Essays & Commentary

Shakespeare didn't have a word processor, but almost all writers today do. Scholars must play a major role in deciding how to preserve and study the various electronic versions of literary works, writes Matthew Kirschenbaum, an associate professor of English at the University of Maryland at College Park. Add your views in the comments section.
(Illustration by Bob McGrath)

In a fast-paced workshop on Web design, Fred L. Pincus, a professor of sociology at the University of Maryland-Baltimore County, gets a taste of how overwhelming college can be for many of his low-income and working-class students.

From an evolutionary perspective, animal brains seem no less capable of generating intelligence than do human ones. The differences are of degree, not kind, writes David P. Barash, a professor of psychology at the University of Washington.

Two books on the history of Russian philosophy and the treatment of its intellectuals provide chilling context for developments in the Vladimir Putin era, writes Carlin Romano, critic at large for The Chronicle.

A secular revival of the language allows non-Orthodox Jews to express their identity without becoming entangled in the politics of the Middle East, writes Anne Trubek, an associate professor of rhetoric and composition at Oberlin College.

Tax incentives provide relief for middle- and high-income families with children in college but do little for the neediest families. The code should be simplified and focused to change that, writes Susan M. Dynarski, an associate professor of public policy at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

CRITICAL MASS: Antonioni, Bergman, and the soul.

The Arts

A photographer, geologist, and pilot shares his aerial perspective on mountains.
Rocks of Treasure Mountain, west-central Colorado (Photograph by Michael Collier, 2007 )

Encouraged by his daughter, a professor of performance studies at New York University, Mayer Kirshenblatt painted what vanished long ago: life in the Polish village that he left in 1934.