Humanities & Social Science

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"Human beings are works in progress that mistakenly think they're finished" Dan Gilbert Sculpture: Nathan Sawaya

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July 15th is Rembrandt Van Rijn's birthday, and we chose his version of the “Night Watch” to celebrate.

Also known as "The Company of captain Frans Banning Cocq and lieutenant Willem van Ruytenburch preparing to march out" it depicts a XVII century dutch company.

It is a protoytpical example of baroque art, and is currently displayed in the Rijksmuseum, in Amsterdam.

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The world,” he revealed, “is a heap of people, a sea of tiny flames.” Each person shines with his or her own light. No two flames are alike. There are big flames and little flames, flames of every color. Some people’s flames are so still they don’t even flicker in the wind, while others have wild flames that fill the air with sparks. Some foolish flames neither burn nor shed light, but others blaze with life so fiercely that you can’t look at them without blinking, and if you approach you shine in fire.

Eduardo Galeano, "The Book of Embraces". 

Rest in peace dear Eduardo Galeano, may your fire keep making us shine.  

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Sculpture: “Politicians discussing global warming” by Isaac Cordal, Berlin.

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Boléro is a one-movement orchestral piece originally composed as a ballet, commissioned by Russian actress and dancer Ida Rubinstein. The piece, which premiered in 1928, is Ravel’s most famous musical composition. Click on the link to listen to London Symphony Orchestra’s interpretation.

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Happy National Libraries Day!

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A simple and old, yet eloquent and powerful conclusion from "The Dream of a Ridiculous Man" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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Banksy's graffiti near Regent's Canal in London.

[We're happy to have reached 1,000 followers on Twitter after only a couple of months of existence (@HumAndSocialSci) and now we're on facebook too: https://www.facebook.com/humanitiesandsocialscience]

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Yes, we celebrated "Cat Day",

as strange as it may seem,

we did it our own way:

with Neruda's "Cat's Dream".

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We love Yo-Yo Ma's interpretation of J. S. Bach's prelude to the Cello Suite Nr 1, and we'd like to share it with you :)

[humanitiesandsocialscience]

#SylviaPlath would've turned 82 today, but life is so full of ironies that we get to celebrate it with "A Birthday Present" written by her

[humanitiesandsocialscience]

William Butler Yeats' poem "He Wishes For The Cloths Of Heaven" (English subtitles available. To activate, click on the respective button, on the black YouTube bar below the video) "Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths, enwrought with golden and silver light, the blue and the dim and the dark cloths of night and light and the half-light, I would spread the cloths under your feet: But I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet; tread softly because you tread on my dreams." 

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Edgar Allan Poe's poem "A dream within a dream"

(English subtitles available. To activate, click on the respective button, on the black bar below the video)

"Take this kiss upon the brow! 

And, in parting from you now,

Thus much let me avow-

You are not wrong, who deem

That my days have been a dream; 

Yet if hope has flown away

In a night, or in a day,

In a vision, or in none,

Is it therefore the less gone? 

All that we see or seem

Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar

Of a surf-tormented shore,

And I hold within my hand

Grains of the golden sand-

How few! yet how they creep

Through my fingers to the deep,

While I weep- while I weep! 

O God! can I not grasp

Them with a tighter clasp? 

O God! can I not save

One from the pitiless wave? 

Is all that we see or seem

But a dream within a dream?"

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Original picture: http://pixabay.com/es/playa-para%C3%ADso-hermosa-playa-nubes-392673/

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William Blake's poem "A Poison Tree"

(English subtitles available. To activate, click on the respective button, on the black bar below the video)

"I was angry with my friend:

I told my wrath, my wrath did end.

I was angry with my foe:

I told it not, my wrath did grow.

And I watered it in fears,

Night and morning with my tears;

And I sunned it with smiles,

And with soft deceitful wiles.

And it grew both day and night,

Till it bore an apple bright.

And my foe beheld it shine.

And he knew that it was mine,

And into my garden stole

When the night had veiled the pole;

In the morning glad I see

My foe outstretched beneath the tree."

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