It's a good thing that we're protected by tenure and academic freedom, but we should realize that it creates a risk of getting cut off. Scholars should write, at least sometimes, for the general public.

The thing that I find so bad about anger is the desire for payback. Of course, it is very human to wish for revenge. Your mother has died in the hospital, and the first thought a lot of people have is, I'll sue the doctor. You feel helpless, and you think, I'm less helpless if I'm doing something active that makes someone else pay. And social media make it easy to inflict all kinds of pain on other people. But what good does it do?

I think the imagination helps us move out of the purely oppositional mentality and see the world in a richer and more variegated way.

In our swamp of media sensationalism and group-speak, BOSTON REVIEW stands out as a bold voice for reason and argument, one of the very, very few places that offers intelligence, integrity, and variety.

People don't just want to feel satisfied. They actually want to act.

As human beings, we ought to be vulnerable. We shouldn't try to say that we can be self-sufficient or do everything that's necessary for a good life on our own, because we need other people.

TV has a lot of problems, but I think the Internet and social media have a lot more. Under the cover of anonymity people say the most vicious things.