February 2003 Archives

Well, it sure would have been easier to do this daily...%-)

My buddy Raz, intending to keep debate lively, sends me this link to remind us the U.S. isn't the only country with economic links to Iraq.

Meanwhile, on another conflict with world-wide implications, I just watched a short (35 min) video, On Orientalism, which is an interview with Edward Said. He descirbes (my paraphrase) settling the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a litmus test for the future of humanity: we will either build walls, creating an increasingly segregated world, or discover ways to live together with differences. His insight into the centuries-long demonization of Muslims is a clear explanation of how "reality" is "socially constructed." Despite his incisive criticism of the western depiction of Muslims and Arabs, Said throws his lot in with other Arab intellectuals who believe a peaceful coexistence is possible. A couple of resources are the Israeli-Palestinian Bereaved Families for Peace and the MidEastWeb Gateway.

My own learning curve here is that the term orientalism does not refer only to the Far East (such as China).

While I promote these peace sites, I am constantly reminded that pacifism is an ism just like any other ideology.

One organization is trying to run local newspaper ads explaining to the American public that there is no proven link between Saddam Hussein and the 9-11 attacks. They cite "A recent New York Times
poll revealed that 42% of Americans believe that Saddam Hussein was behind what happened September 11th."
You can peek at the ad without contributing - just scroll down to the bottom, or you can donate to the cause.

Some reports on the Virtual Protest on February 26 from The Washington Post - "ANTIWAR PROTESTERS FLOOD SENATE PHONE LINES;" The BBC - "US 'VIRTUAL MARCH' OVER IRAQ," and The New York Times (requires free "registration") - "AN ANTIWAR DEMONSTRATION THAT DOES NOT TAKE TO THE STREETS."

Here are some current students' own weblogs:

Foundations of Education - My Foundations of Education Blog (Tracy), Inspirations (Deborah), cdarling (Crystal), and Lovetoteachkids (Darlene).

Another teaching resource is Teaching for Change.

Writing As Communication - Matt Henry's LiveJournal.

Some more general blogging references:

A terrific article by Jo Ann Oravec that gives an overview of weblogs as an internet phenomenon, Bookmarking the World, also includes many links to interesting blogs. The journal it's in may be of interest to teachers: Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy.

Aldon Hynes posted this comment and query to an academic listserv on Internet technology and communication: "I would like to return to (hopefully) the more germain topic of studying the role of the internet in the current issues surrounding proposed U.S. attack against Iraq. I remember from my days as a demonstrator, that an important aspect of the demonstrations was always gathering afterwards for a beer to talk about what had happened which helped galvanize the sense of commitment to the cause, sense of community etc. I've noticed what seems to be a similar occurance in blogs, especially after last weekend. I know that there are people here interested in the role of blogs. Is anyone looking at blogs as an emerging political tool?"

Finally, if anyone is interested in helping out with research on computer-mediated communication please complete this survey. It should take about ten minutes.

Yo! Had to take a few days off to take care of the psychosocial being (as my Alexander teacher calls it). Instead of doing homework and other professional academic-type tasks, I played. Out to dinner with friends and drinking beer with my uncle. Turned NPR off and listened to music. Ahhhhhhhhhhh. Now I can face the world again.

To wit, this site Abolish: The Anti-Slavery Project from one of my Sociology students.

And this immediate need to counteract government permission for companies to lie about the organic properties of their food products. In Vermont, both Senators Leahy and Jeffords are working to get this provision removed from the 2003 Fiscal Budget legislation currently on the floor.

Of note: In protest against the state's prohibition against gay marriages, a local minister announced from the pulpit Sunday that he will no longer sign marriage licenses when he performs wedding ceremonies, though he will continue to preside over religious ceremonies." Read Jay Deacon's Valentine's Day sermon, "Desire!"

I am crushed. Leda told me she agreed with Raz. She tried to soften the blow by telling me that my blog provides some "counterbalance to all the others that are sooo personal," but clearly, I'm boring. :-(

I want you to read me for my MIND! Not my daily catalogue of activities! Alas....Todd and I spoke later about a cohort gathering. We're trying to find a night to go out as some folk want to "get rowdy." Todd, teasing, said, "I don't get rowdy." "Neither do I," I said, more seriously, "but sometimes I dance."

Awesome photographs of the protests on February 15. I have a slow server and it took a long time to download all of them (literally about 5 minutes) but it was well worth it. My favorites are from Antartica and Prague.

More on the virtual protest set for Feb 26.

And some leaflets you can print for distribution.

Thanks to Aldon Hynes for the following sites:

A report of first-hand experience at the protest in NY. You have to do some scrolling (through a bunch of quite interesting stuf!) to find the entry on February 17th at 11:46.

A a business networking community centered
in London has had some discussion about the peace movement, note these entries:

Julian Bond on 17/02/03 - 09:16
Phil Woodford on 16/02/03 - 23:59
Leon Benjamin on 16/02/03 - 08:51
Dave Cross on 16/02/03 - 08:48

This morning, my daughter and I were snuggling on the sofa talking about some of our friends. It seemed like ìthe right time,î so I told her:

S: The next time you see [our friend] sheís going to look different.
H: What do you mean?
S: Sheís decided that she wants to be a man.
H: How do you do that? Whatís going to look different?
S: Thereís some hormones our bodies make ñ a kind of chemical ñ and boy bodies make a lot of one kind, and girl bodies make a lot of the other kind. You have to go to a lot of doctors to get permission. Our friend is now getting shots of the kind that boys have. Sheís already started to grow more facial hair. At some point weíre going to have to start calling her a he.
H: Why does HE want to be a boy?
S: I think she, he, feels like inside herself she is a boy, and her body just doesnít match.
H: Oh. Do you know other people like that?
S: Yes, Iíve met people who were once girls and are now boys, and boys that have changed to girls. It works both ways.
H: Do you want to change to be a boy?
S: No, I like being a girl.
H: Me too. ÖHow does [her girlfriend] feel about it?
S: She's having a hard time. She wants to be with a girl, not with a boy. But she's hanging in there and will see what happens...
S: I think Frankie (our dachshund puppy) always knew that our friend is really a man ñ remember how she (the puppy) always barks at men but not (as much) at women? And she always barked at our friend, even before any of us knew she was thinking about changing.
H: Sometimes I know that people are really what they are on the inside, not the outside.
S: Yeah, itís kindof confusing when we talk about someone being ìreallyî a girl or a boy according to what their body is ñ because inside themselves they always felt they were ìreallyî one way, even if their outside body doesnít match their inside picture. Anyway, itís kindof private, I wanted to tell you now to give you time to think about it and ask questions, to get used to the idea.

We spend a lot of time talking about whatís right/wrong, how appearances can be deceiving. Harry Potter is one of our constant frames of reference. Professor McGonagal seems mean but sheís got a soft spot in her heart for all things Gryffindor. Snape flirted with the dark side, and even though his personality is still creepy, seems to have come around. Hagrid looks scary, but we know about his compassion for weird and wild beasts! Then thereís the folks who look pretty but are mean and selfish (we have some of those in real life, no need for fictional characters).

The whole thing about diversity has so much to do with appearance. Most Caucasion Americans imagine a ìwhiteî person as the quintessential American, despite the fact that non-European immigrants (voluntary and otherwise) helped build the country from day one. And this weekís Newsweek proclaims the end of deafness as a victory. I was writing about media framing yesterday, this one is almost beyond the pale, asserting as it does to speak on behalf of members of American Deaf Culture. According to Jim Reisler, itís a good thing to eradicate American Sign Language since it is not ìa shorthand version of English.î Yeah, why not? Who needs another distinctive language? Who needs the heterogeneity? Why fight to keep a unique form of human communication, whose use might yield insights into human capacities and potentials we have yet to tap? Herald the age of technology ñ through which we can all become the same!

Well, itís Day Ten of the flu. Slept 16 hours last night plus an hour nap this afternoon. Is it over yet?

My buddy Raz checked out the site: on the plus side, lots of links, on the down side, ìimpersonal.î Sigh. Iím ìso serious,î as Hunju likes to tell me. :-) Itís the teacherly part, I guess, combined with a bit of nervousness about the medium ñ am I ready for this (potential) exposure? We shall see.

Two new protest opportunities upcoming.

Speaking of which, in Global Culture and Communication last week we discussed the ways that the media frame the news. Folks in class were mighty frustrated that despite huge turnouts at peace protests last weekend, the major news media still privilege Bushís incessant war talk. My local paperís headline after the protests last weekend was, ìBush Shrugs off Protests,î which seems accurate, if disheartening. While I have heard coverage and commentary about the protests on NPR, the percentage devoted in the overall mass media to official White House sources vs the percentage devoted to peace activists is huge. In todayís paper thereís a story about Ben and Jerryís (yes ñ the ice cream guys) attempts to get anti-war advertising on tv ñ the networks keep rejecting them because the ads are deemed ìadvocacyî and/or the images ìtoo graphic.î

This weekís Newsweek provides an illustration of framing: a four-page spread with a huge picture of protesters in London. The story is about historical differences between the US and Europe when it comes to war ñ being as Europe has been ravaged and the continental US never has. This is obviously a legitimate and interesting point ñ but the framing is such that one would never know there were hundreds of thousands of protesters in the US too!

Then, there is the case to be made that weíre not really engaging in a debate about whether to go to war or not, just slinging two opposing dogmas at each other. Bush & Co. say ìFIGHT FIGHTî and the anti-war folk say, ìDONíT DONíT.î Personally, I am conflicted. The fact that 60% of the Iraqi population is 100% reliant on food aid says a lot about the kind of dictatorship in place. Iím displeased that thousands of innocent people will die if we attack, but, as my feisty friend says, isnít it worse to die of hunger? What compels me to protest the Bush offensive is twofold: mistrust (I admit it) of his (and overall US) motivations. Fear that Saddam will finance or otherwise aid terrorists is not a reason to undertake the myriad risks of attacking him now. This seems to me a strategic cover for more crass goals related to corporate economic interests. The second reason is more idealistic. There is an historic opportunity here to be part of a revolution that is literally and practically ìof the peopleî against the massive institutionalized structures of our society that in many respects no longer work for us (the people). The US needs to be accountable to the UN, and we need to rally to make sure that global governing structures are enabled to do the job of considering The World. Otherwise, weíll end up like that future envisioned by Kim Stanley Robinson in which ten ìtransnatsî run the show and national governments are a relic of the past. Do we really want to become a ìglobal shopping market,î as envisioned by management guru Peter Drucker? So much for vaunted human aspiration.

Anyway, for a thoughtful critique of intellectuals' unreflective support of the peace movement, check out this article by Jonathan Rosenblum.

Well now, I've been stumbling along learning the blog software for Blogger.com (with intensive tutoring from my intrepid computer guru, Ben Tucker!) for the last several weeks. It's time to "go public" and share the site with my students. Some of them (perhaps, you!) will choose to establish their own weblogs as a project for the Foundations of Education course. Ben tells me Blogger is probably the easiest for beginners, but there is an array of choices, and some may give more options for the technologically more sophisticated.

Please go to the Weblog Kitchen for a list of possible software programs for your Blog. And get ready to play! :-)

The blizzard comes! Our usual pre-storm flurry � water, flashlights, wood. It�s a way of life in Vermont, but I feel for the folks further south who aren�t accustomed to winter precautions and inconveniences. I anticipate we may lose power this time, as the cold has been so intense for so long the trees will not have much flex in them as the snow weights them down.

Quickly then, the New York Times finally starts to take the anti-war demonstrations seriously, not just one but two headline stories today! (But you can't read them unless you subscribe.) Instead, look at this breakdown of 11 million marchers worldwide compiled by the Independent Media Center.

[the FP] and I recently watched one of the Bill Moyers interviews with Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth. He was quite a compelling and inspirational guy. In speaking of teaching, he said (something to the effect of), "If you're going to teach anything, teach people how to live!"

Somehow, I've got to inject some enthusiasm into the Writing class. I haven't successfully conveyed any compelling reason for the first couple of assignments. Some of the students found their own reasons anyway (which is what good writers do - they take a thesis or assignment and take it in/take it on, turn it into a vehicle for thier own purposes and ambitions while staying true to the task), but most have not. I'm considering asking them to substitute their OWN "assignment" for the personal narratives. What if I simply give them their choice?

Some interesting things shared by some of my students: an 8th Grade Final Exam from 1892 and a recent article on Bush's use of religious language. Also, a speech given to the US Senate by Robert Byrd, which I found via a link at Wil Wheaton's blog. Wil (aka Wesley from Star Trek's Next Generation. Star Trek lives!) posted about marching against the war with his mom in LA yesterday.

And a little social construction of reality from the United Nations: according to Maureen Dowd of the NY Times, ""Mr. Powell can't very well seduce the world into bombing Iraq surrounded on camera by shrieking and mutilated women, men, children, bulls and horses..." Hence, the Guernica cover-up - Picasso's anti-war painting, typically on display at the UN, was shrouded lest it offer ironic counterpoint to Powell's call to war.

Check out the world-wide peace demonstrations yesterday, as reported from Britain. The international coverage is somewhat different than that in the U.S., where mass media outlets are still seeking to downplay the size and significance of the protest movement.

This is historic ñ the first time that the power of the people has been mobilized on such a large scale to counter institutionalized authority. Can Bush continue to lead the U.S. into war based upon the designs of his own coterie?

Meanwhile, Iím reading two different literatures, one from the business school and one from a critical communication perspective. Iíve been struck be different definitions of the term, liberal. In the international sphere, the policies of establishing free trade and the free flow of information are described as liberal ñ because they remove barriers for corporations to compete in a so-called ìfree market.î Understand, this is supposed to ìa good thing.î Domestically however, liberalism refers to policies that would do the same for individuals - supports, aids, compensations to enable, allow, permit individual persons to overcome systemic barriers and accomplish the goals they seek. It seems highly ironic to me that we have designed a system that increasingly privileges fictional entities (corporations) over real, flesh-and-blood entities ñ you and me.

Mattelart describes the last three centuries march toward ìglobalizationî as an effort at homogenization, but questions the outcome of the capitalistic, so-called rational system weíve created: ìThe homogenization of societies is inherent in the unification of the economic sphere; their fragmentation is the corollary. The gap is widening between market rationality and cultures, between a technoscientific system that is being generalized and the wish to affirm a sense of belonging. This distortion is turning the outcome of humanityís march toward integration into an enigmaî (p. viii).

Mattelart forces me to consider the utility of teaching a sociology course such as Ethnicity and Diversity in the U.S. when the forces that are most powerfully shaping our world today have shifted the boundaries so far beyond internally-conceived borders of ìdifference.î My consolation is that as a teaching strategy, one must begin with situations that are familiar enough to students that they can perceive the dynamics at work and then make the leap to potential larger-scale consequences of constant repetitions of these dynamics. As a teacher then, I constantly struggle with my ambition for studentsí growth and the possibilities provided by context and structure (such as introductory level courses and expectations of certain curricular objectives to be covered).

Finally, a long piece on courage that pays homage to the astronauts of the Columbia. I heard an elegant letter someone wrote to NPRís afternoon classical music program about how the reach for the stars embodies all of humanityís striving for betterment. The loss of their lives has deep symbolic value for all humanity, especially as we seek to carve out peaceful solutions to endemic problems.

Brookeís weblog, ìConfessions of a Student Teacher,î reveals the internal struggles that a teacher faces, and reminds me that the most important thing Iím doing at the beginning of a class is ñ selfishly? - creating the conditions under which I can teach. My group relations background and its emphasis on authority relations as a central theme of any groupís developmental process has given me more confidence that I can be explicit about my expectations (ìRules and Regulationsî I call them in the Jr. Writing class at UMass) and allow the relationships to emerge over time, as we all sort out our orientations to the learning task and each other as co-learners. Thereís a paradox here ñ about accepting ñ embracing? - the authority I have as an instructor (without denying, masking, or minimizing), and then co-creating WITH students a relationship within this context that serves the task of learning.

In the early stages of a group, everyone is ìfeeling each other out,î so to speak ñ determining to what extent (or even if) their needs, desires, hopes, fears, etc. are going to be able to be realized. By being comfortable in the role of teacher and all the authority that it does bring, I think I can make it easier for students to become comfortable in the role of learner. As the Jane Kenyon poems demonstrated for the CCV ED class ñ teachers have incredible power. Not just over kidsí self-esteem and orientation to education per se, but over their future. We are the ones who assign grades and evaluate educational success that co-determines (with other factors, of course) future tracking and its unavoidable relationship to ultimate career possibilities. The desire to have a relationship and be liked by students is a short-term goal that may (not?) serve them best over the (hopefully) long span of their lives.

The balancing part of this kind of approach is keeping myself focused on what it is we are supposed to be doing together. For instance, in the Jr. Writing class, the students are supposed to be improving their writing about subjects that fall within the purview of the communication discipline. How can I cultivate a climate in which feedback about writing ñ a sensitive subject for most people ñ can be taken as instructive, constructive, supportive, and encouraging while pointing specifically to things that need improvement? And, English is not my background. Perhaps my reliance on structure is in some ways compensation for lack of experience with the subject matterÖalthough I think I emphasize structure as deliberately in the online CCV Sociology classÖI donít recall if I have done so, so much, when Iíve taught either Soc or Interpersonal/Small Group communication on-the-ground (in a face-to-face, traditional classroom). So there is this too, simply the degree of familiarity with the subject matter.

Now, for K-12 education, some resources. The National Association for Multicultural Education produces a wonderful journal, Multicultural Perspectives, and hosts an annual conference brimming with training and the latest research on teaching about and managing differences, including ethnicity and gender, most prominently, but also sexual orientation, religious, and other forms of social grouping.

Current events can provide entre to acknowledging differences and making bridges. For instance, see this story about Yao Ming, the Chinese basketball player making waves in the NBA (involves signing up for a three day free trial). You may consider joining DiversityInc.com (5.95/month) for daily stories on issues of diversity in the U.S. I currently just get the free listserv index of stories, which gives me a taste of whatís out there.

Another listserv I am on is from Tom Atlee, who is the founder and co-director of the non-profit Co-Intelligence Institute.

Tom has recently put out quite a bit of information on the apparently impending war with Iraq (although I still say donít discount the peace movement ñ but get busy if you want it to work). He offers two listservs: one that focuses primarily on sustainable co-intelligence and another that provides a comprehensive range of the ìstuffî he uses for his sources and might be of interest to others. Email Tom at cii@igc.org and put in the subject line "subscribe regular" or "subscribe HI-VOLUME."

Here is his latest compilation:

INDIVIDUALS WITH GOOD EMAIL LISTS
To subscribe, write to them directly. --

John Steiner at steiner_king@mail.earthlink.net
Rick Ingrasci at rick@bigmindmedia.com
Caspar Davis at prana4@shaw.ca
S Culver at ksvp@sinewave.com
Dan Drasin at Ddrasin@aol.com
Marty Greenhut at martyg@bcn.net

WEBSITE-BASED LISTS
In addition to having useful email lists, Tom marked them as follows:
* Very informative website (check it out)
** Includes archives of messages (so you don't have to
subscribe to an email service, but can check
their messages on their Websites).

(Listed in order of their importance to me (Tom) and the percentage of their messages that I read or at least scan.)

* ** New Heaven New Earth. To subscribe, send a blank email to nhnenews-subscribe@yahoogroups.com. Check out their Archives.

* GlobalNetNews. To subscribe OR send a blank email to globalnetnews-subscribe@yahoogroups.com. You can also (or alternatively) subscribe to their once-a-day email summary, with thumbnails and links to orginal sources, by sending an email to globalnetnews-summary-subscribe@yahoogroups.com. (VERY HIGH VOLUME)

** Stephan Schwartz. Check out the Archives.

* Truthout. Subscribe here for article titles plus links.

** Voice4Change [specifically news and info of interest to peace movement activists] and their Archives.

* Interhemispheric Resource Center.

We�re into the second week of courses now. The division of labor between me and [the FP] in the online education class points not only to our areas of expertise, but to essential personality differences. She�s done a huge amount of work on the relationship end (responding in depth to student introductions), and I�ve done the more structural stuff (trying to clarify expectations around assignments and performance). It highlights to me that my connections with people come through joint engagement with a certain task (which could be anything we�re mutually interested in), whereas [the FP] connects with people first, and uses that connection to facilitate the task. Our styles are almost opposite in this way. This may have a lot to do with our chosen audiences too � [the FP] moves between high school and college, but I have only taught at the college level. Certainly the age group one is working with requires different sets of skills.

The writing class at UMass is going well, I think. My pace is slower - more measured -than last fall. Hopefully this will facilitate more reflection and engagement with the writing process than the frenetic energy I brought before.

In my Global Culture and Communication course, we�re reading The Global Media: The New Missionaries of Corporate Capitalism by Herman and McChesney. The authors show how advertising (by advertisers � notably transnational corporations) has come to manipulate, dominant, and control the content of global media, ever pushing towards entertainment instead of �public service� engagement (which could lead to intelligent debate about large trends such as the spread of corporate capitalism). The �dominance of advertiser interests under conditions of advanced technology�makes it possible for advertisers and the media to segregate people by income class, allowing concentrated service to the affluenct and in the process creating �the electronic equivalent of gated communities.� Instead of unifying, the advertising regime divides� (p. 142, referencing Turow). Because sex and violence sells internationally (no language translation issues), it is pervasive. Any commitment to the welfare of children is clearly only rhetorical: �Half of primetime dramatic characters engage in violence and about 10 percent kill, as they have done since 1967. Children�s weekend programming �remains saturated with violence,� with more than twenty-five acts of violence per hour, as it has done for years� (emphasis mine, p. 146, referencing Gerbner and Signorielli).

It's a bit unnerving to be reading this while taking the Organizational and Administrative Theory course, in which the roots of this kind of associating with others in groups called "organizations" are explicated. It's not hard to grasp why there are such strong trends of apathy and pessimism about humanity these days. Even without impending war with Iraq.

As teachers then, we need to be aware of the HUGE socializing influence of the media � both in terms of ADVERTISING and CONTENT, not only upon those whom we teach, but also upon ourselves. Careful examination of the assumptions and values underlying the daily taken-for-granted aspects of our culture must occur if we are to minimize the transmission of values with which we inherently disagree.