Margaret Atwood and Eskimos - The Monday Morning Memo

Margaret Atwood is writing a sequel to *The Handmaid’s Tale.* Read about it in the *New York Times.*

I have long heard the sound of the French language in the paintings, architecture, music and food of France. Likewise, the sound of the German language is in the paintings, architecture, music and food of Germany. And the sound of Italian is in the paintings, the architecture, music and food of Italy.

Do these connections exist only in my mind, or is there something there?

The chicken-and-egg question in my mind is this: Do the nuances of language shape the worldview and culture of those who speak it? Or do the worldview and culture shape the language?

Another chicken-and-egg conundrum:Is culture altered by high-impact artistic expressions? (Books, music, paintings, photographs, cultural icons, etc.) Or are those artistic expressions altered and shaped by the culture?

Does art reflect culture, or does culture reflect art?

Aroo,
Roy

“In a piece for The Atlantic called “Chicken Littles are Ruining America,” David Brooks argues that American society has swung from an emphasis on communalism in the mid 20th century to individualism from the 1970s on. But now, he argued, the pendulum is swinging back. “Twenty-first-century communalism is a peculiar kind of communalism,” he wrote. “Whether you’re on the MAGA right or the social-justice left, you define your identity by how you stand against what you perceive to be the dominant structures of society. Groups on each side of the political divide are held together less by common affections than by a common sense of threat, an experience of collective oppression. Today’s communal culture is based on a shared belief that society is broken, systems are rotten, the game is rigged, injustice prevails, the venal elites are out to get us; we find solidarity and meaning in resisting their oppression together. … In this culture, people feel bonded not because they are cooperating with one another but because they are indignant about the same things. … In this way, pessimism becomes a membership badge – the ultimate sign that you are on the side of the good. If your analysis is not apocalyptic, you’re naive, lacking in moral urgency, complicit with the status quo.”

- Michael Drew quoting TheDispatch.com, Feb 2, 2024

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