tiny bear hug

[hashtagnyu]

Wherever your next stop is, you can share it with us. Follow THIS IS NYU for amazing stories from students all over the global network, and become a blogger yourself!

[tinybearhug]

Loving my @Rothys & think you will too. Get $20 off your new favorite flats, the perfect shoe for life on the go.

In case anyone needs a Rothy’s shoe referral code, use mine for $20 off!! :) (Cute / fashionable flats, perfect for travel and everyday wear)

[tinybearhug]

I love paper craft. 

[austinkleon]

How to graciously say no to anyone

“There is no money in answering letters.”  —Groucho Marx

A couple of years ago, I was getting sent this article, “Creative People Say No,” at least twice a day. The idea was that creative geniuses say “no” to a lot of requests (like, a psychology professor researching processes of creative genius) in order to get their work done, so if you want to be a creative genius, you have to say no a lot so you can get your work done.

A bunch of people asked me what I thought about it, and I said, “It’s good advice for the rich and famous. Creative people say yes until they have enough work that they can say no.”

Ian Bogost explains it nicely, here:

[Y]ou have to say ‘yes’ for a long while before you can earn the right to say ‘no.’ Even then, you usually can’t say 'no’ at whim. By the time you can say 'no’ indiscriminately, then you’re already so super-privileged that being able to say 'no’ is not a prerequisite of success, but a result of it.

There was a little index card in the back of Steal Like An Artist that didn’t make it into the book that sums up my own point of view: “Be as generous as you can, but selfish enough to get your work done.” (I recycled the line later in Show Your Work!)

Of course, sometimes you just have to say no for whatever reason. For that, Alexandra Franzen suggests this format in her piece, “How To Graciously Say No To Anyone”:

Hey [name],

Thanks for your note. I’m so proud of you for ___—and I’m flattered that you’d like to bring my brain into the mix.

I need to say “no,” because ___.

But I would love to support you in a different way. [Offer an alternative form of support here]

Thank you for being such a wonderful ___. I am honored to be part of your world.

[A few closing words of encouragement, if you’d like]

[Your name here]

Images above from The Ransom Center, Tim Ferriss, @maudnewton, and my letters archive.

[tinybearhug]

Coming Home.

[flanneryogonner]

Free PDF Books on race, gender, sexuality, class, and culture

Found from various places online:

The Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire

Angela Y. Davis - Are Prisons Obsolete?

Angela Y. Davis - Race, Women, and Class

The Communist Manifesto - Marx and Engels

Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches by Audre Lorde (link updated 1/14)

Three Guineas by Virginia Woolf

Critical Race Theory: An Introduction by Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic (link updated 1/14) 

The Black Image in the White Mind: Media and Race in America- Robert M. Entman and Andrew Rojecki (link updated 1/14) 

Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism - bell hooks (link updated 1/14) 

Feminism is for Everybody - bell hooks (link updated 1/14) 

Faces at the Bottom of the Well - Derrick Bell

I am Your Sister - Audre Lorde (link updated 1/14)

Black Feminist Thought-Patricia Hill Collins (updated 1/14) 

Gender Trouble - Judith Butler

Four books by Frantz Fanon

Their Eyes Were Watching God - Zora Neale Hurston

Medical Apartheid - Harriet Washington

Fear of a Queer Planet: Queer Politics and Social Theory  - edited by Michael Warner

Colonialism/Postcolonialism - Ania Loomba (updated 1/14)

Discipline and Punish - Michel Foucault

The Gloria Anzaldua Reader

Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative? by Mark Fisher

This Bridge Called by Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color by Cherríe Moraga & Gloria Anzaldúa

What is Cultural Studies? - John Storey (updated 1/14)

Cultural Theory and Popular Culture - John Storey (updated 1/14)

The Disability Studies Reader (updated 1/14)

Michel Foucault - Interviews and Other Writings

Michel Foucault - The History of Sexuality, Vol. 1, Vol. 2, Vol. 3

Michel Foucault - The Archeology of Knowledge

  This blog also has a lot more.

(Sorry they aren’t organized very well.)

[tinybearhug]

Hold On To Your Heart. 

(Head On (Man Man))

[tinybearhug]

[burnsparkleandfade]

Just Say NO! #WarOnDrugs #bearsmoking #tinybearhug (at Okaerinasai)

[burnsparkleandfade]

Inside looking out. #caged (…or perhaps they are crawling into another universe. #adventure) (at The Standard, High Line)

[tinybearhug]

Watch the full short film HERE.

[tinybearhug]

[tinybearhug]

Clean Bandit - Rather Be (feat. Jess Glynne) - ahhh such a cool video and great song.

[tinybearhug]

Awesome video. I can't understand the lyrics but the melody is nice and happy. The animals are the best part. 

[sinbadism]

[tinybearhug]

Baby Tanuki (^__^), you are so adorable.  

[tinybearhug]

On Your Mark (1995) animated music video from Hayao Miyazaki. Beautiful.

[tinybearhug]

Reflecting on the memory of a great civil rights activist, Yuri Kochiyama.