It’s impossible to follow up a post on the death of a loved one and sound anything but banal, but here goes: Friday, I got a call at the office from my old friend Matt Ruben, an urban studies scholar in drag as a literature scholar (or is it the other way around?) Anyway, I …
Category Archives: Politics
A Dispatch From South of the Border
The following email arrived in my inbox yesterday, which I am reproducing here. If you want to skip to the chase, here’s a link to a letter you can send to the Postal Board of Governors. I’m not sure if they’ll pay attention if you’ve got a Canadian address, but then, it being the U.S., …
Here Come the Leaping Lesbians
For each academic year since I’ve become a professor, the end of classes has been punctuated by a rock show. I have fond memories of sitting on the Carnegie-Mellon lawn in Pittsburgh, lazily watching a lukewarm set by Superchunk. Another year we drove to Cleveland to watch Shiner (one of my favorite bands at the …
More Language Politics
I was pleased to see that the French language lobby stopped the Esso Corporation’s plan to give its depanneurs an English name — “On the Go,” and I am pleased to see that people are now starting to ask questions about the English-language signs for multinationals. Since Bill 101 the Quebec language police have been …
Oh, and I forgot to mention the liberal convention
That was sure a surprise when we tuned in at the end of the afternoon yesterday. I sure hope they know what they’re doing. Dion doesn’t exactly seem like a popular figure inside or outside Quebec. But then, parties here don’t choose their leaders by popular vote.
Baby’s First Liberal Convention
Last night Carrie and I watched our first Canadian political convention and . . . is was boring and disappointing. Yes, I know we should have known better from years of American political conventions but somehow I thought it would be different here, that issues and positions would be discussed. Instead, it was a serial …
The “Quebec is a Nation” Controversy 101 for Americans
Ron writes in the comments that he’d like an explanation of what the hell is going on up here in federal politics. Given that I have found no more divisive issue (1) among Canadians (and that’s among anglophones and among francophones as well as across language divisions), I’m sure to get myself in trouble here. …
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