A few weeks ago, as I was scrolling through my social media feed, someone commented on Chris Smith’s Devo, a documentary on the Akron, Ohio band. The post pointed out that watching the band’s early performances during the 1970s really solidified them within the lineage of punk. Taken together with their ideological positions and aesthetic, Devo embody punk. Inspired by the Dadaist and other twentieth … Read More Why We Need Art!
+ claude mckay, lillian e smith, Palestine, rashid khalidi, reading, the stone face, william gardner smith
Each semester, I inevitably share my musical tastes with students. This may arise when I play background music while students do some in class writing, or it may arise when we discuss a specific topic and that topic reminds me a song. This semester, I shared with students some of my musical tastes, specifically my love for punk, hardcore, and metal. Their initial reaction, … Read More How Do You Choose What to Read?
+ dc comics, James Gunn, jerry siegel, joe shuster, nofx, punk, superhero, superman, Zulu
Even before James Gunn’s Superman debuted earlier this month, the right-wing, conservative backlash rose up to proclaim that Gunn’s adaptation didn’t adhere Superman’s ideology, calling it “Superwoke.” I do not want to argue about that here because I have written about Superman’s initial appearances before and how he has always pushed back against oppressive systems and championed immigrants. One need only look at Joe … Read More “Maybe that’s the real punk rock”: Hope and Humanity in James Gunn’s Superman
+ afropunk, hardcore punk, Muslims, punk, Robert Fitzgerald, ronald reagan, Soul Glo, The Linda, Lindas, Zulu
Shut up, put one in the air’Cause when I get it, I get it out everywhereServing and slinging, I’m not sitting scaredElites don’t fight fair, I got no time to care40 years of Reaganomics, n****, this what we getN****, it is what it is, the world in service and shitDeliver food we spit in, can’t even cook for they kidsYo, my n**** stay flipping … Read More Speaking Truth to Power: Robert Fitzgerald’s “Hardcore Punk in the Age of Reagan”
When I came of age in the 1990s, Nirvana served as my entry point into music. I gravitated towards the Seattle sound, and when Rancid and Green Day broke through in 1994, I added the punk scene to my rotation. One band I always steered clear of , though, was Bad Religion. Seeing their logo of a cross with a line struck through it, … Read More “We’ve Got an American Jesus:” Songs Against Christian Fascism
Interminable Rambling 