Forty years ago, the chemistry of pop stardom was irrevocably changed. Nineteen eighty-four was an inflection point: a year of blockbuster albums, career quantum leaps, iconic poses and an enduring redefinition of what pop success could mean for performers — and would then demand from them — in the decades to come. (Pareles, The New York Times)
Read MoreChastising her fellow 25,000 students at the college dating back to 1636, Claire Miller has claimed that the university should require them to at least pick up a book. Writing in The Harvard Crimson, the college newspaper, Ms Miller has called for the university to make an English course compulsory for students, who pay more than $56,000 (£44,350) a year for their tuition. (Millward, The Telegraph)
Read MoreThe United Nations human rights chief said Monday that 184 people were killed over the weekend in the Haitian capital, as Port-au-Prince was rocked by a spike in gang violence that pushed the death toll from Haiti's spiraling security crisis to at least 5,000. (CBS News)
Read MoreDespite the incessant tracking of evangelical Christian, Latino Catholic, Muslim and other religious groups through the recently ended election season, a study released on Election Day by the Hartford Institute for Religion Research showed that most congregations are politically inactive, with nearly half actively avoiding discussing politics at their gatherings. (André, Religion News Service)
Read MoreIn August, Zoë Kravitz released her directorial debut, a vivid, trippy, darkly funny horror film set on a private island owned by a tech billionaire, Slater King (played by Channing Tatum). … Blink Twice is a story about what men are capable of when no rules apply to them and their actions have no consequences. (Gilbert, The Atlantic)
Read More“Polarization means division, but it’s a very specific kind of division,” said Peter Sokolowski, Merriam-Webster’s editor at large, in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press ahead of Monday’s announcement. “Polarization means that we are tending toward the extremes rather than toward the center.” (Furman, AP News)
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