What are you reading right now?

[Guybrush]

Häxan: Witchcraft Through The Ages (1922)

https://www.criterion.com/films/352-hxan

Figured that could be it, although it is a Swedish film (not Danish) 🙂

It's been on my to-do list for years and years, but so far I've only seen clips / parts of it and never the whole thing.

[jadis]

Maybe Swedish-Danish?

I love it. Always a pleasure to rewatch

Also this is one of my favorite things on YT

[Guybrush]

Maybe Swedish-Danish?

I love it. Always a pleasure to rewatch

Hey, you're right. I'm sorry. I looked it up and while it's a Swedish language film (in text) with a Swedish title (who else does umlauts over their As), produced by a Swedish company, it was filmed in Denmark and has a Danish director.

I might bump it up the list.

[Lisnaholic]

These days Google is so full of trash AI generated answers that I've personally found it unusable for anything but the most basic stuff. I like going in depth, and honestly I do consider it work related as a lot of it is related to my domestic lifestyle. You get a lot more insight into the theory of the practical tasks as well. I'm passionate about the little things, for sure.

I don't know about AI generated answers, but you're absolutely right that for quality and depth a book will usually give you much more.

"...the most basic stuff..." Yes, that's often what I'm hoping to discover!

[jadis]

Treating myself to a reread of one of my favorite books of all time. It's a 90 page essay ostensibly about some painter called Constantin Guys but really about learning to accept and recognize the beauty of the modern world and not to nostalgize about the past 

[degrassi.knoll]

I have a great rec for the both of you - @Guybrush @jadis



Read this while completing my religious studies degree and it's one I revisit often. Not the most pleasurable read, but factually dense and absolutely fascinating.

[jadis]

Fuck that sounds absolutely fascinating and another one I have to just add to the queue and not let myself read right now cause I have things to do

In the 1980s, America was gripped by widespread panics about Satanic cults. Conspiracy theories abounded about groups who were allegedly abusing children in day-care centers, impregnating girls for infant sacrifice, brainwashing adults, and even controlling the highest levels of government. As historian of religions David Frankfurter listened to these sinister theories, it occurred to him how strikingly similar they were to those that swept parts of the early Christian world, early modern Europe, and postcolonial Africa. He began to investigate the social and psychological patterns that give rise to these myths. Thus was born Evil Incarnate, a riveting analysis of the mythology of evilconspiracy.


The first work to provide an in-depth analysis of the topic, the book uses anthropology, the history of religion, sociology, and psychoanalytic theory, to answer the questions "What causes people collectively to envision evil and seek to exterminate it?" and "Why does the representation of evil recur in such typical patterns?"


Frankfurter guides the reader through such diverse subjects as witch-hunting, the origins of demonology, cannibalism, and the rumors of Jewish ritual murder, demonstrating how societies have long expanded upon their fears of such atrocities to address a collective anxiety. Thus, he maintains, panics over modern-day infant sacrifice are really not so different from rumors about early Christians engaging in infant feasts during the second and third centuries in Rome.



In Evil Incarnate, Frankfurter deepens historical awareness that stories of Satanic atrocities are both inventions of the mind and perennial phenomena, not authentic criminal events. True evil, as he so artfully demonstrates, is not something organized and corrupting, but rather a social construction that inspires people to brutal acts in the name of moral order.

The one thing from the Satanic panic era that has received some renewed attention in the aftermath of Epstein is the Franklin scandal. Don't have an opinion on it personally but kinda get the fascination.

[Guybrush]

I have a great rec for the both of you - @Guybrush @jadis


Read this while completing my religious studies degree and it's one I revisit often. Not the most pleasurable read, but factually dense and absolutely fascinating.

Yess, looks great! Thanks for the recommendation. And I noticed that the author's name is almost Frank N. Furter 🫦

I'll add it to my queue 🙂

[SGR]

[SGR]

I have a great rec for the both of you - @Guybrush @jadis



Read this while completing my religious studies degree and it's one I revisit often. Not the most pleasurable read, but factually dense and absolutely fascinating.

Yup, that's going on my Amazon wishlist

[degrassi.knoll]

 

[Nimbly9]

So good.

[ribbons]

^ Didn't hear this was out - need to get!  Thanks for posting it.   

Currently reading this, for the umpteenth time, on the train to and from work.  I have many of Swami Vivekandanda's small paperback books, and this may be my favorite of all.

[innerspaceboy]

Philip K Dick and Philosophy discusses Dick's common themes like the nature of the self and of reality from the perspectives of Aristotle, Socrates, Descartes, Sartre, Kant, Hume, Heidegger, and Nietzsche, along with more contemporary thinkers, all in the context of both Dick's direct writings and of the film versions of his works, and all in plain and accessible language.

The essays are each surprisingly concise, making the text a breeze of a read. Though it's worth noting that many readers observed that the book is best-enjoyed AFTER the reader has familiarized themselves with Dick's body of work, (or at least seen the movies), as many plot points are revealed through throughout the course of the text.

This title is #63 of the 100-volume series, Popular Culture and Philosophy, which includes similar cultural examinations of properties like Seinfeld, The Simpsons, and The Matrix.

I enjoyed it.

[Psy-Fi]

Found a copy of this along with several other WWII books at a used book store. Also stumbled across this video on YouTube while reading this book. Several of the people mentioned in the book are featured in the video, including the author. Amazing that he not only survived all of the combat he was in but did so without being wounded.

Peleliu 1944: Horror In The Pacific (1991) | Full Documentary