This is the first in a continuing series of reminders that the past informs the present as it infuses the future. As Benj DeMott notes, the aim of First of the Year is to define "the democratic imperatives and demotic tones that make our ongoing politics of culture matter." This annual publication is grounded in the needs of "dissed" people: disenfranchised, disadvantaged, disinherited, discomfited, and dismissed. But the concept has been sharpened to acknowledge that though the underdog is owed sympathy, the mad dog is owed a bullet. In short, First of the Year is very much an effort of the twenty-first century. The publication aims to be more than a launching pad for writers. It attempts to bridge the gap between radical perspectives without losing focus on the centrality of African-American culture to the national conversation. The coming together of figures like Armond White, Kate Millett, Lorenzo Thomas, Russell Jacoby, Adolph Reed, and Amiri Baraka is quite unlike what can be found in standard literary and social publications. They treat the African-American condition as a policy issue or an executive summary report--not as a touchstone for the state of the nation as a whole. The initial volume also deals extensively and seriously with the issue of humanism and terror, the nature of social movements, electoral and urban politics, and the musical trends of our time. It does so with a sense of urgency often denied in mainstream literary reviews. Issues of "standards" are addressed from the angle of African-American cultural traditions, and the mind-body problem as a matter of race not just of metaphysics. In a nutshell, this volume intends to open a new chapter in the Harlem Renaissance; or better, an American renaissance with a Harlem lilt. First of the Year is an attempt to make political arguments breathe through cultural voices. Contributors include Sheldon Wolin, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Kurt Vonnegut, Paul Berman, Charles Keil, and Philip Levine, among others, ensuring its ability to entertain.

Alive to history in the making (and the weight of the past) this volume examines Obama's presidency and Lyndon Johnson's, the killing of Trayvon Martin and the death of Andrew Breitbart, Occupy Wall Street and "America Beyond Capitalism." It presents essays, poems, and plays that speak to our times and challenge the liberal imagination. The title, That Floating Bridge, evokes Representative John Lewis' line--"Obama is what comes at the end of that bridge in Selma"--as it quotes a track on Gregg Allman's Low Country Blues, which Scott Spencer lauds here in a review for the Ages.

That Floating Bridge's peerless range of contributors includes Amiri Baraka, Gar Alperovitz, Bernard Avishai, Uri Avnery, Bill Ayers, Paul Berman, John Chernoff, Mark Dudzic, Carmelita Estrellita, Henry Farrell, Fr. Rick Frechette, Donna Gaines, David Golding, Eugene Goodheart, Lawrence Goodwyn, Lisa Guenther, Alec Harrington, Malcolm Harris, Casey Hayden, Christopher Hayes, Patterson Hood, Roxane Johnson, Ben Kessler, Bob Levin, Philip Levine, Bongani Madondo, Greil Marcus, Scott McLemee, Judy Oppenheimer, Jedediah Purdy, Nick Salvatore, Aram Saroyan, Tom Smucker, Fredric Smoler, Violet Socks, A. B. Spellman, Scott Spencer, Richard Torres, Jesmyn Ward, and Pablo Yglesias.

An account of how Franz Boas "did more to combat race prejudice than any other person" anchorsone section, but the volume also addresses devolutions of "diversity" linked with careerism in the art world and academe. An un-scholastic section titled "Criticism of Life"celebrates older and younger critics/poets. Songs are key to this volume's good times. Music writing--ranging from Eddie Hinton's Very Extremely Dangerous to Berlioz's Romeo and Juliet--enhances the pleasures of this text.

Diversity and "perspective by incongruity" dene the approach to changing times in this fourth volume of the First of the Year series. Insights come from interesting minds in unobvious juxtapositions. First's roster of irreverent--and holy --regulars includes Amiri Baraka, Bernard Avishai, Uri Avnery, Chuck D, Diane di Prima, Fr. Rick Frechette, Donna Gaines, Lawrence Goodwyn, Roxane Johnson, W.T. Lhamon Jr., Philip Levine, Kanan Makiya, Bongani Madondo, Greil Marcus, Charles O'Brien, Judy Oppenheimer, Tom Smucker, Fredric Smoler, A.B. Spellman, Scott Spencer, Robert Farris Thompson, Richard Torres, David Waldstreicher, and Armond White.Their angles on history and history in the making are enhanced by contributions from new members of First's family of defamiliarizers such as Peter Brown, Wesley Brown, Mark Dudzic, Robert Hullot-Kentor, and Aram Saroyan.

Perspectives by Incongruity touches down in Kashmir, Haiti, South Africa, and Indonesia. There's a vital section devoted to the Arab Spring. But the volume homes in on the U.S.A. as well, digging into race and class structures of feeling (and fantasy). It means to comprehend the Obama era in real time. Music is key to Perspectives by Incongruity's offbeat truth-telling. Contributors sound off on Jay Z and Kanye West, mambo and Afropop, Dylan and Coltrane, Sun Ra and Arcade Fire. First's meaning is (as ever) in the mix.

This is the second volume in the "First of the Year" Series. Contributors like Armond White, Philip Levine, Donna Gaines, Lawrence Goodwyn, Irving Louis Horowitz, Charles O'Brien, Fredric Smoler, Paul Berman, and Amiri Baraka are back (and blazing). And there are important new voices in the "First" mix, such as Vincent Harding, Roxane Johnson, and Bob Levin. If there is a leitmotif to this edition, it is the election and inauguration of Barack Obama as the first African-American president. "First" aims to be up to the minute of this moment.

As Benj DeMott notes "a glance at this volume confirms the margin is still the center for us." And that margin stretches from Harlem to the world. There are tales of edgy sojourns in Afghanistan, Thailand, and South Africa. The volume also has a Question & Answer with Ousmane Sembi1/2ne, who taught Africans to resist "elements of received culture-those fixed rules and values which nobody but those on the margins dare to question." A second interview with Adam Hochschild celebrates the Englishman who invented abolition, and an African-American original who coined the phrase "crimes against humanity."

The volume includes a protest against the Israeli war machine by Uri Avnery who has long been a creative outsider in his own society. It makes the case that American ideologues (on both extremes) keep getting the Middle East wrong because they cannot grasp the complexities of any country, including their own. "First of the Year's" minority angles of vision will help readers see with new eyes. It will help their hearing too. The volume has plenty of music writing marked by loving attention to details of pop performances. In short, this collection reflects its editor; direct, unafraid, urban, and entirely contemporary.

This is the first in a continuing series of reminders that the past informs the present as it infuses the future. As Benj DeMott notes, the aim of "First of the Year" is to define "the democratic imperatives and demotic tones that make our ongoing politics of culture matter." This annual publication is grounded in the needs of "dissed" people: disenfranchised, disadvantaged, disinherited, discomfited, and dismissed. But the concept has been sharpened to acknowledge that though the underdog is owed sympathy, the mad dog is owed a bullet. In short, "First of the Year" is very much an effort of the twenty-first century.

The publication aims to be more than a launching pad for writers. It attempts to bridge the gap between radical perspectives without losing focus on the centrality of African-American culture to the national conversation. The coming together of figures like Armond White, Kate Millett, Lorenzo Thomas, Russell Jacoby, Adolph Reed, and Amiri Baraka is quite unlike what can be found in standard literary and social publications. They treat the African-American condition as a policy issue or an executive summary report--not as a touchstone for the state of the nation as a whole.

The initial volume also deals extensively and seriously with the issue of humanism and terror, the nature of social movements, electoral and urban politics, and the musical trends of our time. It does so with a sense of urgency often denied in mainstream literary reviews. Issues of "standards" are addressed from the angle of African-American cultural traditions, and the mind-body problem as a matter of race not just of metaphysics. In a nutshell, this volume intends to open a new chapter in the Harlem Renaissance; or better, an American renaissance with a Harlem lilt. "First of the Year" is an attempt to make political arguments breathe through cultural voices. Contributors include Sheldon Wolin, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Kurt Vonnegut, Paul Berman, Charles Keil, and Philip Levine, among others, ensuring its ability to entertain.

"Benj DeMott" has written for the "The City Sun, The Village Voice," and academic journals. Since 1998, he has edited "First of the Month," along with Charles O'Brien and Armond White.i1/2 DeMott grew up in Amherst and now lives in New York City with his wife and son. He went to the University of Rochester where he studied with Christopher Lasch, i1/2 but his most important teachers have been family.

This is the second volume in the First of the Year Series. Contributors like Armond White, Philip Levine, Donna Gaines, Lawrence Goodwyn, Irving Louis Horowitz, Charles O'Brien, Fredric Smoler, Paul Berman, and Amiri Baraka are back (and blazing). And there are important new voices in the First mix, such as Vincent Harding, Roxane Johnson, and Bob Levin. If there is a leitmotif to this edition, it is the election and inauguration of Barack Obama as the first African-American president. First aims to be up to the minute of this moment. As Benj DeMott notes "a glance at this volume confirms the margin is still the center for us." And that margin stretches from Harlem to the world. There are tales of edgy sojourns in Afghanistan, Thailand, and South Africa. The volume also has a Question & Answer with Ousmane Sembi, who taught Africans to resist "elements of received culture-those fixed rules and values which nobody but those on the margins dare to question." A second interview with Adam Hochschild celebrates the Englishman who invented abolition, and an African-American original who coined the phrase "crimes against humanity." The volume includes a protest against the Israeli war machine by Uri Avnery who has long been a creative outsider in his own society. It makes the case that American ideologues (on both extremes) keep getting the Middle East wrong because they cannot grasp the complexities of any country, including their own. First of the Year's minority angles of vision will help readers see with new eyes. It will help their hearing too. The volume has plenty of music writing marked by loving attention to details of pop performances. In short, this collection reflects its editor; direct, unafraid, urban, and entirely contemporary.

This is the third volume of the First of the Year annual series. Contributors such as Armond White, Philip Levine, Charles O'Brien, Uri Avnery, Donna Gaines, Tom Smucker, Scott Spencer, and Amiri Baraka are back (and fractious as ever). And First's family of writers keeps growing. This volume includes vital new voices such as A. B. Spellman, Bernard Avishai, Rudolph Wurlitzer, and Diane di Prima. First never shies away from hot button issues Fredric Smoler, for example, offers a definitive consideration of America's recent history with torture. But First's approach to current political firestorms is often marked by a cool sense of the past. History is always in the mix when First writers examine the roots of Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin and contemporary right-wing pundits who falsely claim the mantle of Whittaker Chambers. First's refusal to toe "correct" lines is apparent in Benj DeMott's reconsideration of Chambers' work. The new volume is also marked by its cultivation of radical imaginations. The ideas of the Situationists and Cornelius Castoriadis are revived. A young historian, David Waldstreicher, recovers the radical, useable past in the 60s work of Staughton Lynd. Amiri Baraka evokes the felt quality of Jesse Jackson's 1988 campaign and another poet remembers (in verse) long-forgotten, extreme political acts of American Renaissance poets. A recent review of First of the Year: 2009 used a phrase of Kenneth Burke's "perspective by incongruity" to make sense of the method that shaped it. First is committed to thought-provoking incongruities. Faith that wonder is our best teacher informs this volume. First's music writing provides a high-low soundtrack of surprise. Beyond the section on Michael Jackson, there are serious responses to John Coltrane and Bach, World Saxophone Quartet and Mariah Carey, Sonny Rollins and Willie Mitchell. First's message is in the music.

Alive to history in the making (and the weight of the past) this volume examines Obama's presidency and Lyndon Johnson's, the killing of Trayvon Martin and the death of Andrew Breitbart, Occupy Wall Street and "America Beyond Capitalism." It presents essays, poems, and plays that speak to our times and challenge the liberal imagination. The title, That Floating Bridge, evokes Representative John Lewis' line "Obama is what comes at the end of that bridge in Selma" as it quotes a track on Gregg Allman's Low Country Blues, which Scott Spencer lauds here in a review for the Ages. That Floating Bridge's peerless range of contributors includes Amiri Baraka, Gar Alperovitz, Bernard Avishai, Uri Avnery, Bill Ayers, Paul Berman, John Chernoff, Mark Dudzic, Carmelita Estrellita, Henry Farrell, Fr. Rick Frechette, Donna Gaines, David Golding, Eugene Goodheart, Lawrence Goodwyn, Lisa Guenther, Alec Harrington, Malcolm Harris, Casey Hayden, Christopher Hayes, Patterson Hood, Roxane Johnson, Ben Kessler, Bob Levin, Philip Levine, Bongani Madondo, Greil Marcus, Scott McLemee, Judy Oppenheimer, Jedediah Purdy, Nick Salvatore, Aram Saroyan, Tom Smucker, Fredric Smoler, Violet Socks, A. B. Spellman, Scott Spencer, Richard Torres, Jesmyn Ward, and Pablo Yglesias. An account of how Franz Boas "did more to combat race prejudice than any other person" anchorsone section, but the volume also addresses devolutions of "diversity" linked with careerism in the art world and academe. An un-scholastic section titled "Criticism of Life"celebrates older and younger critics/poets. Songs are key to this volume's good times. Music writing ranging from Eddie Hinton's Very Extremely Dangerous to Berlioz's Romeo and Julietenhances the pleasures of this text.

Diversity and "perspective by incongruity" dene the approach to changing times in this fourth volume of the First of the Year series. Insights come from interesting minds in unobvious juxtapositions. First's roster of irreverent and holy! regulars includes Amiri Baraka, Bernard Avishai, Uri Avnery, Chuck D, Diane di Prima, Fr. Rick Frechette, Donna Gaines, Lawrence Goodwyn, Roxane Johnson, W.T. Lhamon Jr., Philip Levine, Kanan Makiya, Bongani Madondo, Greil Marcus, Charles O'Brien, Judy Oppenheimer, Tom Smucker, Fredric Smoler, A.B. Spellman, Scott Spencer, Robert Farris Thompson, Richard Torres, David Waldstreicher, and Armond White.Their angles on history and history in the making are enhanced by contributions from new members of First's family of defamiliarizers such as Peter Brown, Wesley Brown, Mark Dudzic, Robert Hullot-Kentor, and Aram Saroyan. Perspectives by Incongruity touches down in Kashmir, Haiti, South Africa, and Indonesia. There's a vital section devoted to the Arab Spring. But the volume homes in on the U.S.A. as well, digging into race and class structures of feeling (and fantasy). It means to comprehend the Obama era in real time. Music is key to Perspectives by Incongruity's offbeat truth-telling. Contributors sound off on Jay Z and Kanye West, mambo and Afropop, Dylan and Coltrane, Sun Ra and Arcade Fire. First's meaning is (as ever) in the mix.

This is the third volume of the First of the Year annual series. Contributors such as Armond White, Philip Levine, Charles O'Brien, Uri Avnery, Donna Gaines, Tom Smucker, Scott Spencer, and Amiri Baraka are back (and fractious as ever). And First's family of writers keeps growing. This volume includes vital new voices such as A. B. Spellman, Bernard Avishai, Rudolph Wurlitzer, and Diane di Prima.

First never shies away from hot button issues--Fredric Smoler, for example, offers a definitive consideration of America's recent history with torture. But First's approach to current political firestorms is often marked by a cool sense of the past. History is always in the mix when First writers examine the roots of Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin and contemporary right-wing pundits who falsely claim the mantle of Whittaker Chambers. First's refusal to toe "correct" lines is apparent in Benj DeMott's reconsideration of Chambers' work.

The new volume is also marked by its cultivation of radical imaginations. The ideas of the Situationists and Cornelius Castoriadis are revived. A young historian, David Waldstreicher, recovers the radical, useable past in the 60s work of Staughton Lynd. Amiri Baraka evokes the felt quality of Jesse Jackson's 1988 campaign and another poet remembers (in verse) long-forgotten, extreme political acts of American Renaissance poets.

A recent review of First of the Year: 2009 used a phrase of Kenneth Burke's--"perspective by incongruity"--to make sense of the method that shaped it. First is committed to thought-provoking incongruities. Faith that wonder is our best teacher informs this volume. First's music writing provides a high-low soundtrack of surprise. Beyond the section on Michael Jackson, there are serious responses to John Coltrane and Bach, World Saxophone Quartet and Mariah Carey, Sonny Rollins and Willie Mitchell. First's message is in the music.