Ringing true...

Saints be praised I have actually begun to really work on my dissertation/prospectus. Well, really, I started a while ago, but now it is actually interesting me.

Something clicked when I started reading Julia Kristeva's Strangers to Ourselves. Although Kristeva's work naturally focuses more on the problems of immigration in France, much of this book will help me provide a ground work for my own discussion.

One passage in particular haunts me. Perhaps because it is more applicable to my own work about what it means to be home, than to the work for my dissertation; whatever the reason, I can't get it out of my head. Referring to the foreigner, Kristeva says,

"Melancholy lover of a vanished space, he cannot, in fact, get over his having abandonded a period of time."

I still can't quite articulate how this sentence reverberates in my soul. Maybe you can wrestle with it in the comments.

Distraction...

Really, I was going to post something academic, but I got distracted by this:



And now it's time for Project Runway.

End of civilization....

Really. Have you seen this? Fox's Hole in the Wall. Then again, I have just watched 20 minutes of it.

Daily Illustrations

Once a few months ago I tried to explain my dissertation topic to my Mother-in-Law. I tried to explain to her that I wanted to explore the way the language the media used influenced the way we think about immigrants. She heard language and thought I was talking about the increase in Spanish language media. Eh...I tried.

Today, unwittingly she provided me with the perfect illustration of the influence/power of language. Unfortunately, it's an example I could never tell her about. She'd been talking about Sarah Palin's speech yesterday. My MiL is in love with Sarah Palin. Then she went on to say something about the Democrats. I can't remember the exact sentence because she didn't say, "The Democrats blah, blah, blah." She said, "The Enemy blah, blah, blah." Well, actually the construction was, 'Blah, blah, blah The Enemy." And, yes, there were capitals in her voice.

My MiL listens to local conservative talk radio and watches Fox News. It's a running joke in the family about how liberal I am, but it must not really occur to her what that means. I don't really think she believes I am the enemy, but it's how she's learned to think about political opposition. That bugs me for everyone involved. I don't hate Republicans or Conservatives or Libertarians. I know, and really admire, lots of people with political views that are different than mine. I'm not saying it's only Fox News that promotes this kind of language. The Media (big "M" and all inclusive) is responsible and so are we, as a nation, because we like a good fight. But, what we need to realize is that it matters.

The true lesson here, the one that I can never really tell her about, is that although I know this woman loves me, I know she "Didn't mean it that way," it still stung.

Getting to know each other...

This semester's schedule is set up so that on Tuesdays and Thursdays I am ostensibly working on my dissertation. So far, well, you saw the ceiling. Today there is no dissertation work because I'm holding student conferences.

You might find it confusing that I'm holding student conferences right now and posting at the same time. It would appear to be impossible, but that is only true if student's actually show up for their conferences. Now, I guess I cannot be too hard on them. I did cancel class yesterday. However, even in the cancellation announcement, I made it clear that conferences today would go on as scheduled.

About that class cancellation. This is the first time I have cancelled class unexpectedly. It sucked to have to do it the second week of classes, but I didn't feel like showing up full of fever sweat and shaking with the chills. Actually, for a group of first-year students, they did a pretty good job of figuring out the discussion board assignment for the day.

Each semester it's tough to decide whether or not to do these beginning of the semester conferences, but when I'm teaching 101, I think they are helpful. It makes the students find my office and helps them realize that nothing terrible will happen to them when they come here. (Well today it might get them sick, but I'm making them sit far away and using a lot of purell.)

***I just got my first "Why I couldn't make it to the conference" email. The student said he rode his bike around campus and couldn't find our building. It could be legitimate, but our building is pretty big and brand new and shiny.

A new line...

This morning I got a little post birthday present in my inbox. The book review I wrote over the summer is being published in the October edition of the journal. Yeah!

It's my first 600 words in print and a new line on my CV.