because we can never know the essence of things, but cannot help but sense them, we must take however imprecise a stab at them, create something pseudo-reflective of the unnamable, and put it out there, to see if anyone recognizes it. on the level of personal expression, that is art, on the level of the collective, nationhood.
there are two ways to lose people: by hurting them, or by being hurt.
the post-blast period has been a weird one for every lebanese person, even the diaspora ones with a less-than-mild attachment to the motherland. for the first few weeks after it happened, i had friends texting and calling me from all over the world, people i haven't spoken to months or years, some people i haven't … Continue reading oc3
the 'l' in 'ol4' stands for lebanon today. imagine you and your siblings inherit a house. a biig, beautiful, ancient house, five stories high, made of stone and rounded with balconies, with a red brick roof and garden all around. you and your siblings move in with your families and all your things. you live … Continue reading ol4
today i want to address something that continues to weigh heavily on my mind: the inherent problem of history, which is the very way it’s been told. it has risen like an endless wave, starting from something small—a phoenician ship that washes up on a roman shore. a group of seamen know a carthaginian sail, … Continue reading oc2
because 'art' can be a reductive notion, i've decided to start a new 'thread' (if you will) on culture in general. the word 'culture' suggests a myriad of things--it could range from having heavily religious implications to referring to the creative or industrial production of a society. even within the productive sector, different subcultures emerge: … Continue reading oc1
first time. in december, i left my lover in canada and flew to a sunny place for the winter. for the six years preceding, we hadn't been apart for more than a month or two at a time, and what is 'apart' in an era with smartphones and wifi? we hadn't ever actually truly been … Continue reading ol3
hey friends. it's been a while. as much as i love love, i've been thinking about art a lot lately. in our last class, the professor asked us what we would do, culturally, to get people politically engaged, to encourage people to become politically functional citizens. some people suggested that we make 'the masses', or … Continue reading oa3
what is the social significance of art? when I say ‘art’ here, i mean all creative endeavours, from literary novels and poetry to painting and film. basically, all things ‘cultural’. where, if ever, do culture and reality collide, and what is the resulting impact? as i ask this, i wonder how narrow, or wide, the scope of what we consider culture can be.
some say the greeks had 8 words for love. some say they had 7, others 4, still others 6. but the underlying idea is that these emotions were identified as being distinct from one another, rather than permutations of the one. but the ancient greeks were pagans, and just as love was separated into several entities, so was god himself.
