On Television
Pierre Bourdieu

A Vast Wasteland, Thoughtfully Visited -- "On Television" is only a brief 82 pages long. But because it's packed with ideas -- my God, how long has it been since you have read anything packed with ideas? -- I've taken several months to read, savor and study these words, as one might examine the thickest text in the most rigorous graduate course. And like Gide's journal (perhaps the last book I read packed with ideas) I have dog-eared dozens of pages to bring me back to this French sociologist's keen observations about journalism, democracy and "free" speech. Do you know how to tell if a book is filled with ideas? You walk away not with conclusions (which is the point of nearly all writing courses and which happens in about 99.9 percent of everything we read), but with thoughts, ruminations and contemplations.