#materical culture

[blackswaneuroparedux]

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Stabat Mater dolorosa Iuxta crucem lacrimosa Dum pendebat Filius Cuius animam gementem Contristatam et dolentem Pertransivit gladius Quando corpus morietur, Fac, ut animae donetur Paradisi gloria. Amen A setting of the Stabat Mater text from Nebbiu, Corsica. This style of hymn singing from southern Corsica is sparsely ornamented, in contrast to the more typical elaborate ornamentation in most Corsican sacred music. It was recorded live in the refectory at Mont Saint-Michel, France.

Terza: Lauren Breunig Segunda: Lynn Rowan Contra: Will Rowan Bassu: Jeremy Carter-Gordon

[tonyglowheart]

Chinese people astound me with their like sense of community and etc. Like, there are hometown associations, alumni associations, and they like. actually have communications and events and such. Like, do Americans do that abroad? or are they just too busy with insular "expat" communes or etc lol

[champmorado]

i cant figure out how to word this post but

1. i headcanon mater as filipino

2. in filipino, we use the term "mang" when talking/referring to an old man

3. mater was originally gonna be named tom in the concept art

4. mang tomas is a very popular brand of sauce in the philippines

conclusion: mater is mang tomas

[teatro-magico-solo-para-locos]

Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus nunc et in hora mortis nostræ...

@teatro-magico-solo-para-locos

[moriavamp]

guys you should totes give me song recommendations yogurrt if you give me one god damn fucking owl city song again i will strangle you with my bare hands [joke] accidentally went on a huge ramble in the tags but there's some good metal/rock recommendations down there if you wanna check em out!

[sag-dab-sar]

I should probably write about how I came to worship Mary as Our Lady of Sorrows via Dominican Vudú (which I ended up placing aside for now) NOT via my Christian past or Catholic schooling. Anyone saying I am "appropriating Mary" should really learn about Christian missionary work and all the syncretism that went into POC protecting and adapting their culture in the face of it.

(I may or may not be able to write about it but still)

[auressea]

Yom Tov

May you have an easy fast and find Peace this Yom Kippur

[bumbog]

coming to the realisation that i have no idea what the plot of cars 2 was

[salsafrattale]

Day 1/30

06.11.2022 | i have to write a paper for philosophical anthropology so I'm trying this challenge and see if I can get less distracted and more productive. Been waking up a little later than I'd like to these couple of days so I'm gonna try and get that better so I can study a little more. All in all I'm pretty happy of how much I did today: watched a missed lesson recording and took notes, and read the material our professor gave us about Wittgenstein. days are getting colder but the sunset light is so wonderful against the marble, pic can't really catch that

[elainemorisi]

call me a snob or whatnot, but I sorta think that if you are going to solicit me for money in honor of my 10th reunion, oh dear class representatives, you could at least put actual signatures on your begging postcards rather than crayon-on-a-tablet representations of your given names

[carriesthewind]

Ok. I am maybe kind of losing my mind just a little bit.

A few days ago, I mentioned in a post that the IA only cares about information being digitized, not about actual digital access. And I mentioned that access includes patrons being able to actually find what they are looking for, and suggested IA did not prioritize that critical aspect of access. But I didn't really go into any more detail.

So someone over on bluesky linked to this write-up of a talk Brewster Kahle gave about using so-called AI. And one of his reported statements made my mouth drop open in shock.

...and then I read further in the article and realized it was incorrectly reporting basic facts around Hachette, so I had to go and listen to the whole speech myself.* (And I want to say, briefly - he raises some legitimate potential uses for LLMs! He's kind of a dick about some of it ("it's up to us to go and keep [Balinese] culture alive"), but some of the things he's talking about actually seem useful.)

*Incidentally, while Kahle doesn't lie about the ALA brief in the speech, he absolutely misleads about the nature and facts of the case and deliberately omit the part of the story where the IA decided to suspend the one-to-one owned-to-loan ratio thing, despite repeatedly emphasizing that one-to-one was what the IA was doing with their lending program.

And oh my god. He really said what the article reports. (This portion starts around 20:10.)

He says that the IA has scanned over 18,000 periodicals. And that they used to have professional librarians manually create descriptions of the periodicals in order to catalog them. (Sidenote: there are existing directories, but he describes their licensing terms as "ridiculous." This is not a field I know much about, but I spoke to one person who agreed, though for different reasons. His reason is that you can only license, not purchase, the directory descriptions. The person I spoke to was instead focused on the prices demanded for the licenses. Regardless, the idea of creating an open, free directory seems both like an incredible amount of work and an amazing resource...if it was accurate.)

But according to Kahle, it took 45 minutes to an hour to create a description and catalog each periodical.

And so now, instead, they're using AI to make the descriptions and so it only takes 7-10 minutes!

"And yes it hallucinates, and it has some problems, and whatever — but it’s a lot faster than having to write it yourself!"

Oh. My god.

Just.

YOU ARE KNOWINGLY INTRODUCING AI HALLUCINATIONS INTO YOUR CATALOG?!

(And yes, he says that they are "confirmed by a librarian" but it can't really be, not if it's only taking 7-10 minutes! Maybe the librarian can do a quick check for super obvious errors, but actually checking a AI's summary work requires actually going back to the source and reviewing it yourself!)

I just....

I need to emphasize for those of you for who aren't familiar - if a book or article is miscataloged, it is effectively lost. Because it doesn't mater if a library or an archive owes it - if someone can't find it when they are looking for it, it is not only inaccessible, the only way to find it again is through chance. Imagine if you went into a library, but instead of organized shelves (where if even if you can't find what you're looking for, the librarians know where to look), every single book was just piled in a heap.

If a book is miscateloged, it still exists, but it is lost, not truly accessible. And they know that this is happening, "but whatever." Because Brewster Kahle doesn't actually care about real, practical, digital access. (Much less non-digital access.)

(And then to top it off, he goes on to criticize the Library of Congress for not being "access oriented.")

I just. 18,000 periodicals. And they've knowing, recklessly lost who knows how many of them. I feel like crying.

18,000 periodicals.

[nathanielzalexandria]

I love all the headcanons of "Steve is not dumb he's..." Hard of hearing, has poor eyesight, learning disability or his primary language is not English. I particularly enjoyed @dwobbitfromtheshire 's recent headcanon that he's hiding it because his father hates feeling inferior and only Eddie realizes that he is not dumb. But I would like to throw my own hat in the ring.

Steve is not dumb. Actually, he's quite smart and did quite well in school (because his parents would not expect anything less). He just wasn't into nerd culture and everyone just placed their stereotypes and rumours of him being a pretty and privileged rich jock who bought his way out of school but couldn't buy his way into college. Nevermind that he was in the top 10 students of his year and for most of his classes if not topping them and if not he wasn't failing the rest other than one or two science/math-based (rumours say the school forged those marks so that Steve could continue sports) and had a 3.6 GPA. It wasn't enough to get into his Dad's alma mater so his dad dismissed any of the other schools he got accepted into.

He does not try to hide his intelligence from Nancy or the Party, but Nancy had bought into the "Steve is simple-minded " narrative and the like before they got together and failed to realize that they are both in the same AP classes that were full of seniors and in any group or partnered project he more-than-well pulled his weight and had his own insights. So she spreads the narrative to Mike who spreads it to the rest of the party so by the time the events that befan with Dustin asks him for help with his "dog" and developed into concussed in the back of a car while a preteen drove his car, the kids have also bought into parts of the narrative. It doesn't help that he really isn't into the stereotypical nerdy stuff

Even his best friend Robin believed the lie until she worked with him and then got tortured with him by Russians. She eventually realises that he's way smarter in a practical sense than people give him credit for (he did raise himself since he was 11 or so) but does not think of it as stretching into the academic side of his life. She has not stopped calling him "dingus" though.

Eddie on the other hand knows better, which is why when a specific exam was coming up he turned to Steve.

He barged into the Harrington home a day when tye entire party was their.

"Stevie, you either have to tutor me or lend me your notes for this class. I am not failing this class and increasing the possibility of another year at fucking Hawkins."

Mike and Dustin burst out laughing at that before Steve can answer.

"I know you're e bad at that subject, but I didn't realise you were desperate enough to use Steve's notes," Dustin says with that condescending tone that means it should be obvious to Eddie.

Mike snorts at that derisively, "If he even has notes."

"Maybe," Lucas said diplomatically, "there are better options than using Steve's notes?"

Nancy steps up next offering some of her notes and flashcards since she took the class last year/is taking the class, "It's not my strongest subject but if we do a study group I'm sure you won't fail the class."

Eddie stares at the group with growing bewilderment as they agree that Nancy is the best choice while implying that Steve was not. Actually, they were acting as though he was dumb for even asking Steve, which made no sense to him.

Eddie turned his eyes to Steve. His posture by the kitchen island was much more different than when Eddie burst in. He had subtly curled into himself as if to make himself smaller, shoulders tense and a resignation on his face as if he's been through this conversation so many times before.

It was almost as if...

"You guys think that Steve is dumb, don't you?"

There was the type of silence that only comes when the quiet part is said outloud.

"No we don't think Steve's dumb," Robin begins and Eddie can hear the 'but' before she even said it, "But you know he wasn't good at the school part of school."

She continued to ramble on from there but Eddie did not hear any of it. He was too busy reevaluating the group he was with and rechecking old memories and facts to see if there was any inkling of truth to this strange idea that even the older teens should know isn't true.

It took him a moment to find the answer, and when he did he could not stop the derisive laugh that burst out and interrupted Robin's ramble.

"You guys fucking bought into the rumours, didn't you? I expect that from the kids maybe even Johnathan, maybe even Robin because of you became friends after he left school, but not from you, Nancy."

Nancy had that look on her face that she got when she was ready to argue but Eddie steamrolled over it.

"Jesus H Christ! Weren't y'all together for a whole fucking year? How do you not know that he was at the top of his year when you were together? Unless you dismissed that in favour of believing the rumours that his parents paid for his grades and the school wanted to make sure he kept on playing sports?"

He paused for a second waiting for someone to contradict him, but the look on Nancy's face was one of scrambling to defend herself. He sighed at that; she still wasn't getting it and it a sweeping look at the others proved they were lost too.

"Even if they paid off the school he would not have been in the top ten of his year, he would be like Carver and Hagan whose parents paid and their grades were just good enough to get into a decent college without too many questions. And they would not have kept on giving him high grades after he stopped doing any kind of sport in his last 2 years at that dump. Hell if Hargrove wasn't such a fucking beast at sports he would have been told he would have to repeat his senior year with me."

"It's okay Eddie; leave it go." He turned a fake sunny smile with his eyes tightly shut towards Eddie as if to pacify him.

Eddie turned to Steve who had yet to say anything throughout Eddie's diatribe up until that moment. He just continued to robotically make dinner for the party as though nothing was wrong, as though the hurt dripping off him didn't matter.

"I'm not letting this go! They had classes with you, some of which I'm pretty fucking sure were AP classes. If I had the attendance needed I would have graduated last year because of you, Stevie. So excuse me if I'm a bit annoyed that our friends are so blinded by a rumour that they can't fucking see your Salutatorian medal. Hanging. Right. There!"

All eyes except Eddie and Steve's turned in the direction that Eddie pointed at.

And there on the wall, was a framed silver medal with the word "Salutatorian" emblazoned on it. The party immediately burst into chaos amongst each other.

"Now, pretty boy, are you gonna tutor me or what?"

Or it goes something like that, I'm not sure.

[evilsoup]

"listen to black voices" often means "listen to middle-to-upper-class black liberals and shut up about radical politics". i guess one of my more controversial positions would be that white marxists have a greater capacity to make useful contributions to discussions on racism than black liberals -- the latter often having a clear material interest in maintaining themselves as community leaders etc while any kind of cross-racial class-based movement against racism would undermine the need for such positions.

Look at the very succesful wrecking campaign waged against extinction rebellion by black liberal concern trolls bleating about how not everyone was able to risk arrest, or the disastrous consequences of racial deference around the blatantly false antisemitism accusations that brought down the corbyn movement, or the entirely succesful capture of the black lives mater movement by the black liberal middle class sheepdogs of the democrats.

Standpoint epistemology transformed into a moral imperative is a tool of capital and indeed of white supremacy. It's a weapon of (in this case) rich black people to silence white (or even non-black ethnic minority) anti-racists, sideline any potential working-class anti-racism, maintain cultural hegemony over black workers, and position themselves as an intermediary layer with the state.

[prettyboykatsuki]

how surprising ur response doesn’t address the issue at all!!!! i would love for u to go off on me because it’s easy for me to win a disagreement when i know i’m right lmao and also i KNOW 100% for a fact that countless people would agree w me but it’s not reaching the correct audience w a sane mindset cuz all ur followers are 🌽 addicts too thinking the same shit as u and pitying and comforting ur ass in ur replies🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️shits cringe to watch but anyway every normal person knows it’s weird and that’s all the matters i suppose cuz post that shit literally anywhere else and your ass WILL get dragged

maybe let’s try a one month no 🌽 challenge and try again! maybe ur mind will detox and you’ll realize ur fucking weird

i didn't respond to your ask with any dignity because the original premise of your ask was not worthy of being dignified with time nor attention.

ive gotten tens of asks of people who also want to hold moral superiority over me by regurgitating opinions they've adopted from their online internet circles without any real nuance and thus i have no reason to take it seriously. you are not the first person to try to peddle this to me and there is nothing about your ask that warrants any of my thoughtful consideration.

i normally wouldn't bother with correcting this one either, but because im already in a deeply irritable mood - sure, i will give you the response you are asking for, starting with the post you are criticizing.

firstly, you're incorrectly reading my post. you intentionally misrepresent my post with your wording and also the sort of joke i was making by implying "memed about waiting for the age of consent" so i can indulge my porn addiction."

im going to disregard your application of harmful real world rhetoric to what is essentially fiction and go along with the idea that fictional characters are in anyway effected by my posting.

the main issue is fundamentally that you are misreading it. i know you are because i am the original poster and the author of this post - which means i can directly tell you that the point of this post is ironic.

it is poking fun at the people who have accused me of pedophilia for aging up a fictional character for years because he is now, in canon, an adult.

the irony of that is that i was doing what horikoshi was when writing my fics. the people who treated my aging up as invalid simply because horikoshi is the author are no longer able to wield it against me. the author has no confirmed his adulthood, which makes that argument moot.

your argument is that i was in some way making a joking about having waited for izuku to reach adulthood in order to sexualize him. this is blantantly incorrect and a misreading of the post in general. that is not something you can counter because if you've spent any time on my blog at all - it would be very clear i was already aging up and sexualizing characters on my own whims.

both posts for better viewing.

the other thing you spout off about is porn addiction. this is the main reason i didn't find any reason to take your points seriously. if you knew, researched, or understood any of the points you've borrowed from your peers on tiktok - you would know why porn addiction is not a term you can apply to erotica.

in the first place, there is no universally understood diagnostic criteria for porn addiction. there are other forms of research related to how porn interferes with cis-heterosexual partnerships and the quality of sex life and some affiliation with watching porn as a compulsive behavior - but neither of these things qualify as addiction.

pornography is a highly politicized topic because our society is structured upon old school protestant christian beliefs and puritanism. but pornography and sexually explicit materal is a difficult thing to quantify in usage. it is culturally ubiquitous and has several nuances in relation to its use. it is near impossibly to quantify sexual behavior because it is a normal, human urge like hunger or thirst whether or not you choose to believe that.

here are three articles making points about the claims around porn addiction from reliable sources that you're welcome to point out.

one | two | three

as i keep repeating - addiction is a specific line of behavior and being frank, it's rather insulting you think i suffer from a porn addiction given i used to do actual drugs and suffered from real life addictions lmao.

but if you want to use other addiction diagnostic critera in this argument. my posting on silly erotica tumblr does not

interfere with my daily life or relationships

negatively affect my performance in school or at work

cause me to withdraw from social situations

lose interest in my other hobbies and activies that improve quality of life.

none of the above applies to me. but im guessing you don't have any actual concern.

it's very clear to me and everyone else that your peddling of this term has nothing to do with whether or not i actually have the addiction - and everything to do with you attempting to moralize my behavior to an audience and boost up your own points.

if i really did have a porn addiction, implying i had an addiction - you are implying that this is something i should be ashamed of just as you are implying my fellow porn addicts should also be ashamed.

you see addiction as a point of shame and not a disease and don't show any actual empathy which makes you a morally bankrupt human being in my subjective view. you don't have any actual arguments about how this might effect my behavior or character. only that addiction (a thing people can't control) is bad, that i am bad for watching porn and being addicted to it.

neither of these are provable as you do not know me.

instead your attempt to find fault is to arm yourself with puritan talking points and internet tiktok buzzword language and make your clauses have some kind of ground or validity. it is trite and frankly embarrassing watching you come into my inbox with such confidence that you would be able to argue with me critically and meaningfully.

the last thing i will address is your point about this not being a popular opinion.

you are under the impression im not aware of this and that this is not a choice i've made deliberately so i will be kindly blunt.

i, unlike you, have formed these opinions with my own critical understanding of culture, sociology, psychology, and politics by researching and reading from people who study these things with more expertise than me.

these opinions are formed by my own discretion and worldview. they are unpopular opinions.

unlike you, my peers are not decided by my moral parading. rather, im frank and upfront with those world views and have formed a circle that agrees with them.

i do not need your validation nor the validation of people online to confirm whether or not im a good person. the reason people agree with me is not pity, but because they too have formed their own opinions and ours happen to allign.

you think this is pitying behavior because the people you choose to align with would cast you out for showing even a breadth of disagreement or critique. you have not fostered a space for intelligent conversation because you can't see disagreement without accusing someone of this or that.

you are all the same and you are all equally confident in your hivemind opinions. i applaud your audacity and admire your confidence in your own ability to argue something you've barely formed your own conscious thought about.

i dont need to detox anything and i dont care about being weird. i also, really don't care about you or your opinions.

you are unoriginal and boring, a pest of the highest pedigree and i don't find you intimidating. your inability to receive validation from your own moral character will doom you to shame and guilt for as long as you allow and thats much more punishment than i could ever dole out to you

have a good day pookie 🫂🫂

[dailyadventureprompts]

Villain: The Cult of the Wyrm Eternal

Any adventurer, alchemist, or awestruck child can tell you that there is power in the body of a dragon, and like all sources of power it's only a mater of time before someone comes along to try to capitalize on it.

Enter the Cult of the Wyrm Eternal, which emerges from long buried vaults to dissect the bodies of dragonkind like flesh eating beetles. The cult originated from a time beyond remembering following the teachings of a profane text known as the Har'Khon Libram, which survives into the modern day as a sort of how-to manual for those seeking forbidden knowledge allowing them to revive the cult's practices and discover its caches of lost power.

It's in this manner that the cult has survived millennia and numerous purges at the hands of heroes, holy orders, and oligarchs: With each iteration caching away knowledge and resources for acolytes they will never meet.

Hooks:

A prominent dragonborn hero and ally of the party disappears, leaving behind few clues and a mystery to solve. Lacking a true dragon to carve up for ingredients the cult abducted the dragonborn and plans on sacrificing them after a gauntlet of strange rituals intended to suffuse their flesh with power.  Its a race against the clock for the party to find their friend before there’s nothing left of them but a grisly scattering of magical items bound for the cult’s armoury. 

The local warlord has a new pet, a young dragon provided to him by the cult in exchange for his protection and material support. Tales of him riding out to wreak destruction from its back send shivers of terror through the populace. What a surprise then when the party encounter it in the wild, rampaging aimlessly after  slipping her bonds.  Brainwashed by cult doctrine the parry find themselves  negotiating with a creature with the drives of a caged tiger, the volatility of an abused teenager,  and the destructive potential of an artillery battery.  Talking her down will be as difficult as diffusing a bomb, but they might just come away with important information or even a new ally should they help her evade recapture.

Using knowledge purloined from the mysteries of the mother hydra herself a cell of the Wyrm Eternal has been working on a ritual to create a true dragon, experimenting with drakes, basilisks and other reptilian monsters, filling the wilderness with bounty worthy monsters that will inevitably bring the party crashing into their lair.

Background: The knowledge contained within the Har'Khon Libram is cursed, part of a scheme by the book's original author in an attempt to evade both death and those who hunt unlawful immortality. Reading the book not only imparts the authors knowledge upon the prospective cultist, but also a vestige of their cosiouness, which steers them towards the same course of action that has kept the cult alive for so long: constructing more vaults, hoarding draconic power, and propogating the Libram's knowledge so that the infection can spread through time.

Hidden in the depths of each vault are tablets of further tainted lore, which causes the seed of malign presence within the Wyrm cultist's mind to blossom, opening their mind to the space between life and death and allowing their patron's thoughts to swirl into their own. In this way the party can end up fighting the same villain through many proxies, the unseen master of the Wyrm eternal studying them as they cut down vessel after vessel before formulating a counteroffence.

Dungeon Dressing:

Wyrm Eternal vaults vary by the culture that originally constructed them, but are always in remote, sheltered areas that could endure largescale devastation. Their entrances are hidden and warded against intrusion, protected by magical cyphers that can usually only be broken with aid from the Har'Khon Libram. Vaults can also contain these doors within, locking away the greatest treasures until the acolytes have further tainted their thoughts with the Libram's curse.

Undead are ubiquitous within dungeons claimed by the Wyrm Eternal, ranging from simple servitors to looming guardians to dragonbone infused war machines just waiting to be unleashed on the cult's enemies all with green corpsefire flickering in their heads. Access to these undead armouries and the arsenal of magical items that come with them are one of the primary drivers for individuals to become cultists in the first place.

Each vault will likewise contain preserved pieces of dragongore, ranging from single skulls placed on altars to whole cellars filled with blood magically preserved in clay or glass vessels. If a cult cell reached full operation, it's likely to have atleast one mummified corpse preserved in an onsite tomb, it's vital organs ( and perhaps a few spares) preserved in canopic jars waiting nearby.

Art 1 Art 2

[ericdeggans]

Booking Speaking Engagements for Fall/Early 2025

One of the coolest things about trying to analyze pop culture and society is the privilege of presenting those ideas to others via public speaking.

For me, the venues have run the gamut - from addressing students at Harvard, Duke and Columbia universities to helping anti-drug task force members learn to talk about tough subjects across race and class lines and outlining prejudice and stereotypes in media with employees of Progressive auto insurance company and members of the Association for University and College Counseling Center Directors.

Here's a sample of a TEDx talk I gave near my alma mater, Indiana University, on how to talk about race -- successfully -- across racial lines.

So, if you need an engaging speaker for keynote, presentations or other events, I am booking for fall/early 2025.

I started doing this in 1990, so I have decades of experience as public speaker, TV/radio/podcast host and facilitator w/past jobs ranging from Harvard to CNN and SXSW.

CLICK HERE for more details, including how to book me.