Word: performativity
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...coin-operated machines located in Mather, Currier and Leverett Houses—which cost $4 an hour to use ($3 with tokens)—allowed students to write and correct text documents on screens, as well as perform basic list and mathematical functions...
...brains as well as our bodies: we have at least some capacity to overcome alcohol's effects by sheer force of will. Mark Fillmore, a psychologist at the University of Kentucky, has found that study volunteers who are warned that a certain alcoholic drink will highly impair their performance on a psychomotor test actually do better on the test than people who are given the same drink but no information about impairment. In other words, at least in a lab setting, those who are led to believe that they're about to get truly blotto end up not letting themselves...
...prone to nodding off at concerts, we have the perfect event for you. On June 12, a group of topflight Japanese musicians - including violinist Iwao Furusawa, tenor Masafumi Akikawa and wispy-voiced female vocalist Aoi Teshima - will perform a series of works with the intention of sending the audience to sleep. The concert, to be held at the Tokyo International Forum, is a live rendition of music selected for a Japan Airlines in-flight audio relaxation channel. The pieces, which include Schubert's Ave Maria and a Mozart Divertimento, were tested by a physician specializing in sleeping disorders and compiled...
...radicalism of Rescorla's drills cannot be overstated. Remember, Morgan Stanley is an investment bank. Millionaire, high-performance bankers on the 73rd floor did not appreciate the interruption. Each drill, which pulled brokers off their phones and away from their computers, cost the company money. But Rescorla did it anyway. His military training had taught him a simple rule of human nature: the best way to get the brain to perform under extreme stress is to repeatedly run it through rehearsals beforehand...
Americans tend to think of the presidency as all-powerful, but much of its authority comes from the ability to convince the public to follow, and the same is sometimes true in diplomacy. The time when George W. Bush could perform that trick has long passed. But if Americans are adjusting to the idea of a weak Bush, an even tougher mental leap awaits them once he leaves office: accepting that the U.S. isn't the force abroad it was just a few years ago. The next President's hardest job may be getting the country used to that...