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In a city overflowing with prime tourist attractions, the Anne Frank house may be Amsterdam's greatest. A visit to Amsterdam must include a stop to see the house, an extremely well run and highly affective museum. A new traveling exhibit recreates Anne Frank's secret annex for American visitors (Bringing Anne Frank’s Secret Annex to New York, and the World - The New York Times), and a new book (The Many Lives of Anne Frank) examines the construction and lasting influence of the world's most famous diary. After the break, a brief excerpt about Anne and her diary from my own forthcoming book:  The first diary bought as a present for Anne Frank by her parents. Courtesy of the Anne Frank House, Amsterdam.
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 And now for something completely different: In honor of the GOAT’s birthday, one day early, I present a list of the top fights in Muhammad Ali’s career, ranked. Highly subjective justifications follow. My criteria, such as they are, center on Ali’s greatness writ large, and not solely for his boxing acumen, significance as an activist, or humanitarian greatness. I remain inspired by the Greatest of All Time, no less in these trying days. Comments and counter-takes welcome!:
The Big Sleep is an outlier in the world of film noir. Like most good noir, there are Dark and Sinister goings-on, to include embezzlement, infidelity, gambling, and murder. It’s got it all, and then some: drugs and pornography also feature, somewhat rarer debaucheries than we’re accustomed to in the period. But there is also a lightness to the film, conveyed in part by Bogie’s irrepressible nonchalance. It is also, as has been frequently commented, a hash of a plot best consumed with giddy delight rather than forensic solemnity. We know the film is in effect two Raymond Chandler short stories cobbled together, filtered through a number of rewrites, including one at William Faulkner’s boozy hand. So The Big Sleep offers a pastiche-y, perpetual “What’s going on?” affect. It’s a beloved film, but a hard movie to take seriously, and in that sense a bit of a noir orphan. But I think there is something else going on as well, a critical gender confusion on which few have commented. Outlier in its genre it may have been, but it was rather more central to the broader culture of which it was a part.  One of the aims of this blog is to trace how the ideas that shape American empire are reflected and amplified by American culture, even--and perhaps especially--in American popular culture. Expect to see frequent excursions into American pop culture: Coming are more than a few posts about Star Trek, for example, a venerable proponent of American empire. Today, let’s consider another revered piece of pop culture, one that has been around quite a while, but which has also gotten renewed attention in the early 21st century: Captain America’s shield.  |
AuthorI am an editor and historian of US history, diplomacy, and international relations. Archives
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Why empire?This blog presents new scholarship on American empire, places the American experience in a broader and global imperial context, explores imperial habits throughout American society and culture, uncovers the imperial connections between the foreign and the domestic, and develops “empire” as a critical perspective.
At least two features in the American experience are clarified through the lens of American empire: First, we better understand persistent social inequities in a nation professing a fundamental commitment to equality. Second, even a cursory glance at American history makes plain the chronic violence at the center of US foreign policy, which frequently mounts or supports bloody military conflict abroad. Empire helps us recognize how and why the United States seems to be constantly at war--including often with itself--with all the foreign and domestic consequences thereof. |
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