summer mvp

…and while we’re talking about worthwhile stuff to read, I need to mention the superior blogging of Jay Livingston over at Montclair SocioBlog.  This guy … I love this guy.  His fantastic posts over the summer made what time I did register online enjoyable.  He has my vote for Summer MVP of the Socioblogosphere.

slow news: goth talk

slow news (Sept. 18, 2008)

You Just Can’t Kill It

By Cintra Wilson (NY Times)

Those who know me know that I am a great afficionado of the Times Style Section.  The sheer preposterousness of the proported “trends” they cover is a delight.  This article fairly insightfully and humorously discusses the allure of goth subculture to young people.  The Goth subculture is at least vaguely familiar to those of us who have attended high school within the past thirty years.  But too often people focus on its outward signs — the make-up, the black clothes, the overt pathos — without understanding what values might lie behind the symbols.  Of course, neither this article nor the fashion exhibit nor the referenced coffeetable book are comprehensive examinations of the meaning behind the Gothic subculture.  But it’s an interesting window for the uninitiated.

One of the best parts is the final line, which I read as a direct potshot at me.  I own plaid shots and I love Nirvana.  Does that mean I’m not cool enough to smoke cigarettes behind the high school?

castaway

Greetings after a long absence!  I thought of telling you all that I had fallen victim to an experience closely paralleling Tom Hanks’ in Castaway.  But alas, the truth is much more mundane.  Summer was simply too packed for me to post.  I was delightfully somewhat removed from the Internet during the summer months.

I had hatched a glorious return during the first week of classes, but those of you who are employed by liberal arts colleges know too well of the extensive faculty workshops that accompany the beginning of a new year.  For those of you who are less familiar, let me describe a few of the key features of these events:

The Liberal Arts: our faculty workshop is rife with panel discussions and small workgroups that consider pedagogy and the mission of the liberal arts.  While I know well that this would be misery for many, I view it as gift that I work for an institution and have colleagues that eagerly engage in serious conversations about pedagogy.  Or more simply people who believe that discussion of the liberal arts should be a living one.

Curricular Theme: Our current curricular theme involves the increasingly globalized society and encouraging our students to think about the many questions and challenges that reality presents.  To kick-start a conversation on this topic (rather than resorting to cliches), we were treated to two truly excellent speakers in professional positions with global relevance, each of whom spoke for 45 minutes.  We then had another hour to just ask them questions and have a dialogue.  What a pleasure to engage in an interdisciplinary, intellectual conversation!

Pondering: To paraphrase Weber, all the most intellectually productive times I have enjoyed were spent laying in a hammock just thinking.  The informal tradition at my institution is that faculty take nearly a full week just before the beginning of classes to prepare their syllabi — even if they’ve taught the same classes for twenty years.  It’s a wonderful time when we think carefully about the process of education, chat about assignments, and swap readings.

Though I personally cherish the community and intellectualism that this programming encourages, it’s also damn time consuming.  Of course, the semester only gets busier.  But somehow, I’m now re-acclimated to the pace.  So, it’s my sincere hope that I’m back now — like for real.

Just one more thought: Like many, I was saddened to hear of the death of gifted writer, fellow liberal arts educator, and thoughtful human being, David Foster Wallace.  Others, with more expertise or greater poetry of language, have already offered insightful commentary on the man.  But I just wanted to post quote of his that speaks volumes about his personal biography, but also resonates for its honesty about our historical era:

There’s something particularly sad about [living in America around the millennium], something that doesn’t have very much to do with physical circumstances, or the economy, or any of the stuff that gets talked about in the news. It’s more like a stomach-level sadness. I see it in myself and my friends in different ways. It manifests itself as a kind of lostness. Whether it’s unique to our generation I really don’t know.

awkward!

Oh, to be a fly on the wall for this little convo. Would have killed Senator Feinstein to put out a cheese plate?

On another campaign-related note, I find it fascinating how the Obama campaign is changing political culture (perhaps, even expanding the traditional boundaries of who engages in political discourse).  “American surprise us and let a black man guide us.”

hillary and would’ve been serendipity

I’m an Obama guy and have been since I read a New Yorker profile of him back in 2004.  Given any one of my demographic characteristics, it’s pretty predictable (like everything in my happy, but  in-lock-step-with-a-fitted-regression-line life).   But after last night’s victory, I wanted to say a word about Senator Clinton.

Consider this: today is the 89th anniversary of Congress proposing the 19th amendment to the Constitution, giving women the right to vote.  Imagine if Hillary Clinton had won the primary process and stood today as the victor on the anniversary of a great leap in the women’s suffrage movement.  What a beautiful, serendipitous moment it would have been to see the first female presidential nominee on such an important date on the feminist calendar.  Of course, Hillary’s campaign as is has been important and historic.  Clearly, it has inspired many women and girls across the country.

I hope and expect to see a female president in my lifetime.  I just hope it’s a woman with more political conviction and a truly progressive agenda.  Barbara Boxer, maybe?

why i hate sex and the city

Okay, I guess I get it.  Wouldn’t it be nice to be rich and (relatively) young and live in New York and go to cool bars and restaurants and have a close circle of friends to chit-chat with?

But here’s my issue: Sex and the City was considered groundbreaking because it featured women who were independent and successful in the way that men are.  However, to me, it seems misogynistic that the show implicitly suggests that when women gain independence and parity with men, they use it to have casual sex and engage in rank commodity fetishism (see Carrie’s repeated declarations of love for overpriced shoes).  Seriously, are these best representatives of womankind we can find?  I think not and, yet, girls and women across the country idolize these insipid, callus, consumers.

Not convinced that Carrie and friends are as bad as all that?  Check out Roger Ebert’s review, which makes the SITC movie sound like a Farrelly Brothers flick.

briefly noted

Holy god this is true (via whatisthewhat). I love Ira Glass like George Bush loves tax cuts for the wealthy.

Fascinating discovery of “uncontacted tribe” in Brazil, but don’t the photos look like Old Hollywood fakes?

The dumblest thing I’ve ever heard (via Sociological Images)

And finally, on what I suppose is a sentimental and vaguely moralistic note, I think that when you honestly notice something positive about someone, it is really important to be forthcoming with a compliment. It’s amazing how much it means to people to be reassured of their value by those around them.

slow news: too white, too male

slow news – May 28, 2008

An Op-Ed Need for Diverse Voices

By Deborah Howell (Washington Post)

The WP ombudsman, Deborah Howell, points out that of the WP’s 654 op-ed pieces so far this year, 575 were by men, 79 by women, and 80 by minorities.  I suppose this is something we’re all aware of, but it is truly startling to see the hard numbers.  And, of course, the Washington Post isn’t alone on this one (Nicholas Kristof “nervously” awaits comments about this issue).

For the record, I favor any proposal that might lead to less David Brooks, Thomas Friedman, and Nicholas Kristof.

oh, to live in new york

Drawing on the news that the NY City Transit may bring back double-decker buses on Fifth Avenue, NYT blog City Room asks readers what Old New York institutions they’d like to see make a return.

I loved comment #4: “Myself. When I could afford to live there.”

momentum

Momentum, according to the OED, is “the quantity of motion in a moving body, now expressed as the product of its mass and its velocity” or, figuratively, “continuing vigour resulting from an initial effort or expenditure of energy.” The avalanche gains momentum as it crashes toward the terrified skier. What begins with a bit of an ice block breaking off, soon gains in both mass (picking up snow and ice as it moves) and velocity as the growing wave of icy death hurdles down the mountainside. In the physical world, it’s a simple concept.

But what of its use in social terms? Anyone who saw Kobe Bryant’s performance in the second half of their West Conference finals game last night knows intuitively what the announcers meant when they said, “The Lakers now have all the momentum” despite facing a ten point deficit (for the bookish types among you, the Lakers overcame a 20 point deficit to win against one of the best defensive teams around, the evil San Antonio Spurs). Of course, there surely was a type of physicality to that momentum: as Kobe began to hoist more shots, he sharpened his stroke, storing data in his muscle memory. But the far more significant type of momentum was social. Down by twenty, Kobe dug deep, summoning his trademark killer instinct and played with an aggressiveness that said, “There’s no effing way I’m losing this game on my home court.” His intensity and confidence spread to his teammates and they began to read each other better. Pau Gasol displayed incredible athleticism in finishing off Kobe’s lobs and dishes. My beloved Sasha Vujacic, a 24 year-old kid from Slovenia who couldn’t crack the bench last year, took gutsy three pointers. In fact, the momentum was first and foremost social; it was borne of a willed confidence, greater communication with each other, and a willingness to defer to the leadership of a player with godlike talent. And like the snowball gaining in mass and velocity, each additional sunk basket contributed to more exuberance, more confidence, and a better belief in their ability to win if they work together.

Where else in the social world can we see momentum? To be sure, we’ve heard a lot about it during the everlasting Democratic Primary Race to the point where the concept has been largely discounted. But isn’t it true that a primary win can give a candidate more confidence and contribute to the sense among campaign supporters that there’s a enthused “movement” (since that’s what everybody’s calling it) growing? Didn’t Senator Obama’s surprise victory in Iowa raise his stature in the race? Didn’t Senator Clinton’s victory in NH revitalize her campaign? While we must not confuse the effect of victories in shaping media narratives with actual momentum, perhaps the media serves as an echo chamber in which the snowball can grow.

I think it’s also possible to think about how personal relationships gain momentum. Or how an ideology can gain momentum. If I had to definite social momentum, it might be something like, the growing acceptance that a belief or hope is, in fact, true. Maybe that’s why mentions of social momentum are so closely bound to the idea of confidence.

Ideas, readers?