Author Archive
Fighting Words
Guest post by tf
I have been silent since my brief guest blogging, but I could not let this oversight by The New York Times go unremarked. Elaine Sciolino reported on the fighting words uttered by French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin in the National Assembly on Tuesday, June 20th. Addressing François Hollande, the leader of […]
Abuse
Guest post by tf
Much of France is fixated on the televised parliamentary hearings concerning the Outreau sexual abuse scandal, named for the town in the north of the country where the abuse, both actual and invented, was situated. Eighteen people were formally investigated for abuse of children, of whom only four proved to be guilty. […]
Shelter
Guest post by tf
Since December 21st, Médecins du Monde (Doctors of the World) has been distributing tents to homeless people in Paris.
Dr Françoise Jeanson, President of Médecins du Monde, writes, in her letter of December 22nd (my translation):
These tents are not a solution, they symbolize the absence of a solution.
By that date, ten homeless people […]
Colonne Morris
Guest post by tf
There are 773 of these columns in Paris:
Soon their number will drop to 550…
Technorati Tags: Berlin, colonne Morris, karambolage, Litfaßsäule, Paris, Vienna
Candidate
Guest post by tf
France’s next presidential elections are due in about fifteen months: the first round in April 2007 and, since it is extremely unlikely that any candidate will gain a majority in that round, the second round in May. Candidates on the right and the left have been jostling for position for some time […]
New Year
Guest post by tf
In the States, it is customary to wish people a happy new year. In France, I’ve been learning, that is insufficient. “Happy New Year” is just the beginning. This should be followed by the statement that you hope the year will bring good health, happiness, prosperity, and success, or some combination thereof. […]
Polygamy
Guest post by tf
Polygamy has become a bogeyman in polemics in both the United States and in France recently, but for different reasons.
In the States, some opponents of gay marriage argue that the next step after legalized gay marriage is legalized polygamy. For instance, Stanley Kurtz writes in The Weekly Standard that
… increasingly, bisexuality is […]
Benefits
Guest post by tf
Lieutenant Laurel Hester, an investigator with the Ocean County, New Jersey, prosecutor’s office, is gravely ill, and would like for her same-sex domestic partner of six years to be able to inherit her pension benefits. If she were a state employee, it would not be a problem. If she were an employee […]
For Dummies
Guest post by tf
The book Tropical Colonization: An Introduction to the Study of the Subject by Alleyne Ireland (New York: Macmillan, 1899) uses the term “subject” in its title without irony. The United States had recently taken possession of Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. Before then, “The American people [had] never been interested in […]
Elocution
Guest post by tf
With all the talk of call centers in poorer countries, one sometimes forgets that they are a booming business in the rich world. In Eugene, Oregon, Lane Community College has just reintroduced its eight week certificate program for would-be call center employees. As reported by Sherri Buri McDonald in The Register […]
An anthropologist and documentary filmmaker, 
