Chomsky’s second speech, a discussion of Harold Pinter’s censorious Nobel Prize acceptance speech, failed to impress contributor Armin Rosen. He sends this evaluation of the MIT linguist’s decidedly uncritical reception. I remember reading somewhere that Noam Chomsky was a controversial figure, but if I had to depend on my own sense perceptions for evidence, I’d […]

While you’re all recovering from your Super Bowl excitement and realizing that your first quiz of the year is on Tuesday and you haven’t read for it, reminisce briefly about the week gone by. – Clubs threw food at us while recovering from the news that ABC actually cares that they do something. – New […]

Composer Portraits – Frank Zappa Miller Theatre February 2, 2007 I often try to think about things in terms of how I would explain them to Benjamin Franklin. On Friday night, I attended the latest in the Miller Theatre’s Composer Portrait series, in which Fireworks Ensemble and Zephyros Winds (a string quintet and a chamber […]

3111 Broadway between 122nd and 123rd Morningside Heights has a new spot to satisfy your sweet tooth. Chokolat Patisserie, long a shuttered storefront, opened within the last month in the beyond-Barnard, downhill stretch of Broadway (although its website is still under construction).  If you’re looking for a Hungarian substitute to hunker down and study, Chokolat […]

For those of you who rocked Glass House Rocks on Thursday night, perhaps we can admit that, for once, Lerner couldn’t have been put to better purpose. If you were fortunate enough to show up in the earlier half, food was (for the time being) in great abundance – some of the delights included international […]

In which the Battle of the Spicies comes to a satisfactory conclusion, as narrated by Armin Rosen. I was drunk as fuck the first time I encountered the Spicy Special at 109 Gourmet Deli–but then again, who isn’t drunk as fuck when they first encounter the 109 Spicy Special? Plenty of establishments cater to a […]

Gail Archer, associate professor, organist, and music director of the Barnard/Columbia Chorus, played a concert Sunday evening, January 21 as a way of thanking her mentor who continues to mean so much to her. Archer commissioned her onetime teacher, the avant-garde composer David Noon to write an organ piece on the Pascal plainchant, Pange Lingua. […]

In which BW culture editor Paul Barndt indulges a taste for blood and gore. You may have caught Pan’s Labyrinth, a violent fairy tale set in fascist Spain written and directed by Guillermo del Toro. It has a good shot at the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar this year, and I, for one, am a […]

Albert Maysles, with his brother and co-director David, is responsible for some of the most famous and influential documentaries of all time. If you haven’t heard of him, just pick up Grey Gardens at Kim’s. The story of two of Jackie Kennedy’s lesser-known relatives living in a crumbling Long Island mansion, it has inspired a […]

Busy Bwog reporter Bari Weiss found herself in Hamilton Wednesday evening, listening to the stories of students who stepped outside their comfort zone this summer. Her account follows. Two Jews, two Palestinians, one half-Jew half-Palestinian—sounds like the introduction to a bad joke.  But tonight in Hamilton 603, these were the identities (or, as they will […]

Restaurant Week is upon us! It’s your semiannual shot at climbing into the City’s swankest restaurants through the backdoor–you best hurry to make those reservations before your time runs out next Friday. Surveying the offerings, Bwog freelancer Bari Weiss takes us to Bolo, the Spanish sensation run by that guy you may have seen on […]

In which Bwog music critic Bryan Mochizuki forgives the Shins their trespasses and disses the music blogosphere…oh wait… “Phantom Limb” – The Shins Depending on whom you talk to, the new Shins album is either lethargic and dull or some more euphemistic variation on those words.  Except for this song.  This is THE SHINS.  This […]

In which BW culture editor Paul Barndt presents a swashbuckling throwback. Now that you’ve had a chance to see Justin Timberlake in Alpha Dog three or four times, rent Edison Force, his feature film debut, a cop thriller also featuring Oscar winners Kevin Spacey and Morgan Freeman, as well as LL Cool J, Dylan McDermott, […]

Bwog music critic Bryan Mochizuki would really like to have a mixtape review for you this week. Unfortunately, this happened two nights ago, and since Drama is the biggest DJ in the game, everyone is clamming up. www.datpiff.com, the site that streams them for free, didn’t stream anything yesterday, and all of the places to […]

Classes have begun, and you’re eager to know what your instructors have in store beyond that cute introductory slide lecture. CULPA expert Owain Evans is here to help, writing Bwog to point out what he thought was a suspicious evaluation. “Was this review written by the grad student himself?” he wonders. Bwog can’t say, but […]