Category: Film, Art, Television, and Media

MAGA Country: Streeterville and the Jussie Smollett Story

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date March 28, 2019

The city of Chicago is central to this story, but it has been ignored in all the coverage.

Film, Art, Television, and Media Race, Sex, Gender, and Sexuality

On Liam Neeson and the Erasure of the Idea of the Past

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date February 14, 2019

In this context, time as we understand it no longer exists, and has shifted into a permanent state of the ever-present; social media has served to flatten out time. There is no “was” in this scenario, only an “is.” We suffer from a permanent state of is-ness, engorged with anger.

Image result for Paul Klee, The Red Balloon,

Film, Art, Television, and Media

Mary Poppins Returns, and Not Much Happens

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date February 6, 2019

It feels like every character is bounding out of the screen asking you, Do you feel that child-like sense of wonder yet? Well, DO you?

Image result for rene magritte hegel's holiday

Film, Art, Television, and Media Queer Politics, Culture, and History

Jason Momoa, Aquaman, and the Queer Art of Friendship

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date January 29, 2019

Excerpt: If “queer” means anything, and if we queers have given anything to the world, it’s a combination of sex and love that stretches the imagination and the concept of friendship.

Capitalism, Class, Inequality Feminism Film, Art, Television, and Media Queer Politics, Culture, and History Race, Sex, Gender, and Sexuality

Your Trauma Is Your Passport: Hannah Gadsby, Nanette, and Global Citizenship

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date November 20, 2018

Excerpt: Nanette assures viewers, especially straight ones, that queers and women can and must be understood and assimilated by first understanding us as uniquely and literally broken and bashed in.

Feminism Film, Art, Television, and Media Race, Sex, Gender, and Sexuality

All the White Ladies: The Real Dinosaurs of Murphy Brown

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date November 13, 2018

All the white ladies, from Hillary Clinton to Diane English to Candice Bergen and the fictional Murphy Brown, living in a past only they recall fondly and refusing to confront the realities of the present.

Academia Film, Art, Television, and Media Queer Politics, Culture, and History Race, Sex, Gender, and Sexuality

Asia Argento and Avital Ronell Or, Humans Are the Worst People

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date August 22, 2018

Naming power isn’t really enough if the primary aim is to simply shift power around, and #MeToo’s supporters and “leaders” haven’t really done all that much to change that conversation.

Academia Film, Art, Television, and Media On Books and Publishing

A World of Shame: Time, Belonging, and Social Media

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date June 12, 2018

Excerpt: This is a murder mystery without a murder. Think of it like a Brian De Palma movie from the 1970s: a streetwalker is found dead in an alleyway, and the detective assigned to the case is about to write it up as another transaction gone awry until he begins to see the clues that unravel a sprawling political conspiracy.
The body is incidental.

Film, Art, Television, and Media

Death by Celebrity: Anthony Bourdain, Kate Spade, and the Lives We Flee

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date June 11, 2018

Suicide isn’t something we can fully claim to understand, but it’s also not something we need to blame people for.

Feminism Film, Art, Television, and Media Politics Race, Sex, Gender, and Sexuality

A Monica for Our Time: Reinventing Sex and Trauma in the Age of #MeToo

Post author By Yasmin Nair
Post date March 10, 2018