Reflexivity

Maybe, just maybe? MoveOn.org is sponsoring a campaign to support the filibuster. This article explains why the real issue is consolidation of power in the presidency rather than abortion rights. CBS downplays support for the filibuster.
I just wrote to my Senators, Jim Jeffords and Patrick Leahy of Vermont:
Dear Senators,
Please reject the further consolidation of political power in the interests of only one of America’s many constituencies by participating in and maintaining the filibuster against Samuel Alito’s nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Effective democracy is founded upon the vigorous interaction of different viewpoints. Judge Alito’s record indicates a viewpoint that coincides with that of other Justices already on the court; in other words, his nomination contributes to a consolidation of one ideology rather than fostering the diversity upon which America’s proudest values stand.
The United States Supreme Court is the most symbolic enactment of freedom, independence, and the rule of law. It can only maintain its integrity if – within its own membership – it cultivates the freedom of interpretive choice based upon a wide range of independent ideologies. These ideologies must represent the broad range of cultural, social, ethnic and economic strata of the US citizenry, else the Supreme Court becomes merely a tool of a minority in power, rather than a judicial body vested with the interests of the nation as a whole.
Your courage in fighting for all Americans encourages and inspires me to believe that you will continue this good fight on behalf of deeper, more enduring values than the will to power.
Respectfully,
Stephanie Jo Kent

Popularity: 1% [?]

I missed a fundraising dinner on Tuesday night but understand it was compelling and that it’s going to be “a hell of a fight to get Bernie elected.”
Here’s his website which currently features an article from The Huffington Post by David Sirota, “The Most Important U.S. Senate Race of 2006.
Sirota: “Make no mistake about it – the GOP and its Big Business backers are going to do everything they can to try to knock off Sanders. They have already recruited a multi-millionaire corporate executive who has pledged to spend $5 million of his own money to try to buy the election. And Sanders faces special challenges because he refuses to accept corporate PAC money.” (italics added)

Popularity: 1% [?]

This Latin form of music and dance was the subject of Mari’s a colloquim yesterday “aiming to throw out some thoughts and cultural sites for discussion” on translation and representation. Ivy Queen is one of the hottest stars. Her lyrics have been picked up even by several generations of women, not just youth. The talk about reggaeton – debates about the social issues it raises – apparently parallels talk about previous forms:
tango, whose lyrics spread “The secret tongue of “lunfardos”, term used by thieves to refer to themselves. In this way watch became “bobo” (dumb-stupid) due to two characteristics, it is very easy to steal and it works all day long non-stop.”
mambo: “Since the mambo there has never been a dance that has given rise to so much unbridled fantasy and pyrotechnics or reached such rhythmic rapture.”
Merengue in the Dominican Republic.
Salsa didn’t spread as widely – perhaps (!) because it’s too hard for gringos to learn?

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 1% [?]

I did see this … wow. Grotesque, yes. A bit weird too. (Does such an opinion expose a puritanical streak?) I did laugh, although moreso revisiting it afterwards with my good pals than during. DEFINITELY “boundary-crossing” stuff, which George Carlin articulates well. Fascinating look inside comedy as an institution, too. Anyone for a socioeconomic class interpretation? Or are we talking basic social unredeemability – sheer outrageous excess? I always want there to be a message.
What’s the moral element in such totally and intentionally amoral performances?

Popularity: 1% [?]

Commgrad GEO stewards report:
This is the THE most important mass action that GEO is organizing this
semester and it is vital that we participate to protect our own interests. Comm grad students were very active last year in contract related protests. So we hope that all grad students, new and old cohorts, will take time to be at the rally.
In addition to our great turnout at last year’s A21 rally (link above), many of us also attended a bargaining session between GEO reps and the administration. Intense is putting it mildly.

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 1% [?]

“As Bakhtin puts it, one can ‘curl up comfortably and die’ with the abstract meaning of a sentence (MHS, p. 160), but not with its contextual meaning” (127).
A brief summary of Bakhtin’s three global concepts (according to Morson & Emerson) follows:

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: unranked [?]

Sure. (responding to Radhika’s request for more info)
Keep in mind, I’m teaching mass comm for the first time – so the students’ questions are all new to me. We read a piece by Stanley Aronowitz last week (”Working Class Culture in the Electronic Age“), which generated many questions about the relationship between particular ‘identities’ and depth of critical perception. For instance:
Is there a correlation between immersion and awareness? Take middle-class people and their representation in the media, does this lead them not to think deeply about the representations, whereas members of those groups not so well-represented might wonder why?
Are blacks in general more likely to notice their subordination because of secondary education and inferior resources made available to them &emdash; do these factors led them to notice the inequity more quickly than white children do. Is that regional?
After we saw Hall’s video, the questions intensified.

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 1% [?]

Briankle, in his book, agrees with Schutz that “the problem” of intersubjectivity is actually “an ‘intramundane problem’” (79). I haven’t read Schutz’ explication of what he means by this term; a simplistic online definition is ““being in the material world”, as opposed to “extramundane” (is this a synonym for transcendental?)

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: unranked [?]

Students in my Intro to Mass Media class have been asking similar questions (especially after viewing Stuart Hall’s Race: The Floating Signifier) as these two esteemed academics on the Association of Internet Researchers’ listserv:
Charles: My applied ethics class, we’re reading an essay by Robinson A. Grover, “the New State of Nature and the New Terrorism,” which argues that new media and globalization have brought about a new version of Hobbes‘ war of each against all, etc.
Radhika: hmmm
Charles: I attempted to buttress some of Grover’s claims with the work of Cass Sunstein, his notion of “The Daily Me,” etc.
This inspired one of my students to ask: are there studies, etc., that suggest that the new media, by giving us greater communication with “the Other” works to make us _less_ fearful of the Other, and thus, under some circumstances at least, _more_ likely to engage in aggressive behaviors, including warfare?

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 1% [?]

I’m finally reading some of Foucault’s stuff – Ethics: Subjectivity and Truth. I have to admit I’m enjoying it. It’s also kind of embarrassing, because I can’t help but recognize myself in various configurations of the technique’s of the self. Foucault identifies changes in the ways people used to write about the self, tracking several phases from the Greeks, through Christianity and the Renaissance. It’s sad he died in his 50s, one imagines he could have still accomplished a lot.

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 1% [?]