On Martin Luther King Day 2016

Democracy Now played a recovered audio tape of a speech MLK gave in London in 1964 (transcript and audio are here).  The crucial themes of desegregation and racial equality are there. In this context of this class, you can see the extent to which Dr. King was an interedisciplinary cultural thinker who made connections among realms most people see as separate--domestic racism, foreign policy, police policy, jobs and employment, international economics, and the psychology of personal identity.

In California, protestors shut down the Bay Bridge for a half an hour, for #BlackLivesMatter #BlackHealthMatters #ReclaimMLK and related justice issues.  SF Chronicle coverage is here.

Today, as we start our discussion of noir fiction, film, and society, we'll begin to ask whether noir sanctions or supports protest, revolt, or revolution.  The immediate answer is no--it thinks D for Dissent is for suckers. But does it also lay out psychological and social conditions of the kind that prompt dissent, protest, revolt, and revolution in the 20th century? Stay tuned.