LongReads Round-Up Volume Fifteen

What!? It's been nearly a month since my last update? How did this happen?

#Animals

Owls are so hot right now http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/26/science/long-cloaked-in-mystery-owls-start-coming-into-full-view.html?pagewanted=all

#Comedy

Louis CK and modern comedy http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2013/02/louis-ck-our-gogol.html

#Education

Indonesia has one of the worst education systems in the world www.aljazeera.com/programmes/101east/2013/02/201321965257154992.html

Some Christian homeschoolers want to study evolution, don't believe Adam rode dinosaurs in the Garden of Eden http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/03/old-earth-young-minds-evangelical-homeschoolers-embrace-evolution/273844/

#Feminism

Political commentator Zerlina Maxwell recently went on Sean Hannity's show to promote educating boys and men about consent and rape culture. Since then she has received death and rape threats from men and women who don't believe there is a need for educating men about stopping rape. Two pieces: a response to harassment on xoJane, and Maxwell's points on education on Ebony

http://www.xojane.com/issues/zerlina-maxwell-receives-rape-and-death-threats-hannity#

http://www.ebony.com/news-views/5-ways-we-can-teach-men-not-to-rape-456#

Margo St. James was a seventies pioneer in protecting the rights of sex workers and providing health care services to them. Her thoughts on minority criminalzation and feminism after forty years http://bitchmagazine.org/article/forty-years-in-the-hustle-sex-work-margo-st-james-interview-activism-coyote

#Film

Has the Hollywood machine squashed inventive storytelling in modern film? Short answer- yes http://www.newrepublic.com/article/books-and-arts/magazine/107212/has-hollywood-murdered-the-movies

#Health

Buying drugs on the internet: http://nplusonemag.com/i-m-waiting-for-my-ups-man

The pharmaceutical/insurance/medical complex is exploiting all of us www.healthland.time.com/2013/02/20/bitter-pill-why-medical-bills-are-killing-us/print

#In France

Gerard Depardieu, French icon, is changing citizenship to escape new super taxes http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/02/25/130225fa_fact_collins?currentPage=all

#Language

How language affects our concept of time and saving: http://blog.ted.com/2013/02/19/saving-for-a-rainy-day-keith-chen-on-language-that-forecasts-weather-and-behavior/

#Literature

Academic texts need to be as well written as entertainment pieces http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/02/15/on_writing_well

An account of a symposium on the works of Allen Ginsberg http://www.litkicks.com/Topics/NaropaReport.html

Making me very excited to read more George Saunders http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/magazine/george-saunders-just-wrote-the-best-book-youll-read-this-year.html?pagewanted=all

A new collection of fairy tales shows male characters getting the same kind of torments Sleeping Beauty and Snow White found themselves in http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2012/03/long-lost-fairy-tales.html

A hundred years of women writing about their feelings and being told they're frivolous http://therumpus.net/2013/03/the-ghost-of-mary-maclane

Two of Renata Adler's books are back in publication http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2013/03/welcome-back-renata-adler.html

Italian author Francesco Pacifico writing about sex, purity, and Catholicism in his new novel http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2013/03/12/underwear-life-an-interview-with-francesco-pacifico/

#Music

Nina Simone's activism through music http://www.good.is/posts/remembering-nina-simone-as-a-siren-and-powerful-civil-rights-activist

All Hail Queen Beyonce http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/culture/2013/02/her-highness.html

#National

Is Marco Rubio the answer for Republicans? http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/02/19/marco_rubio_not_ready_for_prime_time_republican_foreign_policy?page=full

About the (lack of) training a member of the Foreign Service receives: http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/02/19/sink_or_swim_state_department_training?page=full

Ways Obama wants to model after Germany: http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/02/president-obama-wants-america-to-be-like-germany-what-does-that-really-mean/273318/

#Photography

A woman documents scenes of spousal abuse and then is reamed in a misreported article: http://www.salon.com/2013/03/01/dont_blame_the_victim_or_the_photographer/

#Religion

The Pope's butler did it! http://www.gq.com/news-politics/newsmakers/201303/spy-in-the-house-of-lords-march-2013?printable=true

#Technology

Its possible that a big part of the Republican loss in the presidential campaign was due to out of date or totally absent social networking and tech base  http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/17/magazine/can-the-republicans-be-saved-from-obsolescence.html

After reading this article, I had a nightmare about a teenage boy watching me through my webcam http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/03/rat-breeders-meet-the-men-who-spy-on-women-through-their-webcams/

Bring on the modified chicken blobs! http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/10/opinion/sunday/dont-be-afraid-of-genetic-modification.html?_r=0

#Television

After mainlining two seasons of Homeland, I assuredly agree with this http://www.salon.com/2012/12/15/tvs_most_islamophobic_show/

Are all the heroines of modern TV crazy? http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/17/magazine/tvs-new-wave-of-women-smart-strong-borderline-insane.html and my response: http://sailorbaby.tumblr.com/post/45241524615/semi-serious-thoughts-on-television-response-to

#Travel

A skeptical trip to Disney World in the seventies: http://www.newyorker.com/archive/1971/01/02/1971_01_02_052_TNY_CARDS_000299445?currentPage=all

#War on Terror

An early piece from The Atlantic about preemptive arrests and thought crime http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2006/10/prophetic-justice/305234/?single_page=true

On NDAA and domestic terrorism: http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/02/201321710236780782.html

The CIA wrongly captured and tortured a man as a terror suspect http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/2012/dec/13/cia-tortured-sodomised-terror-suspect

LongReads Round-Up Volume Thirteen (aka The One All About Girls)

#Crime

Is there a scientific cure to pedophilia? http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/01/14/130114fa_fact_aviv?currentPage=all

#Development

Jared Diamond reviews Why Nations Fail, surveying economic policies, centralized governments, and natural resources along the way: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2012/jun/07/what-makes-countries-rich-or-poor/?pagination=false

#Feminism #Literature

1993 article by Deborah Tannen about "marked" and "unmarked" in literature, in that to be female is to always be marked or derivative of the norm, which is male. Sadly, Tannen misses the mark (no pun intended) in how this also relates to intersectional forms of oppression such as race or sexualty. http://www9.georgetown.edu/faculty/tannend/nyt062093.htm

An argument that there is still a need and purpose for female-centric anthologies of literature, and other specially designated spaces: http://humanities.uchicago.edu/orgs/review/CR_532_Spahr_Young.pdf

#Health

Two part investigation into the troubling trend in labiaplasty and cashing in on physical insecurities:
http://www.guernicamag.com/daily/kirsten-oregan-labiaplasty-part-i/
http://www.guernicamag.com/daily/kirsten-oregan-labiaplasty-part-ii/

Elizabeth Wurtzel, author of Prozac Nation, on mental health and self help, and being disillusioned with life: http://nymag.com/thecut/2013/01/elizabeth-wurtzel-on-self-help.html

Obligatory "how can I relate this to Girls" response article: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2013/01/what-would-hannah-horvath-make-of-elizabeth-wurtzel.html

#Journalism

Catching up with former executive editor of GOOD on social media, and internet publications http://therumpus.net/2013/01/saturday-special-the-rumpus-catches-up-with-ann-friedman/

#Literature

This excellent interview with poet Megan Kaminski provokes a dialogue about women's place in the modern literary canon, and offers an abundance of further readings: http://www.themillions.com/2013/01/topographies-of-desire-the-millions-interviews-megan-kaminski.html

Ethics in reading literature in an ever-globalizing age: http://lareviewofbooks.org/article.php?type=&id=1244&fulltext=1&media=#article-text-cutpoint

Interview with James Franco about his poetry chapbook and his literary endeavors in general: http://lareviewofbooks.org/article.php?type=&id=1237&fulltext=1

Fan Girl interview with Margaret Atwood: http://therumpus.net/2013/01/the-sunday-rumpus-interview-margaret-atwood/

A series of links on New Narrative, modern female authors, and what is "women's literature," anyway:

http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2010/08/all-the-sad-young-literary-women/61821/

http://nplusonemag.com/female-trouble

http://thenewinquiry.com/essays/the-semiautobiographers/

Hannah Horvath's bookshelf: http://www.themillions.com/2013/01/ten-books-to-read-now-that-hbos-girls-is-back.html

Celebrating the anniversary of literary theory text Exercises in Style, with a new edition:

http://therumpus.net/2013/01/exercises-in-style/ 

http://www.themillions.com/2011/09/staff-pick-exercises-in-style-by-raymond-queneau.html

Jeffrey Eugenide's advice to young writers, winners of the Whiting Award, and a response from The Millions:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2012/12/jeffrey-eugenides-advice-to-young-writers.html 

http://www.themillions.com/2013/01/jeffrey-eugenidess-killer-advice.html

#Obituary

A round up of links after young internet and free access activist Aaron Swartz's suicide last month:

http://www.economist.com/news/obituary/21569674-aaron-swartz-computer-programmer-and-activist-committed-suicide-january-11th-aged-26-aaron

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/13/technology/aaron-swartz-internet-activist-dies-at-26.html?_r=0

http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2013/01/20/the-tragedy-of-aaron-swartz.html

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/why-did-the-justice-system-target-aaron-swartz-20130123

http://www.infodocket.com/2013/01/12/tragic-news-internet-activist-and-developer-aaron-swartz-dead-at-26/

#Religion

How the internet is shaping (and dissolving) fundamentalist religions: http://www.salon.com/2013/01/16/religion_may_not_survive_the_internet/

#Science

Rookie interviews Neil deGrasse Tyson, maintaing its position as coolest publication for girls in print or online:  http://rookiemag.com/2012/07/an-interview-with-neil-degrasse-tyson/ (I love when she asks, do you ever get really overwhelmed by the universe?)

#Sexuality

How the sexual revolution has developed since the 1980s: http://lareviewofbooks.org/article.php?id=1252

Growing up with Judy Blume: http://lareviewofbooks.org/article.php?type=&id=1201&fulltext=1

#Technology

You've got a friend in the world wide web, the new hub of social activism, do-gooders, and Likers:  http://nymag.com/news/features/internet-nice-2012-11/index1.html

#Television

Girls is back, and so are all the articles about HBO's most talked about twenty minutes a week: http://www.interviewmagazine.com/film/lena-dunham-february-2013#_

Emily Nussbaum writing about Girls and the tradition of provocative young women in literature http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/television/2013/02/11/130211crte_television_nussbaum?currentPage=all

Elaine Blair on the (oft non-titilating) portrayal of sex on Girls last season: http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2012/jun/07/loves-lena-dunham/?pagination=false

#Travel

Ploughshare winning essay on living in Jerusalem and attempting to understand Israel/Palestine issues as an American: https://www.pshares.org/read/article-detail.cfm?intArticleID=9725&src=longreads

Three essays from poets living in Gaza: http://lareviewofbooks.org/article.php?type=&id=1205&fulltext=1

"The Mindy Project" Round-Up

Last week, Mindy Kaling's new show, "The Mindy Project," premiered on Fox. This is a Big Deal for Women in the Media, as Kaling is creator, star, and head writer of the tongue in cheek rom-com lampoon of  a show. 2011 had a surge in female-led comedies ("New Girl," "Whitney," "Two Broke Girls") but "The Mindy Project" is different right out of the gate: our heroine is a thirty-something OB-GYN woman of color, while last years shows centered on aimlessly drifting white girls.

Here are some articles on "The Mindy Project," also a #LongListen from NPR, and a piece Kaling wrote for The New Yorker last year about rom-com tropes:

from Salon: http://www.salon.com/2012/09/24/mindy_kalings_entitlement_project/

from The New Republic: http://www.tnr.com/article/books-and-arts/107812/mindy-kaling-tvs-smartest-airhead

#LongListen from NPR: http://www.npr.org/2012/09/25/161745528/mindy-kaling-loves-rom-coms-and-being-the-boss

The New Republic asking, where are the female writers? http://www.tnr.com/blog/plank/107818/the-woman-project

By Kaling for The New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/humor/2011/10/03/111003sh_shouts_kaling?currentPage=all