Recently I stumbled on a relatively new blog Tenured Radical that I really dig for it provides a compelling and witty, (if not at times very disturbing) picture of what I am soon to face, being I am at the cusp of starting an academic job. Not only is writing a real pleasure to read but she has a lot of good things to say and it is worth checking out (well maybe only if you are a student, academic, or university administrator though I reckon it may have wider appeal). At first, she blogged anonymously but now she has come out under the sun revealing her identity.

Her recent post on the problems of grading hit home, I guess because it seems like in the last week all my friends are talking/complaining about is grading given it is the end of the semester and all (I thankfully don’t have to worry about that till next year). Grades and granting them, have such a complex psychology and set of consequences for teachers and students alike and she gives a nice taste of what they are.

So, yes these three topics, the caveat, the book Better than Well and Hot Latino Bodies are related. You just have to stick with this long post to find out why…

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As I progress slowly but surely with my book manuscript, I am really coming to see how a dissertation and book are quite different creatures. I think one of the most important and noticeable differences is that a book has a lot more short caveats and warrants than necessary in a dissertation.

I think there are two main reasons for this. One of which is has to do with your committee members, the primary and (usually only readers) of the dissertation. They are a lot more prepared and adept to ingest complex ideas than lets say undergraduate students, because that is what they are trained to do and because most of them are much more familiar with your topic because they have been with it nearly as long as you have. In a dissertation you are also allowed to (and often expected) to go on and on, ad naseum, with your theoretical explanations that help substantiate what are otherwise shakier, initial claims. For various reasons, for a book, especially if you are not some FFT (Famous French Theorist), you are strongly encouraged to dump most of the theory in favor of providing a streamlined version (which really, is preferable of course, but extraordinarily hard to pull off).

I have been thinking a lot of the caveat because I have just finished re-reading a book “Better than Well” that is not only fascinating in its own right but brings the caveat to a stunning art form. The author, Carl Elliot, is a philosopher/bio-ethicist and the topic of the book, broadly speaking, examines how the rise of new enhancement technologies (prozac, plastic surgery, sex change surgery) is bound tightly with longer-standing, distinctly American ideals, such as the autonomous, self-directed and authentic self.

It is one of those rare books that can be read by your father, aunt and uncle, tossed over to a willing teenager, and assigned in all sorts of college courses and still manage to impress all sort of academics in all sorts of fields. Part of the reason for his broad appeal is because the book is thoughtful and clever and so chock-full of really interesting examples that you are hooked and want more of his tasty intellectual Kool-Aid. So while he has one main focus, which largely triangulates between enhancement technologies, selfhood, and consumerism, in the process of exploring them, you learn about a bunch of other really neat topics: suburbia, the history of cosmetics and childhood, odd social phobias, long-gone and culture- bound disorders like dissociative, fugue, amputee wanabee’s, extreme blushing, and so much more. Along with crystal clear writing, he also throws in some classically funny lines, my favorite one currently being: “For better or worse, suburbia has come to stand for something than can be survived only with minor tranquilizers.”

Another reason he manages to pull this Houdini-like feat is because of his judicious and artful use of the caveat, which is really the only way he can bring forth complex ideas, in a fashion that is much more accessible than is usually done in a purely academic book.

To take on example, when he introduces the usefulness theories of Thorstein Veblen, an economist usually known (and only barely), by academics, he opens in the following way, because in many ways, if you just decided to pick up a copy of Veblen, his style make strike outdated:

“Reading Veblen nearly a century after he wrote The Theory of the Leisure Class, it is not easy to know which parts of the book to take seriously. It comes off as equal parts intellectual theory, social satire, and crackpot polemic,” (and goes on for a full more paragraph) and then says “Where Veblen is prescient, however, is his sense that in a consumption economy, consumer goods would become markers of who we are.” p. 103

In this way he can say, “ok Veblen is useful because of this specific reason” and yet communicate to his academic readers that he knows the limits of Veblen.

No matter how much I love the book, and now matter how I think his use of the caveat is stunning, there are two problems I have with it. In one case, I think he fails to give one of the most important caveats.

He paints a picture in which all of American society is ensnared in dominant social codes and mores (which somehow all point back to consumerism and capitalism and a desire to improve the self). While there are points he seems to back away from that sort of statement, and a few rare points where he ascribes his insights to the group I think he should mainly be sticking to—white, liberal-leaning middle-class Americans—I think there are more instances where he paints a picture of America as far more uniform than it actually is. According to his account, no one is immune to the forces he so eloquently writes of and so in the end the environmentalist activist, is as caught up in the traps of consumer life-style as is the investment banker on Wall Street.

It lead hims to say such statements as

“Many Americans today learn who they want to be by listening to a Methodist minister or a civics teacher but by watching advertisements for The Gap.”

Ok while he bit about the civics teacher may be true, any consideration of lets, say… the religious right in this country, which, as we know from recent elections, don’t represent a teeny-tiny itsy-bitsy minority (and for a fascinating glimpse into the world, I would recommend Jesus Camp), would bring holes, and sizable ones, to that sort of statement. Many Americans do in fact listen to their minster. And this does not only help explain the deep divisions in this country, but I bet because they do listen to their pastors, their notions of the good, the self, etc, are going to be pretty distinct from those he describes (and gain see Jesus Camp to get at this point)

It is not that the religious right exists outside of the web of consumerism we are all at least partially caught in, and indeed, a lot of the new Protestant religious movements here and elsewhere as Jean and John’s Comaroff’s work has shown can be all about securing a more robust middle class lifestyle. But we must remember that even something as powerful as consumer capitalism or dominant ideals of an authentic, beautiful self—though powerful and more often than not work in concert with each other—do not quite have the power to efface all meaningful difference— between lets say a white, “liberal” middle class woman and let’s say, many Latinos, who, do, let’s not forget, comprise a huge portion of America. Many Americans have a very different picture of the ideal female body than the picture he explores, which is skinny and lanky and forever youthful (and hence the appeal of botox and lipo). Let me provide just one example drawn from the annual Puerto Rican day parade and this hold true for the one held either in NYC or Chicago.

Along with a blizzard of Puerto Rican flags, what you may also notice is the abundance of really bright spandex being donned on ladies that are not by any standard of the word “slim.” I am sure that any middle class lady (you know, the type who spends 5 days of the week working out at the gym, wishing her thighs were just a little thinner), would feel morally repulsed in seeing that sort of image, that is if they even bothered to go to the parade. But among many Puerto Rican men (not all) a sexylicious and extra-curvy, meaty Puerto Rican woman, decked out in tight & bright spandex, will like bring on a loud “HAY MAMITA, ven acá”…………………” which roughly translates into “You are HOT… Like I want you NOW.”

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Spring has arrived in many parts of North America. But in Edmonton, North America’s largest and most northernly city, spring has sort-of-come-but-not-really as it recedes fairly quickly. There will be a day of “explosive” warmth (you know, a balmy 45-55 F) and of course locals strip down to near nakedness, wearing shorts and, the more flamboyant will don an 80′s inspired cut-off tee. Hot. This sartorial statement says WE are SO ready for the long winter to leave … for good. Despite the collective sentiment, which is probably shared by 99.999999% of Edmonton’s inhabitants, the winter cold, snow, and breeze are indifferent to our deepest pleas and they come right back, making us sport at least a few layers of winter clothes.

Within this dance between winter breeze and spring warmth, I have spent most of my time staring at my computer doing everything possible to transform half-baked ideas, hunches, sentiments, and theories into coherent words, sentences, paragraphs, and chapters for my book. I am working on it full-force and am enjoying it more than I have in a year though from time to time I get fed-up, lost, sick of it, and my writing soul descends back, deep into one of Dante’s infernal rings, where I fester with my frustration, convinced that I should have become an organic flower farmer/acupuncturist that I almost became (well not really, but I have always fancied that combination as an ideal and fulfilling career path). Slowly I usually make my way back up, brush off the cobwebs of despair, and proceed anew.

Within this highly secluded life of monastic-like repetition, thankfully, I have been enjoying some new things this spring. Once a week I head over to an University of Alberta off-site library facility to pour over archive material for a new project, which I am not going to talk about here (it is super-duper-top-secret) but it has been interesting working at an archive, especially one that is housed in an old Ikea.

Since I am one of those right-brained people, I like to listen to music while I work, and lately I have also become pretty obsessed with house & electronic music, mainly thanks to a local DJ, David Stone whose weekly radio show on CJSR, BPM, is simply the bomb. He claims to bring the “latest and greatest of electronic dance music from around the world” and I think he is totally right. If you like this type of music, do catch his weekly show on Sat nights at 6 PM (MST).

I sometimes get a little sad when I listen to some good music or see some stellar performance because it reminds me that what I may one day have to offer to the wider world—an academic book and article here and there—simply cannot bring the type of joy that musical performance and other creative expressions can bring. While you can listen to songs and over again, a book, if it is really superb, may attract a second or third reading. An academic book or article may at times light an inner light of joy, but let’s face it, it is usually a pretty cerebral light oh’ joy, leaving untouched those part of the brain, soul, heart, where more visceral, mysterious, yet fully self-enveloping feelings of joy reign high (but I am trying my hardest to stick a funny section or two in every chapter to leave a trace of laughter because if I can’t manage that with an ethnography on hackers, I will have failed miserably).

Every track David Stone plays is something I want to listen to over and over again and thanks to mplayer stream dump function, I can. And funny enough, is that in the last month software—believe it or not—has brought me much joy as of late. I have been using free software since 1997 and I used to get A LOT more annoyed—no make that a downright frustrated—with programs (or lack of programs) than I do now. In fact, now, I am simply stunned whenever I upgrade to a version of a program. For example, Word Press 2.0 is like so much nicer in terms of usability and functionality than 1.5. The same goes for Open Office, the Gimp, and even Firefox, which has some bugs, but is so much better than its predecessors.

I once described free software using the well-worn cliché as “the gift that keeps on giving.” And I think that this is becoming more and more true. And like wine, with the passing of time, these gifts usually get better and better. And like a unexpected present that arrives on your doorstep, these software packages induce some joy, because it is actually pretty neat to see these programs develop and grow into something stronger and more useful; so thanks to those who spend their time hacking away at making and improving this software and thanks to those (you know who you are) who helped with my recent WP upgrade!

Lately a lot of what gets published on intellectual property seems to cover well-covered ground and so there is a lot of reinventing the wheel (and I find this especially so in Law Journal Articles, which are a very special breed of writing in that they usually make one point but it takes a seventy to a hundred pages to do so).

But this collection Symposium: Intellectual Property and Social Justice caught my interest and while I cannot vouch for even one of the articles (I just came across this five minutes ago), the titles at least seem original and interesting. And best, is that they are available for free download.

Awhile back, one of my favorite bloggers, Philip Dawdy of Furious Seasons, deviated from his usual posts that place a big fat critical magnifying glass under the marketing (and other shady) tactics of Big Pharma and wrote a very thoughtful, (also furious) account of Web 2.0 claiming:

this whole Web 2.0, social networking, virtual community business is essentially a pornography of the self—a projected, fictionalized self that is then worshipped by the slightly less-perfect self.

It is a little off the top at times but makes some really good points that I agree with (and generated a really interesting discussion).

It merits reading alongside Danah Boyd’s recent rumination on the very same topic, fame, narcissism and MySpace, where she seeks to address narcissism but she deflects blame the suite of technologies and places it instead on the broader set of cultural practices that sustain this accentuated inward focus:

My view is that we have trained our children to be narcissistic and that this is having all sorts of terrifying repercussions; to deal with this, we’re blaming the manifestations instead of addressing the root causes and the mythmaking that we do to maintain social hierarchies. Let’s unpack that for a moment.

These two read nicely with an older piece in Harpers Attack of the superzeroes: why Washington, Einstein, and Madonna can’t compete with you . The author, Thomas de Zengotita claims “Being famous isn’t what it used to be” because new technologies of mediation and reflexivity (and by new, he means a lot more than web 2.0, it includes reality shows, focus groups, karaoke, the hyper-representation of the real stars, alongside the usual suspects) and concludes that we life as if we were always on stage, concluding somewhat disparagingly “We are all method actors now.”

Of course, this is an important part of the story but not the whole story. There are times, for example, these social technologies help to patch up what is arguably as common in North America as is this narcissistic self, which is the fragmented self, that comes into being, for example because many of us, migrate here and the, for example, for work.

So a social networking site like Facebook, provides somewhat of a stable point of reference, where there are individuals collected, in the same place, even though the people are no longer really in the same place. It is at least a recognition of certain relationships whose “local” face has now passed but instead of completely completely fading into the realm of memory, the past lives on, albeit in transformed ways, within a virtual space. This facet of social networking is not particularly narcissistic, but is building new technologies of memory that I think works somewhat against the conditions that fragment the self. And while the patching up of the person may make an individual “whole” and “individuated” it seems it is a form that is much more mundane than the “pornography” or “narcissism,” explored above, though of course, they do abound–but karaoke, that is always pornography of the self. But… porn can be fun.

Here is an odd technological image (to make you smile I hope) and here is the not-so-odd Technolgy Quarterly published by the Economist.

For those that believe patents in theory are good idea but who are critical of the actual implementation of system, this project, Big Patents India is a novel and important project to include some checks and balances in the patent-application and granting system. It is described as the “first (and only) site with all post-TRIPs Indian patent applications online, searchable, and free” and thus adds a much-needed and important dose of transparency… I look forward to seeing how this new technology refigures the politics of drug patents in India.

Back in October I mentioned that I may soon try out Zotero, “The Next Generation Research Tool” that they claim is “easy-to-use.” Well after various upgrades, it has been installed and I am up and running with it. And I have to say it made me as happy as my morning cup of coffee, which is basically ecstatic. The software was not only a snap to install, but so amazingly smooth in terms of user interface and functionality.

While I wish this existed years ago, well, I am just happy it does now. I know it will make my life dealing with the infolanche of books, articles, and blog entries so much much less overwhelming. So thanks to all the people and organizations that have made Zotero happen. I love you all.

Mr Chopra, at Decoding Liberation has made some very fine points concerning why so-called high-failure in open source is nothing to fear. He is responding to a piece by Chris Holt who is responding to a piece by Clay Shirky recently published in the Harvard Business Review. I tried today and faild miserably to getthe Shirky piece. Can anyone get access to the HBR? If yes, please do send me a copy!

Recently, I got a comment on an older blog post on Edmonton that basically agreed with another comment that Edmonton was so not the cat’s meow. Despite the winter and many months later, I guess I still do think it is, although in saying so, it is not I think their assessments are wrong, I think my take has as much to do as what has come before (like NJ, which was not the high point o my life), my experiences here, and what is to come in the future.

I tend to like Edmonton because there is enough stuff to do but not too much to do. It is that whole freedom from choice that I like because I often shut down in the face of too much choice. What also colors my experience in a positive light is that generally, Canadian politics, social policy, and way of life, are a step up or two (or maybe three) than that of the United States. So the worst of Canada (if you are even to call Edmonton that, which I would not), in this regard, beats out the best of the United States. And I have lived most of my life in the US so that is my point of comparison. Even if you are living in a fantastic American city, you always face the possibility of struggling in ways that will *never* happen in Canada. It makes for a calmer, less aggressive society. For example, I recently learned that Edmonton has the highest murder rate in Canada, at a whopping …. 36 people per year (population of Edmonton = 1 million). I grew up in a place, Puerto Rico where the yearly murder rate hovers at about 700-800 per year (population = 4 million). And yet people here are freaking out over the high rate of murder, which is a good thing because hopefully they can bring it down but this fact should make the US pause and think about what they are doing up north to keep the murder rate so darn low (and the answer I think is pretty easy to find).

But perhaps a lot of my love of the place has as much to do or more with my state of mind. After a grueling year of finishing a dissertation under pressure as I had deadline, and then living in NJ where I was on the job market (which meant spending so much time churning out application after application and then flying around interviews), in addition to flying 7 times in one year to visit my mom, my life here just feels so much more sane than it has been in years. What sealed it all was that right before I moved here in August I was lucky enough to be offered a permanent job (which means this summer I will be moving to NYC to join this department and I will be back to the land of overwhelming choice), so that for the first time in 5 years I did not have to apply for anything in the fall that would guarantee my livelihood for the next academic year. I was not faced with a year of lots of travel (and actually traveling in out out Edmonton is really one of my least favorite things). With that firmly in place, I could just concentrate on things like my work, my friends, brewing kombucha and do things routinely, like exercise, which I had not consistently done for years.

There are things about Edmonton that I find totally obnoxious like the cities inability to plow roads leaving a thick glaze of black ice on the roads so that when you drive in the city, you basically are at real risk for an accident (and this is despite a 6.6 BILLION government surplus). There are a tad too many strip malls in the outlaying areas, and of course there is the infamous winter. We are still deep in it. The cold temperatures have been with us steadily for months now and according to folks, there are still two more months to “look forward to.” The cold and the constant layering of clothes are getting to me a little, although I do appreciate that the cold is just not as cold as one would think with the actual temperatures. The lack of wind, the dry conditions, the cute as chubby-as-anything- bunnies that run through the snow, and the overpowering sun all help to make -6 F much more mild, so it is not as bad as you would or I would think it was.

So while I am thrilled to join the department where I am moving too, I will be sad when I leave, though perhaps not as sad as Edmontons “darling” hockey player, Ryan Smith, who was just traded by the Oilers to the NY Islanders. The day he left, he literally was shedding tears at the airport. And I have to say, even though I have no attachment to hockey, I found the pictures endearing because there is nothing like seeing a grown Canadian man cry over hockey! : )