Quintilian's Journal

12:16pm: On Changes
I've moved my hypertext home. Staying over here. Feel free to bookmark!

10:14pm: On One Month of Kindness
Jerry Rinehart, Associate Vice Provost for Student Affairs, sent me an email reminding me that March is the "Month of Kindness."

"Please join me in celebrating March as the Month of Kindness. The goal of
this month is to unite the campus by encouraging acts of kindness that
create an environment filled with goodwill, tolerance, pluralism and
openness. A series of events has been organized by several student
organizations and others to support this goal and to encourage members of
the University community to 'Be Kind. Pass it On.'"

Given that March is one of the longer ones, I would have preferred to been spotted those few extra days of wontonness and celebrated kindness in February. But, I suppose three more days won't kill me, and assuming everyone else recognizes and celebrates along with me, nobody else will either!

4:21pm: On the Past
Check out this collection of color photographs from WWI. Sorta cool and a lot more easy to connect with than the typical black and white stuff you find from that era.

4:14pm: On Mystery
Having just finished-up with Season One of _24_, I was afraid that I would run out of mystery and intrigue to sustain my thirst. Apparantly, judging by my very active comment section for the post below, I might be able to de-subscribe to Netflix, since I won't be needing Season Two for a while. Take a peek, friends (both new and old!).

11:36pm: On Subtle Bias
Deferring work for a moment, I hyper-skimmed one of my favorite rags and stumbled across a striking article discussing a test that reveals oft-hidden and subtle biases towards relationships between attitudes and demographic groups. Seeing that the article was a hefty five pages, I declined a full and thorough read-thru but took note of the test and visited it. I am happy report that I have no bias that assumes a relationship between gender and career and family. And those of you familiar with my infatuasian will be little surprised to learn that I have no bias against Asians and their place on U.S.

I'm no penguin of Popper's, so I hardly *know* how scientific or reliable or accurate these tests are, but, they are a diversion--and apparently increasingly well known. I recall watching a similar test played with on an episode of the cartoon,The King of the Hill--Spoiler: Hank was a racist and Peggy was not.

12:58pm: On Chili Cheese Burritos
I've found a reasonable analogue to the mostly discontinued Taco Bell Chili Cheese Burrito: a regular beef burrito, no onions, with nacho cheese added. Just letting you know. But, to make things easier in the future, sign this.

10:51pm: On A.O. Scott on Andrew Lloyd Webber
I wasn't expecting much from the movie adaption of Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera, since the orginal seemed like the movie adaption of itself already. But, A.O. Scott's little number on it isn't really that impressive either. Comparing its music, early on, to a "bad case of swollen lymph nodes"--a potentially impolitic move, given the significant correlations between swollen lymph nodes and AIDS, AIDS and homosexuals, and homosexuals and musicals--A.O. was already in a delicate spot. But, he really loses it when he goes on to say something like this:

"Lord Lloyd Webber's thorough acquaintance with the canon of 18th- and 19th-century classical music is not in doubt, but his attempt to force a marriage between that tradition and modern musical theater represents a victory of pseudo-populist grandiosity over taste - an act of cultural butchery akin to turning an aviary of graceful swans and brilliant peacocks into an order of Chicken McNuggets. The songs fill your ears, but you are unlikely to find yourself humming any of them after the movie is over (which may, come to think of it, be the only merciful thing about this "Phantom.")"

We might say that you, A.O., enact the very thing you attack, as you attempt to yolk insight with a poorly composed analogy.

10:20pm: On Fiscal Federal Devolution
Personally, I love Federalism. Perhaps it's my affected Southern roots, or perhaps it's the clear-headed logic of a two-hundred (+) year old system that implicitly and simultaneosly embraces modernity's love of observation and experimentation and post-modernity's respect for pluralism, but I like the idea that different states can decide to do things differently. Sure, keep an eye out for rights (and wrongs too!), but remember a pretty nice conception of civic life is the town-hall where reasonable people get together, acknowledge that they are together, and decide what to do with themselves. Despite new technologies, media, and McDonalds, there is still probably a sense that folks in Dayton, Tennesee will do things a little bit different from the folks in Athens, Georgia or Madison, Wisconsin.

But, sometimes things get silly. Take this article, for instance. Or, better yet, the subject that has been declared "fit to print." Nowadays, we realize that some things, no matter how locally experienced require national attention. Terrorism, a few years ago, was intimately experienced by the folks of NYC, DC, and a little patch of ground in Pennyslvania, but the "nation" was just as much a target as the blocks that momentarily became targets. So, apart from borader economic questions of whether or not the federal government has the money and how many strings and regulations come attached to it, there seems to be a sense in which the federal government should help fund local efforts to prevent further terroirst activities.

Who gets these funds, of course, is a big question. New York City, naturally gets a fair share. But, relative to other cities, fair does not equal equal; NYC gets a lot more money than any other city. DC, Boston, and LA get nice chunks of change too. Places like Memphis, well, they get nothing. In a cold economic world, this probably makes sense. If I have five places and know that terrorists like to make big explosions around lots of places, I will probably spend most of my money on the big places. Compared to NYC, DC, and LA, Memphis doesn't quite compare (it doesn't even have a neat shorthand acronym!) But, like most folks eager to get high off the hog, Memphis disagrees. One of her spokesperson's thinks so, at least:

"We are at the crossroads of America, for cars, for trains, for river traffic," said Claude Talford, director of emergency management services in the Memphis area, which received a $10 million grant for 2004 but is not slated to get any direct grant in 2005. "We are a prime location, a prime target, any way you look at it."

Well, you, Claude Talford may look at, but chances are terrorists won't be--they probably don't even know that Tennesee exists, unless you talk so loud they find out. And besides, isn't it a little unseemly to be talking about being a "target." You don't have to be George Lakoff to know that talk is powerful stuff, worlds are made of words.

Yes, there is some tension with Federalism. It's not all about what goes on differently within each separate state, county, and town. Sometimes, these little places like to make themselves into bigger places. But, I'll let you decided whether or not I am correct.

11:03pm: On Medical Ad-Vice
I kept looking through it, expecting to read the real reason: they might end up seeing you naked! Though, now that I think about it, there seems to be a meme of sorts in our society about little ones "playing doctor" that goes along precisely those lines. A follow-up "playing harassment defendant" game wouldn't hurt, I suppose.

9:44pm: On A Christmas Carol Being Sung
Today, NBC brought one of Dickens’ classics into today's homes and hearths through a stunning musical rendition of A Christmas Carol, with Kelsey Grammer cast as Mr. Scrooge. Now, anyone who knows anything knows how much I love short stories put to painstakingly grand settings and sounds. So it should come to no surprise that when I flipped past channel eleven and saw snow and song I flipped out. Holy paternal racial typecasting, Bat[per[child]]!!

Imagine my surprise when I saw Det. Ed Green playing the role of Spirit of Christmases Past, Present, and Future! Naturally, the first thing I thought was that some chimney sweep from the upcoming BET musical, Oliver, Twist and Shout!, had accidentally stumbled onto NBC's lily white set (I really wasn't all that persuaded that NBC had successfully countered claims that there were no people of color represented on the network by pairing Ross with that African American archeologist). But, three seconds later, Jesse Martin began singing about Tiny Tim and I knew I was wrong; this here African American was Mr. Scrooge's Virgil. Apparently, NBC's famous former doctor of the mind had found his SOUL!

Goodness gracious. I have never seen Spike Lee's Bamboozled but, I do recall hearing about his critique of the "super duper magical mystical Negro" that is frequently portrayed in the media. Spike Lee says that Hollywood tends to cast African Americans in roles where they play wise and insightful spiritual guides to confused white protagonists who, through their relationships with these African Americans, become better off for knowing them, like John Coffey in The Green Mile or Will Smith in The Legend of Bagger Vance. Though probably not as bad as portraying African Americans as thieving, drug-pushing/using, rapists, this role still seems to cast African Americans in roles subservient to the wants and needs of white authority figures. A cursory analysis of NBC's musical might lead to this conclusion (and the cursory kind is all that my laziness allows me to be willing and able to do, though I am eager to hear any others!).

Living in Minnesota, I am little enthralled with snow and the trouble it can bring, but, in this case, I think I will wish for a White Christmas(Carol) and not this feeble attempt at Christmas Rap.

1:16pm: On Perspective
Occasionally, the lens with which we view the world might benefit from the wipe of a scratch-resistant cloth. I was reading this article in the NYT about last week's Wisconsin hunter deaths and was struck by a passage the reporters offered:

In Wisconsin, mourners said they were still dazed by how a day of deer hunting turned into a killing spree after a group of local hunters confronted Chai Soua Vang, 36, of St. Paul, who, police say, was using their tree stand to hunt on their property.

Obviously, this was written by, for, and from the perspective of humans, but, I bet if deer were observing and processing the scene and being paraphrased by the Times there would be considerably less shock expressed at the turn of events which turned "a day of deer hunting" into a "killing spree." I imagine for them (and not being a deer, probably not even in the right language), the two phrases are inextricably entwined.

Naturally, in the grand scheme of things, the death of a few deer here and there (even if we're talking about a "few" understood in terms of "thousands") does not strike me as particularly troublesome in light of the millions of animal deaths we usually accept and digest or of the many avoidable human deaths accrued around the world in any given year. So, this is not a proto-screed against the travesty of officially sanctioned and socially accepted animal hunting. Nor am I seeking to minimize the unnecessary and avoidable loss of those hunters’ lives. All I'm saying, is that it was an awfully funny little sentence.

5:16pm: On the Visual
On a communication studies listserv someone emailed a link filled with pictures apologizing to "everybody" which, judging from this, seems to be everyone but those who voted for Bush in the past U.S. election. I was intrigued by the site and thought it a somewhat noble and innovative way to protest within the new medium we're currently musing around with; the pictures create something of a "hyper-enactment" that might eventually be thought to speak to some sort of ideological Diaspora that someone, somewhere--probably right down the hall from my school office (which, to not sound silly, I feel compelled to point-out that I share with five other grad students)--would find useful to theorize about. I, however, do not need to go to such critical leaps. I think it's neat because it's filled with citizens doing something to express their opinion without throwing down Molotov cocktails (at least not in the pictures!) and because there is a sense in which it seems clear that everyone posting to the website realizes that they are a part of a larger set of people doing the same thing. So, they are expressing their opinions and they seem to be doing it self-awarely.

Well, almost everyone seems to be self-aware, at least. At first glance, she just looks like any number of the other folks on the site: she's holding up an apology card. But, when you read the card, she's making a plea that strikes me as silly: she is begging (everybody, presumably) not to bomb Travis County Texas. Well, once again, this whole "everybody" thing does not seem to countenance the reality of things. Clearly, she's talking to potential terrorists, since no state would likely (at least in the reasonably near and distant future) actually be able to bomb the U.S. If this is the case, what a ridiculous thing to do--expressing apologies to potential terrorists. Now, perhaps I am a bit too old fashioned in my outlook, but I just don't think that people need to apologize to once and future terrorists. To be sure, there is probably a time and place to send sorries regarding innocent women and children killed throughout the world and to entire people's treated pretty rottenly by Colonial/Capitalism throughout history and all of that. But apologizing to people, however frustrated they may be, who may decide to bomb Travis--or any, for that matter--County, well that seems plain silly to me. No wonder she can't look at the camera directly!

Yes, this "everybody" thing is a decidedly troubling thing for me. It subsumes too many things. Though I hardly consider myself very political, and if pushed, would just call myself a Joe Lieberman Democrat or a John McCain Republican, I think that there is something argumentatively unsettling about big terms like “everybody,” that, when read within immediate context, end up meaning "everybody but the red states." At this point, the site begins to lose a sense of its civic grandness. Certainly, the public square must be a place of disagreement, and even well defined and organized sides, but it also must be inclusive enough to leave space for those who disagree--you know, the "body" we expect to find in "everybody."

1:07am: On Rights
James Lileks offers an interesting narrative towards then end or his post where he finds himself the Socrates of the party, inoccently pointing out: "But, the emperor doesn't have any clothes!" Naturally, they don't get it; but I suppose it wouldn't be a good story if they did. One exchange struck me:

Later I was talking with an architect, who described how housing is a right in Europe, unlike America, where there is no such right.

“But it’s a right granted by the state,” I said.

“Yes, of course.”

“So if the state grants it, the state can take it away.”

He was baffled. “Yes, of course, but they wouldn’t.”

I wonder how Lileks would have responded if the man had said something to the effect of,

"Sure, to be true. [sips glass of wine or martini] But, I bet that if it ever wanted to, the state could probably take away our rights to life and liberty just as easily as Europe could take away housing."

Sure, there must be something different between granting rights and recognizing them; I've even written that on several students' speech outlines. But I wonder wether or not it is best not use the take away line to mark that difference?

10:45pm: On Federalism
Professor Althouse , as usual, offers a thoughtful take on an issue. An issue, actually, that one of my students is taking up for her speeches this semester: the teaching of creationism in public schools. My student points out that creationism is just one theory that can taught alongside others, and I was quick to point out that if that was the argument for why we can teach it, then what would stop us from teaching all the other explanations of biology. But, then I asked myself what other explanations are there out there to teach? I guess maybe the Greeks thought about biology in some sort of earth, wind, fire, and water sense and before evolution caught on as the dominant species of explanation there must of been other competing explanations and there had to be an explanation that this revolutionary (in Kuhn's sense of the word) explanation must have displaced and replaced. But, are there currently any other competing explanations within the biologic world other than creationism?

After my student's next speech, I'll be sure to mention this point that Professor Althouse makes:

But I tend to doubt that teaching creationism in public school will prove very satisfactory for anyone. Some parents and kids will chafe at having their time wasted on the topic or at having religious subject matter presented in public school. And people who are eager to have creationism taught may change their minds as science teachers invite kids to compare the evidence and look critically at a subject people normally approach through scripture and faith. In practice, there is a lot of potential for holding up religion for scorn among the students and offending the creationism-believing students and parents who are now hoping to find their beliefs supported and accommodated. Asking students to take a scientific and critical approach to religion seems more likely to undercut religious belief than just teaching evolution without mentioning religion. I think Grantsburg will abandon its creationism experiment soon enough, with or without the intervention of a court.

And though Professor Althouse doesn't seem to keen on creationism being taught, her post doesn't explicitly suggest that it should be forbidden from Grantsburg's curriculum, which is far more friendly towards creationism than many academics. Her seeming tolerance towards alternative and opposing theories reminds me of an interesting point JG brought up this weekend and one that I am increasingly amenable too--the embracement of Federalism. Many people, especially on the Left react vehemently to the idea that schools be allowed to teach creationism, throwing back pithy qausi-Clarence Darrow quotes from Inherit the Wind (a terribly unfair hatchet job on one of Populism's most progressive leaders and spokespersons) and willing to put a lot of resources into fighting it. Well, why can't people just say, it's a Federalism thing. Why can't we (the whole country) let Mississippi or Alabama teach what they want and New York and California as well? If it ends up that Mississipi becomes a backwater state, and nobody wants to move there, then fine. They'll try it out and if it doesn't work, then they might just stop doing it. I think it's a great argument in the halls of the department--talking about the benefits of Federalism is not just rare, it's iconoclastic and it has the added benefit of avoiding overtly ideological tones--Federalism seems much more neutral than the rabid anti-Christianity or Science you regularly hear in the debate.

8:14pm: On Conclusions about Classes (Or, on seeing the asses in my classes)
I'm frequently fretting with my fellow graduate students and future colleagues about my students and the inner workings of their minds and personalities that are suggested by their actions. Though I can never expect or hope to know with absolute certainty and finality the particular paths and relays my students' neurons take while coursing past particular strands of DNA and memories clinging to long since formed synapses, I must occasionally come to conclusions about their ethoi by observing and experiencing their behaviors and subsequent explanations of those behaviors; I consider it good practice for jury duty. After roughly nine weeks of teaching public speaking to nearly fifty students, I can only conclude that students will do anything to get the most amount of credit for the least amount of work and will capitalize on their sense of my easy-goingness to achieve this goal that is as pernicious as it is vicious. In the course of nine weeks, I've had three of my students lose a grandparent, several take an unexpected soccer trip, one enacting citizenship in the community by voting for president while abdicating their duty to engage in my class, and a host who choose to simply skip class--all of which has happened on scheduled speech days. On non-speech days, I count myself grateful if I have a one-to-one ratio between the amount of students in class and the fingers I have on my hands (10).

It's not that I suspect my students of being congenital slugs; I don't. Rather, I suspect them of taking advantage of a space of learning that is a little too Montessorian for the tastes of a large, underfunded and overpopulated state university's population. Way back at the start of the semester, instead of going over, word-for-word, my syllabus' clear and absolutist prose, I speak at great lengths about my intention to help foster a New Athens, in our little plot of school for our little bit of time together. I wag my tongue felicitously over ideals like mutually determined norms of discussion and socially constructed senses of duty and obligation to ourselves and each other. I assure you this: it takes nine weeks of licking before you get to the bitter center of this tootsie roll poop; this semester's students know how to play the make-it-up-as-we-go-along game with the worst of them, and when it's twenty-five to one, I know who is going to lose.

After all my careful observation and analysis of my careless students and their common denomination, I feel confident enough to pass harsh judgment but am ultimately only comfortable enough with passing that harsh judgment on myself--a typical humanist's response to any observed or experience social phenomenon. After an especially disappointing class session, I flagellated myself all the way home and immediately sat down and set out to revamp my entire pedagogical paradigm. The students may be paying $1500 for a class, but I am the one being paid to teach it. I'm no expert, but for whatever reason the department thinks I am better at public speaking (or, at least teaching it) than any given class of students. I'll defer to their better judgment and have better faith in my own. No more exceptions, no more abstract, ideal, and ultimately quixotic expressions of the public square's virtues, and no more staring at my students’ bosoms.

12:31am: On Iconicity
Recently, I took a trip to Chicago. Ostensibly, I was going to attend the National Communication Association's annual convention. In actuality, I sojourned to that city lapping up against the shores of Lake Michigan to reenact the friendships of a recent past. Friends were still friends. I dropped by the Comm Studies department at NU, saw and spoke with Karen and Debra, unfortunately missed out on Brenda and her crew of needy cookie-eating students, and remembered many good times chatting and staring out that big and expensive window overlooking the even larger and more expensive Technological Institute. I also saw Professor Goodwin, asked her how she was, listened to her perennially sagacious advice, and left saying, "goodbye, Jean." Perhaps most pleasantly, I reunited with my friends, Ben, Janet, Jeff, and Susan. We met up with each other downtown, stopped in on Chinatown, found an Ibuprofen for my pounding headache, and happily settled into the old norms of friendly discussion. It was as nice as it was short and perhaps that was a part of its charm; but, I won't think about it too deeply. Instead, I'll just remember it every now and again and expect to one day recreate the scene that was recreating so many scenes of such a short while ago.

Returning to my new home in Minneapolis, I eagerly waited to read what Ben had to say about the weekend and was not disappointed. Here's what he had to say on his site, secondhandrants.com:

Here's the deal, gentle reader. On one hand, you've got nostalgia, a warm, blurry sentiment that's tough to satisfy regardless of how many photos or Classic Coke tins you possess. On the other hand, you've got those rare moments when you fill in the lines, connect all the dots, and realize that nostalgia isn't nostalgia anymore. It's nostalgia fulfilled. It's everything you remember with a shiny new coat of paint and a change of tense--things and people that were, are.

That's why this past weekend was so enjoyable. Cicero, Yellow Volvox, Ironman, and Nils made a grand return, if only for an evening. You may know these people, you might not, and we'll get to why this applies to you in a moment. For now, let me just say that a great deal of pleasure came from realizing that although people were different--more learned, more married, more engaged--the talk was just as good, maybe even better. Same creamy filling, new coat of paint.

A large part of conversation, and this is what applies to you and me, inevitably involved storytelling. It occurred to me that the narrative tradition exists and will continue to exist for good reason. People love stories and will sit enraptured, hour after hour, to hear tales unfold. I bet you knew this all along, right? What does this mean for Secondhand Rants? We'll see.

In a way, his post was just just like the time all of us spent together: it was anticipated, reflective, a joy to experience, and far too short. In a word, Ben's post was, iconistic, reflecting what it was describing. Thanks, Ben.

10:24am: On Comings and Goings

I will be gone for a month and am not sure if I will be able to post any musings during that time.  But, rest assured, I will be in California with eyes opened and mind eager to observe the day to day actions of our public square.

9:31am: On Credibility

On the last day of my rhetorical criticism class, some of my fellow citizens presented their class research projects while the rest of us listened on intently and cupped our faces with pensive hands and fingers.  During their talks, three of the five presenters mentioned the role that speaker credibility, ethos, played in their texts.  Whether it was just coincidental or perhaps indicative of all texts resilient enough to survive through time and land on a critic's lap and desk (or, lapdesks, for those lucky few who have a good, solid, one that doesn't excrete little styrofoam balls all over your sheets), all thought that their text's authors had good credibility.  They also thought that that credibility was important to appreciate when examining the text.  Now, to be perfectly honest, I have not ever really thought about speaker credibility, either as a theoretical term or as a critical lens from which to understand a speech better.  And listening to these presentations, I now know why; it's a ridiculous little concept, or at least is when applied in the manner these presenters saw fit to do. 

One of the speakers said that his text's author had credibility because the rhetor was a Native American Indian who defied the stereotypes: he wasn't a drunk, a law degree, and a law practice.  So, post hoc ergo propter hoc, the speaker has credibility!?  Silly.  I think it is bad for the development of the public square when ordinary citizens like the ones in my class, understand credibility as some finite characteristic draped on some speaker before she steps into civic deliberation.  And I wasn't impressed by the particular qualities that my fellow citizen thought were his author's most credible assets; not so much because I think that drunks and laypeople without law practices are wonderfully credible people themselves, but because I think that a person is credible enough to speak in public by virtue of being a fellow citizen in our deliberative world.  I think that the public square would be helped enormously if we just gave our speakers the benefit of the doubt, assumed (actively, at times) that when they speak, they are doing so with concern for society and the greater good, and that their words will be sufficient enough to reveal their credibility.  That's what I'm aiming for, a speech-created credibility.  The speaker's credibility would be determined within the public square, based on her words, not some notion we might have about her education or experience before she walks in and starts talking with us.  And like anything else I'd aim and fire at, I'm sure I'm off the mark, but it seems like an ideal. 

More than that, Aristotle said the same thing On Rhetoric: "[There is persuasion] through character whenever the speech is spoken in such a way as to make the speaker worthy of credence; for we believe fair-minded people to a greater extent and more quickly [than we do others] on all subjects in general and completely so in cases where there is not exact knowledge but room for doubt.  And this should result from the speech, not from the previous opinion that the speaker is a certain kind of person" (George Kennedy's translation 38).  Plus, a speech-based credibility would affirm the significance of the act of speaking, since we wouldn't view the text as some product produced by some credible source, so much as an action that creates and maintains credibility and demands are active attention, when listening or speaking.

 

10:48pm: On Folkways

Over the past couple of weeks I've noticed that the deodorant/anti-perspirant I've been using has lost its effectiveness and I recalled Ben or Janet telling me that the body adapts to anti-perspirant and, incidentally, that Asian people don't sweat--and when they do, they don't smell.  So, I've decided that my time with Old Spice has concluded and have contented myself with a move to Sporty or some such other Spice.  Before making that move, however, I have temporarily suspended my use of any underarm treatment and am reminded every now and again, often, when I least suspect it, that I have eschewed this most basic folkway picked up in those noisome middle school years.  The first time I realized the effects of my decision was when I was sitting on the bus, reading my current Jack Aubrey novel, and unhappily greeted with the familiar scent sure to make me a winner in the ol' olfactory game.  "Typical," I uncharitably thought about my fellow bus companions, "somebody has forgotten to put on their deodorant, or never wears it at all."  But, as people got off and on the bus, leaving me no constant variable, I deduced, ever so reluctantly, that I was the causus foetum and promptly hung my head--and arms!--down, in shame.

This evening, after a trip to uptown, I felt a bit of perspiration on my skin and remembered once again that I was naked, on at least one level.  But, whether or not it was because I was in the sanctuary of my home or because I had evolved to a higher level of consciousness, I wasn't as repulsed with myself.  Like many people out there--crackpots, wackos, etc.--I began thinking that there is no real good reason why I should apply anti-perspirant everyday.  Smell, of all things, is pretty socially constructed; there is no such thing as a good , bad, right, or wrong smell, we just absorb a scents of it by inhaling great lungfuls of the air we happen to be walking through, alongside all these other people and their exhalations.  Besides, how natural can it be to apply disappearing paste to your skin every single morning without even thinking about it!?  And the fact that it stops working after a while, suggesting to my, admittedly unscientifical mind, that the body is actively working against my morning routine, suggest even more strongly that I should think twice about using it.

And there's the thing, I think twice about using it, decide not to, and then think about my obligations as a fellow citizen.  Even if b.o. is just a socially constructed bad thing, a thing that after further thought, on my part (and, to be honest, every now again, I don't even object to the occasional whiff of a worker's unadulterated scent--it seems reassuring and traditional in some way, a slap in Ms. Lauder's dolled-up face, even), doesn't make all that much scents, I still have second thoughts about walking around free as a bird or a bum.

And I think about it some more, and realize that it doesn't even make sense that I should have these thoughts, since this is America, for heaven's sakes!  It seems very incongruous of me to stand here in a society that, without fail, maintains the sanctity of human individualism, and worry about whether or not the stubble-faced joe across the bus will look his nose down at me, or at least turn it away from me.  Funny business, these conflicting values, personal liberty and civic obligation; makes things a little tough to navigate.

 

8:43pm: On Endings
Two things are concluded today, my first year of graduate school and Frasier.  Three guesses as to which of the two I learned more from.

5:18pm: On Interruptions
You'll have to excuse my rather un-civic comments today, but I'm sitting here watching every network's local meteorology teams discussing the threat of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes.  Now, what that involves is the constant repitition of town, city, and county names along with estimated times for when the storms will strike, all of which is made possible by a wide array of doppler technology that updates rader displays every minute, prompting another recitation of town, city, and county names "under the gun."  Much has been said about newscasters ability to make much of nothing when no new information is available, but I think it is ridiculous when the newscasters are compelled to explain why they are interrupting regularly scheduled programs.  Shouldn't it be self-evident?  And if it isn't, why are they interrupting our tv programming?  Arghh.  All I want is to watch King of the Hill, and this is the second Sunday in four weeks that has been interrupted by, fate and her band of reporters.

7:57pm: On Mother's Day Marketing
I got an email from 1800flowers.com today, with this subjectheading: "Stop dilly-dallying! It's Mother's Day for Pete's Sake." Inside was a letter encouraging me to buy a Mother's Day gift for my ... mother. This is what the letter said:

Dear Timothy,

Remember when Mom wanted you to hurry as a kid, she'd give you that look, and say, "Stop your dilly-dallying!" Let her know you listen now just as well as you did back then, and visit our Make It By Mother's Day Collection to find terrific gifts for all the wonderful moms in your life! Get her gift delivered in time for Mother's Day.

Shop now (yes, now) and we'll keep all this last minute shopping stuff just
between us.

What are you waiting for?

This is what I replied with:

I want you to know that I am very offended at this email, for many reasons: assuming that I have a mother, that I ought to give her a gift, that the gift should be flowers, and that your reminders should be written in the condescending tone in which this one is written in. How dare you accuse me of "dilly-dallying" and claim that you will be benevolent enough to keep this "last minute shopping stuff just between us." Let me be the first to let you know the only thing between us is an indefinable amount of miles, fiber-optics, a palpable irritation on my part, and a capitalistic-pig's sense of self-entitlement on your own. For three days in a row you have emailed me with "opportunities" to buy flowers. I have never gotten three reminders in three days from a company, web-based or otherwise. This is inexcusable and a gross abuse of marketing policy, for a company based on products intended to provide happiness and good tidings to its customers.

Just because you have an old email account of mine on your records does not give you the right to flood my inbox with your petty little ads and specials.

I want my email to be taken off of your list. The email is __________. It differs from the account this email is coming from because I have had my _____________mail forwarded to this account and I don't have the ability to send out an email using that account. But, I still get emails sent to it and I want them to stop coming from your company. I am appalled at what your marketing department has come up with, and no longer want to be a part of it.

Timothy W_________

I hope that they listen to that.  And, "just between us," I ordered something for my mother from 1800flowers five days ago.

6:42pm: On Norms

When I took Introduction to Sociology my first year in college, I was struck by how easily the terms and concepts discussed in the class seemed to apply to everyday life.  For about five weeks that quarter, every trip I took on the EL affirmed and shaped my inchoate understandings of social stratification based on race and culture, anomie, and the everyday norms and folkways that compel us and our fellow citizens to bury our faces in books, newsprint, busroute-maps, or anything but the eyes and faces of the, often times smelly and overly-clothed, riders sharing the trip--but not the journey!--with us.  Later on, I learned that Jean-Paul Sartre used this anonymity, forced on and enforced by every rider of public transit, to elucidate his notion of seriality and class formation.  Sarte, according to KKC, compared human interaction to the bus queue, a point at which people are doing the same thing together but not really sharing a sense of identity with each other while they are doing it.  According to Sarte, when some event occurs, like the explosion of a nearby car, the collapse of an elderly woman, or the surprise announcement that the busride is free for the evening, people--who didn't recognize any connection to the person standing in front or behind them--undergo a shared experience outside the realm of the normal and expected and momentarily become a community of sorts.

Linking these two terms together makes perfect sense when I recall an event that occurred on my own bus ride today.  After about three stops into my ride, I saw the bus door open and a young-ish, slightly pudgey, man stepped on and took a seat right in front of me.  Immediately following him was an older and hunched-over woman who began speaking loudly in my direction.  Perking-up my ears and attention, I realized that she was not talking to me, but the young man who had just sat down in front of me.  She was telling him, and, consequently, the rest of the bus, that "You shouldn't get on in front of an old people, women, or children.  You let them go first, and then you get on.  You remember that!"  The young man in front of me nodded his head liked a ruler-slapped pupil and I almost did the same, since, given my description of the young man, we were the same person.

After that, I got to thinking.  Should the young man really have let the older woman on before him?  I know that when the Titanic sunk--and possibly on other ships, mind you--women and children were supposed to get into the boats first, but a Minneapolis bus isn't quite the same thing, despite the occasional metaphor articulated in city-budget meetings.  Is this sense of appropriate behavior that the older woman articulated, a "norm," if you will, actually applicable to everyday life and interaction?  I wonder what would happen if we used this approach to every event in our life that intersected with other people and destinations.  Wouldn't traffic get awfully blocked-up if men always were letting older people, women, and children go in front of them on highways and ramps?  What would happen if two older women were waiting in line at the same grocery counter? Would they have to compare drivers' licenses or social security cards, to decide who should go first?  Wouldn't that take-up an awful lot of time, and wouldn't that wasted time be detrimental to the greater functioning of society as whole?  I think it might, and if norms and folkways are supposed to help society function a little bit more smoothly (thank you, Mr. Parsons), how could this particular one be of use to society?

Many questions, and no answers.  Partially because I'm just being playful right now, but also because I am more interested in how norms and folkways, when they are becoming less obeyed or are being introduced, are articulated by everyday people in everyday situations.  On this ride, in a bus that was part of Minneapolis' public transit system, somebody was trying to articulate a norm.  Here was a private person, talking about a public matter; Habermas would say that a public sphere was ready to be born.  What happened?  Nobody did a thing.  We returned to our books.  We returned to our papers.  We returned to our transit maps.  No engagement.  Even though Sartre would say that this outside-the-expected-event should begin a little seriality, nothing happened.  Now, maybe you can't establish norms by breaking them.  I don't know if I buy that.  The Civil Rights Movement, after all, was (to simplify) based on a the idea that violation of norms would help establish new ones (Although Rev. Dr. King would say that African Americans were enacting the greater norms of America, equality and personal liberty).  Is the bus just not the kind of place to attempt to create norms and community?  What would be? Where would it be? Who knows?  Let's talk about it. And, then, let's talk about how we talked about it.

9:11am: On Toothbrushes in Bathrooms
The other day a television commercial aired that began talking about some sort of toothcare product, toothpaste, brush, floss, or something like that, and began raising ominous concerns about the average person's bathroom routines ("Did you hear the one about the priest and the plunger? … ) . The commercial asked us whether or not we keep our toothbrushes out on the sink, and informed us, that if we did, we run a serious threat in getting sick from the "microbacteria" released into the air whenever we brush our teeth. According to the ad, this little concern has been an "unspoken" concern of the ADA whose members, apparently, were afraid to speak out about it. Being a bathroom user myself, I thought that the ad was targeting me, and began wondering about it. One, what is the difference between a microbacteria and a plain old ordinary bacteria? Are there jumbobacteria as well? Let the scientists worry about that! I just don't think that the commercial's dire predictions of bleeding gums re-infected with fecal matter is not worth getting too concerned about. For one, it's not just toothbrushes that we leave lying around our bathrooms, we leave towels, some people combs, other people bottles of lotion. No doubt fecal settles in those places too, and I don't think that the American Cotton Commission gets to tied up about it. What about ourselves? Though I don't stare over the top of the basin with my mouth agape whenever I flush, I do occasionally watch the swirl to make sure it's going in the right direction and inadvertently must be welcoming millions of fecal bits into the homes of my head and hair. What about the toilet itself? The seat, the lever, the atmosphere around the throne? Surely, the entire bathroom must be filled with last month's porkchops. While I have no doubt that it's probably better not to ingest your own fecal matter—or anyone else's I, I suppose—I can't help but conclude that the commercial was only employing something of a doomsday scenario to impress me enough to buy its product. Talk about dangerous pieces of shit!

11:19pm: On Preeminent Domain

Having busily updated an unprecedented amount these past couple of days, I began contemplating a forum jump, moving from this pre-fab set-up with its own norms and virtues that I had no influence on constructing, to a new square my fellow citizens and I could craft in grand Habermasian style.  As to be expected, I inquired about the usual suspects: Cicero, Hermagoras, and even—gasp!—Isocrates.  Imagine my shock and surprise to discover that they had already been nabbed! 

I don't mean to understate the case here, folks, but we're talking about identity theft, and not that silly Dateline or 20/20 crap involving social security numbers and unsuspecting seniors playing fast and easy with unsecured websites.  No, I'm talking about the theft of four of the most preeminent rhetoricians in the history of peoplekind.  And in as much as these men helped cement the foundation for rhetoric and the public square as we in the West know it, our own identities have been ripped from us and put to work like the slaves who made Greek and Roman civilization possible.  Save the irony for tomorrow and spend your energy today!  I can only imagine that it tears you up as much as me to see our beloved Cicero, a man who lived and died in and by the public square, reduced to peddling some piddly private sphere interest.  And, oh, what cruelty beat in the heart of the sophist who so rhetorically flourished the pike in our hearts with name, "WebHouse."  O tempore, O mores!  And what will become of our beloved Hermagoras already nearly forgotten except for scraps of extant phrases and words caught in some Arab dust storm a few years back?  What little we could read of him today will be diminished even more when twenty years from now our only source for data is in some undecipherable language Rosetta's stone couldn't crack.  And there's only a little bit of hope to be found in the fact that some student of that dame, rhetoric, has dedicated Isocrates to a site that offers a brief bio- and bibliography of the man.  Yet, my heart beats like a Visagoth's club on column to find that the site is but a portal, a gateway, to a larger site, www.virtualogogy.com.  How lamentable that a man who, in his day, stood up to both Plato and Gorgias's competing conceptions of rhetoric, cannot, two thousand years later, stand up on his own, without the being chained to the support of others.  Oh, would the link only have lead to something a bit grander, like virtue-logogy.com.

Seeing and experiencing first hand the commercializing of the public square, I cannot help but feel despondant and gripped by paralyzing apoplexy brought on by fear for what they may one day to the still tabulae rosa, Me .  Will I befall the same fate as the rest?  Or will some student of the sqaure come to my rescue and create a space fit and designed for the thrust, jab, parry, and love-making of public deliberation?

But I mustn't sit still any longer.  Enact! Enact!  Let my actionas be examples for today and tomorrow!  Let's discuss issues and discuss the way we discuss them!  Let us take to heart Frederick Douglass' exhortation in Why the Colored American Is Not in the World's Columbian Exposition, and "Contend! Contend!"