Charlottesville, Va

According to First Amendment orthodoxy, we must protect the thought we hate in order to protect the speech we love. Defending the free speech rights of neo-Nazis, pornographers, and cross-burners – the speech of white male supremacy – supposedly secures the free speech rights of women and minorities. Free speech orthodoxy thus urges women and minorities to see themselves, quite literally, in white men. Feminist theory demonstrates, however, that protecting free speech for white men, far from protecting women and minorities, sacrifices and silences them. If free speech for all is the desired outcome, a dramatic reorientation of free speech theory and practice is required. Rather than urging women and nonwhite men to see themselves in white men, white men should be urged to see themselves in women and nonwhite men. When women’s free speech if protected, everyone’s free speech is protected.

In the aftermath of the 2017 Charlottesville tragedy, the prevailing narrative is a Manichean division between 'white supremacists' and 'anti-racists'. We suggest a more complicated, nuanced reality. While the so-called 'Alt-Right' includes those pursuing an atavistic political end of racial and ethnic separation, it is also characterised by pluralism and a strategy of nonviolent dialogue and social change, features associated with classic liberalism. The 'Left,' consistent with its historic mission, opposes the Alt-Right's racial/ethnic prejudice; but, a highly visible movement goes farther, embracing an authoritarianism that would forcibly exclude these voices from the public sphere. This authoritarian element has influenced institutions historically committed to free expression and dialogue, notably universities and the ACLU. We discuss these paradoxes by analysing the discourse and actions of each movement, drawing from our study of hundreds of posts and articles on Alt-Right websites and our online exchanges on a leading site (AltRight.com). We consider related news reports and scholarly research, concluding with the case for dialogue.

Crónica de un encuentro con Ricardo Aronovich en Trouville-sur-Mer. Emigrado a Francia en los 60, el gran director de fotografía encarnó importantes hitos del cine argentino y europeo. Trabajó junto a Raúl Ruiz, Louis Malle, Ettore Scola, Costa-Gavras, Hugo Santiago, René Mugica, Ruy Guerra y Alan Resnais entre otros. La extensa entrevista que resulta de este encuentro filmado, permite rastrear los inicios de una pasión por el cine, y la influencia de los maestros Simón Feldman y Pablo Tabernero.

Screenplay and research comments for "Monroe Hill", documentary film premiered at the Virginia Film Festival on November 8, 2015. "Monroe Hill", research and film,  was made possible with the award of The Jefferson Trust,  in collaboration with Brown College, the Curry School of Education, and Ash Lawn-Highland. Additional support to the research by Montes-Bradley came from the Office of the Provost & Vice Provost of the Arts, The Papers of James Monroe, Washington Papers, The James Monroe Museum and Library, and The Presidential Precinct.

The violence and death in Charlottesville on August 14, 2017 led to a national and even international barrage of condemnations of white supremacy along with condemnations of those who were slow to condemn. Why do we like to judge and condemn? And why do we do it with such passion and zeal? Theologically, social judgment and condemnation rely silently on confidence that the standard of justice is eternal, that justice is decreed by divine law. Yet, the act of judgment and condemnation also produces self-justification and perhaps even scapegoating in order to protect social unity. If the biblical gospel proclaims that we are justified before God by grace and not via self-justification through condemnation, could we turn our attention more directly on those victimized by the conflict at hand? Specifically, could we listen to the voices of African Americans, Jews, American's Deep South and Southwest, and the disenfranchised white working class?

“Aquéllos que niegan la libertad a otros no la merecen para sí, y bajo un Dios justo no pueden conservarla mucho tiempo”
Abraham Lincoln

A 159 kilómetros de Washington DC la capital americana se encuentra la pequeña ciudad de Charlottesville; Virginia. Con menos de 50 mil habitantes es sede de la Universidad de Virginia, centro educativo público fundado por Thomas Jefferson, quien fue además el tercer presidente americano, considerado “padre fundador” de la patria y también gobernador del estado de Virginia. Charlottesville es igualmente el lugar de nacimiento de otro gobernador de Virginia y presidente americano; en este caso el quinto y también padre fundador; James Monroe.

El choque en Charlottesville

Al conocerse la intención de retirar la estatua de Robert E. Lee, numerosas organizaciones xenófobas se organizaron para impedirlo; pero también para que las diversas facciones se unificaran. Las protestas de los nacionalistas y del Ku Klux Klan fueron el preámbulo de lo que ocurriría el 12 de agosto. Organizaciones eclesiásticas, de derechos civiles, empresas, pero sobre todo la comunidad de la Universidad de Virginia convocaron a manifestarse contra los extremistas. Conscientes de la tensión, las autoridades universitarias reconocían el riesgo de violencia e instaban a la comunidad a evitarla.

Los símbolos confederados en Estados Unidos

A partir del programa de retiro de los símbolos confederados, el censo realizado indica que hay 1,503 símbolos de la Confederación en espacios públicos. Esto incluye estatuas, banderas, celebraciones públicas, nombre de escuelas, carreteras, parques, puentes, ciudades y bases militares. Los símbolos confederados aparecieron años después de la guerra civil como respuesta a las leyes estatales y municipales que imponían casi de “facto” sobre todo en los estados del sur la segregación racial. Las leyes denominadas “Jim Crow” por un humorista blanco que satirizaba las costumbres de los afrodescendientes ordenaban la segregación racial en lugares públicos como las escuelas, el transporte, los baños y los restaurantes.

La solidaridad a la tragedia de “La Rambla de Barcelona” y el aislamiento americano

Mientras los grupos extremistas americanos sorprendían al mundo en Charlottesville; en cuestión de días, el mundo volvería a sorprenderse por los hechos ocurridos en Barcelona; España. En alerta permanente desde los atentados en París en el 2015, España no sufría un atentado terrorista a gran escala desde el 2004, cuando diez explosiones cimbraron el sistema de transporte público de Madrid, tragedia que tiene a los servicios policiales y de inteligencia en alerta permanente.

Paint This Desert (Ed Fuentes) invites Andrea Lepage, associate professor of art history, to share her thoughts that come from witnessing the climate and mood of her region. With her scholarship in Chicanx Art, social practice, and art in public space, all while teaching below the Mason-Dixon Line, Lepage has intimate insight to recent events. While there will be much debate about the role of civic art as public art, it can be agreed that sculpture in public space around the U.S. will be watched and read more closely. PaintThisDesert, August 19, 2017.

Independent bookstores (often called "indies" or "independents") as named are retail bookshops owned independently, contrasting with chain bookstores. Since an indie is always established by one or few owners, particular genres and editions can be found from bookstore to bookstore, such as new books and used books (also called "second-hand books"). Benefiting from its exclusive collections, an indie could always develop strong connections between readers, publishers, authors, and space itself. Guest Column once notes that indie is "a place for like-minded individuals to gather together and exchange ideas … [it is also a place for] supporting core values of community, creativity, convening, civility and contact." This argument is reminiscent of Paul Groth's identification of Landscape as "the interaction of people and place: a social group and its spaces, particularly the spaces to which the group belongs and from which its members derive some part of their shared identity and meaning." Therefore, it is interesting to situate an independent bookstore in the discussion of cultural landscape, to explore how an independent bookstore is shaped by its geographical contexts, but creates its own cultural landscape actively within the broader socio-cultural networks.

A response to the Charlottesville demonstration and its aftermath, which draws on Pierre Nora' "lieux de memoire" and reahces back to the Arch of Titus and the history of iconiclasm to contextualize responses to the Robert E. Lee sculpture. 

Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Aug. 30, 2017