One of the more famous landmarks in East Berlin is the TV tower (or Fernsehturm Berlin), which was constructed by the GDR in the late ’60s as a way to showcase its technological superiority over the West. My first impression as I exited Alexanderplatz metro station was that I was not moved either by its […]
Archive for the ‘History’ category
Flag waving
In June of 2006, the last time we were in Europe for any extended period of time, we planned to go to Berlin for a long visit. My ignorance of sporting matters is such that the trip was almost completely planned before a more culturally aware friend (read: having any awareness at all) casually mentioned, […]
How to Try
I am missing the arrogance of my stupid youth. When did I get so embarrassed of making a fool of myself? Why wasn’t I ashamed of myself then? The lack of shame usually works for my college students, in that they dare to say and do all kinds of productive things in my classes. It […]
Your kids can dance to it while it wins a war
Anyone interested in music, history, technology, and how all three sometimes converge will find Dave Tompkins’s recently published book How to Wreck a Nice Beach fascinating reading. It’s a history of the vocoder from its development in the 30s by Bell Labs as a voice encryptor for the US Military to its infiltration of techno […]
Dave’s Top 20/Bottom 10/Questionable 5 for 2009
So back in college, I worked for an off-campus student paper that some of you are familiar with. One of our longstanding features was a Top 20/Bottom 10, a concise and witty summing-up of the past week’s news. One of my favorite things about the feature was that the format made you focus on good […]
