"Excuse me, but could you please push apart your thighs?"
I’m not a fan of making lives easy on my readers. I think the kind of bs we usually encounter in what fills our…
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What Happens When You Try to Put All The Words Online
Lexicographer Erin McKean’s interactive ‘Wordnik’ is projected to be the largest online dictionary ever. CHICAGO — Erin McKean doesn’t look much like a revolutionary….
Read MoreWhile we're on courts…a trip back to Sierra Leone
Where earlier this week three members of the Revolutionary United Front were convicted of all kinds of Awful Stuff. The RUF is rebel group…
Read MoreICC warrant for Bashir strengthens global justice, do-good fundraising
The International Criminal Court issued a warrant for the arrest of Omar al-Bashir, the president of Sudan. After the usual politicking in the halls…
Read More"You're totally wrong," or, how I can single-handedly diagnose and save all of journalism
Here’s a description of what one new media guru (who’s actually kind of an old dude, so take hard, Old Guard of a Dying…
Read MoreThe Lexicon of Intervention I
I have a feeling this will be a recurring series: words and phrases used by aid communities, rights groups, or other NGOs (or for…
Read MoreAdvice for Life I
For those of you who haven’t yet had the occasion to squish tightly into a small little mini-bus, known in most of East Africa…
Read More"She left out the ladel! We're sending her back and getting a new wife."
One of my Rwandan friends is getting married soon, and it turns out that getting married here requires a lot of stuff. The wife,…
Read MoreCongo 101, or "Can't you clap?"
This has got to be the best quote yet to run in anyone’s Congo stories. From Stephanie McCrummen, who has been doing stellar work…
Read MoreBack to your comments…
Sorry, friends and strangers, about the delay on comment posting. First it was a tech problem, and then a problem of my own time,…
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