2012 Digest

Just in case you don’t have enough piling up. Here’s a few bits that stood out over the year.

Short Al Jazeera documentary on the collapse of the Celtic Tiger with contributions from Occupy Dame Street, Fintan O’Toole and others. Found Margaret E Ward’s particularly interesting on the ‘subtle control of thought’. When dubious degrees of separation are pointed out we’re often told ‘how small Ireland is’ but this really highlights just how small the circle with access to influence often is.  Paul Mason was doing the rounds plugging the book that followed the blogpost on why it’s kicking off everywhere. 2012 might have cooled down compared to the previous year but his thoughts on some movements & a tendency towards horizontalism are interesting to follow beyond the immediate legacy of Occupy, Syntagma and the Arab Spring. Similarly, Mason was also talking to Castells on Spain and the rise of alternative economic cultures

Coercion and Comic Sans: How “Positive Thinking” Became Capital’s Latest Weapon, Fiona de Londras on ten years since the US began to hold suspects at Guantánamo Bay, why is it still open?  Monbiot on the increasing influence of think-tanks, crucial pieces from Mark Fisher on austerity and mental health and Rosaleen McDonagh on portrayal of Traveller women.

Nina Power’s essay on the pessimism of time and paradoxes facing the left. She also started a show on ResonanceFM (see #4 on animals in particular). Other talks from Gavan Titley and Michael D at the LSE on Alternatives and the Democratic Crisis respectively.  Wendy Brown, Costas Douzinas, Stephen Frosh & Slavoj Zizek at Birkbeck on the cusp of the Greek Elections. Brown & Frosh fascinating.

Caitriona Clear on Irish womens’ social & economic position between 1890 -1922. Paula Geraghty has collected another valuable year of footage outside the narrow mainstream. Talks from this summer’s Countess Markievicz school are worth a watch with contributions from Kathleen Lynch, Camille Loftus and others. Two on Health, Sara Burke on policy at years end and an earlier – far seeing – piece from Priscilla Lynch on the power struggle within a Department that went on to lose a Junior Minister, Chief Executive and almost a Minister in 2012.

Stiglitz & Krugman talk debt and economy  ahead of the US Elections. Inside the mind of Merkel, The Live Register on DCTV and a very awkward Lucinda Creighton in Europe.

RTÉ History show from May on Robert Mallet, public records & genealogy and the tension between Nationalist & Suffragette women. And a 1965 interview with Nora Connolly O’Brien on life in the Connolly household and the last moments before the execution in 1916.

Suggestions welcome. Lots of good stuff floating around this year.