culture — #
This video of four guys turf dancing in the Oakland rain is incredible. Does dance this good belong on a stage or is this the perfect venue?
29 July 2010
film & culture — #
A really great interview with Bill Murray
You have a lot of lines in this one that get tons of laughs I doubt were on the page. It’s all in the rhythm, the delivery. How do you pitch something like that? How do you make something out of nothing?
I have developed a kind of different style over the years. I hate trying to re-create a tone or a pitch. Saying, “I want to make it sound like I made it sound the last time”? That’s insane, because the last time doesn’t exist. It’s only this time. And everything is going to be different this time. There’s only now. And I don’t think a director, as often as not, knows what is going to play funny anyway. As often as not, the right one is the one that they’re surprised by, so I don’t think that they have the right tone in their head. And I think that good actors always—or if you’re being good, anyway—you’re making it better than the script. That’s your fucking job. It’s like, Okay, the script says this? Well, watch this. Let’s just roar a little bit. Let’s see how high we can go.
27 July 2010
food & culture — #
Apparently, Andrew Zimmern of Bizarre Foods was heavily into drugs and alcohol and squatting in a vacant building in lower Manhattan before he turned his life around. Amazing story.
language & culture — #
Does Language Influence Culture?
Do the languages we speak shape the way we think? Do they merely express thoughts, or do the structures in languages (without our knowledge or consent) shape the very thoughts we wish to express?
Take “Humpty Dumpty sat on a…” Even this snippet of a nursery rhyme reveals how much languages can differ from one another. In English, we have to mark the verb for tense; in this case, we say “sat” rather than “sit.” In Indonesian you need not (in fact, you can’t) change the verb to mark tense.
In Russian, you would have to mark tense and also gender, changing the verb if Mrs. Dumpty did the sitting. You would also have to decide if the sitting event was completed or not. If our ovoid hero sat on the wall for the entire time he was meant to, it would be a different form of the verb than if, say, he had a great fall.
In Turkish, you would have to include in the verb how you acquired this information. For example, if you saw the chubby fellow on the wall with your own eyes, you’d use one form of the verb, but if you had simply read or heard about it, you’d use a different form.
Do English, Indonesian, Russian and Turkish speakers end up attending to, understanding, and remembering their experiences differently simply because they speak different languages?
26 July 2010
sustainability & culture — #
SnapGoods is like NetFlix for stuff you only use rarely and probably shouldn’t be buying if it’s just going to waste space in your life and have cost the planet resources to get it to you.
culture & life — #
Do you ever wonder how many people have ever lived?
22 July 2010
culture & science — #
Stonehenge archaeologists discover ‘wooden henge’
Archaeologists studying the iconic Stonehenge monument in southern England have uncovered a second prehistoric henge-like circle only 900 meters away, which they hope will shed more light on the mysterious stone landmark.
21 July 2010
sustainability & culture — #
Maude Barlow: ‘The World Has Divided into Rich and Poor as at No Time in History’
culture & business — #
If you make $40,000 a year, you are richer than almost 97% of the world. $100,000 gets you to 99.34%.
technology & culture — #
culture & parenthood — #
Teens Now Getting High Off ‘Digital Drugs’
I-dosing on “digital drugs” is becoming an alarming new trend amongst teens.
Web sites are luring kids with free downloads of “digital drugs,” which are audio files designed to induce drug-like effects. The sites claim it is a safe and legal way to get high, but parents fear it could lead to illegal drug use.
The digital drugs use binaural or two-toned technology to alter your brainwaves and mental state.
18 July 2010
culture & politics — #
This trailer for The Mirror (Lo Specchio) made me smile. [via Roger Ebert]
In the far northwest corner of Italy, in a quiet valley dominated by steep hills, is the tiny hamlet of Viganella. Its centuries old and mostly uninhabited. In the next fifteen years, the population of Viganella will dwindle from 100 to fewer than 30. For the inhabitants of this village, the empty stone houses point to a very real fear their town is dying and it may soon be a village of ruins.
The mayor of the town, Pierfranco Midali, knows this. So he’s going to try and realize an incredible, if crazy, dream – to revive Viganella by building a giant mirror on the mountain behind the village to reflect sunlight into the town square.
From November through to February, the town of Viganella is in permanent gloom. The mountains to the south block the low winter sun and for almost three months, there is no place in Viganella that gets any sunlight. Pierfranco is going to change this.
The Mirror is a documentary about bringing sunlight to a forgotten village and how this extraordinary idea affects the lives of the people in the village and the surrounding valley. Touching and whimsical, its about the light and the dark and the things in between a documentary film about some extraordinary people and their extraordinary dreams of light.
culture & business — #
Portfolios of the Poor explores how the World’s poor people live on $2 a day.