On partial truths, theoretical afterlives, and the noise of literature review Academic writing places an extraordinary burden on citation because it is trained to evaluate a writer’s capacity for placement before it evaluates the thought itself. Before an argument can be heard on its own terms, the writer must demonstrate that they know how authority is organized: which names must be invoked, which lineages acknowledged, which territorial boundaries respected, and which exist

On popular culture, interpretive generosity, and the accusation of “overreading” - I have recently become more aware of a persistent asymmetry in cultural criticism: many extraordinarily intelligent people become strangely intellectually careless around popular culture. I do not mean that they suddenly lose their analytical abilities - I mean almost the opposite: they become unusually confident. They approach literature, philosophy, history, and social life with seriousness,

In academia, certain questions seem to follow automatically whenever one writes about culture. Have you sufficiently considered the risk of appropriation? Have you overlooked asymmetries of power? Are you being too optimistic? Before speaking of connection and generativity, should you not first warn us more fully about the dangers such possibilities may contain? These are, of course, important questions. Cultural appropriation, Orientalism, and representational violence are r