Word: victorians
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...interior betrays the change of ownership. The hungry sidewalk-stroller is beckoned by windows elegantly warmed by white Christmas lights. However, the transformed decor does not quite live up to the promise of the window. The previously honey-colored, textured walls have been repainted white and covered with Victorian porcelain plates. Though certainly spare, the restaurant is white-on-white without the grace of abstraction. Instead, the sprinkling of tchotchkes verges on precious. Sevres porcelain knick-knacks accessorize the shelves with prim blue and white patterned sparkle, miniature paintings of cherubs in pastel colors decorate the walls. The menu...
Rarely does a century dawn so clearly and cleanly. In 1900 Freud published The Interpretation of Dreams, ending the Victorian era. Her Majesty, as if on cue, died the following January, after a 63-year reign. Her empire included one-quarter of the earth's population, but the Boer War in South Africa was signaling the end of the colonial era. In China, the Boxer Rebellion heralded the awakening of a new giant. In America, cars were replacing horses, 42% of workers were in farming (today it's 2%), and the average life-span was about 50 (today...
...tape recorder was unveiled in 1900 at the Paris Exposition, to which visitors flocked to be scandalized by Rodin's non-Victorian statues, and Kodak introduced the Brownie camera, an apt symbol of a century in which technology would at first seem magical, then become simple, cheap and personal. The Scholastic Aptitude Test was born that year, permitting a power shift from an aristocracy to a meritocracy. The Wright brothers went to Kitty Hawk to try out their gliders. Lenin, 30, published his first newspaper calling for revolution in Russia. Churchill, 25, was elected to the House of Commons...
Generally, teachers suggest a mixture of humility and enthusiasm as the proper attitude towards learning. John Ruskin, a Victorian critic of society and art, wrote that we ought to be extremely careful when reading not to impose our own opinions on the material. Too many people tend to read their own feelings and beliefs into books. The result is that we end up learning a bit more about ourselves, but we never get to hear from the authors themselves. If we want to get at the real learning in the book, we ought to study each word's meaning precisely...
...secondary "hostile environment" policy, which allows employees to file lawsuits on nebulous grounds of psychological distress, is grotesquely totalitarian. It offends free-speech rights and is predicated on a reactionary female archetype: the prudish Victorian lady who faints at a sexual innuendo. This isn't feminism; it's Puritanism...