I see, via Crooked Timber, Clifford Geertz has died, following heart surgery at UPenn. He was an amazing author, prolific and provoking, and of course, so critical to critical theory.
I think my favourite part of the obit is this:
His internship as a copyboy for The New York Post dissuaded him from becoming a newspaper man. “It was fun but it wasn’t practical,” he said,…so he switched to philosophy.
The idea of philosophy being more practical than newspaper, how can you not love it?
Thick description is at long last a term for history. What an amazing person and what a thick life. RIP.