Jess Martinaitis
@jess
Jess Martinaitis
Most African Americans have had at least two life-altering experiences that are burned into their memory—the moment they realized they were black and the moment they realized that was a problem.
Eric Mason • Woke Church: An Urgent Call for Christians in America to Confront Racism and Injustice
The task, impossible at times, is to dialectically hold two uncomfortable truths: that people who have been exposed to indoctrinating narratives most of their lives are not at fault for that, and that they are simultaneously responsible – assuming exposure to free information and accessibility – for examining the validity of those narratives. To co... See more
In 1975, Muhammad Ali gave a lecture at Harvard University. After his lecture, a student got up and said to him, "Give us a poem." And Mohammed Ali said, "Me, we."
Thelma Golden • Thelma Golden: How art gives shape to cultural change
Writer James Baldwin on hate as a defense mechanism: "I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain."
Writers in my position, exiles or emigrants or expatriates, are haunted by an urge to look back, even at the risk of being mutated into pillars of salt. But if we do look back, we must also do so in the knowledge – which gives rise to profound uncertainties – that our physical alienation from India almost inevitably means that we will not be capabl... See more
Salman Rushdie • Salman Rushdie · Imaginary Homelands
“Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years”
Paul Verhoeven, the director of “Basic Instinct,” has a new skeptical-scholar’s book, “Jesus of Nazareth” (Seven Stories; $23.95). Verhoeven turns out to be a member of the Jesus Seminar, a collection mostly of scholars devoted to reconstructing the historical Jesus, and much of what he has to say is shrewd and learned.
art can change the way we think about culture and ourselves. My interest is in artists who understand and rewrite history, who think about themselves within the narrative of the larger world of art, but who have created new places for us to see and understand.