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.

Modal/stereo/ideal Types

It is an interesting experience - teaching where I'm at right now. Generally speaking, I really like my students. At this point, having substantial interaction with undergrads at 4 different institutions, I've developed various ideas about the modal student character at each place. These are, of course, gross generalizations.
1. My undergraduate institution: nerds who attend class consistently, do the reading, and engage their study as a hobby as much as a chore. They don't really care too much about grades but that's probably because they've never really had to. They make no bones about the fact that they're living in the realm of ideas divorced from practical concerns and applications.
2. My graduate institution: hard-working students who attend class regularly and do the work. They tend to take a more instrumental approach to studying (e.g. how much do I have to do to get an 'A?') and care a great deal about their performance. The modal student at this institution reminds me of those over-achieving, anxiety-ridden, scholar-athlete, student-council types from high school. I'm just saying that's the sense I get.
3. Lectureship 1: these students didn't seem particularly interested in being undergraduates. They were enrolled in specific programs certifying them for specific jobs and did the bare minimum. The exception was the larger number of "alternative" students who were taking my course because they were in the 50s or so and enjoy studying. I loved those students.
4. Lectureship 2: these students definitely embrace the notion that college offers an extended adolescence for drinking and hanging out with contemporaries free from the responsibilities of adulthood and the watchful eyes of parents. They think nothing of skipping class, not turning in assignments, and performing poorly on exams. Because they see this as the way a college student behaves, however, the best and most engaged students in the class are just as likely to engage in these behaviors as the worst. I find that, within bounds, I really enjoy this no-nonsense, let's-skip-the-bullshit, I'm-here-for-the-party approach to undergraduate life. I don't hear from my students about why they didn't get an 'A' but they do come by my office hours when they are interested in the material. I guess what I mean to say is that they are more genuine in their interest when interested and, therefore, more of a challenge and more rewarding to teach than other types of students because the onus is on me to grab their attention and make the material matter to them personally.

Official beginning of the new year

It is with great pleasure that I announce the beginning of the new year! The quality and quantity of sunlight has reached sufficient levels to enduce euphoria and remind us of Spring.

*Last year the new year began on March 3.

hey!!
[...]
HEY! Can't you hear me calling you?
[...]
How can you be so cruel?
[...]
What's happened to our relationship? Don't you love me anymore? It used to be that you would come running before I even knew that I wanted you. You would just appear as I was getting ready to make my wishes known. But now, now you leave me here alone! What did I do to deserve this?
I still love you but you don't always need me. Right now you need sleep more.
Even if that's true, you always used to help me sleep.
I did. But when you were younger you needed help falling asleep. Now you are fighting sleep because you'd rather be awake.
So, what if I would? A girl's got to live, hasn't she? Why would I spend two hours lying here sleeping when I could be out and about putting things in my mouth, drooling, and laughing at those fuzzy four-legged siblings of mine? Life is a load of fun and I don't want to miss any of it.
I sympathize but there's an expression you should learn: quality not quantity. If you get a little nap in you'll enjoy your afternoon so much more than if you're overtired -- weepy and emotional, rubbing at your eyes all the time trying to keep them open.
That's not how it would be!
Baloney!
Why don't you give me a chance and we'll see how it goes?
Sorry, kid, mother know best.
Bite me you old hag.

looking-glass self

Somewhere along the way I lost my nerve.
I'd love to get my confidence back but the tricky thing is, who is making an accurate appraisal of the situation: the potentially megalomaniacal me that entered a doctoral program certain that the department's decision not to fund me was no indication of my potential; or the stuttering, nail-biting, second-guessing me that sees the departmental decision not to offer funding as the first in a long line of actions and decisions that I should take to indicate my status as a second-rate graduate student with limited potential?

How to be OK with it, corollary

I think the next thing you have to do is realize that you're nothing special.

When I was a kid my mother always said that she saw me as a politician's wife because I was smart and loved a good debate, or a news anchor because I could really shine in front of a crowd. I wanted nothing more than to be the next child star on "Little House on the Prairie," follow in the footsteps of Samantha Smith in bringing an end to the cold war, and, eventually, be a famous* political activist and author.

At some point you look up and realize that you're just an ordinary person who is leading an ordinary life and that what you do is just a job. To make more of it than that is pure arrogance.

*Further, you realize that famous is probably the wrong word. After all, Durkheim, Noam Chomsky, Thurgood Marshall -- these names are largely unknown in society-at-large.

E's photo of the month: nearly 6 months old

How to be OK with it, Part I

I think the first step is realizing that you're nothing special.

Shortly after my mom died, I found myself in Barcelona. There is a thousand-year-old cathedral in the old city. The cathedral itself is built on part of the old roman wall. At one time that old city was new. If you walk along the north wall of the cathedral, you can touch cuts in the stone laying at about waist level. Those grooves in the wall, according to locals I spoke with, were created over many years by roman sentinels sharpening their swords. When you place your hand in the grooves, the stone feels cool and smooth. You can stand in front of the cathedral on the same stones that millions of people, mostly long gone and forgotten and, likely as not, unremarked upon in life have walked.

There, in the center of an old city shortly after my mother's passing, I was first struck by the enormity of humanity and the insignificance of the single life.

There is no shame in being one of the nameless and faceless millions who pass through this world quietly. For every Churchill and Shakespeare there are hundreds of lesser known leaders and poets whose memories fade quietly and for each of those there are thousands more whose abilities to organize men and create verse are never noted at all.

I am not suggesting that these lives don't matter. Each of us contributes to the crush and clamor of life at minimum through contact - just like the bouncing electrons we learn about in high school physics. Perhaps, through our everyday efforts we make the world a better place in some George-Bailey-ish kind of way, doing good that produces good. But there is no harm in being unknown and forgotten. Even George Bailey was unknown outside of Bedford Falls.

Book: Nathan Glazer (1997) We Are All Multiculturalists Now

This is primarily a conjectural and doctrinal piece. How nice it must be to be at the point in your career when you can produce books in which the validity of your statements are derived from the fact that it is you making them!

Glazer is mostly critical of the multicultural push, particularly in primary and secondary education. He suggests that multiculturalism is a necessary evil, if you will, a result of the failure of civil rights era reforms to assimilate African Americans. Glazer believes African American assimilation will occur eventually but, the fact that African Americans are alone (he cites evidence that suggests Hispanics and Asians will assimilate in much the same way that earlier immigrant groups did) in failing to assimilate has undercut support for the belief in an eventual race-less American identity. Glazer laments the loss of attention to core American values and mourns the passing of the relative truth of the old "western civilization" perspective on history. He asks if the "center will hold" given erosion of belief in the possibility of americanization, etc.

Gut reaction: Thank you, Mr. Glazer, for your service. Your contributions will not be forgotten. But with all due respect, sir, you have taken us as far as you are able.

Football or baseball?

For me it's football but it used to be baseball and while I was walking the dogs this morning I was thinking that my switch to football parallels my move away from numbers.
I started college as a math major but grew frustrated with what I experienced as a gaping, yawning, dark and menacing chasm between the increasing abstraction you experience in upper-level mathematics and, you know, LIFE. In grad school I developed a similar aversion to quantitative work - it feels so far from the nitty gritty that makes things interesting and real.
Don't get me wrong, I loved logic and advanced calc and analysis and all that but it seemed empty and disconnected -maybe kind of like what Lacan says about the slipping of signifiers - in my mind it started being little more than brain candy. Anyway, former little leaguer and citizen of Red Sox Nation I may be, but baseball is a little like that- batting averages, pitching stats, a large sample, all this attention focused on the pitcher facing the batter while everyone else stands aside. Give me a short season with weather and lots of folks on the field contributing to the success/failure or each play. It's messy, unpredictable and complicated in its simplicity (4 tries for 10 yards).
So, yeah, that's what I was thinking about.

Time Capsule

We're coming up upon the 6th (!) anniversary of my mother's death. As you might imagine, her absence is a bit more conspicuous right now. At any rate, I decided to google her and came across the most random llittle time capsule. My island home may be a low-end Martha's Vineyard now. Back in 1977, however, it was a backwater fishing village. I think I am personally acquainted with every person named.

I wonder if this is why my mom's favorite remedies were vinegar, salt water(especially the Atlantic Ocean), baking soda, witch hazel, and freshly squeezed carrot juice.

2006 award for best use of a dying word goes too...

I've been trying to get a picture of a Hernia Moving Truck for as long as I've been in Milwaukee. Today I finally gave in and found one using Google Images.

You know, she doesn't look black. In fact, she is just about the whitest black person I've ever seen.

This morning I received this email from a colleague:

I just want to remind [you] about our commitment to Africology 2/22. Our topic is posted as BLACK PhD STUDENTS in the US: Panel on Graduate Education. I'm sorry I have been so busy and gone most of January so this one got away from me. I don't expect a big crowd. I anticipate a casual discussion about our road to graduate studies including a brief discussion about our work.

I responded:

Per your request here's my CV. So, my question is, is it OK that I'm white? I certainly am happy to present but I'm not in a position to speak on the topic of being a black doctoral student.

Colleague replied:

I know, [islander]. Don't sweat it. You can certainly talk about doing "minority" studies and some of your experiences in that area. I believe that the chair of Africology thinks we're all black..

The thing is, though I study race and ethnicity, "minority studies" doesn't really work either because, pathetic as it may be, I am mostly interested in "diversity" as a cultural imperative organizing our everyday approaches to difference.

The other thing is that this (having it assumed that I'm not white as a result of my research or position) has happened to me a few times now.