Archive | May, 2012

  • Argentina and the Magic Soybean: The Commodity Export Boom That Wasn’t

    One of the great myths about the Argentine economy that is repeated nearly every day is that the rapid growth of the Argentine economy during the past decade has been a “commodity export boom.”  For example, the New York Times reported last week: Riding an export boom for commodities like soybeans, Argentina’s economy grew at […]

  • Flipping the Race Card

    Teaching ethnic studies is hard.  You have, on one side, folks who would universalize all human experience, not out of meanness but out of sincerity: “I know how you feel,” they say, “because my uncle had a similar experience, and let me tell you. . . .”  Of course the uncle’s experience is nothing like […]

  • “Fail Again and Fail Better”: Matan Kaminer on J14 Protests in Israel

    I met Matan Kaminer in Tel Aviv in January 2012, and we agreed to do an extended interview about the state of the left in Israeli society after the controversial J14 social justice protests. Can you tell us a little about yourself and your background?  How did you get involved in political activity? I was […]

  • Pursuing Impossible Objects: An Interview with Simon Critchley

    You’ve written about Beckett, Stevens, Blanchot, and others.  Literature seems a fundamental concern.  Indeed, your own prose is somewhat more literary than other contemporary philosophers’.  What is the significance of literature for you? Well, it’s very important.  When I stopped playing in punk bands when I was about 19 or 20, I decided I was […]