It's the type of sentence that makes me, a 22 year-old born amid the roaring buzz of the dot-com bubble burst, gag in my throat, close my eyes and shake my head over the keys of my laptop computer. "Electronic media shuffle us through a myriad of experiences which would have baffled earlier generations" I … Continue reading Pokemon Go & Culture Wars
Tag: writing
10 July 2016
There is a man living somewhere in the Elmwood Village strip of Buffalo who plays saxophone or air-flute, closing his eyes willing into existence the sound of jazz through pure, unapologetic imagination. The instruments do not exist, and I hear no sound. I'm not a musician, only a listener, pale ears in a crowd, calloused … Continue reading 10 July 2016
On the Events of Flint, Michigan
I've recently begun writing an ecocritical analysis of slow environmental violence as it ravages communities, specifically those below the poverty line both in the United States and abroad. My reading in my Ecocriticism graduate seminar (where ecology and studies of nature meet literary analysis) have led me to an analysis of Flint, Michigan, informed by the … Continue reading On the Events of Flint, Michigan
On Web Writing and Digital Platforms
As someone with a well-vested interest in digital forums for writing (blogs,wikis, social media, YouTube), it may come as a surprise that I choose to publish many of my online thoughts using WordPress, such as the site you're reading now. Yes, I have a firm, though not expert, grasp of HTML and CSS, and have … Continue reading On Web Writing and Digital Platforms
13 March
On the first day that I visited her she told me that a spring in her mattress had been making a noise. As we laid there and moved around, the spring made a noise and I knew what she had meant. When you left me I could not speak or breathe. I was chained to a reservoir … Continue reading 13 March
Adirondack Winters
Huntington Memorial Camp. Raquette Lake, New York- in the Adirondack Mountains. 2016 has been my first winter in graduate school, and my first winter in quite some time to not visit this special place. The walk to the church wasn’t terribly long, maybe three quarters of a mile, but with our boots sinking into the … Continue reading Adirondack Winters
Rob Nixon’s “Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor”
Rob Nixon’s Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor tackles the clash between exploiters of natural resources, driven by desires for short term profit gains, and those native to the exploited areas with no choice but to live with the ecological aftermath. Nixon asserts his theory of slow violence played out in the environmental … Continue reading Rob Nixon’s “Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor”
Peter Handke’s “A Sorrow Beyond Dreams”
Peter Handke's memoir "A Sorrow Beyond Dreams" details the life and eventual suicide of his mother, which he attempts to portray in the narrative as having been an "exemplary case" of voluntary death. This is my response to the dense, sparse narrative in which Handke refuses sentimentality and resists analysis; the text ventures into places rarely … Continue reading Peter Handke’s “A Sorrow Beyond Dreams”
Coba Ruins
Top, from left: Recovered Mesoamerican ballgame court; Coba ruins from peak; Coba, viewed from ground. Bottom: A selfie; a family portrait- typical tourist stuff; Mayan glyph script, the only fully-developed pre-Columbian writing system in the Americas, of particular interest to me on the trip. 3 January 2016. 10:45a.m. Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico. "The captain of the winning team," … Continue reading Coba Ruins
Jacob Richter 