good news

It appears that we may have made some friends here in brew city. FINALLY!

out but not down

I have only to administer and grade the final.
I created a lovely eggplant parmigiana the other evening.
My so-called works-in-progress presentation went quite well. Much interest and many questions.
It is not my fondest desire that the next time I teach I will be teaching as an assistant professor but it is up there in the top 10 or so on the stuff-for-myself-alone list.

The History of Love was fine but, really, it wasn't all that. However, Bird was a riot. If I were going to pick my role in the movie adaptation I would either be Bird or Bruno.

help wanted

Seeking responsible and caring individual to stand in for exhausted mother, lecturer and graduate student. The appointment will begin immediately and conclude on December 13. Responsibilities include: preparing and delivering lecturers, grading assignments, and responding to student needs; clothing, feeding, bathing, and supervising the activity of a wobbly toddler; completing grant applications and upcoming dissertation presentation, creating winter interview schedule, and overseeing survey scanning and commencing analyses.

google-ized

So, I feel like every time I go to blogger, they are making it more difficult for me to stay old school. Are they going to force this google-ization on me? When? Should I move over to typepad or some other platform?

I used to be a fan of google but am beginning to feel like they are getting to be a little too big for their britches. I know their employee practices are commendable and all but do they really need to acquire absolutely everything ? Yes, I know, the bottom line, increasing profits, etc. etc. but what about monopolies and separation of powers and all that?

meh.

I'm on campus using my prehistoric laptop (external wireless card, big and heavy, blue line down the left side of the screen, red line down the right) trying to get some work done (teaching of course, the works-in-progress presentation I'm giving in a couple of weeks is sadly mistitled) and am about to head over to the gym after quite a long hiatus (approx 6 weeks).

The winter doldrums set in early this year - during that mid-October spurt of cold and grey. At this point I am underwater - hoping that I will be able to hold my breath until the semester ends. I optimistically imagine that I will resurface with an exuberance and joie de vivre that will carry me through until the new year (my new year, folks, the hint of spring).

Anyway, I am truly off to the gym and not looking forward to the scale or watching how quickly my heart rate soars - likely reaching my target rate while climbing the stairs up to the cardio theater. I am looking forward to sweating and listening to my return-to-the-gym ipod playlist which includes toe-ticklin' tunes from MSTRKRFT, Spouse, Kekele, Pixies, Smashing Pumpkins, The Bravery and New Order, among others. On a related note, have I mentioned that I am enjoying the resurgence of the "post-modern" sound in some contemporary music?

if I were you, I would expect a quiz on Monday

I know lots of folks who feel badly about failing those who attend class. In general I concur that it is kind of crappy to fail students who are regular attendees, engaged in lecture and clearly putting in effort to prepare for class and exams.* It seems like nearly every semester I have a student or 2 who falls into this category - just doesn't seem to get it - and I spend significant time with them trying to get them to learn how to read, write and take tests. Anyway, these students I get. I am baffled by the students who come to class and do nothing and yet somehow expect that I will pass them despite their poor performance on exams and other assignments.

I hit an all-time low with one of my sections this week. One of my students entered before class and put her head down on her desk to sleep. Once class began her head stayed down so I called on her. She popped up and answered (albeit in a way that demonstrated she hadn't done the reading) my question and then put her head back down. I decided to give her the benefit of the doubt - paying attention with head down - a few minutes later however, there was a slapping noise which was the result of her hand (in her sleep) dropping on to the desktop. Further, there was much less student involvement than usual (e.g. no one responding to questions and comments) and one student, who made no mention to me of an early departure, packed up and left. Meanwhile one of my most annoying students (annoying in that she is outspoken in class at the same time that she doesn't prepare, generally late, AND to top it off added the class at the beginning of the semester to get an A to bring up her GPA (assuming, apparently, that my class - Sociology, after all - was an easy A)) closed her notebook and put her head down on the desk too. I had reached the limit.

"So," I said, "I am sorry. I didn't realize that this was such a horrible lecture. Should we just forget about it and I'll see you next week?"
[Silence]
"I mean," I continued, "I've got 2 people sleeping down here in front, other folks leaving and most of the rest of you sitting comatose. If my lecture is that painful for you all, let's not waste any more of our time, OK?"
[At this point a couple of my tried and true regulars said that they were paying attention and interested. Then the annoying student spoke up.]
"Well, I didn't do the reading so I really don't understand."
"Oh you're not prepared. All the more reason not to pay attention to a lecture in which I am going over the material you should have read before today."
[Silence]
"I will continue the lecture for those of you who are interested. However, I would like the rest of you to pack up. If you have a need to sleep, I highly recommend the sofas in the Union on the 3rd floor. We'll wait a minute so you don't disrupt us further on your way out."
No one moves. After a minute I recommence the lecture and abstain from soliciting any class participation. The sleepers are awake, wide awake. At the end of the period, most students exit through the back. I am still livid and, further, the lecture needs to be completely revamped.

*When this happens, I tend to fault the university for admitting students who are not up to the work and then not following through with services. The university I'm at now does a great job of making itself accessible to those from the community who are interested in being students but I do think that, if you are going to take tuition $$ from folks, you should make a commitment to helping them through successfully.

the stars at night

We were away the last 10 days or so - in TX. We spent time in Austin. Eh - not a fan - kind of a bigger even more all-the-inconveniences-of-a-city-with-none-of-the-perks town like Madison. South Austin wasn't bad and the bats were kind of cool. Then it was San Antonio. What a nice city! An old and walkable city center. The coolness (meaning temperature) of the somewhat over touristed riverwalk. A great place to visit. Last was San Marcos (pronounced locally sanMARcus) which ended up being a pleasant surprise. The outlet malls were on the outskirts and there was a nice little village center and even some good food (best vittles of all 3 locations).

Other things learned:
1. The smell of barbecue (I'm from Maine so the spelling is a guess) makes me ill - burnt flesh with a few spices rubbed in. It permeates everything. I can't even eat the bread or the beans without tasting it and feeling like I'm about to toss my cookies.
2. One can only spend so much time eating cheese enchiladas, rice and beans.
3. At the young age of 14 months I would guess that E has consumed less than 1/8 the sugar of the typical American toddler. I suspect one of the things she is going to enjoy about traveling as she grows older is all the crapola she gets to eat.* We have a pretty established diet of whole grains, unprocessed/sweetened fruits, veggies and legumes, and organic dairy products without additions. So, on this trip, we couldn't give E her normal whole milk organic plain yogurt and ended up with those typical yoplait and dannon-type things. 3 of the first 5 ingredients are some form of sugar! They averaged 12g of sugar per container (less yogurt than E usually eats at a sitting). They also contained less calcium and protein than a typical serving of whole milk plain yogurt. I can't believe people think of those things as part of a healthy diet.

*Incidentally, I didn't travel growing up (barring the trip to the mainland to shop at the mall and our annual family trip to "Funtown," a 30 minute drive from the ferry terminal and, in my mind, basically another country). All the same, my parents ruined their credit on a family trip to DisneyWorld when I was in 7th grade. They purchased a package which included meals at resort restaurants. I think I ordered a steak pretty much every night. Toward the end of the trip, as I was finishing off yet another steak, I turned to my mother and said, "I really like steak, but, when we get home, do you think you could make a green salad and macaroni with butter and pepper?"Sure enough, mom made that for our first dinner at home. She also made it for all my subsequent homecoming meals - home from college, home from Russia, first meal after the Nutcracker closed, etc.

[]

so very busy and exhausted and overwhelmed and...
E has given up her morning nap. I generally blogged, tidied up, and took care of self-grooming during this time. The house is a mess, my teeth are fuzzy and my hair greasy, and the obvious.
I am eagerly anticipating next semester - no teaching! My thoughts on this life, the academic one (always tempered by the all-the-time me), swing wildly between 2 poles. Some days I am invincible, a happy parent of a wonderful child and a budding sociologist with an exciting and important research agenda. Other days I cannot tell if it is mental fatigue or physical exhaustion weighing me down but all the same I cannot imagine a life in which I am any more than the something less than part-time academic/educator-in-training that I am now - at least until E and any subsequent siblings are off to school.
detours and derailments. some days they are a pleasure and others...

[rant]

I don't have much time because I have to go downstairs and start cutting up fall vegetables for roasting however, I just sat down to check my email and am doubly annoyed.

First, human subjects is still stringing me along.

Second, I received an email from a student. Not inherently problematic but get this:
This student has been registered for my class since the beginning. I first heard from her the third week of classes (via email) in which she explained her reasons for being a no-show up to that point. I sent her the syllabus and suggested that she should read it. I told her that I run a tight ship and that she had already missed 2 assignments and a quiz that could not be made up. She said that she would be able to catch up. She attended not the next class but the class after that and vanished for the next 4. Today she emailed me explaining why she was absent the last 2 weeks, asked for make-up work and inquired into what she needed to know for the impending midterm.

You've got to be kidding me!

What I want to say is:
THERE IS NO MAKE-UP!
THE EXAM WILL COVER 5 WEEKS OF MATERIAL ABOUT WHICH YOU KNOW NOTHING AND A BOOK YOU INDICATE YOU HAVE NEVER EVEN HEARD OF MUCH LESS PURCHASED AND READ IN ITS ENTIRETY.
I AM HAPPY TO SPEAK WITH YOU ABOUT HOW TO APPROACH COLLEGE EDUCATION BUT PLEASE DROP MY CLASS.

release me!

In all seriousness, IRB, you are messing up my life right now. Not only should I have been collecting data THIS WEEK, I cannot complete a research fellowship application requesting support for research that I do not yet have permission to do.

In my experience, the second you say you are going to be looking at how racial, ethnic and religious difference is interpreted and managed, they assume you are out to do harm. Even if you are gathering data on TECHNIQUES and CURRICULA they claim up and down that the people WHO WILL NOT EVEN APPEAR IN YOUR RESEARCH PRODUCT are at risk.

This is really an interesting case of the university managing knowledge production. I mean, I say I want to go hang out in a poor neighborhood to look at racial tensions and that's fine. Poor people are interesting reading and they don't sue. You say you want to find out how notions of diversity are produced and disseminated by power players and next thing you know we've been strung along for 2 months and asked to navigate all kinds hoops and hurdles clearly designed to get you just to give up.

Office update

As you may remember, I've been redesigning my office in order to create a space conducive to completing a dissertation. This will be particularly crucial when I lose my Milwaukee office at the end of the semester at the same time when the winter doldrums tend to set in.

At any rate, I LOVE my desk - so spacious with loads of leg room and surface area and I can look out the window when I need to move my eyes to something else for a minute.


While I've had the desk for a month, I just put up my new shelving unit today. It's Smart Furniture, but discounted stuff from their outlet store. As you can see, we can grow into the existing space and this unit is modular so when we move we should be able to reconfigure it to fit in our new space. We could also add on to it if need be.


Last major item on the acquisition list is a lateral file. This photograph shows where it will go and some of the material waiting to go into it.


We were hoping to get one "on loan" from one of our workplaces but, alas, none are available. I'm keeping my eyes peeled but if I haven't found something by the next credit card billing cycle I'm going to get the one that matches the desk.

On the wish list: an office chair and corkboard.

Apropos

best student typo ever:
excreta instead of etcetera

ode to human subjects

your hands around my neck
my voice is distorted, muted, silenced
knowledge/power culture/power corporate power
you protect those without need
and perceive risk only to your own skin
you limit what we may learn
and determine what can be known

verily

1. Teaching a repeat class is a good experience - allows you to work on balancing your teaching with research, service, etc.
2. Perfect weather today - hot in the sun, cool in the shade, memories of summer and hints of what is to come.
3. Here's something to do with all that CSA corn:

Preheat oven to 425
Cut kernels from 3 ears sweet corn and spread on cookie sheet
Spray with olive oil
Bake until golden (15 minutes-ish)
Drain and rinse one can of black beans
Chop (and all other sensical prep), combine and pulse in food processor
1 red onion
1 cup cilantro
2 gloves garlic
2 jalapeno peppers
4 -6 ripe roma tomatoes
1 red pepper
3 tablespoons of cider vinegar
1 tablespoon of vegetable oil
Juice of 1 or 2 limes
pour into large bowl and fold in the beans and completely cooled corn
add 2 diced avocados immediately before serving

whoops

A journal editor has asked that I review a manuscript. I suppose this is a CV builder too even if it can't be placed under the "publications" heading.

Is it just chance that I am getting this request? Seems odd but the editor made no mention of my advisors and I know they are clear that I want to be a BOOK reviewer.

on reviews

Apparently it is appropriate to have your advisor recommend you as a reviewer. If you're faculty I suppose you're supposed to make the contact yourself.

rapt

Today I was lecturing and noticed that we were running out of time. I began to speed things up a little and noted that no one had so much as capped a pen. This is uncommon in my teaching experience at this and my previous place of employment. In fact, I tell students on the first day that I find it the height of rude when folks pack up before I stop talking and request that they refrain. In general people comply with my request but, all the same, usually there is discernible change in the tenor of the class in the last 5 minutes. Today I thought to myself, "Damn, I knew this was a good lecture but I didn't realize it was that interesting."

Finally, about a minute after the class-time, I used my "I'll leave you with this [somewhat debatable statement] and we can pick up here Wednesday. Still no one moved and slowly it dawned on me. "We still have another 15 minutes don't we?" To which there were universal nods and a few snickers.

to all 2 or 3 of you

traffic is down lately. i feel a little disgruntled about it too. blogging without the help of jfw's sidebar is a little more lonely. seriously. anyone out there?

so i've written the first draft of a stellar book review and i've got some "feelers" out to figure out how to get it picked up. if things are going too slowly or not going at all, i think i'm just going to be brazen enough to email some editors and tell them that i've got reviews and, since they are in the review business, at least in part, we should get together.

doesn't this earthbound organic/natural selection foods thing bug you a bit? i did a little snooping around and it seems to me that natural selection foods is the packaging arm of earthbound and they also package for all kinds of other folks - many of whom are not organic. here are my questions: are all the greens sold under the earthbound label produced on the earthbound farm? if not, why is there no mention of that on the label or on the company (FARM!) website? are the other greens packaged by natural selection produced on earthbound acreage (meaning that the farm is not completely organic)? finally, what, if any, work is done to insure that organic greens are not processed with conventional greens or, for that matter, that the organic greens remain free of pesticide and other chemical residues introduced into the packaging facility by the conventional greens?

it's weekends like this that make me happy for community supported agriculture even if I am up to my ears in sweet corn and carrots.

2 things

1. To those who keep leaving copies of the new testament on the bench in front of my gym locker, on our steps, and in my office mailbox: thanks for being worried about my salvation and all but although it is true that I have not accepted Jesus Christ as my savior, it is not for lack of access to the New Testament.
2. Also, perhaps this is only hilarious if it depicts your current life fairly accurately but I laughed so hard I cried.

what was i thinking when...*

If I were put together enough to run any regular kind of posts, one of my regular "segments" would be entitled "What was I thinking when..." In these posts I would detail some glaringly stupid thing I had done.

For example:
1. What was I thinking way back when I was 5 years old and at Feeney's grocery on the island with Mitzii (yes, really) and her mom and I just popped a piece of gum in my mouth without waiting to pay for it or even asking if Mitzii's mom was willing to buy us a piece of gum?
2. When I agreed to teach 2 classes this semester?
3. When I stupidly announced that a faculty member had been offered and turned down a job at another department and I did this in a very public setting in front of that faculty member even though I had no idea how public that information was and I learned it through a member of the faculty at that other department who has his foot in his mouth even more frequently than I do?
4. When I said, "I swear to God" while giving a lecture?

Of course, if I were going to really do it up, I would elaborate on these stupid acts, including the lead in, how quickly (or not) I realized I was an idiot, exactly how bright red I became and for how long, and how my stupidity continues to affect my life even today.

*incidentally, I imagine this is the kind of post that prompts my partner to believe my blogging is risky activity.

Last night when I was giving E her bath before bed, she was splashing around like usual and she slipped and went under - the first time ever on my watch. I was right there. I saw it all happen and recall the detail so well it was one of those seconds that lasted forever. One minute she is laughing at the water she is causing to fly about and the next minute she is staring up through the water with a look of complete shock on her face. I pulled her out instantly and held her, getting soaked. She made a couple of futile attempts at gasping for air and then coughed a little, fussed for a second, and started to squirm in my arms. I thought to myself, "Well... she's OK so it's probably best to put her back in the tub for a second so she can end the bath on a good note and not develop an aversion to bathing or the water." I placed her very gingerly in the tub and she started laughing and splashing again - this time reaching across the tub for one of her bath toys. "Be CAREful," I said as she began to slip again and I took her arm to make sure she stayed alfoat. She laughed again!

At this point I decided that I was the one developing an aversion to her baths and pulled the plug both literally and figuratively. My partner took care of bathing tonight. As for me, I'm thinking she's old enough for the shower.

To blog or not to blog

My partner and I differ a little bit when it comes to our notions of privacy and risk. When we first moved in together, it was a constant battle between having all the shades up, the windows open, and the doors unlocked and living in a "locked down" facility. We've both regressed toward the mean a little. He doesn't feel the need to close all the downstairs windows every time he goes upstairs and sometimes he even leaves the outer door unlocked when he takes out the dogs although he is still pretty strict about keeping the blinds down and curtains drawn. I actually frequently lock the doors when I am inside and am not constantly running around the house undoing all the closing up he does. However, I still don't worry about closing the shades at night or drawing the curtains so that folks don't see me streaking from the shower to my bedroom closet.

My generally unarticulated philosophy on privacy goes something like this:
1. If you have nothing better to do than hang around waiting for a glimpse of me streaking to my bedroom, I feel for you.
2. If you happen to see or hear something "private" because the shades are up, I expect you to show me the courtesy of turning away and moving on. I would do the same for you. Privacy is, after all, a social arrangement. Living in close quarters (there is not more than 14 feet between our house and the next and there is only a wooden fence separating our backyards) means that we are privy to all kinds of information about one another. Instead of policing the public/private boundary, ultimately a futile task, it makes more sense to maintain norms for respecting the difference between public and private behavior.

Remember Goffman's story about how the Shetland Islanders would walk into one another's houses (same holds on my island home) but would make sure to announce themselves by approaching noisily? Were they to walk in on anything (within reason) private, they would likely turn a blind eye.

So here's the thing. My partner thinks I should discontinue my blog in light of my impending foray into the job market. He thinks that much of the information I disclose is too private and would be a problem if it became known to potential employers and he takes it as a given that my potential employers will discover my blog.

I tend to think that's baloney. First, I think potential employers have better things to do than trying to find out if I have a secret blog somewhere. Second, even if folks were to learn about this blog, I fail to see how it would color their opinion of me as a candidate provided the blog was not used to account for some previously recognized problem with me as a candidate. Lastly, although my posts here aren't constitutive of some joyous and empowering Whitman-esque (Whitmanian??) "yawp," I do value the opportunity to make a "peep" every now and then. SO, dear reader(s), I solicit your help in 2 ways. First, if you would be so kind as to respond to the poll, I would be much obliged. Second, comments are welcome.

Plan of Attack

Here's the plan. What do you think? Actually, unless you are going to tell me things that reinforce my fragile self-esteem, just remain mum, OK?

This semester:
1. Send out 2 (possibly 3) book reviews so as to take small steps toward overcoming the fear of disseminating research (to be completed by October 15 ath the LATEST). I'm much more comfortable commenting on other people's work so why not navigate the process a couple of times with written work that I feel OK about? I know, I should have been doing this all along.
2. Complete and clean up dissertation chapter 2.
3. Send it out to folks for comment.
4. Prepare thesis (I know, I know. This should have been done ages ago) for submission.
5. Find folks to read revised thesis and send it to them.

The break:
1. ASA submission- first run at chapter 3 based on data collected in initial field site (try to hijack panel with like-minded co-conspirators)
2. Revise chapter 2.
3. Revise thesis.

Next semester:
1. Send chapter 2 out for publication.
2. Send thesis out for publication.
3. Begin chapter 4 interviews.
4. Ongoing chapter 3 data collection in follow-up sites and writing.
5. Hunger data analysis and policy brief.

E's photo of the month: 1 year old

Can you believe it?

middle

there are so many mediocre books in the world. hopefully the not so random sample of books I've read over the past few days are not indicative of some accelerating devolution in research around race and ethnicity, particularly the African American middle-class and educating African American youth.

Sheesh. Can't we do any better than The Dreamkeepers and Black Picket Fences*, folks? Am I missing the really good stuff?

*I'm inclined to cut Patillo a little slack. It was her dissertation, after all. She deserves props for just getting the manuscript out. Further, I attended a presentation she gave at the ASA and liked it. Ladson-Billings, however, is too senior to have produced the book she did. I decided to use it to replace Bad Boys on my students' reading list because I generally have a number of future teachers and last semester they were hoping for a book that offered a plan of action instead of just spelling out how schools reproduce inequality. Ladson-Billings offers a plan of action. However, it hinges upon having the same cultural frame of reference as the students. She profiles 8 teachers (6 African American and 2 white). However, of the white teachers, one has an African-American cultural frame of reference and the other spent a great deal of time in African and has an equal number of white and African American friends. I fear that my mostly white suburban education students will come away from the book thinking that they don't have the ability to be good teachers of African American students.

refrigerator blindness

I'm back to Jeffrey Alexander again but only for a moment.

He's reaching on his application of the autonomy of culture and his requirement that cultural sociological analyses take culture as an independent variable. Ultimately, or at least based upon his own work, one must conclude that his theory cannot make predictions and only appears to have value when used as a retrospective explanatory tool. Furthermore, actors, interests and values, and other spheres of social life are left out of his "thick descriptions of culture." Yet they come sliding right back in again when Alexander attempts to explain cultural change and the succession of social theories. Instead of self-interested agents, economic incentives, politics, or other "non-cultural" factors, Alexander's theory rests on theory itself as an actor seeking self-preservation and ascendancy ("Broad theories can defend themselves by defining and protecting a set of core propositions, jettisoning entire segments of their perspective as only peripherally important" (Meanings of Social Life, p. 205)). Alexander constructs culture as an actor the same way states are constructed by Skocpol, individuals are constructed by rational choice theories, corporations by organizational theorists, etc, etc.

Ultimately Alexander is so adamant regarding the independence of culture that he really has no way to bring culture back into the world of material consequences without jettisoning that which is most important - an understanding of culture as the affective, dramaturgical and discursive context in which all action is carried out.

impatience

Anyone know when I can expect the books I ordered at the ASA? They're coming directly from the publisher so I kind of figured they would arrive quickly.

i'm here but i am tired. in lieu of a proper post, i am opting for bed.

inconvenient

The office is coming along great. I love the desk and now cannot wait for the shelving and file cabinet to arrive. I like it all so much, in fact, that I am thinking of renting a carpet cleaner so I can attempt to bring the carpet up to snuff with the rest of my new office. I also need an office chair, a corkboard, and some picture frames.

Yesterday was my partners birthday so we went out for a nice dinner and a movie. We saw An Inconvenient Truth. I enjoyed it. I think it's safe to say that my thoughts kept returning to a few specific things on the walk home (thankfully, I was spared the guilt of driving home because we live in a neighborhood in which we can walk to 4-star restaurants and movie theatres).

First, I kept wondering what my dad and Mary would think of the film. I think my dad would find it somewhat compelling and I think that Mary would either say that we just need to pray about global warming or she would say that there is no such thing at all and that people who think other countries are doing a better a job on the environment should just go ahead and move.

Second, I've decided that I am going to seriously curb my driving over and above the low levels of driving we currently do (I am going to be a mass transit and walking nazi). This endeavor is supported by the impending opening of Milwaukee's first Whole Foods which is minutes away from our place.

Finally, wouldn't it be nice to have a president who is ABOUT something? I don't think we've had one of those in my lifetime - a president who is really consumed by one particular social concern. The film reminded me that back in the 90s I was a huge Al Gore fan, read his book, followed the work he was doing on the Kyoto Protocol, etc. My partner thinks Gore should take another shot at the white house but I think that would be foolish. He won't have the party behind him and, besides, I think he may accomplish more as the man who should have been president - kind of a Jimmy Carter-esque position (I know Carter did a term) of having the moral authority and voice but not having the practical obstacles to pursuing the best ends.

An office worthy of a dissertation, Part I

We have a very nice house and we tend to keep it tidy and reasonably clean except for the dog hair tumbleweeds that like to blow about between vacuuming sessions. Our decorating is a bit on the spartan side - not a great many knick-knacks, etc.

Our house is great except for the office, which is a total disaster. See photographic evidence here:



I've decided that I need an office worthy of the dissertation I want to write - a corollary of my dad's obsession with "dressing for the job you want to have." The office worthy of the dissertation I want to write will have comfortable seating, loads of surface area and enough shelves for the books (and other assorted reading material) my partner and I currently posses as well as the books we will come into possession of in the next 24 months (presumably after that time I will have a job and an office at said job and some of my books will live at work).

I recently implemented phase one of the office reconstruction: ordering a spacious corner desk. Target's Furio mission style desk with hutch and computer desk have to go. Phase 2 is floor to ceiling modular shelving to be ordered during the next credit card billing cycle. Phase 3 is the acquisition of a lateral file no more than 42 inches long. I'm trying to do that one on the way cheap.

The desk has just arrived and I am about to start taking this office apart to usher in a new period of unprecedented mental clarity and productivity! Not sure how long it will be before I get my computer set up in the desk's CPU cabinet. Until then, adieu!

the end is near!

[click for more info]

I know that the last couple installments haven't been the best but here's hoping.

strong program

I'm really quite busy over the next few days and, it being E's nap time, I should be tending to a plethora of more immediately pressing things. However, I need to work through this a little bit.

I've been reevaluating Jeff Alexander's strong program of cultural sociology since the ASA. I decided earlier on in my graduate career that the strong program is a little too retrospective (in that it doesn't seem to have any predictive power) and a little too agent-less for me. However, some conversations I had at the meeting led to me think I should reconsider. So, I'm reading.

Anyway, in theory (used here as a figure of speech) I am sympathetic to the strong program which is akin in many ways to Foucault's study of the causal and arbitrary nature of language/discourse/knowledge (have I mentioned that I LOVE Foucault? Discipline & Punish would likely make it on my all-time top 10 READING list) but maintains the autonomy of culture, which is to say that the cultural realm is distinct from and not homologous (sorry Bourdieu) or reducible to other elements of the social world like the state, economic interests, etc, etc.

It is no wonder that Alexander's theoretical work is appealing to me. My entire larger research project, including my quantitative master's thesis and even my BA thesis, is concerned with the relationship between intention and action (particularly as both intention and action are mutually constitutive as well as necessarily referential to both internal and external meaning systems). However, I have never encountered an application of the strong program that works for me.

What I am looking for is a more microsociological theory of cultural autonomy that takes pragmatic (here used as a reference to American Pragmatism. I am thinking here about the importance of habit and intelligence in that pragmatic sense) and ethnomethodological (e.g. accountability to everday interaction) concerns into account. I want this microsociological theory to be the corrolary of a more macrosociological theory of culture explaining the development, dissemination and impact (causally speaking) at the macro level of culture structures.

Any ideas, folks? Seems like too large a project for the dissertation.

and down again

Not only am I crazy (see my comments here for proof), I attended a job market meeting today (yes, I know, not until next year but I worry that my partner is going to be offered a lateral this year and I want to have something to send out) in which I looked at CVs that confirmed no amount of cosmetic work is going to make mine worthy of the short list. Then I was off to a meeting with a faculty member I hoped would be a good collaborator/mentor/#4. This particular individual gave me a "we'll see."

Given that most of the faculty I know from taking courses and attending brownbags have left or retired and that I am not around the department to maintain and initiate relations with others, I feel like I'm really in a bind when it comes to rounding out my committee and coming up with a list of recommenders (let's bracket the fact that I'd also like a bit of a shepherd and agent when it comes to the job market). Furthermore, I would find it particularly painful to be told by a faculty member I asked that s/he would rather not recommend me/etc so I find myself not asking. I know I'm not around and I know there are a lot of grad students in the department and I know that it's work to write those letters, particularly if you want to do it well and say something about the dissertation but I also know I need some advocates.

For now, my ego mildly bruised after today, I think it best if I get through some of the books and articles on the stack and finish my syllabus for the fall. No danger of assaults on the self esteem there.

recovery

Better today although I'm decelerating when it comes to work. E doesn't have school this week - intercession - and my partner started teaching today. Thus, I am going to have a slow work week.

Something else about the ASA. Did anyone else notice that there were a lot of babies and small children present? Further, did anyone notice that those youngsters were usually in the care of their fathers or other male caregivers?

It seems too obvious to mention but I will anyway. The idea is, folks, that good dads can bring their kids to work from time to time ( and aren't they just such great parents for taking part in care-giving) while good female sociologists don't let children distract them from their work. We hear and obey!

shambles

Sadly, things have gone downhill since my last post. Back to feeling alone, invisible and "like butter scraped over too much bread." No new developments academically... it's just the rest of it, you know, the rest of life.

Is it just that I have been home long enough for the ASA high to wear off? Is blogging bad luck? Was it wrong to state what I had been feeling for days, that things are good?

Damn.

post hoc

Sorry, sorry. I thinking I'm starting to be over this endeavor but I've felt that way before so we'll just play it by ear, OK?

The ASA was great! If you haven't noticed, I am a bit socially and intellectually isolated out here in brew city. Thus, it was wonderful to have interaction and with SO MANY SOCIOLOGISTS! The whole experience really boosted my confidence in my work and made me feel better about my chosen vocation.

E and her dad had a nice trip too. They went to many of the museums and sites. My partner likes to visit old Olympic venues. Luckily for him, Montreal once hosted the Olympics. Luckily for me, I was too busy to accompany him on a tour. E loved our accommodations in Montreal. She was really working on pulling up and cruising - precursor to walking. She also diversified her mobility repetoire a little by adding conventional crawling (she is typically a butt-scooter) and crab walking to her skill set.

Anyway, the trip has energized me. First, I am no longer applying for asst. prof. positions this year. Instead I'm going to put the energy into getting one chapter finished and sent out to journals and 2 other chapters well underway. Second, I am going to put more energy into networking with other sociologists doing work sympathetic to my own. Finally, I've been ON TASK since we returned. I get through most of the items on my to do list most days (and I've replaced a lot of mom-ish chores with dissertation-ish ones) and put in extra work time during E's naps and, importantly, at night.

So, things are good.

not the ritz

One of the things we learned very early in our travels with E was that luxury is meaningless. Our first hotel visit was a night in posh room on the executive floor of Chicago's Palmer House Hilton. My partner had a conference. As we put E to bed at 7 that evening, it dawned upon us that we had nowhere to go and, our child being a light sleeper, we would neither be able to turn on the light nor the television without waking her. My partner went off to a cafe to work on his presentation while I sat in the dark, then moved to the bathroom to read, and then watched television very quietly until it woke E.

Since then we have either stayed with friends or rented suites. Here in Montreal we find ourselves in a fully-equipped 1 bedroom apartment in Hotel La Tour Centreville. The hotel is in a fabulous location just 2 blocks from the IGA (also something that counts for a great deal when traveling with a child ) and just 2 blocks from the conference site. It's nothing fancy. The appliance in the kitchen are old - that mustard color that they stopped making years ago. There are about 10 too many layers of paint on evertyhing and the color scheme leaves much to be desired. However, E can scoot around to her heart's content and she can spill her food without me feeling like we are trashing the place. (Maybe someday I will tell you the story of the blueberries and the 4-star hotel carpet but I am being upbeat today. Take my word for it, though, blueberries are best eaten at home.)

To top it all off, we have the unexpected perk of inexpensive wireless internet and a chinese restaurant in the lobby.

E's photo of the month: 11 months

hard place and elusive balance

Yesterday we visited friends in Chicago. Close friends. Kin, really, and, as it works with family (as the previous post elucidates), the relationships are often based upon shared history and the promise of continued contact, perceptions of acceptance and support, etc. Shared interests and opinions just don't count for much with family.

I think one of the reasons I have trouble forming friendships is the fact that I grew up in such a large family network and small community network. When there are only 6 kids in your grade and you're surrounded by extended family, you don't have a lot of opportunity to engage in much interest group socializing and boundary making when it comes to friends and cliques. Even now I have a hard time figuring out who my friends or potential friends are so I generally default to the approach-everyone-and-let-them-decide strategy of discerning who might think I am worth counting as a friend (given my characteristics as well as the individual's resources for forming and maintaining relationships). I tend to offer about 4 chances unless I am totally blown off in which case the "one last chance" rule comes into effect.

Anyway, I digress. That is not what I intended to post about at all. This is what I intended to post:

Yesterday in Chicago, one of the kin we got together was Dr. D. He's basically the kin equivalent of an in-law being that he is the kin of our kin. Dr. D has his own sad story which I may tell some day but suffice it to say for present purposes that he is an elitist and quite sexist. Over the years I have tolerated these flaws without comment but lately it's grating on me. The big issue is that he clearly dismisses me as anything but a brainless child-producing organism. For example, when we first saw him yesterday he and my partner exchanged their usual pleasantries:
"Dr."
"Counselor."
and then engaged in a lengthy discussion in which Dr. D asked my partner a great many questions about how his work was going, what research he was working on, etc. Some time later Dr. D turned to me and said, "How's it going, Mommy?" Not really waiting for a response, he turned to E to tell her how darling she is. We've had conversations in which I basically had to bully my way in saying something along the lines of, "You know, this is actually my area and I would like to make a contribution to this conversation if you think you can comprehend the wisdom of a social scientist."

Of course, it works the other way too. When E was quite young I would bring her to campus for my dissertation group and meetings with my advisors. Often I would bump into folks from the program and the first thing out of their mouths was "How is the dissertation going?" I took offense that folks would see my standing there with my new baby and not recognize that my dissertation wasn't really a priority at the moment. I felt like they were implicitly critical of my decision to rear a child.

So, yeah, damned if you do and damned if you don't I guess.

[]

i was just perusing the asa schedule and found at least 2 other students doing similar work. their cvs kick my cv's ass. fortunately, my cv is not publicly available so, when they receive my email requesting to get together at the meeting, they won't be able to google me and find out how awful i am.

who am i kidding? i'll never get a job. i really think i would be happy being a mom and working at the hunger task force or the humane society or the peace coalition or the urban ecology center. i mean, i really love teaching and consuming research and i have ideas for projects all the time but i really don't think i have what it takes to BE that person. you know what i mean?

Alleluia and Amen

I was minding my own business reading the newspaper from my field site when I happened across this story discussing my island home.

The island is home to all manner of people so I don't begrudge folks a Baptist Church and even a visit from Falwell himself. However, it is all particularly horrifying to me because this is the church that my dad has taken to attending with his new wife even if he does roll his eyes and claim that he is still a Catholic and even if he does side with the "liberal faction" in the family when we are discussing everything but homosexuality. There are some things about Mary and their relationship resulting in disquiet for me. Up to this point I have chosen to turn a blind eye because, quite frankly, I am overjoyed to see my dad happy and cared for and am willing to tolerate a whole lot of woohaa as long as that is the case. And, of course, there is the fact that my dad and Mary are all I've got and, although I used to be able to give my dad a dressing down when I deemed it necessary, I'm not sure that I've got the pull these days to get any more an invitation to show myself out.

throwback

Finally saw X3 yesterday. I liked it. I think they tried to do a little too much. I mean, you just can't get everything in there, you know, even if true fans get frustrated by neglected characters and plot lines. At any rate, I think Marvel has done pretty well bringing their comic books to the big screen. Mostly, however, if I'm going to see an action film, I would opt for a Marvel or other comic book adaptation pretty much every time because the plot and characters are so much richer than your average clicheed (imagine there was an accent OK) action film and heroes/villains.

Case in point, we rented "The Island." It was awful.

Anyway, that trip to the movies occurred during designated work time. We had our regular Wednesday afternoon childcare and instead of going to our respective offices we went for a really nice and insanely inexpensive lunch and followed it up with a trip to the budget movie theater. So, our entire afternoon out would have cost only $16.50 if it weren't for the $45 child care surcharge.

group w

10 calls in need of return. I'm waiting. Poor planning.

Middling

Perhaps this is why I find it fairly blah here in cheeseland. I have always said that it is "regular" here.

The question is, though, would you rather be a resident of a representative state? I wonder, if you polled folks from each state ahead of time about how much they thought it would be a good thing to be most representative of the U.S. population when it came to things like population density and home ownership rates (numbers that are going to leave extremely rural states and those with old-growth large cities on the outs). I would bet that, on average, folks would tend toward the condition of their state (e.g. folks in Hawaii would not consider it a good thing while folks in Michigan would).

The most 'representative' state: Wisconsin

By Mark Preston
CNN Political Editor

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Looking for a state that is a microcosm of the whole country? You won't find it in Iowa or New Hampshire -- there are 25 states that come closer to average statewide measures on important characteristics such as race and income.

[...]

Holland identified 12 key statistics -- four that measure race and ethnicity, four that look at income and education, and four that describe the typical neighborhood in each state -- and added up how far each was from the figures for the average state on each measure.

Holland said he chose these 12 different categories because "they have a strong impact on the political landscape in every state."

Close behind Wisconsin are four other Midwestern states that look most like a hypothetical average state -- Missouri, Kansas, Indiana and Ohio. Most of the least-typical states tend to come from the Northeast, including Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York. West Virginia is in 49th place, while Mississippi comes in dead last.

[...]

So, what makes Wisconsin so special -- or, to put it another way, what makes Wisconsin so average? It is about as close to the average state as you can get on most of the 12 measures included in this study.

[...]

"It's important to note that there are hundreds of ways of making this same calculation, and dozens of states could all make a legitimate claim to being the most representative state in the nation," Holland said.

To make the calculations easier to understand, Holland recalculated each state's score to produce a zero-to-50 scale -- there are 50 states, after all -- with a high score indicating a state that is more representative than a state with a lower score.

A ranking of the 50 states

1. Wisconsin 36.4

2. Missouri 35.2

3. Kansas 34.4

4. Indiana 30.8

5. Ohio 30.1

6. Oklahoma 29.9

7. Oregon 29.3

8. Nebraska 29.0

9. Georgia 27.3

10. Minnesota 26.9

11. Michigan 26.8

12. Washington 26.3

13. Wyoming 25.9

14. North Carolina 25.8

15. Florida 25.6

16. Montana 25.3

17. Virginia 25.3

18. Alaska 25.1

19. Pennsylvania 25.0

20. Arizona 24.8

21. Delaware 24.1

22. Tennessee 22.3

23. South Dakota 21.4

24. Kentucky 20.3

25. New Mexico 20.3

26. Iowa 19.6

27. Texas 19.6

28. Illinois 19.5

29. Rhode Island 19.0

30. Maryland 18.9

31. Colorado 18.8

32. Louisiana 18.3

33. Idaho 18.1

34. Vermont 17.9

35. Maine 17.4

36. New Hampshire 17.4

37. Utah 17.0

38. Hawaii 16.3

39. South Carolina 15.8

40. California 15.3

41. Arkansas 15.0

42. Alabama 14.6

43. North Dakota 13.8

44. Nevada 13.5

45. Connecticut 13.1

46. Massachusetts 11.6

47. New Jersey 11.4

48. New York 6.5

49. West Virginia 4.8

50. Mississippi 2.8

note of optimism

Meetings with advisors went pretty well this week although one advisor suggested a substantial reorganization of the project. Although I think he is right that it would make for a better project and a more interesting book, there is no way that I could finish the diss by the fall 2007 (seeing as I will have additional data collection to do in spring 2006) - a problem given the fact that I am going to try to sell myself to a few select places as someone who will have a Ph.D. by August.

Another problem: recommenders. I am so out of the loop I don't even know who to ask.

don't sweat the small stuff, right?

rocks along the starboard side

Working on this dissertation is a lot like being the captain of a sinking ship. Not the Titantic, however, more like some slapped-together, oddly-painted old wooden dinghy like the one belonging to Burt Dow, Deep Water Man.

it's been one of those days (weeks?) that lead me to suspect that I am the problem.

why am i such a freak/jerk/snowqueen/snob/puritan/perfectionist/nerd/bookworm/misanthrope/coward/poser?

Persnickety, pernicious, persimmon

Have I mentioned that we don't have air conditioning? Every year we (I) bring up the idea of purchasing a window unit but then we count the number of days we would have used it (it usually ends up being less than seven) and decide it would be a waste. In our case air conditioning would be particularly silly because I am a fanatic about having the windows open as much as possible from May through October (and even at other times of year. Basically if the temperature exceeds 60 degrees, I open the windows) and couldn't stand to give up use of a window for an air conditioner that I am only going to use 7 days of the summer.

It's all perfectly sensical but yesterday I would have signed a contract agreeing to keep my windows closed for all eternity in exchange for a little cool.

for free

it really irks me when people refuse to give without getting-- particularly when a request is converted in a bargaining discussion.

e.g.
[q]would you be willing to help me out next monday?
[a] only if you do something for me on friday.

so what you're telling me is you are able to help me out monday but you won't do it if you can't get something in return, right?

fair warning

I can hear you searching the coffee table drawers for the remote control. I told you that if you continued to leave it lying on the arm of the sofa I would hide it.

Sorry but I am a woman of my word.

[untitled]

I just don't have it in me right now, folks.

Part of it may be that after our treks the mundane seems a little too mundane to be blogworthy. I'm sure a large part of it is that I have enough mundane in my life that many days I am up by 6:30 and I don't stop moving, except for the occasional bathroom break, until after 8 p.m.

However there are a couple of items worthy of mention, and even discussion, although I am not likely to elaborate a great deal.

1. E started daycare this week. She's going 2 half days for the rest of the summer and 3 half days in the fall. She made the transition without any trouble at all. In fact, if I hadn't rationalized her obvious indifference to my leaving her as clear evidence of her sense of trust and security in her mother's love, I might be a bit upset that she happily scoots away to play with the daycare's toys the second I put her on the floor.

2. In the last 1.5 weeks I have doubled the number of times I've been to the gym in the past 10.5 months. I also brought my bike in for a tune-up and got a baby trailer. Heart health here I come!

3. I am going on the job market, albeit in a limited fashion, this fall. Not ready to apply to those dream jobs (and dream locations) yet, just throwing my hat in for a couple of openings in the area. I mean, given the difficulties of the market when you are coordinating with a partner who is also an academic, I would be crazy not to apply for available positions this year - they're small departments making multiple hires so I'm guessing they may not hire at all next year.

4. At present I find I can't eat enough cottage cheese and pineapple - two foods that I learned only in the past year that I can tolerate at all. Mostly I eat the cottage cheese with lettuce, snap peas and sliced tomatoes from our farm share. I eat the pineapple alone or with strawberries from the farm.

E's Photo of the month: 10 months old

Doors of Stockholm and vicinity

One of the things I do when traveling is watch for interesting doors and entries. Stockholm offered a specimen or two. So far my best sightings were in Tossa de Mar, Spain. We've recently acquired a scanner and, if I ever get this office organized, I'll set it up and scan some really great Tossa door photos for you. At any rate, here are a couple of doors, entries, etc. from Stockholm:

This first one is a knocker. The door itself was cool but difficult to photograph due to its size and location on a narrow street in the Gamla Stan, Stockholm's oldest neighborhood.


This is the old keyhole in a barn door in Uppsala.

Unfortunately I've nothing in there for scale but note how thin the actual door is.

This is my favorite kind. Door within the carriage door. You know there is some great open space behind that. That's one of the most intriguing things about older areas like this. On the street it feels so close and congested. There is nothing but mostly windowless walls and doors on the narrow streeta and then you get inside and there are plants and open courtyards and apartments.

You can get a glimpse of the green space inside through this door on the left. I also love the contrast and the close proximity of the two entries.

back from the hinterlands

We're back in Stockholm. Flying home Wednesday. Had a great time up in the land where the sun barely sets.
Enjoyed a smörgasbord with my friend's family. 6 types of picked herring. Veggies swimming in creme fraiche. Swedish shnapps. Mosquitos and the endless days of midsommar.
Loads of fun, truly.
Our 6 weeks of travel is soon to come to an end. How bizarre it will be to go home. I bet E doesn't even remember the place.

hej from stockholm

Busy, folks. We're having a great time. Travelling with the little one is a lot of work but not as much as you might expect.

Can you see these Swedish letters in blogger?: ö å ä

We're having a dinner party tomorrow night to watch Sweden v. England and the next day we are leaving to head north for Midsömmar - the solstice. Apologies to those of you who have been waiting for your invitation to the 2nd annual summer solstice party. We're going to hold it belatedly upon our return to the states.

A couple of mundane differences noted:
1. Pets are not spayed or neutered.
2. People don't use credit cards, they use debit cards.
3. The toilets have 2 flushing options, number 1 (small flush) and number 2 (big flush).

apologies

sorry. i have morphed so completely into my island self that i generally forget that i have a blog at all. there is something about this place - the contentment and completeness of the space i think - that makes it difficult to make plans, to return phone calls, etc. it's much easier to gadabout, read a book out in the yard, walk down to the ice cream shop for a cone and then walk "out backshore"to listen to the surf. to mosey on home as the daylight dwindles, throw some veggies on the grill and fall asleep in front of the red sox game. at night as you lie in bed you can hear the bell buoy marking the ledge in whitehead passage chiming away and, when it's foggy, the horns at two lights and portland head.

i told dad and mary that i was moving in permanently.

observations at home

1. I am old. How do I know this? The "grown-ups" of my youth are now old and grey and the islanders born after my departure are now the youth of the community.

2. I named E after my mother and it is so nice to introduce E to people who knew her namesake. So many people have gotten teary-eyed when they learn her name. It feels right.

3. This is the dog's last trip tp my island home. Although Mary was very kind to allow them into her home this trip, her home is not really fit for dogs. On the up side, the house looks great and my dad is as happy as a lark. It is so nice that he found someone to share this part of his life (kids out of house, retirement, etc) with. When I think about how much he and my mother sacrificed to raise all of us, it does make me sad to think that they didn't get the chance to enjoy this stage of life and marriage together. But at least dad is getting a chance.

moment of truth

The day of reckoning has arrived. Back when we were looking to get a family-friendly car my partner continuously trumped my but-a-station-wagon-will-be big-enough arguments with his claim that our drives out to Maine will require a mini-van. Of course, he learned long ago that the way to get what you want out of me is to somehow tie it to an increase in the frequency, duration and/or enjoyment of visits to Maine.

We have been packing for the last 24 hours and now loading has begun. I will try to snap a photo of the finished product but I highly doubt my partner, being the driven and task-oriented bloke he is, will allow me to run back into the house to post it for you all. He will likely claim that we'll get to Maine sooner if I don't take the time to blog and instead, say, make sure that we haven't forgotten anything.

meet the parents

sometimes my life imitates art except in my case it isn't art it's the movies, specifically, meet the parents, and life doesn't imitate art but instead recasts in an entirely different genre, say, horror.

(belated) E's photo of the month: 8 months old

ticking away...

although i don't generally go in for the hallmark holidays, i made of point of letting my partner know that i expected recognition today. apparently E decided to get in on the act by FINALLY starting to get that sleeping-through-the-night-and-taking-2-hour-naps thing figured out. if it sticks, i predict that life will improve immensely. let's face it, 8.5 months of 2-3 hour sleep blocks punctuated by the very occasional 4-6 hours of blissful shut-eye does take its toll.

anyhow, we slept in until 7:30 without any middle of the night feedings! we made breakfast and putzed around. after E's a.m. nap we went to the mke public market for lunch. we came home and the sun came out so i took the dogs for a walk on the river while E had her afternoon snooze. then it was off to the symphony for the family concert and home for baby bath and bed and the series finale of west wing. i've just finished grading so tomorrow i prepare for the great trek home to the island.

free at last and homeward bound!

master identity and total institution or "i'd like to thank the academy..."

I attended the departmental graduation ceremony yesterday. I make a special point of being present at the graduation celebration because I usually find it so heart-warming and encouraging. The event reinforces my hope that one day I, too, will finish my dissertation and that my advisors will have some nice things to say about my work and/or myself. Then I will get my moment to thank everyone. I can't tell you how many times I've daydreamed about that moment, standing up there and being done or at least done enough that in the fall my tenure-track appointment will begin.

Of course, yesterday I had additional motives. I like to attend departmental events to see folks. Since I am rarely on campus and have now been absent from the department at least as many years as I was in residence, I don't get much opportunity to keep in touch. Lastly, I wanted to bring E to the graduation. I guess I do have a little interest in showing her off but, ultimately, I want her to know that I am someone besides her mother, that I am a person in the world too. I know that she is too young to understand any of that now, but I guess I'd like her to grow up thinking of her mother as a sociologist-mom instead of having it be something that she must be taught explicitly when she is old enough for such lessons.

I am not sure how different the day was or if it was just me, but I ended up leaving Madison feeling defeated, insignificant and spent.

Many of the people I think of when I think of the department were not there for various reasons. This drove home the fact that the current department is not the department I knew. That the people I did know often did not recognize me (when I say they did not recognize me I mean that they passed over my face as they scanned the room for familiar faces not they didn't remember me when I said hello. I have discussed this elsewhere) confirmed that I am not a part of the life of that place now. If my day arrives and I attend the departmental celebration, I will stand before a room of strangers and my advisors, unable to share funny anecdotes or lament my departure as the loss of a regular companion, will say something about how I am an independent sort.

Then there was the whole motherhood thing. I thought that the event would be a perfect way to allow my mother and scholar roles/identities to interact. After all, the departmental graduation ceremony is a family affair, right? I was imagining that many other students would have their partners and children with them. I was wrong. Even students completing the program, with family in attendance, left the children at home. To top it all off, I brought my partner to help with E in case of trouble. He was uncomfortable since he knew very few people and he made me feel more awkward and out of place by trying to push me to socialize. Then E began fussing and he was forced to pace the hallway with her as there was no comfortable place for a dad and a baby to sit and wait. Naturally, he was grumpy and I began to suspect that I am a selfish and insensitive person for dragging my family all the way to Madison so I could feel connected, so I could persist with the illusion that the relationships between my disparate parts are smooth and seamless.

Good book?

I'm looking for a good ethnography concerned with the African-American middle class. One which focuses on intra-group class conflict in addition to particularly middle-class experiences with prejudice would be ideal. Suggestions?

No Play List

So, one of my best friends from middle school is getting married in a couple of weeks. Naturally, I am going home for the big event (and to get some sleep and to get grounded and to introduce E to the island and family and to eat some good food).

Well, the other day my pal K2(should be superscript) emailed me regarding her upcoming meeting with the DJ:

We have a meeting with our DJ on Friday, and we need to finalize the all important DO NOT PLAY list. SO much more inportant than what they CAN play...anyway, I've got a few, but I wanted to pick your brains to see if you could come up with any I missed. Here goes:

Wind Beneath my Wings
Old Time Rock'n'Roll
Any Celine Dion
Celebrate
We are Family
Electric Slide, Macarena, Chicken Dance, YMCA, etc
Any Vanilla Ice
Friends in Low Places
Love Shack (sorry kids, I know it was fun at Zootz circa 1990 but...)
Unchained Melody
I will Survuve
Shout
Pretty Woman
A Moment Like This
Paradise by the Dashboard Light (or really anything by Meatloaf)
Lady Marmalade
Any Michael Jackson

OK, well, see, I must be growing soft in my old age or, perhaps, I've spent too many nights at the karaoke kid because many of those songs would be on my DO play list (of course some, mostly the ballads, are right on). Sheesh... it's a wedding! I mean, Billie Jean, Shout, Love Shack... you might as well skip the cake too!

I've fallen out of touch with K2 over the years. If her eighth-grade self was picking the songs, I'd say we were going to spend the evening listening to Echo and the Bunnymen, Morrissey, the Pixies, the Replacements, Dead Milkmen, Bauhaus, Jane's Addiction, and Siouxsie and the Banshees. Fun, true, but odd to think about.

codswallop

There is nothing to make you feel like a failure as an educator so much as to reach the end of the semester, give your students a journal question that gets at the myths you've been seeking to dispel all semester, and to receive entries like (these are not actual entries):
"I don't know what we can do. Things are different now. Discrimination and slavery ended over 100 years ago."
or
"I think the counter-protestors are right. I'm tired of immigrants coming in and taking our jobs. No one wants them here."

News

Sadly, I get most of my news these days from the newspaper in the town where I did (am doing?) my field research. When life gets crazy, I fall behind on my newspaper reading. Eventually the stack of newspapers is just so awful to look at that I do nothing else (when it comes to academic work, that is) but read month and two-month-old papers. This can be torturous.

This evening, however, I was entertained by a parade of amusing, heart-warming and/or particularly Maine-ish stories. There was the letter to the editor requesting that the person who stole the writer's garbage can return it or, at the very least, come by for the lid so that the thief might get full use out of it. There was the account of the string of bank heists involving a suspect, still at-large, described as a man "“wearing a blue sweatshirt, jeans and sunglasses."” Let's not forget stray kitten that fell part way through a storm drain where it hung, head in the middle of a busy downtown street, until, less desperate measures failing, the fire department was able to free it using a chain saw and the jaws of life.

And then, there was this story, which gave me such a chuckle and made me homesick for what I believe is a particular Maine real-ness.

We used to collect dandelion greens and clams and fish for mackerel for dinner.

left behind

I recently submitted some conference expenses for reimbursement. I transmitted the information electronically as the conference program, the airline ticket receipt, and the lodging invoice were all electronic.

I received a phone call that afternoon:
I'm sorry, but we need the original documents.
These are the original documents.
I can't take copies of conference programs and accounting will not accept these for your lodging and travel. I need the originals.
What do you mean?
They have to be original.
Can you define that? I'm not trying to be difficult but I really don't know what you need because these are the originals. I don't have original credit card receipts or anything like that.
Well, you'll have to call the airline and get them to send you something. And this receipt for the lodging, it needs to be in color or have a signature or something.
OK... I'll see what I can do

Later, me on the phone with northwest airlines:
Yes, my institution needs an original receipt for my travel.
Don't you have the e-ticket and receipt we sent you?
Yes, but that's not original enough for them. Can you send me out something on paper?
We can but it will be exactly the same document and you will be assessed a fee.
Oh screw it. Thanks, though. I think I'll just print what I have and fold it like it was in an envelope.

pony up

So, that dearth of acceptances has now become a spate of panel sessions and, travel prices being what they are and my family situation being what it is, I find that conference attendance is a bit of a hardship. I've used my fellowship allowance and am applying for an ASA travel grant. Any other money out there, folks? Let me know, woulddya? No award is too small!

Maybe someday I'll be on the tenure track and I'll have a faculty development fund that pays for my conference attendance. Maybe sometime after that I'll be tenured and attend conferences for the heck of it or not at all.

U ass

Wouldn't you say that, although people often treat presume and assume as synonyms, there is an important but subtle distinction between them?
I'd say that when you ASSUME (and not in the sense of assuming responsibility), there is no necessary expectation that your assumption is based upon reasonable data - that you formulated your belief without reference to available evidence.
When you PRESUME, you're really a bit closer to inference - a reasonable guess based upon data.

load off

I think my presentation went pretty well. The discussant didn't really give me much useful feedback. I guess, when you've been thinking about something for such a long time, it's probably pretty common for people to bring up issues that you worked through aeons ago. At the very least getting feedback that encourages you to consider things you considered ages ago is better than getting feedback suggesting you've been wasting ages on a useless project.

Anyhow, it was nice to feel like an academic for a day (it's been a while!) and, further, to return to my family at the end of such a nice day and find that everything went well on the home front.

Consumed

I'm not really much of a shopper. If I need clothes, I go to Goodwill or the Gap or Banana Republic or something like that and just buy what I need. Usually I go to Goodwill first and then top of a trip to Goodwill with one to the Gap. I usually head to the back of the store (to the sales) first. However, I definitely don't shop around different stores looking for the best prices. I begin to melt down after about 50 minutes of mall shopping. I can last a little longer if shopping at small boutiques (e.g. Portland's Old Port). Furthermore, I would like to be somewhat fashionable but I have absolutely no interest in staying on top of what that means. That is one of the reasons why I like to go to the Gap or Banana Republic - the clothes have been vetted at least a little.

Back when my partner was about to start his faculty appointment, we believed we had "made it" and actually imagined his salary would leave us with much disposable income. One of things I said I would do with my share was to get a personal shopper who could keep me "funky stylish" in clothes that are designed for my shape (relatively larger top half). Ah, those were the days!

Anyway, I digress. I'm not much of a shopper so when I want to get something for E, I try the consignment shop and if it isn't available there I check ebay and if I can't find it on ebay I get it through amazon.com. I like to buy things for other people but only things that I think they really need or would enjoy having. I LOATHE getting countless generic gifts over the winter holidays and DESPISE giving generic, redundant and/or useless gifts just because I need to uphold the norm of reciprocity.

My older brother and his wife are very nice people and I enjoy their company a great deal but we have very different habits and preferences around consumption. They shop. If they have some time to kill there is nothing they like more than heading out to Walmart to peruse. They are always buying DVDs, soda, cheap clothes, those cheesy novelty items like that "mounted" fish who sings (remember?). They spend what I consider to be an obscene amount of cash on stuff like that yet they are horrified that we buy organic milk in the glass bottles, are willing to eat out at expensive restaurants and they begrudge us the traveling we do - they have been hoping to make it to Ireland for some time now. Don't read this as a criticism - in my mind they are the normal ones. So what's the big deal, right? Class distinctions. Taste. Straight-up Bourdieu.

Since E was born they have sent her a package nearly every month. Sometimes they send us cheap shit that goes straight to Goodwill, resale, or, in the case of the sugar-free chocolate bunny that arrived today, the trash. Sometimes they send us really nice and useful things. The packages always contain a variety of things collected from a variety of stores, presumably as they were shopping for fun. I always call and thank them on E's behalf. So, what the big deal, right? Wait. There's more.

They have a child, C, 2 months older than E. I call to ask what C might need and they say that they are all set with clothes because, as they live in Maine near family, they get so many hand-me-downs they are frustrated because they can't clothes-shop for C. My brother actually works at Toys R Us so they are always buying C toys. I've sent them books and developmental toys but I get the sense they aren't thrilled about them and, as I said, I hate buying gifts that people don't want. I just purchased a radio flyer wagon for C. I think that was a pretty nice gift.

So what? Why the long post? Here's what it is. This same brother and his family are much less economically secure than we are. They rent and they struggle to pay the rent each and every month. They have creditors calling them. They qualify for Medicaid and food stamps. My dining room table is from Pottery Barn. Even if we don't have much surplus income, we don't have any credit card debt and we don't forgo many evenings out or trips to Europe. I receive these packages from them which I appreciate for the caring that went into them instead of their contents. Not only should I be reciprocating, I feel like I should be reciprocating in proportion to my means but I don't know how. We offered to fly them out to visit us but they can't take time from work (no paid vacation). I would like to offer to pay their rent one month or to pay for C's diapers or something but I know that they would be offended if I offered something like that.

My partner says that I should try to discourage them from sending us things - encourage them to spend the money on themselves but I know that they really do enjoy sending E packages even if they do wonder from time to time why I am not as generous toward C.

So, there you have it. I am a big privileged jerk.

Treading Water

I'm busy. Apologies.
I went from being forgotten to being on a panel in that conference. They let me know I was included the same day they asked for the paper I had promised (whoops). That presentation is Saturday and I presented this past Thursday as well.
We had our first night on the town in more than 7 months - with a babysitter and everything this past weekend. We went to the symphony. It was lovely. However, babysitter's do make the evening a bit more expensive - $50 right off the top.
I gave my students a tough exam today so they hate me now.
E has been sick and cutting her two top front teeth.

the obvious

As a parent I find that I am almost never anticipating the disasters that befall us and I am frequently anticipating a disaster that never occurs.

Of course, that I generally take steps to avoid disasters I anticipate might have something to do with my false positives.

Your Scholastic Strength Is Deep Thinking

You aren't afraid to delve head first into a difficult subject, with mastery as your goal. You are talented at adapting, motivating others, managing resources, and analyzing risk. You should major in: Philosophy Music Theology Art History Foreign language

What Should You Major In?

Geography

In the next few months 3 of my 5 siblings will be making substantial moves. Whereas before there were 2 population centers for my family (back in Portland and Chicago), we are about to become much more diffuse. Since my youngest brother followed me out to Chicago in 1998, I have always lived within driving distance of at least one family member. That is about to change.

So, this dispersal has me thinking about how far-flung my family is when compared with my mother and siblings.

Here's my siblings and I with the distance between our birthplace and where we will be living effective 9/1/2006:
CL 7
AM 1176
MR 1469
AJ 1895
RL 3204
CE 433

and here is the same information for my mother and her siblings' current residences or, if deceased, last residence:
BC 3
LR 3
PL 191
DR 3
BR 3
BH 2
LV 4
JC 2
PR 2176
MD 2
TR 1
ST 1

Notice that, in my family, only 1 of the children lives in the metro-area/state/region of birth. While 10 out of 12 of the children in my mother's family live within 4 miles of their birthplace. Of the 2 living away, one lives in New England.

Finally!

I just heard from the organizers of the conference that forgot me. It seems it was, indeed, an oversight and not a reflection on the quality of my work.

That's nice to know.

island life, redux

I'm looking for a total institution.

My colleagues and I will regularly discuss our work over lunch and dine often at each other's homes. We will consider our occupation one of our hobbies as well. I want to see my colleagues at the grocery store, community center and my daughter's ballet class. I want my dean to live a couple of doors down. My undergraduates will be housed within walking distance and a graduate student will reside in the third floor apartment.

The community will identify as a university community. The bookstores will be among the best in the world.

I'm looking for a total institution surrounded by the world. The university, the department and the community will share the space with all manner of social problems and the multiplicity of responses to the world outside of the cloister will encompass the nativist concerns of those who seek to preserve the intellectual detachment of campus life as well as those who call for a university oriented toward the world it inhabits.

Respite

I went to bed at 6:45 last night. Of course, with the time change that was actually 7:45. E was up for the day at 6:00, which was actually 7. I was up to change/feed her a few times in that stretch but, still, it was a tremendously restful night.

We went out to dinner at Cempazuchi last night to celebrate the spouse's return. I had a drink(!), a cup of tortilla soup, tostadas florentina (whipped black beans, goat cheese, spinach and diced tomatoes) and natias, which is this fabulous pudding/custard which tastes like it is made from sweetened condensed milk. It has vanilla wafer cookies mixed in. We had a really nice meal. E sat in her new portable highchair trying, mostly without success, to eat "O's." She managed to pick them up and get her hand to her mouth but, somehow, releasing the food into her mouth is a little beyond her ability at this point.

It's Official...

I am completely exhausted. Another 7 hours until the return of the spouse. E just went down for her morning nap. I've already cleaned up from breakfast and put in a load of laundry. And now to bed!

I'm working on a review sheet for my students. One of the great things about teaching is that you learn so much! I wasn't a sociology major as an undergrad and, even if I had been, I would never have had typical survey/intro course. It would have been all primary texts and seminar. So, yeah, teaching simultaneously imparts a great deal of information about the subject and reinforces confidence because you already do know a great deal. On top of that it organizes your time and, to some extent, maintains your ability to talk shop (this is important for me since I have limited access to my home department).

Mom-ing

E just went down for a nap - she just stopped fussing about 10 seconds ago. I should be using this time for (in order of likelihood):
1. personal hygeine
2. eating
3. tidying up
4. sleeping
5. getting some work done

E and I had a really good day yesterday. While I was lecturing, she did great with the sitter. And we had such a fun afternoon discount book shopping. I picked up some "Priddy books" for her and a copy of Chabon's Summerland for me. I was planning to get Kavalier and Clay but Summer land was only $3.99. Then we stopped for a hot fudge sundae.

Last night while she was eating dinner we had a great running gag going taking turns blowing raspberries. She thought it was a total gas. When I picked her up out of the high chair she gave me this huge spontaneous hug and kiss (her kisses are sloppier than the dogs'). Sometime she gets completely overwhelmed by her emotions and at that moment you could tell she was experiencing extreme love. It was very nice.

Anyway, I really do need to make better use of this time. Today we are going to see the persnickety grandparents because last night in a fit of goodwill I called and asked them if they would like to see their granddaughter over lunch. I was hoping to meet them somewhere in the neighborhood in order to avoid having them come by the house but they just called to tell me they would be coming by at about 11.

So, here is the revised list of what I must use this time for:
1. clean house
2. personal hygiene
3. maybe a couple of minutes of shut-eye.

Airports don't count

As you can see, I have much traveling left to do.


create your own visited countries map

States in which my feet actually touched the ground, passing through on cars and trains does not count

create your own visited states map
or check out these Google Hacks.

awestruck

Kudos to all the single parents out there.
My partner has been gone for only 4 hours and already the next few days stand before me like a yawning, gaping, dark and damp chasm.

E's photo of the month: 7 months old (!!)

in reposone to Jeremy Freese's post: the sociological imagination

So, I'm reading this book right now, Diversity: The Invention of a Concept by Peter Wood. It's probably the most entertaining book I've picked up for my dissertation in the past year. I would love to spend a couple of hours sharpening my wit against Mr. Wood's criticisms of "diversity" and the multicultural left.

Anyhow, apart from coming up with a new metaphor for diversity (meaning the cultural approach to difference, not actual heterogeneity) - the town dump(!), Wood spends a great deal of time railing against diversicrats, diversidacts and all other manner of diversiphiles. What amusing titles! Despite the fact that I fundamental disagree with several key assumptions and, hence, the conclusions drawn, there are several moments in the text where Wood correctly points to a problem with prevailing approaches to difference.
That the ideology of diversity circumscribes what can count as a scientific explanation and, further, makes it a moral failing to do work that does not further ideological tenets (e.g. all culture is good culture) is problematic. The most critical limitation of diversity as a cultural framework is that it is designed for the university and the office - relatively impersonal spaces where social distance, interactions and norms are largely governed by institutional context. Prevailing notions of diversity provide no guidance for everyday living with difference - for life on the street.

If I ever write my dissertation, I will spend some time talking more about all this. However, seeing as I am on the sociology blacklist, it just seems pointless for me to keep working on this dissertation.

is there something you're not telling me?

Is there some sociology blacklist out there and is my name on it? You'd let me know wouldn't you? Just wondering because I have still not heard from the organizers of that conference. As my S.O. likes to say: I can't buy a bucket right now.

Nadir, take 2

I'll be the first to admit that I take everything personally. But, seriously, I really think I am due for a little reinforcement - something, ANYTHING, that indicates I'm not just awful.

Also, I don't want to be treated like I'm anyone special. Just the same consideration that anyone gets would be fine.

Lastly, I really need something, ANYTHING, to go smoothly and (relatively) effortlessly.

WTF?

I just received the schedule of a conference at which I was selected to present. Am I listed on the program? Of course not.

I am completely forgettable, perpetually lost in the shuffle, not worth "the time of day" in most people's estimations. I usually attribute this to some personality defect that makes me invisible but these people don't even know me.

Seriously, folks, all signs (both true and serendipitous) point to the fact that I have no academic future. Why do I persist?

Absurdities and Oddiments: Matters of Law

FROM Frigaliment Importing Co. v. B. N. S. Int'’l Sales Corp., 190 F. Supp. 116, 117 (S.D.N.Y. 1960).

The following is excerpted from the written opinion of Judge Friendly:

The issue is, what is chicken? Plaintiff says '‘chicken' means a young chicken, suitable for broiling and frying. Defendant says 'chickenÂ' means any bird of that genus that meets contract specifications on weight and quality, including what it calls '‘stewing chicken' and plaintiff pejoratively terms 'fowl'’. Dictionaries give both meanings, as well as some others not relevant here. To support its, plaintiff sends a number of volleys over the net; defendant essays to return them and adds a few serves of its own. Assuming that both parties were acting in good faith, the case nicely illustrates Holmes’' remark 'that the making of a contract depends not on the agreement of two minds in one intention, but on the agreement of two sets of external signs' —not on the parties 'having meant the same thing but on their having said the same thing.'’

Ah, weighty stuff! This was an historical decision.

But, actually, despite the absurd fact that a judicial decision hinges upon the question "what is a chicken?" I find it marvellously amazing (or vice versa) that the legal profession is able to deal so decisively with some of the headiest philosophical issues.

ProCite v. EndNote

I've got to buy bibliographic software. I've used ProCite in the past but it seems that a lot of folks use EndNote. Anyone able to speak about the differences between the programs? Also, how much work is it to move a library from ProCite to EndNote?

life's work: be what you are

On a family walk the other day my spouse and I were discussing our legal affairs --setting up our will so we know E would be provided for (and cared for by good people) if we both were to die.

Then we moved on to speculate about what we would do if one of us died. I promptly said that I would move home to Maine. My spouse said that made sense. Then there was a brief pause.

"Would you do one thing for me, though?" he asked.

"Certainly." I replied.

"Well, I've got three papers that I'm working on right now. Do you think you could just finish them up and get them published? I've also got a few papers that are forthcoming so you'd need to get them through the editing process."

I began laughing. "Sure. My whole life will have come crashing down around me but I will make sure that humanity is not deprived of your scholarship."

"What's so funny?" he asked defensively, "Don't you want me to get your dissertation research completed and published if you die before you do?"

"No. I can't say that the world will be worse off if my dissertation never sees the light of day."

"That's not what I mean. Don't you just want to know that it's taken care of?"

"No, I doubt that, in the event of an untimely death, I would spend my final moments lamenting all the research projects I've never completed. Thanks, though."

This, I believe, is why my spouse is a rock star, a force to be reckoned with, a scholar and an academic. Me? Not so much.

lost equilibrium

It's been a tough semester for me so far. Although I really enjoy being back in the classroom and my spouse has been mostly fabulous about sharing childcare responsibilities, I'm just finding that I am stressed and overwhelmed much of the time. I get myself so worked up about parenting by obsessing over whether I'm doing OK and know enough to raise my child well. I feel completely anxiety-ridden about my career, wondering if I'll ever get my dissertation done, those presentations prepared, my lectures written and then, of course, there is the job market - if I'm not job-worthy then why continue to work toward finishing? Then, to top it off, the tensions really mount in the interface between work and parenting: will she let me sleep so I can function tomorrow? Will I be shooting myself in the foot by bringing my family along to this conference? Who will care for the baby during my lectures while her father is out of town? Sometimes it all crystallizes in full-blown panic. This is not good.

I'm hoping to take this week to get my chi back in balance. I plan to use this summer to inventory my resources and work on building some local community and support networks. It really is difficult to not have anyone but my spouse. My Chicago siblings are both moving west (one to IA and one to CA) over the summer so I won't have any family in driving distance. I need to adapt.