Posts by Jim McDermott
Learning the Right Lessons From Dante
A few blocks north of Fordham University’s Lincoln Center campus stands a statue of the Italian poet Dante Aligheri. Erected in 1921 upon the 600th anniversary of Dante’s death, the sculpture was largely the work of Carlo Barsotti, editor-in-chief of the Italian-American newspaper Il Progreso Italo-Americano. The monument to Dante was one of five honoring…
Read MoreHumor, Humanity, and Community: The Verbatim Salon Subverts the Immigration Narratives of the Trump Administration
By all reports, the Trump Administration’s approach to immigration in its second term has been akin to so many 20th century dictatorships—people being seized on the street or from their homes by masked men; individuals with valid green cards, visas, even citizenship being terrorized, humiliated, and jailed; and now the military being mobilized in two…
Read MoreBilly Joel’s Weaponized Nostalgia and Spiritual Truth
I’m not sure what I thought pop culture would be like when my generation got into middle age. I certainly didn’t expect it would be dominated by ideas and figures from my 1980s childhood released into the wild again and again like some monstrous zombie army, hungry for our eyeballs and the reanimated feels of…
Read MoreFilms That Show the Reality of Trans People
This year’s Tribeca Film Festival featured two documentaries about the experience of being transgender in the United States right now. Their subjects are radically different: State of Firsts follows Delaware’s transgender congresswoman Sarah McBride as she runs for Congress. Meanwhile Just Kids tells the story of three trans children and their families as they grapple…
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