
Seven Basic Blog Posts
Alt Text: Video, a simple explanation of the meta-narrative behind, above, throughout, whatever, all blog posts. Lore Sjoberg explains. (I also enjoyed his highly intellectual analysis of The Incredible Hulk in this video called, “The Alternative Hulk.” What if Bruce Banner morphed into the Hulk when he had other emotions–not anger, but something else? “Don’t make me curious,” Bruce says. “You wouldn’t like me when I’m curious.”)
Klavan nails it again
It hailed today. Again. Bigger hail this time, and it lasted longer.
Clearly, we have offended Divine Providence. In the spirit of all modern politics, I shall not hesitate to call for full confession of all our corporate sins, just as long as the sins I’m talking about are those of the party I’m not in.
Through the good offices of a friend, I got a replacement for the lost grill on Mrs. Hermanson, my ’98 Chevy Tracker, today. He even put it on for me. It’s maroon, while Mrs. Hermanson is white, which makes her look a little like a circus clown’s face. But my last two cars have been white, and I’m kind of hungry for some color on my ride.
Also, painting it would be like, you know, work.
Tonight I’ll pack her up so I can get an early start for Story, City, Iowa tomorrow. It’s supposed to rain all night, and continue raining tomorrow, and in Story City they project a 50% chance of rain Friday and Saturday. So I have a feeling this isn’t going to be the best weekend ever.
But I promised to be there, and we Vikings keep our vows.
By way of Libertas, here’s another incisive piece by novelist Andrew Klavan, this one from City Journal. It’s about children, and what our culture is doing to them.
The teacher told me that she once had to explain to the class why her last name was the same as her father’s. She dusted off the whole ancient ritual of legitimacy for them—marriages, maiden names, and so on. When she was done, there was a short silence. Then one child piped up softly: “Yeah . . . I’ve heard of that.”
I think our culture, which probably prizes children more than any in the history of the world, nevertheless sins against those children by hitting them from two sides. On the one side, the sexual “options” we give their parents deny them the security of stable homes. But we figure, “That’s OK. The state can parent them.” Only the state’s a lousy parent. So the kids end up with (at least) two sets of dysfunctional families.
But the heart of Klavan’s article is a call to creative conservatives to make a cultural impact that will show the kids there’s a different way.
Conservatives respond to this mostly with finger-wagging. But creativity has to be answered with creativity. We need stories, histories, movies of our own. That requires a structure of support—publishing houses, movie studios, review space, awards, almost all of which we’ve ceded to the Left.
Book Giveaway at MetaxuCafe
Bud has launched of series of book contests on MetaxuCafe. This week, email him with thoughts on the word metaxu (betwixt, intervening, or adjoining) in order to win a copy of Margaret Lazarus Dean’s book, The Time it Takes to Fall.
Ghostblogging for Businesses
Malcolm Sheppard writes,
Most blogs are like whale carcasses. They drift ashore from parts unknown, look like they’ve been dead for weeks, and they stink. Man, do they ever stink. That’s because intelligence and business savvy don’t necessarily indicate writing ability. There’s no shame in that, either. Expecting a blog to turn a manager into a writer is like expecting MSPaint to turn one into an artist. Skill matters. That’s why recycled clipart and truncated, “Powerpoint English” emanate from the brainiest desks in the world.
I want to go on record to say, I would not blog for someone else–except for money. Maybe books or italian food with coffee. No, only money. And here I am for free. What’s wrong with me?
Kudos to Renaissance Guy
Shout out to Significant Pursuit by Renaissance Guy, who writes a good blog. Recently he has a post on what’s wrong with that Fifth Grader game show and a good idea in public schooling.
Don’t Have One; Don’t Do It
P.J. O’Rourke discusses the new deadly sins and lists some of his own:
Opinion. It’s the reverse of fact. Listen to NPR or AM Talk Radio if you don’t believe me, or, better yet, read the opinion page of the New York Times. (I’m talking about you, Paul Krugman.) Some people have facts, these can be proven. Some people have theories, these can be disproven. But people with opinions are mindless and have their minds made up about it. The 11th Commandment is, “Thou shalt not blog.”
Now the question is how can I be forgiven? (via World on the Web)
Folks Still Read
Writers on Britannica’s blog are still talking about newspapers, and Colette Bancroft says Internet readers aren’t as shallow as some make them out to be.
People use the Net for a lot of silly things, but they also make serious use of it (here you are reading an encyclopedia’s blog). Remember all the dire warnings back in the ‘90s that the Net meant the death of reading? So, what do people do online? Many things, but mostly, they read. And they write. Boy, do they write. In blogs and forums and chat rooms, they pour out the words.
She goes on to mention rising interest in books and declining book coverage in newspapers.