Report from Syria

From Ehsani at Syria Comme...

Feel threatened by Iran?

Here's Tom Englehardt's take on the threat:Exclusive: New Iranian Commando Team Operating Near U.S.(Tehran, FNA) The Fars News Agency has confirmed with the Republican Guard’s North American Operations Command that a new elite Iranian commando team is operating in the U.S.-Mexican border region. The primary day-to-day mission of the team, known as the Joint Special Operations Gulf...

One state in Israel/Palestine

Over at Juan Cole's Informed Comment site, the guest bloggers Yoav Peled and Horit Herman Peled argue that the two-state solution (two sovereign entities, Israel and Palestine) is now impossible.What makes the two-state solution unachievable is the fact that since 1967 Israel has settled close to three quarters of a million Jews in the territories it captured from Jordan...

History Club events

Hi all,From the club officers:This is a reminder of a few events happening this week.There will be a meeting this Wednesday, February 1, 2012 at 11:30-12:30 in room A143. ... We will be discussing clothing orders, the book sale, 4th year pub night and the next pub night. Anyone interested in being on the executive council next year are encouraged to come out so they can learn...

History Department Seminar Series: Michael Del Vecchio speaks on fish culture, Friday February 4

From Derek Neal:This is how Mike himself describes his talk:Farming Fish:Fish-culture and Sport in the late Nineteenth CenturyOver the past one hundred and fifty years the province of Ontario has stockedover twenty billion fish. This paper seeks to understand how local, provincial,national, and transnational influences shaped the practice and ideology of fish-culture in Ontario...

The cathedral of Middlesex

The pic is from the Daily Mail.  Here's why it is in the news (the Guardian):An extraordinary medieval barn once dubbed "the cathedral of Middlesex" by Sir John Betjeman has been bought by English Heritage in a move to save it from decay, it is announced on Monday.Just...

That beautiful destrier, again

I am trying to put the finishing touches on my translation of Charny's Questions, and once again I have come up against the case of the beautiful destrier -- Tourney Question 8.  I have had real experts look at this and they are baffled, and suggest that there is a transcription...

Rent, charity, First Nations, Canada

My colleague at Nipissing University, Catherine Murton Stoehr, wrote this fine piece for the Toronto Star:Strengthening the chain between First Nations and non-aboriginal CanadiansOn Tuesday, Assembly of First Nations national chief Shawn Atleo presented Governor General David Johnston a silver wampum belt symbolizing the relationship between the British people and the First...

Constructed categories

Hanne Blank, being interviewed in Salon about her book Straight, is talking about gender identity, but this discussion has a more general application:[Interviewer] I’m quite attached to my identity as a gay man — and, to be honest, I would feel a little troubled having my category taken away from me.See, that’s the thing, no one is going to take that away from you.  No...

Festival time in Harbin

Some people have not got much winter this year, and some are even complaining about it.  But in Harbin, Manchuria, they've got the snow and ice they need for their annual festival.  Click on this pic to see these Chinese girls having fun, and go to the Big Picture to see...

How one gained entree into the highest circles in 6th-century Europe

This year I returned to the early Middle Ages or late Antiquity to teach a fourth-year seminar on Gregory of Tours. Gregory was a sixth century bishop of what is now western France and who wrote a massive history of his times, the Histories, or more commonly the History of the Franks....

Nobody for President

Back in 1972, I was at a gathering of science fiction fans when I saw a prominent fan wearing what looked like a "Nixon for President" badge.  That was such a rare sentiment in my circles that I couldn't believe my eyes.  Sure enough, when I got closer I saw that it actually...

Four Wordles (word clouds) based on my translation of Charny's Questions

Wordles or word clouds are graphic arrangements of words indicating by the size of each word how often it appears in a text.  How much can you read into that?  Well, at the least it may alert you to something you might otherwise overlook.In all of these "Charny" and "asks"...

Snow in Egypt

A YouTube video shows a significant amount of snow on the ground at Alexandria earlier this month:But other videos brought up by the same search ("snow in Egypt") seem to show snow in Egypt in other recent yea...

A Scandal in Belgravia

I just saw the first of this season's episodes of the BBC's Sherlock.  I think it continues to be an absolutely brilliant adaptation.   But then I really, really liked A Knight's Tale, and not just for the jousti...

Ian McKay speaks -- the annual Department of History Keynote Lecture, January 26

From Jamie Murton:The History Department is very pleased to announce the visit to North Bay of one of the leading historians of Canada working today, Dr. Ian McKay of Queen’s University.  McKay’s recent book, Reasoning Otherwise: Leftists and the People's Enlightenment...

After 35 years

It was about 35 years ago that I was introduced to the joys of chocolate croissants in Toronto.  I'm pretty sure they were sold in only a few places, like the P'tit Gourmet, a really neat delicatessen specializing in French food.Finally, chocolate croissants have reached Bonfield,...

Two pictures of Afghanistan, December 2011

From The Big Picture, two views of an undercapitalized society, a miller and a fuel scavenger.  I am heating with wood at the moment, but I have electric backup.  That picture reminds me of things I saw in India.Click the pic for a better vi...

It continues

Thanks to Arabist.net and AhramOnli...

Thoughts on revolution and politics from Egypt

Egyptians are in the middle of something very important, and so what they have to say is of particular interest.Arabist.net has provided us with an English translation of an article by the liberal Egyptian academic Samer Soliman.  I include the following excerpt in hopes you will follow the link to the whole thing:A critical stance in support of my colleagues in the RevolutionBy...

Intellectual goodies on the Internet -- two sets of economics posts

Will McLean has a wide and serious interest in late medieval society, especially that of 14th and 15th century England.  Currently he is interested in how English noble households worked, and is investigating them through their preserved account books.  A number of people...

Catamarca province, Argentina

Just one of the amazing landscapes that the Dakar Rally, an extreme-conditions vehicle competition, went through.  This from the Big Picture, natch, and you should click on it to get a better lo...

Europe?

Over at the New York Times blog site, Frank Jacobs has a long article on "Where is Europe?"This nifty map is the least of ...

Bhaktapur, Nepal in the monsoon.

Thanks to Anuar Patjane, the Big Picture, and the National Geographic Socie...

One estimate of the cost of the War with Iran

By Orrin Schwab via Gary Sick:If there is near unanimity in the Congress to go to war with Iran I say lets go. Lets do it!  They are the duly elected representatives of the people of the United States and they have determined that war with Iran is in the best interests of the country.  We should initiate hostilities as soon as practicable.Here are some parameters to consider...

Endeavor over Ponte Vedra, Florida

Thanks to James Vernacotola, the Big Picture, and the National Geographic Society.  Click to see it larg...

Today's date on the Mayan calendar

More he...

From The Big Picture and the National Geographic Photo Contest, 2011

Kent Shiraishi captures the first snow at a nature spot in Hokkaido, Japan.  Don't forget to click to see a bigger version.  As usual, the bigger picture is much more impressi...

Michael Jackson is not dead

Not if Electric Guest has anything to say about ...

Louis Farrakhan and Ron Paul

An amazing column at the Atlantic by Ta-Nehisi Coates.   Read the whole thing. These excerpts may tell you why you should:As I often do on this blog, I'd like journey back to the Crack era--the late 80s and early 90s--when the general sense was that the black youth of America had lost their minds.... What we wanted was a great messenger who would talk to us, instead of...

Le Saint Suaire et la collégiale de Lirey (Aube) by Alain Hourseau

A forthcoming book on Charny, his family and the Shroud of Turin. If your French is weak, Google Translate works pretty well on this description.http://alain.hourseau.free.fr/livre-7.h...

More from Phil Paine on intelligent protest

More from Phil on the limitations of current forms of activism.  An excerpt:Protests within a func­tion­ing democ­racy are fun­da­men­tally dif­fer­ent from  [the fall of the Soviet Union, the Arab Spring]. The pro­tes­tors face no sig­nif­i­cant dan­ger. This is not to say that we should turn a blind eye to cops vio­lat­ing civil rights, strong-arming peace­ful...

Pictures of Iraq from the Big Picture

Another excellent photo collection from the Boston.com site.Image:  Ihab Najam, an unemployed security guard pessimistic about the futu...

Favorite blog posts of 2011

It was harder to pick them this year.  In particular my selection of Arab Spring posts seems rather random even to me.  But with such a huge series of events in train it might take omniscience to make the "right" choi...

Shocker

Shock 1:  The Globe and  Mail leads off the new year (on its mobile site at least) with an op-ed on There's no way out but a new politics of fairness.Shock 2:  It's written by Michael Ignatieff.Shock 3:  It makes sense.Another good Globe piece from the estimable...