Old wine, new bottle

Since entering into the blogosphere this past spring with a vague notion that I wanted to be a or even the popularizer of cultural anthropology - I have such grand delusions - I have come to the realization that a lot of what I have to say is about the life and work of being a parent and a professor, and a lot of why I think anthropology might be useful to popularize is that I also think we need other ways of thinking about (and even being) parents and professors. I have decided to work with what I have and not against it - a lesson that I constantly relearn as a parent and professor - and hereby relaunch my blog as parenthropology.

Academic economics

How did I miss this Times opinion piece on tenure?

Author Christopher Shea describes the tempest in academia / higher ed's teapot over the economics of universities and colleges. In particular, whether or not tenure ought to be abolished, and the mission of academia / higher ed be rethought. This is in response to recent publications such as Mark C Taylor's new book, Crisis on Campus: A Bold Plan for Reforming Our Colleges and Universities, and his opinion pieces in the Times. Shea concludes his piece:

Here we have the frightening subtext of all the recent hand-wringing about higher education: the widening inequality among institutions of various types and the prospects of the students who attend them. While the financial crisis has demoted Ivy League institutions from super-rich to merely rich, public universities are being gutted. It is not news that America is a land of haves and have-nots. It is news that colleges are themselves dividing into haves and have-nots; they are becoming engines of inequality. And that — not whether some professors can afford to wear Marc Jacobs — is the real scandal.

From where I perch in higher education - a PhD who in fact is immersed in undergraduate education, teaching 4 / 3 (with no TAs) at a public college that is not a research center (and whose research career depends upon the amount of time I manage to steal, essentially, from myself...) and who cannot afford to wear Marc Jacobs - I do not think that private versus public is the only important division, and I do not see the division of haves and have-nots as news. Frankly, is it not for this reason that so many Americans today do pursue post-secondary education? B/c having a college degree might mean the difference having or not having a job. Not to mention why the competition for admission to institutions like Williams and Columbia (or faculty positions there, for that matter) is as stiff as it is?

What is broken needs to be fixed. I just worry that the fixes proposed for academia / higher education will make institutions like the one where I teach as broken as everything else seems to be? Is the new normal "broken"?

I am not tied to the tenure system - I can imagine reasons to abolish it - but in the current stream of rants, I seem to see a lot of suggestions to decrease the autonomy and security with work in academia / higher education.

When it comes to work, is the new normal "sucks"?

Having everyone participate equally in unfair conditions is not the same as banishing inequalities. It seems to me that we all need to feel that we put our energies and efforts to meaningful use in our work, and that we are as necessary to the work being accomplished as the work is for our ability to meet our own needs and wants.

That this is not true for too many people is what sucks and what is broken.

The only thing we have to fear

Today in ANTH 100, I introduced the idea that the concept of culture is one intended to define a field of study - that is, "culture" is a tool that cultural anthropologists use to define / explain what we study. There are lots of ways to study what people do, say, and think, but "culture" lets us see human practices and ideas as learned (and taught) and shared so that individuals identify themselves (and others) as members of particular groups.

As a parenthropologist, I wonder about what we might be learning and teaching today: I just read this post on free range kids about a new book that I plan to put on my kindle wish list: Homeroom Security: School Discipline in an Age of Fear.

I especially appreciated author Aaron Kupchik's assertion: "We’re teaching kids what it means to be a citizen in our country. And what I fear we’re doing is teaching them that what it means to be an American is that you accept authority without question and that you have absolutely no rights to question punishment."

I like Kupchik's title and the connection it makes to the culture / politics / economics of homeland security. Although I have not read it in full, I have become a fan (literally, on FB...) of The Washington Post's coverage on Top Secret America:

The top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do the same work.

After nine years of unprecedented spending and growth, the result is that the system put in place to keep the United States safe is so massive that its effectiveness is impossible to determine.

We invest so much in terms of economic resources, intellectual effort, and emotional energy - for what?

What worries me is not just that homeroom / homeland security is "not working," but that it clearly is accomplishing other kinds of work. These are intended and unintended: As a parenthropologist, I am not interested in conspiracy theories. A lesson that cultural anthropology teaches us, however, is to question "functionalism" - that is, to recall that there might be stated reasons for why certain activities are undertaken (e.g., to keep kids safe and secure at school), and unstated reasons serving to reinforce still other ideas and practices.

***

Along with what we are teaching kids, implicitly and explicitly, about "security," I have been thinking about what kids are learning or not learning about work. I hear so many grown-ups go on and on about kids need to learn "work ethic" and the value of a dollar earned (or saved).

What I find jarring, however, is that seldom do the same grown-ups talk about the worth of work in terms of what workers ought to have - that is, fair and safe conditions. So that at least some college students see unionized workers as "greedy," and side with corporate interests in "efficiency."

Something you sometimes hear pundits wax eloquently on these days is the issue of "narrative" and controlling "the story" as a significant part of politics. What is the narrative of unionized workers? Why do I feel like I only hear stories that basically train me to adopt the values of stakeholders and stockholders? True that my retirement savings make me an "owner" with a stake (and stock) in the system, but that all still depends on being, in fact, a person who works.

Just some thoughts for Labor Day.

Parody

This might reveal supremely bad taste or judgment or both, but I had to share this from the feminist philosophers blog - an example of a new genre of so-called "Hitler parody" that apparently is being posted on YouTube.

This example is titled "Hitler as a teaching assistant" - I agree with the feminist philosophers not only that it is gendered, but also that it is funny (esp. in the world of academia / higher ed), and begs the question of why it is funny.

I am not a historian, but "Hitler parody" seems to have existed since Hitler himself was alive. (Were I a historian, I might know exactly the right citation to insert here. You know where to e-mail me...) He must have been aware of the resemblance to Charlie Chaplin, who would have been quite a celebrity at the time. Also, if you have never watched the original 1942 version of "To be or not to be" (which Mel Brooks remade in the 1980s), put it on your Netflix queue. It contains memorable (and hilarious) sequences concerning "The man with the little mustache..." and a joke that begins, "They named a brandy after Napoleon..." (and ends with the Fuehrer as a piece of cheese).

Ha ha ha - ow!

The nation's finest news source hits on yet another painful truth.

Teaching Nacirema

You might have read Horace Miner's "Body Ritual among the Nacirema" in an introductory class in anthropology. If not, here is a clue about its significance: What does Nacirema spell backwards?

Here is a Wiki on Nacirema.

When I teach "Nacirema" in ANTH 100, we typically engage in a discussion about the bizarre and strange habits of a society that we assume is exotic and primitive. When it is revealed, either by a student or by myself, that "they" are "us," the discussion turns to concepts like ethnocentrism and cultural relativism. Also, that ethnography also is a form of writing, so that we ourselves participate in the making of the exotic, even in word choices ("medicine men" versus "doctors"). I also like to suggest that a reason why students today might fail to recognize the Nacirema is that Miner's account, originally published in 1956, describes a society that has changed since then.

In previous semesters, the discussion has become animated, with a handful of students in the know "sitting out" while the rest work through the article.

This time, however, about a third of the students in one section of ANTH 100 had read "Nacirema" in high school. In both sections, students caught on quickly.

So, I still had almost 20 minutes to kill. (Not to worry. I always have more material that I want to cover...)

It makes me wonder whether or not it might be time for mothballs. For the article, I mean.

Eggsactly!

Followed this link from martinimade to an eggsperiment to determine whether or not pastured eggs really taste better.

As a college professor, I feel like this account actually might be useful for teaching basic concepts in research methods - like how and why science is based on comparison, what is a variable, the challenges of controlling for x, y, or z, and that engaging in research really ought to be recognized as itself a creative endeavor.

As an anthropologist, I appreciated the recognition that eating is shaped by its context. It really means something to me that I eat eggs from "happy" chickens.