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sweetcandycasket

moonandtrees

wittyowl

Alexa Demie for I-D magazine (June 2026) photographed by Petra Collins

#i’ve said it before but good god woman of the forever

buriedknight

Listen for the baneful chants. Weep with them, as one in trance. And weep with us, oh, weep with us...

quantum-dragon

#i tried using logic type shit on my bullies but obviously that didn’t work #what DID work was swinging on people as hard as possible

chekhovs-guns

okay but we should talk more about edward miller's artwork for the locked tomb series. like. these are so beautiful. the only style in which i would like to see tlt adaptation.

illustrations by edward miller for subterranean press edition of gideon the ninth by tamsyn muir

illustrations by edward miller for subterranean press edition of harrow the ninth by tamsyn muir

illustrations by edward miller for subterranean press edition of nona the ninth by tamsyn muir

silverview

#if the men came.

bemusedbibliophile

I usually tell my students that “close reading” means looking at what is actually on the page, reading the text itself, rather than some idea “behind the text.” It means noticing things in the writing, things in the writing that stand out. To give you some idea of what this means, I’ve made up a list of five sorts of things that a close reading might typically notice: (1) unusual vocabulary, words that surprise either because they are unfamiliar or because they seem to belong to a different context; (2) words that seem unnecessarily repeated, as if the word keeps insisting on being written; (3) images or metaphors, especially ones that are used repeatedly and are somewhat surprising given the context; (4) what is in italics or parentheses; and (5) footnotes that seem too long. This list is far from complete—in fact, no complete list is possible—but the list is meant to begin to give you an idea of what sorts of things we notice when we’re doing close reading.

What all five of my examples have in common is that they are minor elements in the text; they are not main ideas. In fact, your usual practice of reading which focuses on main ideas would dismiss them all as marginal or trivial. Another thing they have in common is that, although they are minor, they are nonetheless conspicuous, eye-catching: they are either surprising or repeated, set off from the text or too long. Close reading pays attention to elements in the text which, although marginal, are nonetheless emphatic, prominent—elements in the text which ought to be quietly subordinate to the main idea, but which textually call attention to themselves.

Most of you have been educated to ignore such elements. You have been taught to seek out and identify the main ideas, dismissing the trivial as you go. This has had to be trained into you: read to a young child sometime, you will notice she has the annoying habit of interrupting the flow of the story to draw attention to some minor thing. Close reading resembles the interruptions of that child. It is a method of undoing the training that keeps us to the straight and narrow path of main ideas. It is a way of learning not to disregard those features of the text that attract our attention, but are not principal ideas.

Jane Gallop, “The Ethics of Close Reading: Close Encounters,” Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, Vol.16, No.3 (Fall 2000), pg.7-8 (x)

sparks-sparks-sparks

Magazine covers 1974.

maykitz

the persecution of lefthandedness is insane to think about because it was so intense for so long, in some places still is, without any clear profit motivation. sheer love of the game. as late as the 70s at least they were smacking my stepdad's hands for it with a wooden ruler at school, to this day he's in weird ambidexterity situation where he's not great with either side and notably clumsy due to poor hand-eye coordination. just wtf

seeingteacupsindragons

It is fascinating to me that people also think of handedness as an example of bigotry that just...went away. As you note, it...hasn't in some places. I know people who grew up in the mid-late 90s who still had this problem.

But also, and this is really important to keep in mind regarding bigotry that still causes in many ways larger problems, that the structural problems are not actually fixed.

If you go to any computer lab or public library, the mice will be on the right side of the computer. Sometimes they can be moved. Sometimes they can't. Many computer mice are curved to only fit in right hands.

It is impossible to find lefthanded scissors without going to a specialty store, because most scissor makers don't even make them. And it's not just a matter of grip; the slicing side of the blades is obscured if you use righty scissors in your left hand, so your cut is off.

All those signing pads with the little chained styluses? Almost always on the right side, often not even long enough to stretch to the left. Makes signing for lefties extremely difficult.

I caused actual muscular problems in college having to twist around in order to write at right-handed desks in college when there weren't enough lefty desks--and there never were. Some classrooms didn't even have a single one.

I could go on.

But the point is, bigotry isn't just a mindset shift. People can't just decide they're not bothered by that particular difference anymore and everything's fine, because society is still structured and designed to cause problems for marginalized people. And they're never even going to notice all the little ways their life is bent to convenience them that inconveniences others.

kkelenca

When kiddo was learning to write, their teacher—who was a beautifully kind, caring, compassionate person who even thanked me for making them aware of certain kinds of left/handed supplies, because their new toddler was a lefty and they’d never even thought about it—was teaching the kids a method for word spacing that involved placing their free index finger down at the end of each word and then writing the next one.

Pause for a moment, especially if you’re right-handed—and I’m being serious here, physically do this if you have two functioning arms and hands—and grab a writing tool in your left hand. Now place your right index finger down and try to start writing a word next to it.

Yeah. Great technique, huh? Really convenient and comfortable and easy. 🙃

I sent in a small baggie of small popsicle sticks I’d custom painted for them and labeled with their name for kiddo to use instead, but ultimately they stopped because it wasn’t as convenient when nobody else had to get something out.

Writing in English is difficult enough when you’re left-handed (most of our letters are designed with pull motions, but lefties must push), but even other foundational basics are made more difficult than they have to be, because their needs aren’t considered, even in situations where overt hostility isn’t intended.

Even now, in an older grade, they’re now all sharing a lot of the supplies, but my kiddo has their own pair of labeled lefty scissors they keep in their personal cubby. Teacher was 100% chill with me sending them in, but didn’t even consider to take the step further when I’d asked about whether or not they had them to just… get some for all the lefties. I know there are other kids, know some of them personally. (I made a set of writing spacing sticks for the single one that I knew of back in 1st grade.)

Regarding computer mice? Kiddo had standardized testing last year. They do it on chromebooks now at their school. They did their entire first day with the track pad instead of the mouse, because none of the teachers proctoring or assisting even knew you COULD switch the sides/toggle a setting to switch which button was the dominant select. We happened to have one at home thanks to remote learning during Covid’s early days, so that night we sat down together and found the setting ourselves so they could fix it the following day. But on a student account at school, they couldn’t change that setting. And? None of those teachers knew enough about technology to be able to override it. So even when I went above and beyond and personally sought out the skills and tools to help my child level the playing field on their own, the teaching staff was so unaccustomed to even considering this as a need or problem, that they weren’t able to remove the incredibly basic barriers to a fair schooling experience.

And this is honestly a good school, with staff that care and work hard and take 99% of bigotry concepts very seriously, teach about truth and compassion and how to recognize at this kid level a lot of the basic seeds that can grow into hate and hurt and also healing and helping. But the fact that left-handed needs are different? It is so ingrained to default to right-handed layouts that even left-handed staff don’t conceptualize these problems, because they were taught the exact same way.

#this made me feel seen #RIP all the pens i killed for being a heavy hook handed writer #i can draw on my tablet left handed but can only draw on the computer right handed bc of the above phenomenon