A Museum of One's Own

For those of you who regularly read this blog, I am a museum nerd. I love going and sometimes even review them. I also am a feminist, and I love the idea of a National Women's History Museum. Women's history is an essential part of history, but one that is often forgotten or marginalized. Men frequently wrote the primary sources that historians pull from and since most societies were patriarchies, this meant that women stories often went untold, and if they were, they were from a male view.
A museum is a great way to celebrate and educate museum-goers on the achievements and struggles of American women. Even though there are a few women-centic museums and homes, like the National Museum for Women in the Arts, women have made achievements in other fields too, and despite a few (male) senators beliefs women are all about reproduction and thus a museum is not necessary.

Amazing Bookstores

Flavorwire recently posted this amazing-looking bookstores list. As a literary nerd, of course, I love lots of different bookstores, to the point where I have favorite bookstores for every city (Powell's for Portland, Curious for East Lansing, The Strand for New York). And looking at some of these amazing places, like Livraria da Vila in Sao Paulo, Poplar Kid's Republic Bookstore or The Montague Bookmill, I am tempted to plan a vacation to one of these cities just to have an excuse to go to one of these places. Given my love of Coney Island, I am heartbroken that I cannot hang out at their Bookstore and Barber Shop, which is charming in the same way Coney Island always is.

Living Room Design

Obviously, in addition to being nearly every other kind of nerd on the planet, I am a design nerd.  I love various kinds of art, even the interior decoration kind.  While surfing on the great I Love Old Magazines tumblr, I discovered this great living room set.
I like that (now) vintage look of this.  There's something about this that makes me vaguely think of someone's cool Grandma.  The yellow/green combination looks surprisingly nice.

The Great Gatsby in 3D

So finally, The Great Gatsby will be adapted, again, into a movie. As a literary nerd, I'm sure everyone's expecting me to be excited for it, and I would be, if I particularly liked the book. As a feminist, the book just strikes me as another rich white man writing a book that ignores anyone not white (rich, able, straight, etc.) and then vilifies women, because really, how dare Daisy spur Jay on for so long and then, once she does return his affections, how dare she cheat on Tom?

My other annoyance is that this novel is being adapted over other novels. The Great Gatsby was published in 1925. That same year, writers like Willa Cather, Dorothy Scarsborough, Sigrid Undset, Virginia Woolf, Zora Neale Hurston, and Gertrude Stein were publishing novels, and their works are so frequently ignored by the general public. (Academics still read some of these writers, but are mostly ignored by the general public. Most Americans have heard of The Great Gatsby; how many have heard of The Professor's House?) Moreover, there are other great writers from the same time period who were writing about the forgotten or were part of marginalized groups, like Kafka or Proust. Once again, a story of someone with immense privilege is given way more attention than the stories that in many ways deal with the lives of more than just a small few.

NPR and PBS

Because I am a Masterpiece Theater nerd, I've been quietly watching the fight over public radio and television with interest and this editorial arguing that public radio deserved saving at the expense of PBS caught my eye. The editorial makes a good point about NPR working in a tough field: radio. I don't honestly know anyone who listens to any other radio station, unless it's this one. NPR has either found or created its own niche, and it works this audience brilliantly, doing exactly the sort of stories those audience members want. But the idea of losing PBS makes me go cold. I love PBS, and yes, things have been a little disappointing lately, but PBS still has great children's broadcasting and some great news programs. Those things would be missed if we threw them away.

Gothic Dress

If you've been reading this blog, you've realized by now I'm a totally history nerd.  I love the everyday details of people's lives.  Lately, it seems like I've been stumbling on blogs dedicating to historical clothing and people who make replica costumes.  One of my recent favorites is this cute little number.  There's something strangely Gothic about it.  I could easily see one of the female characters from a Gothic romance wearing this, or maybe even Catherine from Northanger Abbey. 

Art and Pretention

You may have noticed, if you regularly check out this blog, that I'm an art nerd. I'm hesitant to claim the word artist because, although I dabble, I don't think I'm especially good. (And not so much doing it for the product as I am the process.) So I love it when someone actually explains to me what is the what in art. Today, we have the difference between Art Nouveau and Art Deco. Although they are similar, I really needed someone to show me the difference, as I'm sure I'll need to be pretentious enough to explain this to someone someday.
(If you're wondering: the picture to the right is art nouveau.)

Adopt a Word

Poets and other writers are generally word nerds, which is to say that we have our favorite words that we love to us.  For poets, the word is often just as much about sound as it is about its definition, and obscure is only sometimes better.  Save the Word is trying to encourage people to adopt words.  According to them, ninety percent of our communication uses only 7,000 words. 

Go out there and adopt a word.  Looking at what they have available right now, it looks like some of the more fun words include drollic (pertaining to puppet shows), riviation (fishing), and avunculize (to act as an uncle).   

Any Human Heart Actors

Most people know that, as an English nerd, I have a certain fondness for Masterpiece Theater. For those of you lucky enough not to be obsessed Britian, right now they're showing Any Human Heart. Many of the actors in the miniseries are also from various Jane Austen adaptations, as this brief rundown explains. I found myself, being a ridiculous anglophile, wanting to add notes to it, like mentioning that Atwell also was in The Duchess and Broadbent was in some of the Harry Potter movies and The Young Victoria and Hollander was in (with Broadbent) Bridget Jones's Diary and the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. See what I mean? I could play six degrees of separation if it was with British actors.

Living Justice Press

As I've reported before, book nerds love imprints and small presses.  That's how we roll.  So let me point out another great small press: Living Justice.  This great organization, located in Minnesota, focuses on publishing books on social justice, particularly as for Native Americans.