Treating pregnant women with steroid to prevent lesbianism

You read that right. The researcher is associate dean for clinical research at my university: Pediatric endocrinologist Maria New, of Mount Sinai School of Medicine and Florida International University, and her long-time collaborator, psychologist Heino F. L. Meyer-Bahlburg, of Columbia University, have been tracing evidence for the influence of prenatal androgens in sexual orientation. In

Village of the Damned

Black and white photography as rich as Christian Berger’s in The White Ribbon is as much a triumph of legerdemain as it is of lighting; the imprimatur of black and white in a post-Ted Turner world signals seriousness of intent. Very serious. Michael Haneke is no Judd Apatow. He’s a proselytizer, a thesis writer, a

“I have a bit of a paranoid streak”

Laurie Anderson, in an interview with Rob Harvilla, still showing she understands the nuances of language: That administration, the Bush administration, was a very story-savvy one. They knew what they were doing when they paired a ridiculous word like “homeland,” which nobody uses—no American would say “homeland”; it sounds like something from a small Balkan

Hope I die before I stay young: on listening to music

Lots of stuff to digest in this ILM thread addressing what must look like a precarious situation to a twentysomething still infatuated with music: what happens when the consumptive urges inevitably wane with age, partners, and children? Created, naturally, on the same day as this thread about harshly judging people whose tastes don’t coincide with

Love stinks

In yet another example of a film “about” a novelist made by people who’ve never read a novel, The Last Station exists as a vehicle to get costume designers, Helen Mirren, and Christopher Plummer a bunch of Oscar nods. Less risible a notion, however, than accepting the shouted drivel about “freedom” versus “love.” I can’t

What are you putting in that box?

Like riding a bicycle without training wheels and my first lust-driven erection, separating myself from toys was supposed to be one of those milestones. I didn’t mean a single word when I imperiously told Mom on Christmas 1987 that the Transformer I’d gotten was “the last one.” I started high school in eight months; high

Too weak to work

Barry Ritholtz grades financial regulatory reform. Oh boy: “Overall, I give this a C minus: There are simply too many Fs to give them a much higher grade.” He grades each component.

Singles – 6/24

This week’s singles and links to my reviews, with 1 the lowest and 10 the highest score. I found Trey Songz’ hit cuter than everyone else did, but I’m aware of the half-life of cute. As for Sade, I can’t believe I liked her single more than the sick beat on M.I.A’s, but six months

“The president is starting to freak me out”

News: Obama’s weekly video addresses becoming increasingly avant-garde.

Avarice and ambition — Brit edition!

One of Tom’s best posts. He’s illuminating on the phenomenon of Bros, the English boy band that mesmerized their country for a couple of years in the late eighties. I’ve no idea what if any stateside MTV exposure these blond schemers got; we had the Boston fivesome to worry about a few months later. But

Deferring judgment

Stanley Fish on the peril of student evaluations. I’ve never minded them, despite getting more than my share of responses criticizing my lack of “clarity” and “not explaining assignments,” which are usually buzzwords for “He won’t tell me exactly what I need to do to pass the course.” Or, in Fish’s words: “They don’t welcome

Two cheers for ambiguity

I suppose it’s tempting to credit E.M. Forster’s rather non-committal attitude towards his homosexuality for the querulousness and fussiness that make his fiction charming, daft, and, in the wrong mood, unwelcome, like a sweet old lady in the supermarket checkout lane who insists on talking to you; but that would be grotesquely reductive, yet so