About

Submitted For Your Perusal is a weblog wherein I, Matt Thomas, share and write about things I think are interesting.

Every week for over 13 years, I posted links to and quotes from articles that caught my eye in Sunday’s New York Times. In 2020, I stopped posting these digests to my blog; in 2021, I stopped doing them entirely to make room for other things in my life.

Every so often I write somewhat longer pieces on here and elsewhere.

I’m a teacher and writer currently living in Iowa City, IA. I was born and raised in Seattle. I have a B.A. from the University of Southern California and a Ph.D. from the University of Iowa. Both in American Studies. My dissertation project was the first critical history of the life hacking movement.

The title of this blog is a reference to the first line of Rod Serling’s introduction to “To Serve Man,” an episode of The Twilight Zone from 1962 written by Serling and based on a short story of the same name by Damon Knight.

Although the word “peruse,” as the American Heritage Dictionary explains, “has long meant ‘to read thoroughly’ … sometimes people use it to mean ‘to glance over, skim,’ as in I only had a moment to peruse the manual quickly, but this usage is widely considered an error.”

If you buy something (e.g., from Amazon) through a link on my site, I may earn a small affilate commission.

You can reach me via Twitter (@mattthomas) or by email.