Culture Watch

Doris O'Brien writes: Casting a ballot is usually a biannual event. But the obligatory trek to pick up our paper-based stash has for many of us become an urgent daily ritual. For some, the habit may have even morphed into an obsession. At the appropriate time of year, for example, we may happily discover a birthday card or two, sent to us by those who still buy and lick stamps. And if we're lucky, the holiday season may bring a comparative bonanza of greetings — though, again, there's always the chance of ending up as disappointed as Charlie Brown.                more »

"In 2014, SSH commissioned a 2,000-person national survey in the USA. The survey found that 65% of all women had experienced street harassment. Among all women, 23% had been sexually touched, 20% had been followed, and 9% had been forced to do something sexual. Among men, 25% had been street harassed (a higher percentage of LGBT-identified men than heterosexual men reported this) and their most common form of harassment was homophobic or transphobic slurs (9%)." more »

The new series, premiering October 16th at 8/7c, is a six-part adaptation of Gerald Durrell's My Family and Other Animals (and its two sequels, Birds, Beasts and Relatives and The Garden of the Gods), and follows one unconventional mother and her four children on their quest to start anew. Get to know the colorful characters, and the actors who portray them, with Masterpiece's introduction to this sun-drenched series with a biting wit. more »

Joan L. Cannon writes: We went on trips to places that would yield the most various experiences in the smallest locales. For instance, an abandoned talc quarry where, with a jackknife as your only tool, you could return to camp with magnetite crystals, garnets, pyrites, and black tourmaline. I know that few people are of greater importance than the primary school teachers and young parents who initiate children into the practice of paying attention – not in a classroom or to lectures alone, but everything that proves to them that they are sentient and alive – in the present. more »