“It is unsurprising that simplified English is the lingua franca of Moria prison camp and its environs, spoken between asylum-seekers from formerly-colonised states as disparate as Iraq, Uganda, Pakistan and Burma. But in the crucible of the overcrowded detention centre … English is undergoing an accelerated evolution, tentatively beginning to develop its own unique grammar and idiom.”
Tag: 11.20.17
How Restaurant Menus Manipulate Customers
“There is now an entire industry known as ‘menu engineering’, dedicated to designing menus that convey certain messages to customers, encouraging them to spend more and make them want to come back for a second helping.” Reporter Richard Gray ferrets out a few tricks of the trade.
Enough Already With The Wildly Overrated George Orwell
Ben Judah: “There is a simplicity and a clarity to Orwell’s prose. It flows nicely. But there is also nothing special about it other than the fact it has been canonised as the ultimate in English authorial excellence. This is still very much a surprise to me, because there is just so much wrong with it.”
Front Porches – New Houses Are Getting Them, And People Are Using Them Again
“In the 20th century, porches couldn’t compete with TV and air conditioning. Now this classic feature of American homes is staging a comeback as something more stylish and image-conscious than ever before.”
Beyonce Is 2017’s Highest-Paid Woman In Music
Lemonade was a hit with both critics and fans, giving Beyoncé her sixth solo No. 1. The ensuing Formation World Tour, much of it falling into our list’s scoring period, grossed a quarter of a billion dollars. Then she took time off as she and husband Jay-Z welcomed twins Rumi and Sir this summer. Adele finished second, earning $69 million, boosted by seven-figure nightly grosses on her first proper tour since 2011.
The Netflix Adaptation Of Margaret Atwood’s ‘Alias Grace’ Shows What Real Horror Is
The horror is the one reflected in the one painting in the book and adaptation – Guido Reni’s Susannah and the Elders. The horror runs through the heart of everything. “Everyone is possessed by the same demon that no one can exorcise. It’s a horror so pervasive and unimaginable that a glimpse of its true power drives Doctor Jordan mad.”
How Our Attempts At Crowdfunding Failed Big Time (And Taught Us How To Think Better)
Well, it was hard – possibly worse than anyone had advised.
Former Met Museum Director Ignites Leonardo Controversy With Instagram Post
Below the image of the Leonardo da Vinci, Campbell, who left the Met at the end of June, wrote the caption “450 million dollars?! Hope the buyer understands conservation issues…” followed by “#readthesmallprint”.
Why Charles Manson Has Loomed Large In Pop Culture
“Perhaps Charles Manson also remains a source of such horror and continued fascination because he was the ultimate symbol of insanity. With eyes that either projected total blankness or the agitated evil of a demon awakened, Manson looked like what most people stereotypically think of when they imagine a crazy person. In what may be the craziest time that many Americans have lived through, it makes twisted sense, then, that the most recognizable American psycho is still so omnipresent in our culture.”
Modern Languages Association: Full-Time Jobs Teaching English In Universities Declines To New Low
The association’s Job Information List — a proxy for the tenure-track (or otherwise full-time) job market in English and foreign languages — included 851 jobs last year in English, 11 percent (102 jobs) fewer than the year before. The foreign language edition list included 808 jobs, or 12 percent (110 jobs) fewer than the year before.