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Civil Unions Destroyed My Marriage
Organized religion, like marriage, has been thoroughly destabilized. Throughout the Green Mountain state, churches, synagogues and mosques have fallen into disrepair. Or they have become gay discos.
Welcome to Culture Clash, where journalists, academics, historians, cultural critics, artists and activists come together to discuss a single topic from both pop culture and political perspectives. Please read our archived issues below.
Issue 1. Marriage
Issue 2. Work
Issue 3. Identity
Issue 4. Religion
Issue 5. Crime
Issue 6. Kids
Issue 7. War
Till the Credits Do Us Part: Marriage, Hollywood Style
The critical and popular success of the vastly overrated American Beauty leads one to wonder about other Hollywood films that have dealt in a major or even tangential way with the subject of marriage.
Weblog: Civil Unions in Vermont
Here's a look at the press coverage leading up to and surrounding this historic event.
The State of Marriage
In recent years, state and local governments have taken an active role in attempting to reduce divorce rates and preserve the ''sanctity of marriage.'' Here's a list of links to news stories and resources surrounding the debate
Quaker Weddings
A reflection on religion and culture: ''Think of the multitude of sounds at your typical wedding ... Now imagine silence.''
The Art of Manufactured Authenticity
One part family. One part foreign country. And one part randomly selected celebrant. A couple finds the secret to a genuinely unforgettable wedding experience
Objects of Desire
A photo essay on the personal and cultural impact of the wedding registry
Marriage … by the numbers
A century's worth of essential and non-essential statistics regarding marriage
A Natural State?
A rabbi questions the need for marriage: ''Famous gay authors talk about getting a place at the table, and frankly I'm not sure I like the table.''
Money and Matrimony
The cost of a wedding, New York and Indiana style
Issue 2. Work
Boston Public Doesn’t Add Up
David E. Kelley's latest comedy-drama might do for teachers what ER did for doctors: catapult them to fame without worrying about reality
Children on the Farm
In America, some jobs are less equal than others
A Call for a Better Job
A college student finds that telemarketing is a window to the new economy on the Plains
Left Out
Presidential candidate David McReynolds discusses the Socialist Party's search for legitimacy as well as votes
Love of Labor
For almost 20 years, folk musician Billy Bragg has been an unflinching voice for the working class
The Tradeoff
In today's tight economy, many companies attract workers with on-site cafeterias, health clubs and childcare. Is there any reason to go home?
Statistics: The Force of Work
T H E W O R K I S S U E
S T A T I S T I C S
The Force of Work
Compiled by Arnold M. Kee Data applies to the United States Participation in workforce Percentage of black men in workforce in [...]
All-American Anarchist
Carlotta Anderson's biography of her grandfather, the anarchist and labor activist Joseph A. Labadie, examines his passions
Ladies of Labor, Girls of Adventure
Nan Enstad's book has invigorated labor history by examining working-class women's uses of popular culture as a resource to construct their identity
What Hard Work Is
A university professor who watched his father sell hotdogs and dodge bowling pins disputes the notion that academics have it hard
Issue 3. Identity
Naming Our Destiny
A father reflects on what's in a name, and the struggle for black middle-class identity
Who’s Your Heroine?
In Disney's ''Mulan,'' an Asian tomboy defies convention, hoodwinks patriarchal authority and goes on to save the masses - " the dominant narrative of my fantasy youth
Is There An ”I” In Team?
How Americans find an (often fleeting) identity in sports affiliations
Female Athletes Fight Anonymity
Most people who saw Nike's cryptic ''Mrs. Jones'' ads know Marion Jones was on the mic. But why aren't female athletes front and center?
The Great Divide
Interracial Romance Divides Asian-Americans
”My Most Attractive Adversary”
Subtle sexism maintains gender differences
My Dual Heritage
A self-portrait that captures the artist's past and present
Reading and Writing Toward Discovery
An Asian American scholar on what a ''smart girl'' is doing raising questions of identity
The World According to SARK
Can crayons and positive thinking help women find acceptance - and themselves?
Whose History?
When commemorating our national identity, sometimes all we can see is a battleground.
Issue 4. Religion
Constructing Religion
If Pennsylvania Avenue is home to the nation's politics - and K Street its lobbyists - 16th Street is home to its religions."A photo essay
The Absence of Belief
A Q & A with Ron Barrier, national spokesperson for American Atheists
Sometimes You Need a Story:”American Christianity, Vampires and ”Buffy”
Where does a cultural phenomenon like ''Buffy the Vampire Slayer'' fit into our spiritual epistemology?
Holy Art
The work of controversial artist Andres Serrano is on exhibit at the largest cathedral in the world -- and no one is complaining
Bullets, Bada Bing and Beatitudes
Through their Mafia connection, the ceremonies and iconographic representations of the Roman Catholic Church have held a prominent place in the history of film and TV. Witness ''The Sopranos.''
Opting Out
When religious doctrine mixes with public policy, the views of many are ignored
Playing with God: The history of athletes thanking the ”big man upstairs”
The invocation of God and Christ in the world of sport has reached epidemic proportions - not at all by accident. Indeed, there is a rich history to this curious union
A is for Alpha, B is for Brand
With the growth of ''Alpha,'' Christianity has found its marketing niche in the age of flexible religion
Review: Lying Awake
Mark Salzman's latest novel is about many things - religion, cloistered life, poetry, euphoric states - but most of all, ''Lying Awake'' is about the power of restraint, both in Salzman's words and in the actions of his main character, a Carmelite nun
A Church Divided
What happens when liberal and conservative members decide to forge their own paths?"
Issue 5. Crime
Violence We Can’t Refuse
Why do we excuse violence on mafia-based shows like The Sopranos? All criminals, it seems, are not the same
Villains and Heroes
How the media and the American public value narrative over news
Little Monsters
If you have no inclination to enjoy the recent tawdry crop of life-based entertainment, you can still return again and again to such inadvertent documentaries as the Bulger tapes
The Mobster in the Mirror
Even before the recent controversy surrounding The Sopranos, Italian Americans have protested the gangster image
A Crime Without a Criminal
A protester confronts the consequences of his actions, the justice of his cause and the physical and emotional costs of his incarceration
The Allure of Alcatraz
Marketing the prison experience makes us all desire to be behind bars
Juror No. 8
No, it's not a horror movie. Just fodder for my next novel
The Soul of Andy Sipowicz
NYPD Blue, as a long-running TV series, has had the time to do what no other medium can accomplish: show Andy Sipowicz acquiring a soul
The Moratorium Trap
The momentum behind the moratorium movement marks the biggest success death penalty opponents have witnessed in years. Hell, it's the only success. But should abolitionists support what amounts to only partial victory?
Issue 6. Kids
When Mom is in Prison
The girls spent the other part of the weekend visiting their mothers -- applying make-up, doing each other's hair, talking about school and boys, and doing whatever else adolescent girls do with their mothers in a state prison
Cannibal Culture
Consumers of pop culture need a higher degree of cultural literacy than even the highbrows, since pop culture is the greater cannibal of other cultural products -- and, of course, of itself
Leave the Tests (Not Children) Behind
Despite President Bush's assertions to the contrary, standardized testing stifles true education
For the Love of Justin
With girls in charge, witness the feminization of popular culture
A Contract for the American Family
Your daughter comes home, enthused about a musical instrument. Your eyeballs throb. Your head pulsates. How do you resolve this dissonant dilemma?
The Suburban Fast Track
I wonder if I'm really good enough when I get the only A on that test. And sometimes I wonder if I'm a bit delusional, just like the other 2,000 kids who live in my shallow, suburban bubble
My Alien Sister
Coming of age as an only child can be a difficult experience, but it's even more strange when your father grows up alongside you
Kiddie Capitalism
The sound you hear is thousands of hours of market research, immense coordination of people, ideas and resources, and decades of social and economic change all rolled into a single, ''Mommy, pleeease!''
The Great TV Debate
I worry about a lot of things related to my son. For example, am I already letting him turn his brain to mush?
Issue 7. War
CSI: Crime Scene Iraq
This cultural fascination with forensic science as a way to know the unknowable and come to terms with the unthinkable found additional service recently as an unacknowledged weapon in the Bush Administration's arsenal against Iraq
Reality Check
Following 9/11, pundits declared the death of reality TV. So why is it thriving?
Reading 9/11, from A to Z
A good chunk of the growing 9/11 genre -- yes, looking back over the past 18 months, we seem to have spawned a new literary category -- features trite and predictable titles in which heroes implore you to ''remember the sacrifice,'' while insiders at the
Above the Rest
In many if not most cases on JAG, the party responsible for the crime is a member of the less-than-honorable civilian society
Are you a terrorist, or do you play one on TV?
Racial profiling and ethnic stereotyping are nothing new to Americans of Middle Eastern descent. Hollywood has long used images of bumbling, accented Arabs and Iranians as shorthand for "vile enemy"
All Star Militia
America loves its athletes but resents their high salaries and attitude. But what if these multi-millionaire jocks had to do double duty as America's first-strike military force?
The Spectacular War
The very notion that by watching a piece of narrative Hollywood filmmaking we can somehow come to know the reality of war is both prevalent and dubious
Fighting Words: The War Over Language
While we have haphazardly sprinkled our language with war's metaphors, is it possible that we have collectively forgotten how to think clearly about the literal phenomenon?