Mid Theory Collective

“Broadening access to the humanities…—an effort that gives, for example, a room of public school kids the chance to experience the thrill of something entirely new—is needed now in ways that are difficult to overstate. There’s an essential kind of freedom at stake.” 💙😭🤟

Unwanted Reading: A Review of Tom Comitta’s ‘People’s Choice Literature’ The Sunday before I taught Beloved last spring, I sat on my couch wondering how I was going to convince a room full of second semester seniors that, before they left high school that June, they sho…

Had a lot of fun writing this review of @tomcomitta.bsky.social’s strange, moving, and hilarious book. Gets us to think, as I argue here, about the value of an aesthetic education—something we all should aim for as we teach our kids.

mid-theory.com/2025/12/04/u...

Unwanted Reading: A Review of Tom Comitta’s ‘People’s Choice Literature’ The Sunday before I taught Beloved last spring, I sat on my couch wondering how I was going to convince a room full of second semester seniors that, before they left high school that June, they sho…

For MTC, John Downes-Angus reviews Tom Comitta's PEOPLE'S CHOICE LITERATURE and reflects on his experiences as a high school English teacher where on the daily he makes a case for reading the strange, the extreme, the unwanted—for the chance to accept "reading’s complicated gift to us."

Such a brilliant essay, John. So grateful for your thoughts here and the insight into practical ways to keep literature and difficult books alive. Another reminder of how much I’d like to get back to teaching. Sending warmth and admiration from LA

"Those of us who reject romantic notions of individual genius nevertheless can admit that there’s something to be said for a dose of extreme, un-assimalable newness—an aesthetic experience that does not appeal merely to our existing tastes and preferences, that does something unprecedented to us."

For @mid-theory.bsky.social, @johndownesangus.bsky.social wrote about @tomcomitta.bsky.social’s awesome book at @columbiaup.bsky.social! It was so fun to edit this piece!

. @columbiaup.bsky.social @tomcomitta.bsky.social

Unwanted Reading: A Review of Tom Comitta’s ‘People’s Choice Literature’ The Sunday before I taught Beloved last spring, I sat on my couch wondering how I was going to convince a room full of second semester seniors that, before they left high school that June, they sho…

For MTC, John Downes-Angus reviews Tom Comitta's PEOPLE'S CHOICE LITERATURE and reflects on his experiences as a high school English teacher where on the daily he makes a case for reading the strange, the extreme, the unwanted—for the chance to accept "reading’s complicated gift to us."

Styling Algorithmic Life The Instagram Theme Party™ (trademark ours) is everywhere, and it requires you to dress to code. Sundresses studded with a faux-watercolor seashell print. A pair of pajama shorts sporting a flimsy …

Sarah Sgro and Olivia Stowell take on the "Instagram Theme Party™," dressing for the algorithm, and what these rituals tell us about the "kind of choreographed sociality that both relies on and is reproduced by algorithmic culture and platform capitalism."

Article illustrations by Carolyn Jao

Tomorrow's the deadline for proposals for this virtual mini-workshop for grad students with the Post45 Data Collective. Pitch a 10-15 minute presentation with data from the collective. Get feedback from a lot of excellent people.

CFP: The Data of Post45 Literature and Culture (Online Graduate Workshop) How has encroaching climate disaster impacted how the future is imagined in science fiction novels? What can a century of NYT bestsellers lists tell us about trends in mainstream publishing? And how c...

DEAR GRAD STUDENTS,

This March @post45data.bsky.social will be holding a free, online mini-workshop for grads working in the fields of contemporary literature and culture.

More info / abstract submission here: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

1/4

The Post45 Data Collective invites graduate students in the humanities or adjacent fields to explore cultural data reflexively and collaboratively in a mini-workshop hosted virtually on Friday, March 13. Details here: data.post45.org/news/grad-wo...

This sounds amazing, please apply ✨

Styling Algorithmic Life The Instagram Theme Party™ (trademark ours) is everywhere, and it requires you to dress to code. Sundresses studded with a faux-watercolor seashell print. A pair of pajama shorts sporting a flimsy …

Sarah Sgro and Olivia Stowell take on the "Instagram Theme Party™," dressing for the algorithm, and what these rituals tell us about the "kind of choreographed sociality that both relies on and is reproduced by algorithmic culture and platform capitalism."

Article illustrations by Carolyn Jao

Styling Algorithmic Life The Instagram Theme Party™ (trademark ours) is everywhere, and it requires you to dress to code. Sundresses studded with a faux-watercolor seashell print. A pair of pajama shorts sporting a flimsy …

Sarah Sgro and Olivia Stowell take on the "Instagram Theme Party™," dressing for the algorithm, and they tell us about "ritual talismans for a kind of choreographed sociality that both relies on and is reproduced by algorithmic culture and platform capitalism"

Article Illustrations by Carolyn Jao

Mamdani Feelings Starting from a place of extreme negativity, political speech can brush the bright membrane that forms literature’s impossible horizon. The rent is too high in Los Angeles. Consider a number: “One …

"the universal defilement of political speech saddles every utterance with such a burden of filth that, crushed and starting from within a dystopia that has already occurred, political speech can briefly, vanishingly, in the fragile space of an instant, attain the condition that literature cannot."

a gift from @bakaari.bsky.social (some of the other ones she brought were her brilliance and her humor)

@mid-theory.bsky.social

We are underway. @dan-sinnamon.bsky.social delivers opening remarks at a packed “Close Reading For The 21st Centure” book launch symposium.

Mamdani Feelings Starting from a place of extreme negativity, political speech can brush the bright membrane that forms literature’s impossible horizon. The rent is too high in Los Angeles. Consider a number: “One …

"the universal defilement of political speech saddles every utterance with such a burden of filth that, crushed and starting from within a dystopia that has already occurred, political speech can briefly, vanishingly, in the fragile space of an instant, attain the condition that literature cannot."

Mamdani Feelings Starting from a place of extreme negativity, political speech can brush the bright membrane that forms literature’s impossible horizon. The rent is too high in Los Angeles. Consider a number: “One …

On the day of the NYC mayoral election, Ali Raz pens a gorgeous essay reflecting on how Mamdani's rhetoric evinces a poetics of the Universal and convokes a shared commons united by labor and by the rhythms of life spent working in cities most of us cannot afford.
mid-theory.com/2025/11/04/m...

. @zohrankmamdani.bsky.social

This is a beautiful essay

A piece about having Big Feelings about Mamdani. @mid-theory.bsky.social was a dream to work with 💖
Now glueing myself to election coverage. 🍺📺

Mamdani Feelings Starting from a place of extreme negativity, political speech can brush the bright membrane that forms literature’s impossible horizon. The rent is too high in Los Angeles. Consider a number: “One …

On the day of the NYC mayoral election, Ali Raz pens a gorgeous essay reflecting on how Mamdani's rhetoric evinces a poetics of the Universal and convokes a shared commons united by labor and by the rhythms of life spent working in cities most of us cannot afford.
mid-theory.com/2025/11/04/m...

For Your Consideration: ‘A Different Man’ In our “For Your Consideration” column, MTC editors, writers, and readers point your attention to works of art and cultural texts that may have dropped out of the 36-hour discourse cycle, but we co…

In our inaugural 'For Your Consideration' column Amanda Ann Klein and Olivia Stowell discuss Aaron Schimberg’s 2024 film A DIFFERENT MAN, a psychological drama about an actor with facial differences who undergoes an experimental treatment to alter his appearance.
mid-theory.com/2025/10/22/f...

Working with Adam was an absolute dream! He was as usual responsive, attentive, brilliant. We cannot wait to work with him again ✨🎉

Our final meeting on NEVADA will be TODAY 10/30 at 5:30pm ET. We look forward to seeing returning and new faces! Sign up here: tinyurl.com/4yj7xj8p

Our final meeting on NEVADA will be tomorrow 10/30 at 5:30pm ET. We look forward to seeing returning and new faces! Sign up here: tinyurl.com/4yj7xj8p

Conjuring the Unplayable But why does anyone film anything? To remember it and, in the case of home viewing, to watch it repeatedly, allowing the images to spread across time like a curse. The same week I began writing thi…

As you gear up for the spooky season, may we interest you in the unplayable and the haunt of the VHS tape
mid-theory.com/2025/09/04/c...

The Prison-House of Authenticity: A Review of ‘Colored Television’ Here, the tragic mulatto is circumstantial: the novel makes it clear that, given the right motivations, anyone is capable of desiring badly, especially when custom furniture is on the line. In the …

For MTC, TJ Calhoun reviews Danzy Senna’s 'Colored Television.' Of the novel's protagonist they write, "She is the daughter of a theory-minded generation, where race is both too fluid and too real, and where no one actually wants to be understood, only verified."