Explaining Postmodernism by Stephen Hicks

Explaining Postmodernism: Skepticism and Socialism from Rousseau to Foucault by Stephen Hicks, Professor of Philosophy – recommended by Jordan Peterson – is free to read as a PDF and listen on audio at www.stephenhicks.org/explaining-postmodernism

Here are extracts from the Introduction about postmodern ‘Critical Legal Theory’ and the postmodern view of education.

Quaker bookshop suppresses books by Quaker philosopher

Since 2018 the Quaker Centre Bookshop at Friends House in London has been suppressing gender-critical books by Heather Brunskell-Evans

Why Freud Was Wrong: Sin, Science and Psychoanalysis by Richard Webster
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

Rarely have I read a book where the author tries so hard to impress upon his readers the breadth of his study and knowledge of his subject. It's hard to believe that Webster would have intended to make his readers feel small and ignorant. But if he truly intended to write for a lay audience, surely he should have fleshed out some of his vast generalisations and explained the background and context for people who haven't already read everything by and about Freud, as he seems to have done.

Examples:
“The resemblances which Brown and Erikson found between Lutheran Protestantism and classical psychoanalysis can scarcely be disputed.” (Introduction, page 5: why )
“Sulloway’s book, like Roazen's, is a curious mixture of sceptical historicism and irrational piety.” (Prologue, page 21)

I gave up at Chapter One, entitled “Caul and cocaine”, where Webster writes: “[Freud] had been born in a caul …” In a 500-page book, where “caul” is in the title of a chapter, Webster does not deign to explain what it is. A phrase like “the amniotic sack in which a baby is held in the womb” would have been helpful. But no, the implied message (in my humble opinion) seems to be that if you are that ignorant you shouldn’t be reading this book.

I wish Webster could have explained in his Intro and Prologue why he thought Freud was wrong. What I got was mainly ‘Why Freud was Big-headed’ and ‘Why other people agreed with his high opinion of himself’.

Webster was recommended to me by a good friend and the book has a gushing endorsement from Dervla Murphy on the cover, so I had high expectations of this book, but they were not fulfilled. I look forward to hearing about a book that explains why Freud was wrong!

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The End of the World is Flat by Simon Edge

The End of the World is Flat by Simon Edge
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A great read. My favourite scene is on p321, where Mel advises Ginny how to write up the story so as to avoid the risk of her wealthy adversaries taking her down with questionable libel claims: "Fictionalise it. Dress it up as something else ... Find some other subject where a bunch of fanatics take incontrovertible truths and rip them up for some crazy ideology." Mel's suggestion is to have the fanatics "argue that biological sex is a false concept imposed on the world by racist imperialists. Or is that too far-fetched?"
I wasn't expecting it to be such a romping adventure with twists and turns of character. I found many characters credible and believable.
(Slight spoiler alert: stop reading here if you haven't read TEOTWIF yet). Shane was an exception, maybe, due to the way he turned into more and more of a callous, unprincipled villain. But still, he was the Love-To-Hate character and deserved what he got!

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Poetry at #rainbowmillnvccamp 2019

Here is a list of some of the poems we read out at #rainbowmillnvccamp 2019:

Blessing poem by John O'Donohue

To create a space for all our words, 

Drawing us to listen inward and outward. 

We seldom notice how each day is a holy place 

Where the Eucharist of the ordinary happens, 

Transforming our broken fragments 

Into an eternal continuity that keeps us. 

Inventing Ourselves by Sarah-Jayne Blakemore

Inventing Ourselves by Sarah-Jayne Blakemore 

Dark Mountain

We intend to challenge the stories which underpin our civilisation: the myth of progress, the myth of human centrality, and the myth of our separation from ‘nature’.

— Uncivilisation: The Dark Mountain Manifesto

This book or collection of essays and stories sounds worth following up. 

Goodreads

Recommended by friend DB of splendid B&B Radnor House in Hay on Wye. 
Mountains of the Mind by Robert Macfarlane, published 2003, about the history of the human fascination with mountains

Days Without End by Sebastian Barry: two young soldiers find intimacy amid the horrors of the American civil war

Sacred Hunger, historical novel by Barry Unsworth about the slave trade, 1992 Booker Prize (with Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient) 

Words That Come Before All Else

The Words That Come Before All Else address the People, Earth Mother, The Waters, Fish, Plants, Food Plants, Medicine Herbs, Trees, Birds, Four Winds, Thunderers, Sun, Grandfather Moon, Stars, Enlightened Teachers, and The Creator. Each element of the natural world is spoken to and thanked for their contributions to all life. These words bind us and promote empathy with all creation.

Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari

Next Book Group choice (by BB) is Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari (2011).

Weapons of Mass Instruction by John Taylor Gatto

Next Book Group choice (by G) is Weapons of Mass Instruction by John Taylor Gatto, published in 2010.

Librivox

Great find on Internet: Librivox - free public domain audiobooks read by volunteers from all over the world. 

Book Group 2015-2018

Book Group 2015-2018

Murray Bookchin

The Murray Bookchin Reader is available as an ebook at libcom.org and a free audio (MP3) download at www.archive.org, which summarizes it thus:

On Anarchism by Noam Chomsky

Latest version of On Anarchism was published 2014 by Penguin, earlier versions available as PDF.

Colin Ward

Colin Ward (1924-2010) wrote Anarchism: A Very Short Introduction in 2004 (one in the Oxford VSI series).

Lost Connections by Johann Hari

Next month's choice is Lost Connections by Johann Hari (reviewed for example in the Guardian)

Peter Matthiessen

In the Spirit of Crazy Horse by Peter Matthiessen tells "The story of Leonard Peltier and the FBI's war on the American Indian Movement." Peltier was convicted of murder for the 1975 killing of two FBI agents after a trial which, the author alleges, involved government misconduct. The book portrays the violent turmoil on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation during that time, including the 1973 'Wounded Knee Incident'. 

Matthiessen (1927-2014) was an American novelist, naturalist, wilderness writer, zen teacher and CIA agent. He also wrote The Snow Leopard (1978). 

All above from Wikipedia so check for reliability. 

Draw breath

"Draw breath" - poem by Geoffrey Weedon

Breathe in the quiet purpose of this place;
Through outward stillness, seek a calm within.
Here we can find forgiveness and forgive;
Here feel the healing miracle begin.