2023 Week One: On Friendship

June 24–July 1

There’s an oft-invoked medieval proverb: “Blood is thicker than water.” We take it to mean that bonds of the family are stronger than any other — that, simply, family comes first. But some have argued that the “blood” in the phrase is not one of family, but one of covenant, of choosing. This places heightened importance on friendship and fellowship, and on the family of our own making. But what is the state of friendship amidst evolving technology that both connects us and isolates us? Amidst a pandemic and a new normal that has further stratified various circles of intimacy? How has friendship evolved over time and generations, and how can we tend to and nurture the ties that bind us?