An interview with Bernard Williams in the Guardian last November.… Read the rest
All entries by this author
Grayling on Williams 
Jun 16th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
A.C. Grayling on Bernard Williams in The Financial Times.… Read the rest
Williams in The Times
Jun 15th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Another good obituary essay on Williams’ work and why it mattered.… Read the rest
Who Would Mate With Rational Economic Man?
Jun 15th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Is Feminist Economics less silly than it sounds?… Read the rest
Daniel Dennett Interview
Jun 15th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
The spectre of creeping exculpation, the discomfort of discontinuity, and more.… Read the rest
The Arts and Cultural Diversity
Jun 15th, 2003 | By Jatinder VermaImmigrant, ethnic minority, asylum-seeker – slivers of insinuation separate
the meanings of each term in contemporary Britain. Ethnic minority, black and
Asian, cultural diversity – clouds of obfuscation have distinguished contemporary
arts in Britain over the past 30 years.
That I draw an analogy between socio-political and artistic terminology is
not incidental: socio-political concerns have determined arts-funding policy
for the past three decades. Ever since, in fact, the publication of Naseem Khan’s
seminal report for the Arts Council in 1976, ‘The Arts Britain Ignores’. This
year sees the launch of yet another arts initiative, designed to heap attention
on ‘culturally diverse’ arts, aptly titled ‘decibel’ (noise). Why do we need
a showcase of ethnic arts? And what noise is decibel… Read the rest
Bernard Williams
Jun 14th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘He deconstructed as Derrida would do if he were cleverer and more pledged to truth,’ says the Guardian.… Read the rest
Williams in The Telegraph
Jun 13th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘He wanted a moral philosophy that was accountable not only to psychology but also to other branches of human enquiry, especially history.’… Read the rest
What the Koran Really Says
Jun 13th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Ibn Warraq calls for critical thought and a sceptical attitude in reading the Koran.… Read the rest
Nonsense, Not True, Made Up, Bollocks
Jun 12th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
David Aaronovitch on the looting of Iraq’s antiquities and how it was reported.… Read the rest
Judgment Is Not Censorship
Jun 11th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Student editors and Harvard English department not heroes but confused, says Stanley Fish.… Read the rest
The Tasaday
Jun 10th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Feuds within anthroplogy, questions about authenticity, palm leaves versus T shirts.… Read the rest
Alan Wolfe on ‘Diversity’
Jun 10th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
What Americans think diversity is and what they think it isn’t.… Read the rest
‘Watchdog’ versus Teachers’ Union
Jun 9th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Is it discrimination to exclude disabled students who cause problems?… Read the rest
‘Watchdog’ versus Teachers’ Union
Jun 9th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Is it discrimination to exclude disabled students who cause problems?… Read the rest
Hip, Relevant, In Your Face
Jun 8th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Entertaining, short, punchy, fast – poetry on tv. Next up: quantum mechanics lite.… Read the rest
News Because I Only Just Now Found It
Jun 7th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Francis Cornford’s Microcosmographia Academica.… Read the rest
Philosophers Useful After All?
Jun 7th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
They can serve as logical police, with non-contradiction for a nightstick.… Read the rest
The Arts on Television
Jun 7th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Why is coverage of the arts not as good as it once was on UK television? … Read the rest
What is Elitism?
Jun 6th, 2003 | By Ophelia BensonFashionable Nonsense is a fabric of many threads, a sea fed by many rivers, a library with many volumes, a dog with many fleas. But there are also a few themes or core assumptions that play a role – that are ‘foundational’ – in most if not all of these many mansions: anti-essentialism, anti-realism, relativism, pretensions to transgression and rebellion and épater-ing; projects of unmasking, exposing, demystifying – every FNer a Toto pulling back the curtain that hides the Wizard; concern with hidden agendas and concealed power drives; and various kinds of make-believe anti-elitism.
The elitism question is a complicated matter, not least because of the widely-observed paradox that claims of anti-elitism emanate from academics who write a language of … Read the rest
