Sunday, September 21, 2014

Joshua Narins


Josh Narins died yesterday, after a protracted, cranky battle with scleroderma. He was 42-ish.

Josh had a vast online presence, from Twitter to Reddit to
his blog – pardon me, blogs, to his website on his theories about the interrelationship between language, nationality and conflict, to his numerous comments on bulletin boards and blogs, including this one, to Facebook and to other forms of social media you or I have never even heard of, but he did. And emails. His first email to me was precisely one week shy of ten years ago, and there have been hundreds since. He embodied the intellectual equality of the cyber age, corresponding with anyone and everyone who would respond to him, from the lowliest blogger to professors, politicians and Nobel laureates.  Despite a disease that made it all but impossible to sleep or eat, he was recommending readings on Islamic thought and movies and arguing with people on Twitter just a week ago, and now he is silent.


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6 comments:

  1. R.I.P.

    Thank you for eulogizing him so eloquently.

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  2. Thank you for this. Beautifully put.

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  3. You're welcome, Rachael. It was a privilege to know your brother.

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  4. I just read this today December 2 2015

    I thank you for your good words about my son
    I painting a memorial to him now though I can only hope to capture a bit if this complex man
    Again, thank you

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  5. I just read this today December 2 2015

    I thank you for your good words about my son
    I painting a memorial to him now though I can only hope to capture a bit if this complex man
    Again, thank you

    ReplyDelete
  6. Josh and I dated years ago when he lived in his cute little studio in Tudor city, NY. We had a lot of fun together and we only grew apart because I moved to Maine to finish college. He was an extremely interesting and deep person. I remember one night I actually fell asleep while we were on the phone because he had become so passionate about what he was talking about and I didn’t want to silence him. I’m truly so sorry for his loss to both his friends and family.

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