Primitive hunter-gatherers, given the broad range of tasks they had to carry out to survive, have a skill set more immune to the “cognitive” smarts of new AI technologies than a highly educated, highly specialized service worker! This reveals something about both the nature of AI and the nature of the division of labor in contemporary capitalism. It helps us understand that AI systems are best viewed as idiot savants, not Renaissance Men.

Hentyle Yapp analyzes contemporary Chinese art as it circulates on the global art market to outline the limitations of Western understandings of non-Western art. Yapp reconsiders the all-too-common narratives about Chinese art that celebrate the heroic artist who embodies political resistance against the authoritarian state. These narratives, as Yapp establishes, prevent Chinese art, aesthetics, and politics from being discussed in the West outside the terms of Western liberalism and notions of the “universal.”

Woloch analyzes George Orwell's use of the pithy one liner, and finds in them both motivation and caution for responding to a sense of urgency.

Zamora reflects on his academic journey, and the importance of his community origins to both his scholarship and his life.