I have two-thirds of a front porch, that may not get completely rebuilt before the house gets placed on the market. Comps start three weeks from tomorrow. My advisor is, as always, idiosyncratic. I need to get my stuff together to apply for some jobs for next year. Tomorrow morning, I have the test on my lymph nodes to see if they're cancerous.
But as I put Katie to bed tonight, all that just didn't matter. I stood in her dimly-lit room, her lullaby CD playing the Beatles' "Across the Universe," and she and I looked into each other's eyes. I kissed her outstretched hand. I rocked her in her rocking chair- the chair my mom used to rock me in. I stroked her arm, and she began to fall asleep. I put her in her crib with her favorite blanket. I came out here to write because if anything does happen to me, I want her to know how much I love her.
As we sang "Happy Birthday" to her yesterday, I nearly starting crying. It's just unbelievable that the past year has already passed and that I have such a beautiful, smart baby. But I'm reminded, yet again, that she's what matters. This other stuff is for her to help her have a good life.
So I'm going back to finish reading James Clifford's "On Ethnographic Authority." 'Night.
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Saturday, July 26, 2008
Friday, July 25, 2008
Katie's first birthday!
Katie one year ago today, about this time, just a few hours old...
Katie, today, napping as I write.
Katie, today, napping as I write.
Monday, July 21, 2008
The death of Katie's pumpkins?
I was just weeding in my vegetable beds, and I think the pumpkin plant may be dying. It's humongous, nearly took over the other bed, and has a serious presence in our neighbor's yard. It seems, though, that the central root area, where I first planted it, is dying. More specifically, it looks like something's been gnawing around the cord-like stems. But, the other parts, which have began to root into the ground, look okay. It's just near the main root system that it seems to be dying off. There are no leaves in this area, they've all been outsourced to my neighbor's yard.
I wonder if the root system has to compete too much with the foliage that covers the fence. There's a lot of bamboo. Also, the other plants look wonderful, even the tomato plant I sort of mangled transplanting it from the container. I hope this isn't some slow spreading disease. Or, does anyone know how tolerant pumpkin plants are to wet and rather humid climates? It's been really wet all summer.
If anything, we'll have to just buy the pumpkins for Halloween, but we loved her jack'o'lanterns last year and hoped to repeat it this year. Otherwise, I would never have bought the plant. Any ideas?
I wonder if the root system has to compete too much with the foliage that covers the fence. There's a lot of bamboo. Also, the other plants look wonderful, even the tomato plant I sort of mangled transplanting it from the container. I hope this isn't some slow spreading disease. Or, does anyone know how tolerant pumpkin plants are to wet and rather humid climates? It's been really wet all summer.
If anything, we'll have to just buy the pumpkins for Halloween, but we loved her jack'o'lanterns last year and hoped to repeat it this year. Otherwise, I would never have bought the plant. Any ideas?
Household espionage
Just something that gave me a good laugh last night:
Eric was sitting at my desk in our rolling chair. The chair is directly across from the door to Katie's room. I was on the couch, and saw her crawl out of her room, carrying or pushing- I don't remember which- one of her toys.
A few seconds later, Katie was over at the dinner table, grabbing something off of the top of it that she shouldn't be. Eric tried to roll over to her to get the whatever-it-was out of her hand...
"I've been sabotaged!" He said.
Evidently, Katie had stuck that toy she was crawling with behind the wheel of the chair and Eric couldn't roll it over to grab the thing out of her hand.
My little spy. She is a crafty child.
Eric was sitting at my desk in our rolling chair. The chair is directly across from the door to Katie's room. I was on the couch, and saw her crawl out of her room, carrying or pushing- I don't remember which- one of her toys.
A few seconds later, Katie was over at the dinner table, grabbing something off of the top of it that she shouldn't be. Eric tried to roll over to her to get the whatever-it-was out of her hand...
"I've been sabotaged!" He said.
Evidently, Katie had stuck that toy she was crawling with behind the wheel of the chair and Eric couldn't roll it over to grab the thing out of her hand.
My little spy. She is a crafty child.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Making sense of some readings, Part II: U.S. Third World and Postcolonial Feminist Theory
From the Introduction to Scattered Hegemonies: Postmodernity and Transnational Feminist Practice, by Inderpal Grewal and Caren Kaplan:
Our reading of postmodernity displaces Western mystification of non-Western cultures...What does not get recognized in this form of neocolonial discourse is that Western culture is itself, as is every cultural formation, a hybrid of something. Yet the dominant Western attitude toward hybridity is that it is always elsewhere or it is infiltrating an identity or location that is assumed to be, to always have been, pure and unchanging (p. 7-8).
The term "global feminism" has elided the diversity of women's agency in favor of a universalized Western model of women's liberation that celebrates individuality ad modernity (p. 17).
The question becomes how to link diverse feminisms without requiring either equivalence or a master theory. How to make these links without replicating cultural and economic hegemony? For white, Western feminists or elite women in other world locations, such questions demand an examination of the links between daily life and academic work and an acknowledgment that one's privileges in the world-system are always linked to another woman's oppression or exploitation (p. 19).
This reading is for the exam question that I am writing "in dialogue" with my committee member. I don't know exactly what that means, but I sent her a list of questions I see emanating from these readings. I've focused on this book today, but it seems to summarize much of what I'm reading for this exam. It also prompted me to make a connection- well, I'll get to that.
Here's the background:
The feminist movement in the U.S., or in the West, I suppose, is said to have three "waves": the First Wave was largely in the 19th and early 20th Century, as women agitated for the right to vote. In 1919, we got it. By around the 1950s, though, a woman named Betty Friedan was cooking up a book that you may have heard of: The Feminine Mystique. The Feminine Mystique, or, the problem that has no name, has actually been portrayed beautifully in the television show Mad Men. It's the malaise and depression shared by housewives confined to the home, unhappy with their limited choices in life. In one scene in Mad Men, Don asks his wife Betty what she has to be unhappy about- she has the "perfect" suburban life with two kids, a beautiful house and even a dog. She answers, nothing.
Perhaps you've picked up on it already, but this rendition of the "feminine mystique" has a major shortcoming. Betty and Don are white, upper middle-class, as was Betty Friedan and the other leaders of the Second Wave. And as women like Alice Walker, author of the Color Purple, and Audre Lorde pointed out, they and their mothers never had the problem of being bored at home; they were working, cleaning the houses for women like Friedan.
What evolved into the Third Wave is the work by women of color, writers such as Angela Davis, Gloria Anzaldua, Audre Lorde, bell hooks, and Cherrie Moraga, who highlight the class and race-blindness of the Second Wave. In other words, the women who created the National Organization for Women in many ways were/are blind to the different experiences women who are not white or who are and come from difference classes. The oppressions a black woman, or, a Latina, or particularly a lesbian who is black or Latina multiply on the basis of the combination of their identities. And, as one theorist points out, it is not simply a matter of being a woman or being black, these aspects of anyone's identity work in relation and in context with one another. They cannot be separated from the other- I cannot be just a woman or just white, I am a white woman- and that means different things depending on the situation I am in. So, in relation to white men, for instance, I may be one step down the ladder. But a black woman is always already positioned lower in relation to me; a black man may hold power in relation to black women, but they will be positioned below me, who is positioned below a white guy.
This was a major blindspot for the Second Wave white women. It caused a lot of dissension and hostility as women tried to forge a unified "feminist movement." But these issues of power, just like they position women differently in regards to the outside world, positioned and shaped their relationships to one another. This is also when we begin to see "whiteness studies," what is basically the outing of white as a race and culture in it's own right, just like "Blacks" or "Latinos." In other words, whites often fail to see themselves as "raced" individuals; we tend to think only others have a "race." An example would be when you describe two people, and you say something like, "you know, that woman and that black guy." Whiteness tends to go unmarked, unnoticed, and hence, unchallenged. Critical scholars are engaging with this, as are many feminists.
And that brings us to postcolonial theory. The idea here is to deconstruct, to critically engage with and analyze, as well as to recognize the continuing prevalence of colonial modes of thought which oppressed then, and oppress now. The goal is to construct subjectivities that do not rely upon Western knowledges, or Western constructions of the subject, namely because the Western subject cannot be anything but white or Western to be "valued," but doing so without reifying authenticity or primordialism. Part of the project of colonialism was to convert the colonized to the ways of life and thinking of the colonizer, in the name of modernity but also as an effort to pacify the subjugated populations. Conversion took place through schooling, health reforms and other medical means, and largely through religious conversion. Brute force was not necessary, although not ruled out, either. Over time, then, the ways of thinking of the West colonized not just the lifestyle but also the ways of thinking of non-Western societies, continuing colonization post-independence.
White, U.S. feminists, despite their efforts to liberate, were no different. As postcolonial feminist theorists argue, Western feminists have erected the figure of the liberated "Oriental" woman in their own image; Chandra Mohanty in particular demonstrates the neocolonial tendencies of Western feminists and urges instead that feminists from the West learn the situation of the non-Western woman on her own terms, and then prescribe a remedy. Poor wording on my part, but hopefully it still makes sense.
Now this brings me to my main concern here, the "problem," if you will, of relativism. I believe Pope Benedict said something about it, and I have a former professor at OU who, in my mind, hates postmodernism because of it's relativism, among other things. He's a positivist, through and through; the truth must be out there and it MUST be observable...
Anyways, in my mind, I see myself presenting my research at the j-school at OU. It won't ever happen, but this goes back to a rather traumatic research presentation I had there the first year of my master's. It's an imaginary quest for intellectual redemption, I suppose.
So I see myself discussing my as-yet-to-be-exactly-decided dissertation in front of the faculty at OU's j-school, and the issue of relativism comes up. I've been wondering how I would answer. At first, I thought I'd just stumble and look stupid, like a total rookie. And then, I dug deep and found my answer.
My response would be:
Relativism is only a problem when in search of the universal. Universalizing was a key tactic of modernity, in that it was used to cordone off and identify those who fell outside of the norm. Postmodernism, however, and postcolonial theory emphasize and reclaim the value in multiplicity, rather than singularity, and the particular, rather than the universal; in this way, we do not do violence upon those who are different, but instead recognize and respect those who are not like us, on their own terms, rather than ours- "ours," of course, being the patriarchal white, Western world.
Our reading of postmodernity displaces Western mystification of non-Western cultures...What does not get recognized in this form of neocolonial discourse is that Western culture is itself, as is every cultural formation, a hybrid of something. Yet the dominant Western attitude toward hybridity is that it is always elsewhere or it is infiltrating an identity or location that is assumed to be, to always have been, pure and unchanging (p. 7-8).
The term "global feminism" has elided the diversity of women's agency in favor of a universalized Western model of women's liberation that celebrates individuality ad modernity (p. 17).
The question becomes how to link diverse feminisms without requiring either equivalence or a master theory. How to make these links without replicating cultural and economic hegemony? For white, Western feminists or elite women in other world locations, such questions demand an examination of the links between daily life and academic work and an acknowledgment that one's privileges in the world-system are always linked to another woman's oppression or exploitation (p. 19).
This reading is for the exam question that I am writing "in dialogue" with my committee member. I don't know exactly what that means, but I sent her a list of questions I see emanating from these readings. I've focused on this book today, but it seems to summarize much of what I'm reading for this exam. It also prompted me to make a connection- well, I'll get to that.
Here's the background:
The feminist movement in the U.S., or in the West, I suppose, is said to have three "waves": the First Wave was largely in the 19th and early 20th Century, as women agitated for the right to vote. In 1919, we got it. By around the 1950s, though, a woman named Betty Friedan was cooking up a book that you may have heard of: The Feminine Mystique. The Feminine Mystique, or, the problem that has no name, has actually been portrayed beautifully in the television show Mad Men. It's the malaise and depression shared by housewives confined to the home, unhappy with their limited choices in life. In one scene in Mad Men, Don asks his wife Betty what she has to be unhappy about- she has the "perfect" suburban life with two kids, a beautiful house and even a dog. She answers, nothing.
Perhaps you've picked up on it already, but this rendition of the "feminine mystique" has a major shortcoming. Betty and Don are white, upper middle-class, as was Betty Friedan and the other leaders of the Second Wave. And as women like Alice Walker, author of the Color Purple, and Audre Lorde pointed out, they and their mothers never had the problem of being bored at home; they were working, cleaning the houses for women like Friedan.
What evolved into the Third Wave is the work by women of color, writers such as Angela Davis, Gloria Anzaldua, Audre Lorde, bell hooks, and Cherrie Moraga, who highlight the class and race-blindness of the Second Wave. In other words, the women who created the National Organization for Women in many ways were/are blind to the different experiences women who are not white or who are and come from difference classes. The oppressions a black woman, or, a Latina, or particularly a lesbian who is black or Latina multiply on the basis of the combination of their identities. And, as one theorist points out, it is not simply a matter of being a woman or being black, these aspects of anyone's identity work in relation and in context with one another. They cannot be separated from the other- I cannot be just a woman or just white, I am a white woman- and that means different things depending on the situation I am in. So, in relation to white men, for instance, I may be one step down the ladder. But a black woman is always already positioned lower in relation to me; a black man may hold power in relation to black women, but they will be positioned below me, who is positioned below a white guy.
This was a major blindspot for the Second Wave white women. It caused a lot of dissension and hostility as women tried to forge a unified "feminist movement." But these issues of power, just like they position women differently in regards to the outside world, positioned and shaped their relationships to one another. This is also when we begin to see "whiteness studies," what is basically the outing of white as a race and culture in it's own right, just like "Blacks" or "Latinos." In other words, whites often fail to see themselves as "raced" individuals; we tend to think only others have a "race." An example would be when you describe two people, and you say something like, "you know, that woman and that black guy." Whiteness tends to go unmarked, unnoticed, and hence, unchallenged. Critical scholars are engaging with this, as are many feminists.
And that brings us to postcolonial theory. The idea here is to deconstruct, to critically engage with and analyze, as well as to recognize the continuing prevalence of colonial modes of thought which oppressed then, and oppress now. The goal is to construct subjectivities that do not rely upon Western knowledges, or Western constructions of the subject, namely because the Western subject cannot be anything but white or Western to be "valued," but doing so without reifying authenticity or primordialism. Part of the project of colonialism was to convert the colonized to the ways of life and thinking of the colonizer, in the name of modernity but also as an effort to pacify the subjugated populations. Conversion took place through schooling, health reforms and other medical means, and largely through religious conversion. Brute force was not necessary, although not ruled out, either. Over time, then, the ways of thinking of the West colonized not just the lifestyle but also the ways of thinking of non-Western societies, continuing colonization post-independence.
White, U.S. feminists, despite their efforts to liberate, were no different. As postcolonial feminist theorists argue, Western feminists have erected the figure of the liberated "Oriental" woman in their own image; Chandra Mohanty in particular demonstrates the neocolonial tendencies of Western feminists and urges instead that feminists from the West learn the situation of the non-Western woman on her own terms, and then prescribe a remedy. Poor wording on my part, but hopefully it still makes sense.
Now this brings me to my main concern here, the "problem," if you will, of relativism. I believe Pope Benedict said something about it, and I have a former professor at OU who, in my mind, hates postmodernism because of it's relativism, among other things. He's a positivist, through and through; the truth must be out there and it MUST be observable...
Anyways, in my mind, I see myself presenting my research at the j-school at OU. It won't ever happen, but this goes back to a rather traumatic research presentation I had there the first year of my master's. It's an imaginary quest for intellectual redemption, I suppose.
So I see myself discussing my as-yet-to-be-exactly-decided dissertation in front of the faculty at OU's j-school, and the issue of relativism comes up. I've been wondering how I would answer. At first, I thought I'd just stumble and look stupid, like a total rookie. And then, I dug deep and found my answer.
My response would be:
Relativism is only a problem when in search of the universal. Universalizing was a key tactic of modernity, in that it was used to cordone off and identify those who fell outside of the norm. Postmodernism, however, and postcolonial theory emphasize and reclaim the value in multiplicity, rather than singularity, and the particular, rather than the universal; in this way, we do not do violence upon those who are different, but instead recognize and respect those who are not like us, on their own terms, rather than ours- "ours," of course, being the patriarchal white, Western world.
What Katie's been doing these days
Be sure to stay for the whole thing. And really, this is Katie absolutely, 100 percent thrilled and ecstatic.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Green beans deal mashed potatoes stunning defeat
In an amazing turn of events, some thought impossible after green beans' poor reception- to put it lightly- in the winter, Mimi's green beans dealt Papa's mashed potatoes a stunning defeat during Thursday night's dinner.
As the Katie sat captive in front of her parents, bits of meatloaf, and mashed potatoes scattered on her high chair tray, Eric and MaryAnn watched in amazement as, after numerous bites before it, the soon-to-be one year-old squished the mashed potatoes out of her mouth.
"Wow..." said her mother, later adding that the potatoes' rejection was even more surprising given the delicious butter and salt Eric so lovingly added.
Simmered with generous amounts of beef bouillon and bacon grease, experts long suspected green beans might cut into mashed potatoes' lead, which was generated while eating tater tots at what seemed like each and every Sonic on the numerous treks to Oklahoma. Despite a fervent rejection of green beans in early January or February, the Katie slowly began to eat green beans cooked the way her Mimi does it- and, this reporter might add, her mother's favorite way, as well.
"Baba da didi," said the unimpressed, rather serious Katie as she sipped on her cup of whole milk. And then, "Aaaaeeeee!"
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
The joys of walking, the glimpses of toddlerhood
We've gone in the past five days from dreading walking and only doing it on demand, to roaming the house, falling down repeatedly, and laughing the whole time. It's adorable- even after she took a particularly nasty spill which ended with her bumping her head, she was right back in the saddle. She can go to downward-facing-dog position (in yoga, that's when your butt is in the air and your hands are touching the ground) straight to standing. And, she does not want to be held; if so, not for very long. And when she doesn't get her way, she gets very, very upset. And, we don't like to eat much of anything.
We've got our hands full. Those blissful days of baby-hood are slowly ending around here. But she's hilarious and as independent as they come.
We've got our hands full. Those blissful days of baby-hood are slowly ending around here. But she's hilarious and as independent as they come.
Making anger productive
Means I just spent two hours cleaning my house that was beginning to look like a hoarder lived there. I should have spent those two hours reading. Eric's advice as he left this morning: take care of one thing at a time. Sure, because I can only physically take care of one thing- but, in his mind, that also means only thinking of one thing at a time. I find, with him as the perfect example, that leads to paralysis. And, as we all know, things don't necessarily come at us one by one. And right now, my plate is full.
Katie's first birthday is next Friday. I can't wait. I've been planning it since before she was even born. But I think that will be the bright spot of the summer. See, this blog is partly cathartic- I'm a writer who lost track of that fact, and rather than keep a personal diary, I keep this blog. I've always hated journals and diaries, anyways. I unraveled on my Mom this morning, completely unloading all the shit that's going on to her, and I don't think I'm done unloading. I reminded Eric around July the 4th, after he rudely told me that his uncle rudely asked him at the family reunion if we were expecting again, that he married a writer. He laughed and asked, nervously, if I had posted his uncle's question on the blog. I hadn't-yet- but I had thought about it. And so now, I'm in deep need of catharsis. Deep, deep need.
I'm blessed in many, many ways. We have a house full of things that we wouldn't have, namely, a crib and furniture for our baby, if we didn't have wonderful family members. I'm deeply grateful for all of this. But right now, I'm just so freaking PISSED about so many things, I just want to let it go so I don't carry this shit with me for the next fifty years or however long I live. I don't want to talk about the same shitty things that happened to me like some people I know for the rest of my life. I want to get over it, so down the road, I can laugh at it. Or avoid the topic of conversation altogether. But I know some people who bring shit up out of nowhere- and I don't want to be that person. I need to draw the bitterness out, and fair warning: in the process, a few other demons might (already have) escape(d).
Two years ago, after what should have been a preventative and routine surgery to remove my humongous thyroid, the pathologists discovered it was cancerous. Ten days prior to receiving this news, my dad had bought my plane ticket to Peru, where I was supposed to spend eight weeks learning Quechua for a kick-ass dissertation topic. Instead of Peru, I spent the summer languishing in shit-hole Iowa, skin and hair drying up, tired as hell and depressed to boot from the thyroid hormone withdrawal that preceded the radiation treatment.
School started back, although I wasn't sure it was the place I wanted to be at that point, and four months later, we found out I was pregnant. The best news ever, and I firmly believe I would not have gotten pregnant had I not had my thyroid surgery. I don't think all systems were online, if you get my point. Because I was pregnant with Katie the following summer I couldn't have the routine cancer follow-up, which, unbeknownst to me, involved the same process (which lasted 10 to 14 weeks all told) as the initial radiation treatment. The doctor ordered an ultrasound instead...
...which found possible residual thyroid tissue. I cried when I got the news. I was so sick of this thyroid shit. I've had issues with it since I was a kid, and I'm done with it. I was ready to take my pill religiously every morning, get my levels checked once a year, watch for my kids to have enlarged thyroids as they grew up, but otherwise, to be done with it. I wanted to just get on with my life.
The last time I walked into doctor's office, waiting to get the "have a nice life!" I was disappointed, too. That was after my first surgery when I was 20 and had an ovarian tumor removed. Expecting to get the "Nice to know you" at the end of the appointment, I got the warning that I could get a tumor on my other ovary...
So I'm sick of this. Sick, sick, sick. I'm not even 30, for God's sake. My pregnancy was a series of near misses, too: almost diabetic- gotta get my fasting levels checked occasionally, now; almost pre-eclamptic. Next baby, who knows- I can't wait for that next baby, I should note...
But, because I was pregnant, and because the levels in my blood indicated that the cancer was probably okay, we decided that I could wait until I was done breastfeeding to have the follow-up. This has been a specter looming over me all year- is it cancer? is it scar tissue? Who the fuck knows.
A mistakenly canceled apointment later, and I'm finally able to have the full follow-up. This time, no withdrawal, but some expensive as hell simulated hormone shots, an ultrasound, and bloodwork. But that ultrasound- dammit, that ultrasound. My lymph nodes- enlarged. Come back again.
Then the floods happened. We left town. The follow-up was postponed. Three times. And when I finally got it: stable and enlarged lymph nodes in left neck. Translation: they look the same as last time. The kicker: if thyroid cancer spreads, it's to the lymph nodes. So, now, I have to have a "fine needle aspiration" to check it out.
This is when I get really mad. I mean, screamingangryfurious mad. The test date: July 28. My comps start August 18th. The semester starts August 25th. And, in the occasion that I have cancer, and have to have treatment, in order to keep my stand-alone course in the fall, I have to hold these dates NO MATTER WHAT. In order to keep my teaching load, which will almost compensate for no work in the spring, the worst case scenario is me, writing my five exam answers, during which I sneak in some radiation treatment somewhere.
This isn't just because my department is spiteful. I mean, they're weird, but not just spiteful That's too obvious. Oh no- if I postpone my comps, I can't teach my stand-alone. That means someone will have to teach that class- and I know exactly who's smug, shit-eating face it'll go to. And I can't tolerate that, because they've been handed too much over the past three years, and I've sacrificed too much.
So, come August 18th, I'm going to truck into my department and write the hell out of my exam question. I will cut off my nose to spite my face. I actually think of Jesus in this case, and the bible. And you know what? Jesus stuck up for himself. He stood his ground. He may have turned the other cheek, but all the while, he was preaching the Word. He kept on doing his thing, despite the shit going down around him, and being pelted at him.
Because I should be in Peru right now, this very moment, doing my field work. I had a wonderful dissertation topic. It was in the bag. I would have had jobs lined up. I could have been exploring South America right now with my husband and daughter (God know, Eric doesn't have a job, so he could have come with me). But I'm not. I'm two semesters behind the departmental golden children, making decisions between my livelihood and my health while they get paid to write their dissertations.
All I know is, if there's ever that moment, you know, when you go around the room and tell what your summer was like, or, what you've accomplished lately, I won't list passing my comps and I won' be able to list passing my dissertation proposal defense. But I will be able to say, I watched my daughter walk for the first time- I was the one she took her first steps to- and she celebrated her first birthday. And then, I'll say, I dealt with cancer- what did you fuckers do?
Katie's first birthday is next Friday. I can't wait. I've been planning it since before she was even born. But I think that will be the bright spot of the summer. See, this blog is partly cathartic- I'm a writer who lost track of that fact, and rather than keep a personal diary, I keep this blog. I've always hated journals and diaries, anyways. I unraveled on my Mom this morning, completely unloading all the shit that's going on to her, and I don't think I'm done unloading. I reminded Eric around July the 4th, after he rudely told me that his uncle rudely asked him at the family reunion if we were expecting again, that he married a writer. He laughed and asked, nervously, if I had posted his uncle's question on the blog. I hadn't-yet- but I had thought about it. And so now, I'm in deep need of catharsis. Deep, deep need.
I'm blessed in many, many ways. We have a house full of things that we wouldn't have, namely, a crib and furniture for our baby, if we didn't have wonderful family members. I'm deeply grateful for all of this. But right now, I'm just so freaking PISSED about so many things, I just want to let it go so I don't carry this shit with me for the next fifty years or however long I live. I don't want to talk about the same shitty things that happened to me like some people I know for the rest of my life. I want to get over it, so down the road, I can laugh at it. Or avoid the topic of conversation altogether. But I know some people who bring shit up out of nowhere- and I don't want to be that person. I need to draw the bitterness out, and fair warning: in the process, a few other demons might (already have) escape(d).
Two years ago, after what should have been a preventative and routine surgery to remove my humongous thyroid, the pathologists discovered it was cancerous. Ten days prior to receiving this news, my dad had bought my plane ticket to Peru, where I was supposed to spend eight weeks learning Quechua for a kick-ass dissertation topic. Instead of Peru, I spent the summer languishing in shit-hole Iowa, skin and hair drying up, tired as hell and depressed to boot from the thyroid hormone withdrawal that preceded the radiation treatment.
School started back, although I wasn't sure it was the place I wanted to be at that point, and four months later, we found out I was pregnant. The best news ever, and I firmly believe I would not have gotten pregnant had I not had my thyroid surgery. I don't think all systems were online, if you get my point. Because I was pregnant with Katie the following summer I couldn't have the routine cancer follow-up, which, unbeknownst to me, involved the same process (which lasted 10 to 14 weeks all told) as the initial radiation treatment. The doctor ordered an ultrasound instead...
...which found possible residual thyroid tissue. I cried when I got the news. I was so sick of this thyroid shit. I've had issues with it since I was a kid, and I'm done with it. I was ready to take my pill religiously every morning, get my levels checked once a year, watch for my kids to have enlarged thyroids as they grew up, but otherwise, to be done with it. I wanted to just get on with my life.
The last time I walked into doctor's office, waiting to get the "have a nice life!" I was disappointed, too. That was after my first surgery when I was 20 and had an ovarian tumor removed. Expecting to get the "Nice to know you" at the end of the appointment, I got the warning that I could get a tumor on my other ovary...
So I'm sick of this. Sick, sick, sick. I'm not even 30, for God's sake. My pregnancy was a series of near misses, too: almost diabetic- gotta get my fasting levels checked occasionally, now; almost pre-eclamptic. Next baby, who knows- I can't wait for that next baby, I should note...
But, because I was pregnant, and because the levels in my blood indicated that the cancer was probably okay, we decided that I could wait until I was done breastfeeding to have the follow-up. This has been a specter looming over me all year- is it cancer? is it scar tissue? Who the fuck knows.
A mistakenly canceled apointment later, and I'm finally able to have the full follow-up. This time, no withdrawal, but some expensive as hell simulated hormone shots, an ultrasound, and bloodwork. But that ultrasound- dammit, that ultrasound. My lymph nodes- enlarged. Come back again.
Then the floods happened. We left town. The follow-up was postponed. Three times. And when I finally got it: stable and enlarged lymph nodes in left neck. Translation: they look the same as last time. The kicker: if thyroid cancer spreads, it's to the lymph nodes. So, now, I have to have a "fine needle aspiration" to check it out.
This is when I get really mad. I mean, screamingangryfurious mad. The test date: July 28. My comps start August 18th. The semester starts August 25th. And, in the occasion that I have cancer, and have to have treatment, in order to keep my stand-alone course in the fall, I have to hold these dates NO MATTER WHAT. In order to keep my teaching load, which will almost compensate for no work in the spring, the worst case scenario is me, writing my five exam answers, during which I sneak in some radiation treatment somewhere.
This isn't just because my department is spiteful. I mean, they're weird, but not just spiteful That's too obvious. Oh no- if I postpone my comps, I can't teach my stand-alone. That means someone will have to teach that class- and I know exactly who's smug, shit-eating face it'll go to. And I can't tolerate that, because they've been handed too much over the past three years, and I've sacrificed too much.
So, come August 18th, I'm going to truck into my department and write the hell out of my exam question. I will cut off my nose to spite my face. I actually think of Jesus in this case, and the bible. And you know what? Jesus stuck up for himself. He stood his ground. He may have turned the other cheek, but all the while, he was preaching the Word. He kept on doing his thing, despite the shit going down around him, and being pelted at him.
Because I should be in Peru right now, this very moment, doing my field work. I had a wonderful dissertation topic. It was in the bag. I would have had jobs lined up. I could have been exploring South America right now with my husband and daughter (God know, Eric doesn't have a job, so he could have come with me). But I'm not. I'm two semesters behind the departmental golden children, making decisions between my livelihood and my health while they get paid to write their dissertations.
All I know is, if there's ever that moment, you know, when you go around the room and tell what your summer was like, or, what you've accomplished lately, I won't list passing my comps and I won' be able to list passing my dissertation proposal defense. But I will be able to say, I watched my daughter walk for the first time- I was the one she took her first steps to- and she celebrated her first birthday. And then, I'll say, I dealt with cancer- what did you fuckers do?
Saturday, July 12, 2008
A follow-up to the revolution
A point I don't think I emphasized enough in my previous post:
The poor and the oppressed are not stupid. They are not passive. Many like to think they are and we see these ideas perpetuated in images of stereotypes like the welfare (black/woman of color) mother, the criminalized immigrant, so-called "white trash." Or, more to the point, the poor in general: they're often cast as lazy, as ignorant, as unwilling to "pull themselves up by the bootstraps." In short, the poor are poor by some inherent defect; it is their fault that they're poor. They choose to live off of social services, because they're too lazy to do anything else. And if they're lazy, they're stupid, too. By stereotypes I mean, of course, typically untrue representations of certain groups or communities that are often taken as fact or accurate representations/understandings of them.
This leads to the point of exception that Sparks takes with the theorists of the participatory development communication paradigm. Like the dominant paradigm (and also, most of modern social science or philosophy that stems from the Enlightenment), the first group of participatory theorists sought to empower those on the bottom, to work from the bottom-up for social change. The problem? They failed to address the larger structural issues that hindered such an endeavor.
What this means is, as much as we'd like to think all is equal in the world, it's not. There are reasons, which should be apparent but are not, that a child who grows up in a middle-to-upper income neighborhood, in a steady and stable (not necessarily two-parent) household, will be more likely to go to college, land a steady job, and lead a long and productive life, as compared to the child who grows up in a poor community, surrounded by instability, in, for instance, a poor school with few resources and over-crowded classrooms.
We aren't born knowing our possibilities; the world is not necessarily everyone's oyster. If you're white, and even better, male, you DO NOT confront the same world as some one with brown skin. Certain attributes of our identities, our gender, race, class, and even our sexuality, serve as the cards in the hand that we're dealt; and sorry for all you white males out there that think somehow you got handed a raw deal, but you actually got the royal flush compared to the black man who, unlike you, has to confront the pre-existing and pernicious racism of a system that assumes his criminality and inferiority before his competence and capability.
To be blunt, a white man never has to prove themselves in the ways that everyone else does. A white man will never be told that they got something because they're a man. I, however, have had my accomplishments degraded in such a way because I am a woman.
Essentialism, believing that we are all who we are because it is intrinsic to us and natural, is a tactic of the Enlightenment to categorize and subordinate certain sectors of society based on the belief of their inherent inferiority. With the Enlightenment, men (literally, white, male Europeans) began classifying and contriving pathologies based on those all the new "discoveries" in the world and all those things they realized weren't like them. Who fell into these categories? Africans. Asians. Women (hence, the advent of the Obstetrics/Gynecology profession). These groups were all different, i.e., not like the white European men. Women, unlike men, had menstrual cycles. Africans had dark skin and had lives and societies unlike Europe. This, to these white men, made those other groups bad. Since men didn't have periods, there must be wrong with women because they do. Those of us who are not white men are abberations, deviations from the norm; after all, these men held themselves to be made in the likeness of God Himself. As Benedict Anderson points out, around the Renaissance and easing into the Enlightenment, we begin to see representations of Jesus and the disciples that were decidedly European- not a dark-haired, Jewish-looking one in the bunch.
Since these elements, our "African-ness" or our "woman-ness," were natural or essential, they could not be transcended. They could not be changed. Moreover, the connectivity of women's networks and ways of knowing or in the extended families in non-Western countries, for example, was not to be valued; enter Protestantism and the belief that God helps those who helps themselves- think not of your fellow (hu)mankind. And poof! we have the rampant, deeply entrenched belief in individualism, of which the U.S. is a perfect example. It is the individual's fault that (fill in the blank): that they took out loans they couldn't pay back (rather than anything to do at all with predatory lending, looking for vulnerable people to give too much money to), etc., etc.
So take affirmative action. Those against it see it as reverse racism. This implies that people of color are by necessity not the proper person to hire, that a white male would automatically fill the position better. And if we lived in a world where decisions were made fairly and justly, that the workforce was peopled by skill alone, affirmative action would not be necessary. Unfortunately, and empirical studies show this, employers still reject applicants, for instance, whose names sound "too ethnic." Women still get paid less than their male counterparts- a listing of the top women CEOs and the top male CEOS showed nearly a $50 million discrepancy between the men and women. And, for a glaring example, look at the U.S. Congress and the U.S. presidency. Look at public officials in general. Let's just say, it's not a representative democracy, either racially or gender-wise.
Along that line of thought, look at our public officials, our congressional delegations, in particular. Take the Kennedys. Better yet, take Dan Boren, the U.S. Representative from Oklahoma. Take the Roosevelts, the Rockefellers. These individuals all came from families with legacies in politics. Their fathers, uncles, brothers all served in politics and in high-level offices. Take Chelsea Clinton, even. She's a hedge-fund manager, for crying out loud.
Now, understand that these people did not get there only by virtue of their excellence. Although Bill came from Hope, Arkansas, Chelsea didn't. And the Kennedys are practically U.S. royalty. These people had the stage set for them. They were born with a winning hand that was theirs to screw up. They were told as they went along, maybe explicitly, maybe tacitly by Dad's pennant in his study or the sweat-shirt he wore every fall, that Yale was a possibility. Graduating from high school wasn't a surprise. Getting a car at 16 wasn't, either.
We only know what we're told and what we're taught. Some kids are never told they can go to college. Moreover, some families have other considerations besides helping their child picking their Ivy League. Some have to put food on the table or figure out how they'll pay the bills. And some see a much easier way out. Some, true, are just shits, but that transcends class, race, and gender, and it's lazy to assume that everyone who is not like us is worthless. It's much more challenging to assume the best of people than the worst.
But that guidance counselor in the poor school, or the "diverse" district that reaches out to the struggling students; that one television show that gives some one struggling in Mexico or any other developing country hope, or the idea that they can find a better life- that they can demand a better life from their public officials; that one little thing, that one seed of hope- what Appadurai calls the imaginary- or as Suess would say, the thinks we can think (although he still places the onus on "we")- has to come from somewhere.
The poor and the oppressed are not stupid. They are not passive. Many like to think they are and we see these ideas perpetuated in images of stereotypes like the welfare (black/woman of color) mother, the criminalized immigrant, so-called "white trash." Or, more to the point, the poor in general: they're often cast as lazy, as ignorant, as unwilling to "pull themselves up by the bootstraps." In short, the poor are poor by some inherent defect; it is their fault that they're poor. They choose to live off of social services, because they're too lazy to do anything else. And if they're lazy, they're stupid, too. By stereotypes I mean, of course, typically untrue representations of certain groups or communities that are often taken as fact or accurate representations/understandings of them.
This leads to the point of exception that Sparks takes with the theorists of the participatory development communication paradigm. Like the dominant paradigm (and also, most of modern social science or philosophy that stems from the Enlightenment), the first group of participatory theorists sought to empower those on the bottom, to work from the bottom-up for social change. The problem? They failed to address the larger structural issues that hindered such an endeavor.
What this means is, as much as we'd like to think all is equal in the world, it's not. There are reasons, which should be apparent but are not, that a child who grows up in a middle-to-upper income neighborhood, in a steady and stable (not necessarily two-parent) household, will be more likely to go to college, land a steady job, and lead a long and productive life, as compared to the child who grows up in a poor community, surrounded by instability, in, for instance, a poor school with few resources and over-crowded classrooms.
We aren't born knowing our possibilities; the world is not necessarily everyone's oyster. If you're white, and even better, male, you DO NOT confront the same world as some one with brown skin. Certain attributes of our identities, our gender, race, class, and even our sexuality, serve as the cards in the hand that we're dealt; and sorry for all you white males out there that think somehow you got handed a raw deal, but you actually got the royal flush compared to the black man who, unlike you, has to confront the pre-existing and pernicious racism of a system that assumes his criminality and inferiority before his competence and capability.
To be blunt, a white man never has to prove themselves in the ways that everyone else does. A white man will never be told that they got something because they're a man. I, however, have had my accomplishments degraded in such a way because I am a woman.
Essentialism, believing that we are all who we are because it is intrinsic to us and natural, is a tactic of the Enlightenment to categorize and subordinate certain sectors of society based on the belief of their inherent inferiority. With the Enlightenment, men (literally, white, male Europeans) began classifying and contriving pathologies based on those all the new "discoveries" in the world and all those things they realized weren't like them. Who fell into these categories? Africans. Asians. Women (hence, the advent of the Obstetrics/Gynecology profession). These groups were all different, i.e., not like the white European men. Women, unlike men, had menstrual cycles. Africans had dark skin and had lives and societies unlike Europe. This, to these white men, made those other groups bad. Since men didn't have periods, there must be wrong with women because they do. Those of us who are not white men are abberations, deviations from the norm; after all, these men held themselves to be made in the likeness of God Himself. As Benedict Anderson points out, around the Renaissance and easing into the Enlightenment, we begin to see representations of Jesus and the disciples that were decidedly European- not a dark-haired, Jewish-looking one in the bunch.
Since these elements, our "African-ness" or our "woman-ness," were natural or essential, they could not be transcended. They could not be changed. Moreover, the connectivity of women's networks and ways of knowing or in the extended families in non-Western countries, for example, was not to be valued; enter Protestantism and the belief that God helps those who helps themselves- think not of your fellow (hu)mankind. And poof! we have the rampant, deeply entrenched belief in individualism, of which the U.S. is a perfect example. It is the individual's fault that (fill in the blank): that they took out loans they couldn't pay back (rather than anything to do at all with predatory lending, looking for vulnerable people to give too much money to), etc., etc.
So take affirmative action. Those against it see it as reverse racism. This implies that people of color are by necessity not the proper person to hire, that a white male would automatically fill the position better. And if we lived in a world where decisions were made fairly and justly, that the workforce was peopled by skill alone, affirmative action would not be necessary. Unfortunately, and empirical studies show this, employers still reject applicants, for instance, whose names sound "too ethnic." Women still get paid less than their male counterparts- a listing of the top women CEOs and the top male CEOS showed nearly a $50 million discrepancy between the men and women. And, for a glaring example, look at the U.S. Congress and the U.S. presidency. Look at public officials in general. Let's just say, it's not a representative democracy, either racially or gender-wise.
Along that line of thought, look at our public officials, our congressional delegations, in particular. Take the Kennedys. Better yet, take Dan Boren, the U.S. Representative from Oklahoma. Take the Roosevelts, the Rockefellers. These individuals all came from families with legacies in politics. Their fathers, uncles, brothers all served in politics and in high-level offices. Take Chelsea Clinton, even. She's a hedge-fund manager, for crying out loud.
Now, understand that these people did not get there only by virtue of their excellence. Although Bill came from Hope, Arkansas, Chelsea didn't. And the Kennedys are practically U.S. royalty. These people had the stage set for them. They were born with a winning hand that was theirs to screw up. They were told as they went along, maybe explicitly, maybe tacitly by Dad's pennant in his study or the sweat-shirt he wore every fall, that Yale was a possibility. Graduating from high school wasn't a surprise. Getting a car at 16 wasn't, either.
We only know what we're told and what we're taught. Some kids are never told they can go to college. Moreover, some families have other considerations besides helping their child picking their Ivy League. Some have to put food on the table or figure out how they'll pay the bills. And some see a much easier way out. Some, true, are just shits, but that transcends class, race, and gender, and it's lazy to assume that everyone who is not like us is worthless. It's much more challenging to assume the best of people than the worst.
But that guidance counselor in the poor school, or the "diverse" district that reaches out to the struggling students; that one television show that gives some one struggling in Mexico or any other developing country hope, or the idea that they can find a better life- that they can demand a better life from their public officials; that one little thing, that one seed of hope- what Appadurai calls the imaginary- or as Suess would say, the thinks we can think (although he still places the onus on "we")- has to come from somewhere.
The revolution will NOT be televised: Towards a synthesis of Colin Sparks' "Globalization, Development, and the Mass Media"
The expectation must be that, as in the Chilean case analyzed by Mattelart, the existing controllers of the media will resist the attempts to change the bias of communication in favor of the poor. What follows from that, however, is the opposite of the conclusion that the media imperialism paradigm wished to draw. If it is only in great social crises that the chances exist for changing communication, and if in those moments it is almost certain that the state and the media owners will resist such a change, then it is a mistake to ally with exactly these people in the struggle against 'imperialism', whether cultural or military or economic.
Imperialism is, as we have seen, a real and central force in contemporary politics, and it is certain that human liberation cannot be achieved without overcoming it. The allies of the poor and the powerless in the developing world are not, however, the people who run the media in their own countries. However much the latter may resent their subordination to the rulers of the developed world, they fear and will oppose their own poor even more. Of course, the poor of the developing world need allies...But those allies are more likely to be found amongst the poor and the powerless of the developed world than amongst the rich and the powerful of their countries or of the richer countries themselves...
The participatory paradigm...begins...from the perception that it is only when the poor and the oppressed find their own voices that they will have the power and the confidence to resolve their own problems. The starting point for any better understanding of the way ahead is this fundamental insight. The task is not to replace it but to develop its logical implications.
That logic begins from the "bottom" and works up, rather than the other way around, but a stress on the popular is not enough to resolve each and every question that presents itself.
Colin Sparks, Globalization, Development, and the Mass Media, pp. 224-225
So I'm finishing this book today, reading it for comps and spending way too much time on it. But, besides remembering that single-authored books can be read much quicker than what I've doing with this one, the final chapters have paid off substantially. I'll assign this book in classes that I teach.
More importantly, though, this chapter, and this passage in particular, makes me think of the current presidential election. It also makes me think of all the things I want to be involved in changing if, by chance, we move back to Oklahoma at the end of the year. More on these points in a bit.
In this book, Sparks traces the evolution of development communication and suggests directions for its future. Here's a brief primer on the history of mass communication research: it started after WWI, when the U.S. government thought propaganda had been so successful, that they could develop, in conjunction with top scholars, the perfect message, that silver bullet (hence the name, the silver bullet theory), that when disseminated to the public, people would just buy it.
Say what you will about the public, this idea, the "powerful effects" school, has long since been debunked. Mass comm research, although predominantly still in the effects paradigm, accepted decades ago that people's understandings and interpretations of mass media messages are much more complex than what those early adminstrative researchers wanted to do.
As Sparks points out, though, development communication had a particular goal: the betterment of society. Moreover, as development communication came to the fore during the Cold War, it was used, again by the U.S. government and scholars, to try and keep the developing world from going "communist." All sorts of "modernization" projects were designed to reach the developing world and, in short, try and get them to buy into a "modern," i.e., Western, way of life. Rural areas were particular targets in this research.
This project was a complete failure. Peoples in developing worlds just did not adopt "Western" ideals and methods. At first, those at the front of development projects, Westerners, of course, blamed the people themselves. They were backward, too traditional- they weren't cosmopolitan enough, or so said these diplomats, scholars, government officials, and other various "experts" on the situation.
What scholars from developing countries began pointing out, however, was that Western experts often made no effort to understand the things they were trying to change within the context of the location they were trying to change it. Most importantly, these Western scholars and experts did not take into account existing power structures and power relations that might make the non-elites in these developing countries hesitant to accept change from anyone not from their own community. In other words- and this can't be stressed enough- it was NOT the stupidity or shortcomings, or the traditions of the poor that kept them from changing their ways. It was their implication in a system that had long exploited them- had contributed to their poverty, stolen, raped, and oppressed them- it was their distrust of Western experts who were connected to the persistent hierarchies in their own countries, established under colonial rule.
This was the beginning of the cultural imperialism phase of development communication. As Sparks points out, though, like it's predecessors in the participatory communication phase, both lost track of the notion that change must be bottom-up. For the theorists in the participatory camp, they argued that change must come from the people- but forgot to take into account the structural inequities, and therefore failed. The cultural imperialists made strides towards change, going so far as to getting UNESCO to start talks on a New World Information and Communication Order. Unfortunately, as Sparks points out, cultural imperialism scholars, besides a failure to clearly operationalize their terms, focused too much on state relations, and ended up enabling some of the most authoritarian regimes in their quest for developing world empowerment.
So Sparks concludes that in order to actually enact radical change, one that truly confronts and overthrows the huge disparities and oppression resulting from neoliberal policies and a new age of empire, the one which makes it so the majority of the world's population tries to make a living on less than $2 a day, radical activists and scholars must combine elements of the participatory paradigm, with the understanding of world power structures as first theorized by the cultural/media imperialists, to utilize the media for radical change. Radical change, meaning a total overhaul of the existing power structures and inequities that result- revolution, in a sense. More specifically, Sparks calls for media, from the bottom, disseminating messages of inequity gathered from the bottom, targeting a global audience, while starting local. It must be, unlike the problems of earlier forms of development communication, "of the most thoroughgoing democratic kind" (p. 225). It is not, significantly, prone to market-driven values.
Okay, so why did this make me think of the current presidential election? Simply because of my increasing irritation with the candidates' persistence in talking about "free trade." To say you stand for change, and they both do, and then say you support the principles of free trade is a direct contradiction. It is the principles of free trade, of neoliberalism, that have resulted in the problems we face in the world. It is free trade that enables the U.S. imperial inclinations, under the guise of spreading democracy, which is further articulated to a consumerist lifestyle. In short, the U.S. wants to spread democracy, which any more only means, free trade and consumerism. My ability to buy whatever I want is not freedom, but the capitalist ambitions of the U.S., and the transnational corporations with which it does business, is deeply tied to selling democracy as the freedom to consume. The problem is, our "freedom to consume" is slavery. It is not freedom at all, but a mythical belief that we achieve happiness through the acquisition of goods. And those goods, overwhelmingly, are U.S. goods. Not only this, but the standards set of what is good enough, of the things we "must have," are purposely and intentionally in flux, so that we always need more. The goal posts are constantly moved- we can never reach self-actuation. We can never have enough if enough is always something more.
Literally speaking, however, the principles of free trade that the candidates so adamantly support have directly led to the impoverishment of billions of people around the world. It is not empowering at all- the developing countries who accept loans from the IMF or the World Bank are then expected to adhere to structural change. What this means is, they are expected to privatize what may have been national or locally owned industries, extracting the resources that once supported the people and redirecting that support out of the country. It means that workers around the world, due to the increasing privatization of industry, are prone to more exploitative working conditions; one of the things countries must agree to when accepting money from the IMF is, basically, to dismantle their workers' legal abilities to unionize and therefore to get a fair wage and to protect themselves from labor abuses.
This is neoliberalism- this is free trade. It is unquestioned by our candidates, and by the media. As Sparks, and numerous, numerous other media scholars, have noted, the media are implicated in this process; they are of the elite; we should expect nothing else from them.
So here's to a movement from the bottom-up. Lord knows, if I move back to Oklahoma- which would be fine, really- we'll need it to counter the Jim Inhoffes, Tom Coburns, and Sally Kearns of the state.
Imperialism is, as we have seen, a real and central force in contemporary politics, and it is certain that human liberation cannot be achieved without overcoming it. The allies of the poor and the powerless in the developing world are not, however, the people who run the media in their own countries. However much the latter may resent their subordination to the rulers of the developed world, they fear and will oppose their own poor even more. Of course, the poor of the developing world need allies...But those allies are more likely to be found amongst the poor and the powerless of the developed world than amongst the rich and the powerful of their countries or of the richer countries themselves...
The participatory paradigm...begins...from the perception that it is only when the poor and the oppressed find their own voices that they will have the power and the confidence to resolve their own problems. The starting point for any better understanding of the way ahead is this fundamental insight. The task is not to replace it but to develop its logical implications.
That logic begins from the "bottom" and works up, rather than the other way around, but a stress on the popular is not enough to resolve each and every question that presents itself.
Colin Sparks, Globalization, Development, and the Mass Media, pp. 224-225
So I'm finishing this book today, reading it for comps and spending way too much time on it. But, besides remembering that single-authored books can be read much quicker than what I've doing with this one, the final chapters have paid off substantially. I'll assign this book in classes that I teach.
More importantly, though, this chapter, and this passage in particular, makes me think of the current presidential election. It also makes me think of all the things I want to be involved in changing if, by chance, we move back to Oklahoma at the end of the year. More on these points in a bit.
In this book, Sparks traces the evolution of development communication and suggests directions for its future. Here's a brief primer on the history of mass communication research: it started after WWI, when the U.S. government thought propaganda had been so successful, that they could develop, in conjunction with top scholars, the perfect message, that silver bullet (hence the name, the silver bullet theory), that when disseminated to the public, people would just buy it.
Say what you will about the public, this idea, the "powerful effects" school, has long since been debunked. Mass comm research, although predominantly still in the effects paradigm, accepted decades ago that people's understandings and interpretations of mass media messages are much more complex than what those early adminstrative researchers wanted to do.
As Sparks points out, though, development communication had a particular goal: the betterment of society. Moreover, as development communication came to the fore during the Cold War, it was used, again by the U.S. government and scholars, to try and keep the developing world from going "communist." All sorts of "modernization" projects were designed to reach the developing world and, in short, try and get them to buy into a "modern," i.e., Western, way of life. Rural areas were particular targets in this research.
This project was a complete failure. Peoples in developing worlds just did not adopt "Western" ideals and methods. At first, those at the front of development projects, Westerners, of course, blamed the people themselves. They were backward, too traditional- they weren't cosmopolitan enough, or so said these diplomats, scholars, government officials, and other various "experts" on the situation.
What scholars from developing countries began pointing out, however, was that Western experts often made no effort to understand the things they were trying to change within the context of the location they were trying to change it. Most importantly, these Western scholars and experts did not take into account existing power structures and power relations that might make the non-elites in these developing countries hesitant to accept change from anyone not from their own community. In other words- and this can't be stressed enough- it was NOT the stupidity or shortcomings, or the traditions of the poor that kept them from changing their ways. It was their implication in a system that had long exploited them- had contributed to their poverty, stolen, raped, and oppressed them- it was their distrust of Western experts who were connected to the persistent hierarchies in their own countries, established under colonial rule.
This was the beginning of the cultural imperialism phase of development communication. As Sparks points out, though, like it's predecessors in the participatory communication phase, both lost track of the notion that change must be bottom-up. For the theorists in the participatory camp, they argued that change must come from the people- but forgot to take into account the structural inequities, and therefore failed. The cultural imperialists made strides towards change, going so far as to getting UNESCO to start talks on a New World Information and Communication Order. Unfortunately, as Sparks points out, cultural imperialism scholars, besides a failure to clearly operationalize their terms, focused too much on state relations, and ended up enabling some of the most authoritarian regimes in their quest for developing world empowerment.
So Sparks concludes that in order to actually enact radical change, one that truly confronts and overthrows the huge disparities and oppression resulting from neoliberal policies and a new age of empire, the one which makes it so the majority of the world's population tries to make a living on less than $2 a day, radical activists and scholars must combine elements of the participatory paradigm, with the understanding of world power structures as first theorized by the cultural/media imperialists, to utilize the media for radical change. Radical change, meaning a total overhaul of the existing power structures and inequities that result- revolution, in a sense. More specifically, Sparks calls for media, from the bottom, disseminating messages of inequity gathered from the bottom, targeting a global audience, while starting local. It must be, unlike the problems of earlier forms of development communication, "of the most thoroughgoing democratic kind" (p. 225). It is not, significantly, prone to market-driven values.
Okay, so why did this make me think of the current presidential election? Simply because of my increasing irritation with the candidates' persistence in talking about "free trade." To say you stand for change, and they both do, and then say you support the principles of free trade is a direct contradiction. It is the principles of free trade, of neoliberalism, that have resulted in the problems we face in the world. It is free trade that enables the U.S. imperial inclinations, under the guise of spreading democracy, which is further articulated to a consumerist lifestyle. In short, the U.S. wants to spread democracy, which any more only means, free trade and consumerism. My ability to buy whatever I want is not freedom, but the capitalist ambitions of the U.S., and the transnational corporations with which it does business, is deeply tied to selling democracy as the freedom to consume. The problem is, our "freedom to consume" is slavery. It is not freedom at all, but a mythical belief that we achieve happiness through the acquisition of goods. And those goods, overwhelmingly, are U.S. goods. Not only this, but the standards set of what is good enough, of the things we "must have," are purposely and intentionally in flux, so that we always need more. The goal posts are constantly moved- we can never reach self-actuation. We can never have enough if enough is always something more.
Literally speaking, however, the principles of free trade that the candidates so adamantly support have directly led to the impoverishment of billions of people around the world. It is not empowering at all- the developing countries who accept loans from the IMF or the World Bank are then expected to adhere to structural change. What this means is, they are expected to privatize what may have been national or locally owned industries, extracting the resources that once supported the people and redirecting that support out of the country. It means that workers around the world, due to the increasing privatization of industry, are prone to more exploitative working conditions; one of the things countries must agree to when accepting money from the IMF is, basically, to dismantle their workers' legal abilities to unionize and therefore to get a fair wage and to protect themselves from labor abuses.
This is neoliberalism- this is free trade. It is unquestioned by our candidates, and by the media. As Sparks, and numerous, numerous other media scholars, have noted, the media are implicated in this process; they are of the elite; we should expect nothing else from them.
So here's to a movement from the bottom-up. Lord knows, if I move back to Oklahoma- which would be fine, really- we'll need it to counter the Jim Inhoffes, Tom Coburns, and Sally Kearns of the state.
Friday, July 11, 2008
Another garden update
My peppers will probably be a loss- they're growing abysmally slow and are now overshadowed by the okra plants. I have a few carrots that seemed to survive the thinning out, and my basil plants did well after I thinned them as well. There are three tomatoes growing, a number of little cucumbers starting to grow, and I think at least 7 squash that I believe are of the butternut variety. I cut back the pumpkin plant- it's actually taking over our neighbor's yard, but considering our fence has been taken over by their vegetation and ridiculous bamboo, I don't feel too bad.
I realized a few years ago, because we're normally surrounded by corn plants here in Iowa, that veggies pop up on the strangest places on their plants. So I was surprised to see a squash growing- one is about 7 inches long already. I guess I don't know where I think they would grow, but where they grow still surprises me- all these tiny little prickly cucumbers on the plant.
When the okra are done, I'll probably use that space to re-seed carrots and then some onions and garlic as well. Get my root cellar going, if you know what I mean. But Katie and I check the garden every morning, and I point out to her what things are.
I'm open to moving wherever when Eric graduates, but it sure would be nice to do this garden thing again next year...
I realized a few years ago, because we're normally surrounded by corn plants here in Iowa, that veggies pop up on the strangest places on their plants. So I was surprised to see a squash growing- one is about 7 inches long already. I guess I don't know where I think they would grow, but where they grow still surprises me- all these tiny little prickly cucumbers on the plant.
When the okra are done, I'll probably use that space to re-seed carrots and then some onions and garlic as well. Get my root cellar going, if you know what I mean. But Katie and I check the garden every morning, and I point out to her what things are.
I'm open to moving wherever when Eric graduates, but it sure would be nice to do this garden thing again next year...
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Sunday, July 6, 2008
A fear of walking
She's still not walking- I would think this is abnormal, except from what I've read, infants don't usually walk until month 13. So no worries.
What's remarkable, though, is that she can walk, she's just too afraid to do it. She doesn't like to stand alone, and will actually immediately drop to all fours and scream if we slip our finger out of her out-stretched hand. To be honest, she has taken a number of hard falls- I think something like three today alone- and we don't have much soft carpeting to buffer her tumbles. Right now, for instance, she has a V-shaped mark above her eyebrow from some form of knock.
Time and again, we'll catch her standing alone. Once, she was crying out in frustration at me letting go of her hand, and just stood there, unsupported, for probably 30 seconds while she screeched. Today, she stood up next to my lap and handed me her play phone.
We're wearing a path around the living room and dining room, walking with her while she holds onto one finger. She can just go in circles, laughing, squealing and talking the whole way. Her little hand will get sweaty and my finger will start to slip out, but as soon as it does, she predictably shrieks in fear and falls to all fours.
I think, though, the problem lies with the fact that when we see her standing by herself, we just let it happen without celebration. I remember seeing Tina Fey on some late-night talk show a few years back talking about how she and her husband were potty training their daughter. Fey was saying that they had to cheer everytime their little girl had a bowel movement, while choking back their disgust at the poop, as positive reinforcement. So today, Eric and I started cheering, "Yay, Katie!" whenever she did things on her own, or even when she would fall to try and distract her from the bump.
She's gotten braver over the course of the day. Eric and Katie usually go to the playground around this time, and so she's used to walking and playing right now. That is to say, we just went through a little spell where she was crying if we set her down, but crying if we held her because she wanted to be walking around. I guess we'll see- she's taken a few half-steps before realizing what she was doing. No hurries, though-I keep thinking, with her first birthday a few days away, now, it's walking. Soon- way, way too soon- it'll be college.
What's remarkable, though, is that she can walk, she's just too afraid to do it. She doesn't like to stand alone, and will actually immediately drop to all fours and scream if we slip our finger out of her out-stretched hand. To be honest, she has taken a number of hard falls- I think something like three today alone- and we don't have much soft carpeting to buffer her tumbles. Right now, for instance, she has a V-shaped mark above her eyebrow from some form of knock.
Time and again, we'll catch her standing alone. Once, she was crying out in frustration at me letting go of her hand, and just stood there, unsupported, for probably 30 seconds while she screeched. Today, she stood up next to my lap and handed me her play phone.
We're wearing a path around the living room and dining room, walking with her while she holds onto one finger. She can just go in circles, laughing, squealing and talking the whole way. Her little hand will get sweaty and my finger will start to slip out, but as soon as it does, she predictably shrieks in fear and falls to all fours.
I think, though, the problem lies with the fact that when we see her standing by herself, we just let it happen without celebration. I remember seeing Tina Fey on some late-night talk show a few years back talking about how she and her husband were potty training their daughter. Fey was saying that they had to cheer everytime their little girl had a bowel movement, while choking back their disgust at the poop, as positive reinforcement. So today, Eric and I started cheering, "Yay, Katie!" whenever she did things on her own, or even when she would fall to try and distract her from the bump.
She's gotten braver over the course of the day. Eric and Katie usually go to the playground around this time, and so she's used to walking and playing right now. That is to say, we just went through a little spell where she was crying if we set her down, but crying if we held her because she wanted to be walking around. I guess we'll see- she's taken a few half-steps before realizing what she was doing. No hurries, though-I keep thinking, with her first birthday a few days away, now, it's walking. Soon- way, way too soon- it'll be college.
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Getting tickled on the Fourth
We went to Iowa City's Jazz fest last night for the fourth. Everything took place in the area around the Pentacrest. We were sitting on the lawn, and I started tickling Katie with a blade of grass. Later, as we watched the pretty good fireworks show that was, well, pretty long, Katie went from enthralled, to scared, to bored, to hungry, to tired. A nice little Fourth, I guess.
Garden update
In the left bed, from back left going clockwise to center left are: tomato plant, basil, tomato plant, okra, bell peppers, carrots.
In the right bed, from back to front: pumpkin, cucumber, two tomato plants, and butternut squash
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