Alexander Riley

The central theme of Charlotte's Web is death. Continue Reading »

I am in a 1982 Volvo, headed north on I-5 toward Oceanside, at a pace I could easily beat on a bicycle. A universe of cars spreads to the north and the south. Twenty-five miles, on a five-lane freeway, will take an hour or more. How can people live like this? The ordeal of rush hour in Southern . . . . Continue Reading »

A controversy at my university opened my eyes to how many of my colleagues have been indoctrinated into woke dogma. Continue Reading »

We must strive to keep the spirit of Christmas not just on Christmas Day, or during the holiday season, but every day and always. Continue Reading »

Finding the way back to the ethic of thanksgiving, and not just for a day in November, but always, is perhaps the only means by which we can save ourselves from the inevitable dissolution of Egoist America and Victim America.    Continue Reading »

In the wake of the Derek Chauvin verdict, Bucknell University, the liberal arts school where I work, lost no time in issuing a statement. We were told that America remained a terrifying place for its black citizens, and that George Floyd’s death demonstrated “the fear and anger that Black . . . . Continue Reading »

The increasingly dominant view at woke liberal arts schools is that all white heterosexual males are the same. Continue Reading »

Imagine that you recently discovered a book titled How Cancer Works, written by a respected professor from a prominent university. He promises to explain the disease and tell you how to avoid getting it. You would doubtless be interested. Cancer is, after all, an awful thing. With enthusiasm, . . . . Continue Reading »

A year ago in April, a student group at the university where I teach invited Amy Wax, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, to speak on the topic of racial inequality. Days before the talk, the faculty email list exploded with vituperative attacks on Wax and on the student group . . . . Continue Reading »

In 2002, in these pages, Peter Berger, the late American socio­logist, offered a succinct summary of the health and status of sociology. In Invitation to ­Sociology (1963), he had praised its promise. Two generations later, he offered a much more pessimistic picture. Now, a decade and a . . . . Continue Reading »