Issue #35
Serious summer reading
I’m heading to the beach in August so this will be last Free Speech of the summer. As I’ve been deep in reading for my Digital Anthropology masters, here are five of my favourites for your holiday holdall - if you want brain food. See you in September!
Photo by Elizeu Dias on Unsplash
1. My life as a spy
Katherine Verdery was a doctoral student when she first travelled to Romania in 1973 to carry out anthropological research. For 25 years the Securitate (Romanian secrete police) kept files on her. Insights into the realities and potential risks of fieldwork – written like a spy thriller. (Duke University Press, 2018)
2. Coming of Age in Second Life
Tom Boellstorff spent 18 months working and socialising in the virtual world of Second Life, a year after its launch in June 2003. He explores its culture and early impact on society, particularly in terms of identity expression and experimentation. (Princeton University Press, 2015)
3. The Mushroom at the end of the world
Anna Tsing tells the story of the Matsutake mushroom, which grows on destructed forest floors in northern countries - a symbol of hope and reconstruction. This book was part of my reading about the digital Anthropocene, looking at the impact of tech and human activity on the planet. (Princeton University Press, 2015)
4. Race after technology
Ruha Benjamin describes life under the “New Jim Code” where neutral and even benevolent-seeming automation processes hardwire inequality by enforcing existing racial biases. Benjamin suggests ways of cutting through the hype and promises of big tech to question what’s really being served up. (Polity, 2019)
5. The cultural politics of emotion
Sara Ahmed explores how emotions are used as rhetoric - helping to align people into specific communities, specifically around issues like asylum and immigration. She coins the term “affective economies” - which I’ve found useful when analysing the impact of certain visual and social media imagery. (Edinburgh University Press, 2014)
Freer Speech, J.G. Because . . .
Virtually every political narrative you read in The Western Mainstream Media is false.
Washington's Ukraina Grandioznaya Skhema.
The Graveyard of This Empire . . . https://les7eb.substack.com/p/washingtons-ukraina-grandioznaya
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Free to subscribe - always free . . .
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P.S.: Have been a student of the more Physical Anthropology for a long time. First book read on Anthropology - On Aggression, 1963 book by Konrad Lorenz, an Ethologist actually.