Thursday, January 3, 2008

Welcome to 1/2 mile outside the beltway

Somewhere in May of 2007 I got an unexpected phone call: an offer to become a professor of arts management at American University in Washington, DC. As I write this, 2008 has just begun, the Iowa Caucuses are tonight, and it's time to begin writing as a Washingtonian, after many years in my hometown of Bloomington, Indiana. I used to write newspaper columns, alternatively about the arts and political issues, and after a semester of teaching and studying cultural policy with 25 brilliant graduate students from all over the world, I've come to realize that the best format for a blog would be to blend both of my major interests in one glop of prose.

But enough about me. I hope this blog will grow interactively and will represent views on art and politics, separately and together, that are informed about what's going on but that retain some of that flyover-country perspective that comes with the territory of living outside the Beltway. And on a warm night with the windows open, I can hear the Villagers buzzing by in their policymaking Toyotas, bound for a quiet evening in our leafy suburbs.

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