The next phase of Parallel Republic

Welcome back to Parallel Republic. The Second Republic, if you wish.

Parallel Republic is moving into its new phase.  Now that the startup is over, the basic bugs of the platform worked out, and a core team assembled we will be moving to a schedule of at least one major post per week by one of our writers, and extras from writers and the community as they arrive.  Each major post will be part of a series associated with a theme centered on the different authors who will act as editors and ‘heads’ of their respective themes. If contributions get more than two per week, the Friday newsletter will be a summary of the week’s publications on the website.

A key element of this new phase is the creation of columns and series headed by one of our regular authors.

Politics, Society and Education: 
The Parallel Republican and The Friendly Professor

The Parallel Republican and The Friendly Professor will be written by our founding editor Brandon C. Zicha, a liberal arts college professor of philosophy,  politics and economics.  The Republican will focus on politics and society, developing and discussing the core political themes outlined in the welcome post of Parallel Republic.  The Professor will focus on issues of education and the university in our divided society.

But, political culture and society are essential to any political movement - and getting more essential all the time.  As such we are expanding our range of topics and contributions as promised from the very beginning!

Art and Culture:
Glory Days

Art and culture compose the stories we tell ourselves, and are a major element of how we construct a shared sense of meaning.  But who writes those stories? Who are those stories about? And who gets to decide? Glory Days is our art and culture series, written by Michael Wagner. It’s initial theme will focus on working class aesthetics and what that means, the existence (and subsequent loss) of a popular monoculture in America, and why it's important to cultivate art that speaks to and for the experiences that shape the lives of most of our fellow citizens.

Religion in Public Life, Praxis:
Living Orthodoxy

Too much of the centrist political space has an exclusionary hard-atheistic hyper-rationalist component which both pushes people of faith to the fringes, and also denies us the unique perspectives and heritage that they bring to our collective lives.  People of faith remain a plurality in America and any healthy mainstream American political culture needs to engage with it both the health of religion and the health of our politics.  Living Orthodoxy will be the series, written by Rosemary Zimmermann.  

Personal Political Transition, Women’s Issues, Literature and Publishing: Alumna

As polarization continues apace many have found their political identities shifting, and women in particular have seen huge changes in how they live in society since the mid 20th century.  Shifting identities, rebirth, and the challenges of navigating it are by Therese Neumann in this column, which adds a concern for the role of literature and publishing for helping us to reflect upon and navigate our identities and place in society.

Totalitarianism and Statistics:
Normalization

A great deal of our discussion about polarization suffers from an asymmetry.  Americans and Westerners generally are far more educated about and more sensitive to the forms, crimes, and horrors of right wing radicalism and authoritarianism while being far less educated on the forms, crimes, and horrors or left wing radicalism and totalitarianism.  Likewise, proper use of data and inference lead to other forms of bias.  Normalization is a column reflecting on American political life from the perspective of an Americanophile data scientist and statistics professor who grew up in a dissident family in late totalitarian Communist Czechoslovakia.  Lucie Zicha will be the beating heart of this series, bringing in additional themes focusing on social science, data, and sociology. 

The Future:

We are hoping to attract at least two more writers to head up columns with the working title of ‘X’ in dealing with issues of race and reconciliation, and ‘Precautionary Principle’ dealing with science, judgment,and the environment in public policy. 

Most importantly we hope that with regular content coming at you from our core team here at Parallel Republic, you readers will become more engaged with your comments, stories, and suggestions so that we can grow our community.