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PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   2417 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for October 11, 2026

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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So, what are you reading?

I'm attempting Ahmed's Archaeology of Babel: The Colonial Foundation of the Humanities, so far a seemingly interesting open access find, interesting because it seems critical of common names in anti-colonial thought, who he thinks have adopted colonial forms of thinking in philology.

The philological revolution against anciens régimes in both East and West turned immediately, in other words, into the rule of this historical consciousness, which was consequently identified with human liberation. Philology still possesses that identity in Erich Auerbach’s and Edward Said’s dialectically opposed concepts of comparatism. Colonialism’s first trick is to make language appear to be the colonizer’s possession. Its second trick, per Jacques Derrida, is the idea of “liberation,” which internalizes the colonizer’s concept of language within the colonized. As the chapters that follow demonstrate, this colonial trick explains phenomena as apparently disparate and politically opposed as language-based racism, Islamic fundamentalism, Hindu nationalism, and the global discourses of environmentalism and indigeneity, all of which descend from colonial philology.

I just finished reading Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Murakami. Started it like a year ago, stopped reading at the 70% mark. The vibes are pretty good. It's effectively two stories in one. One's sort of a detective style story, the other feels like a dark fairy tale. The prose in the dark fairy tale part is really powerful.

My friend gave me shit for taking a year to finish reading a book. So to prove a point I read After Dark by Murakami in three days. The plot and themes were much more allegorical than Hardboiled Wonderland. Much more dream/magical thinking logic in play. It didn't get great reviews on reception, but it was a better use of my time than doomscrolling. A lot of the deeper themes seem like gesturing at Moloch (in Scott's sense) and the underbelly of japanese society. It makes me want to stay up all night at a Denny's while on LSD.

Thinking of starting Kafka's The Trial. Or I could pick up Blood Meridian again. I stopped that one halfway through.

I loved Hard-boiled Wonderland. I was painfully underwhelmed by The Trial.

Hardboiled Wonderland makes me feel like I need to be buying Jazz records. I just started The Trial and I'm surprised by how fast I'm reading it.

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