actual learning

I love it when material in one class overlaps with that of another. Partly because it makes understanding easier for at least one of the subjects, but mainly because I feel like I'm actually learning something for a change.

Today, the overlap was between lessons in my sociology and blogging classes. A concept found in my soc reading, Frederick W. Taylor's "scientific management," was referenced in our blogging reading and discussion. Taylor, an engineer, applied scientific management to factory jobs, equating time with production and money. With that connection, Taylor found that time can be more easily measured and charted to be saved.

In sociology class, The Family, we apply this scientific management to how parents divvy up their time spent doing paid work and housework or child care. In Blogging in Theory and Practice, we apply scientific management to a discussion of blogs as grids and networks. In my stream of consciousness, I apply it to the separation of my homes.

You see, my relationship with where I grew up has changed since I was a freshman in college, and I think that change has caused some unrest in my relationships with family members. But I think a variation of the sociological scientific management can be used explain it.

When I was a freshman I didn't consider Mizzou "home." My college life served a merely functional purpose. I didn't have close friendships here, nor did I have any sentimental feelings toward Columbia itself. Mizzou is where I did work, and that was it. So it made sense that I still placed the city I grew up in on a pedestal. Going back there was vacation: it was where my true friends were, it was the only place I felt I could truly relax.

However, somewhere along the line of growing up and old, the place I considered home flipped. I seem to have more close friendships in at Mizzou than I do in Wisconsin, and I've grown to honestly love the city of Columbia. I've learned that you can do well in school and still have fun. I've learned to relax and love life here.

It's not that I consider going back to Wisconsin stressful or painful. I still love my hometown and it's still up on a pedestal. But, to be fair, since distance prevents me from often traveling back, the home where I grew up kind of has become a place where I know I have to get work done. There's doctors' appointments to catch up on, and I always want to get my hair cut at my favorite salon. And when I go out, I feel like I have to make a point of looking good and/or putting on a good face in case I run into someone unexpectedly.

This flip of homes is similar to the one described in Ariel Russell Hochschild's book, The Time Bind. To describe why some parents want to stay at work longer, Hochschild employed the theory of scientific management:

"Home has become the place where people carry out necessary tasks efficiently in the limited amount of time allotted" (49)

Again, I want to stress that I love my hometown. My family is there, and even though I feel I have a stable "family-of-choice" in Columbia, I will always love my parents, sister, grandparents more than anything else.

The point here is that I've changed. And until now, when scientific management came up in two classes, I didn't really understand it. I hope my family, friends and you all understand it, too.

mapping middle school

As we talked about networking and how information is transmitted, I kept thinking about the middle school rumor mill. Actually, it was more like the middle school news-network - it seemed like anytime something happened, fact or rumor, the event had to be transmitted through at least three people before it reached the intended source.

The best example of this information transmission is the middle school relationship. Let's be honest, rarely did the pre-teen "boyfriend" or "girlfriend" actually talk to their love/lust/hormonal interest. So, for my mapping assignment, I chose to display the standard middle school break-up.


As you can see, several people know about the break-up before the unsuspecting girlfriend, and all of those people felt it was their honorable duty to tell her. Note the dashed line of communication between the boyfriend and unsuspecting girlfriend. The boyfriend was rarely the person to let the girlfriend know that they were no longer a couple. Of course, there are always a few exceptions where a boyfriend chooses to communicate semi-directly with his soon-to-be-ex; however, this exchange usually was in the form of a note passed while the history teacher was not looking.

when soul meets body

“Soul. The word rebounded to me, and I wondered, as I often had, what it was exactly. People talked about it all the time, but did anybody actually know? Sometimes I’d pictured it like a pilot light burning inside a person – a drop of fire from the invisible inferno people called God. Or a squashy substance, like a piece of clay or dental mold, which collected the sum of a person’s experiences – a million indentations of happiness, desperation, fear, all the small piecing of beauty we’ve ever known.” ~Sue Monk Kidd, The Mermaid Chair

We had quite the discussion in blogging class Thursday. J L brought up a great topic for his blogging/technology in the news presentation: inserting nano-chips in the brain as a form of medical treatment.

There were a lot of good points brought up during the discourse, but I was fixated on the moral/ethical/spiritual aspects of altering the brain with technology. In class, I asked if this technology would violate the line of separation between the soul and the body. Now, I just have a whole slew of questions about the soul itself.


Is there a difference between the mind - the brain - and the spiritual concept of the soul?

And, assuming that there is a difference, where does the soul end and the mind begin?

I'm not a big believer in intelligent design or anything like that, but I've never really questioned the reality of the soul. I wonder why that is?


I don't have any answers for these questions. And I don't have any clue about how to talk it out either. I just wanted to throw these questions out into the cosmos (assuming, of course, that an orderly universe exists.)

Cheers.

cruel and unusual punishment

Should you find yourself channel surfing at 10:30 tonight, do your best to scan past the WE Network.

At Monday nights, the network airs the worst show I have ever been unfortunate enough to catch: Style by Jury. It’s a make-over show that tricks an “unfashionable” person to come in for a job interview or audition. While the person talks to the show’s host, a jury of about 10 random people observe from behind a two-way mirror, ripping apart the contestant’s style and attacking his or her appearance.

Sounds like an average reality show, I know. But I think the whole concept is absolutely awful.

According to the dictionary on my computer’s dashboard, style is “a distinctive appearance, typically determined by the principles according to which something is designed." This definition sounds like it's referring to art or architecture (the dictionary used the columns of a building as an example) but I think it we can interpret it a little differently to get my point across.

I think everyone should have a distinctive appearance. Sometimes that means nothing more than modeling personal style after catalogue cut outs, other times that means turning a bed sheet into an evening gown. Either way, no matter how cookie-cutter or unique, everyone has a distinct appearance. The catch is, though, the principles according to which that appearance is created are designed by each individual. What you wear on the outside is, consciously or subconsciously, a reflection of who you are on the inside.

Style and fashion are likenesses of your personality. More accurately, style and fashion are your personality. It's a physical representation of the intangible self. Which is why I have such a problem with Style by Jury. When these "jurors" rule on the ambushed contestant, they aren't just commenting on clothes and accessories - they're attacking the innocent's identity.

To prevent coming off as a hypocrite in this, previous or later posts, let me write a quick sidebar. First impressions and unfair judgments are at the heart of Style by Jury - there wouldn't be much basis for the show without those nasty snap criticisms. The act of judging, however, isn’t the issue. To quote the wisdom of Sex and the City:

Carrie: Do I judge?

Stanford: We all judge. That's our hobby. Some people do arts and crafts; we judge.

Judging’s not a bad thing – it’s kind of like an in-born defense mechanism like the gut feeling. The problem lies in actually acting on those judgments, when you give more weight to your personal opinion than others’ feelings.

As far as I’m concerned, there’s no such thing as being in-style or out of fashion. People should wear what they are comfortable in. If you’re comfortable in your clothes, you’re confident in your skin. And being happy with yourself is always fashionable.

one is silver

I think I recently made a new friend. We've had a couple of classes together in the past but never really socialized until having a couple of weeks ago. Now, this kid has been added to the short list of people that call me fairly regularly, which includes my mom, sister and two roommates.

I like having a new friend with whom I have a genuine good time. But I'm kind of struck at how quickly I was able to feel at ease and open up with this person. Generally, I'm pretty reserved and make people gain my trust. So what is it that made me trust this cat so quickly?

A quote from Michael Connelly's crime fiction novel, The Poet, suggests a valid possibility:

“Maybe because it is always easy to trust somebody who has done what you have done.” ~Michael Connelly, The Poet

Connelly, a former crime reporter for the Los Angeles Times, was describing an exchange between a newspaper reporter and a former newspaper reporter. The current reporter was musing over why he was so quick to trust a complete stranger with information for a hot story.

Fictional story or not, I think there's merit to that idea. My new friend and I are both journalism majors - we both have put in extensive tenures at the Missourian. Thinking a little deeper, any good friends I've made over the past year have been journalism or Missourian kids. Granted, proximity probably plays a role. But there still seems to be some kind of unspoken club, clique or good-ole bond that people seem to share with those that do what they do. Maybe its because there's always something to talk about. Or maybe there's a special understanding and respect for each other.

Either way, I'm kind of glad that bond among professions exists. If nothing else, I've made some great friends because of it. Cheers.

novel ideas

It looks like the score is Dan Brown 1, petty authors 0.

Maybe that's an unfair label for Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, the two authors of The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail that claimed that Brown plagarized their ideas in his best selling The Da Vinci Code. In other words, Baignet and Leigh felt that their thoughts - not just the words they wrote and published - should be copy-wrighted as well.

Today, a British judge sided with Brown, ruling that Brown didn't steal the idea from Baignet and Leigh. Which is a good thing for the novel and novel writers.

Yet the fact that this lawsuit made it as far as it did still irks me. I think Baignet's and Leigh's egos were hurt by the fact that a novelist was better able to engage audiences with the idea that Jesus and Mary Magdeline were married than they were.

“The original writer is not one who imitates nobody, but one whom nobody can imitate.” ~François-René de Chateaubriand

I think the two authors are upset that even though their ideas may have been somewhat unique and original, their writing - thus themselves as authors - was not. It's a shame that the novel had to be put in such danger just for the sake of two men's bruised pride.

takin' care of business

To spark a fairly intelligent discussion (and to fulfill the Blogging in the News Presentation assignment), today, let's talk a little about big businesses that are creating official blogs for their companies.

According to the Atlanta Business Chronicle article, "Businesses wake up to blogs," 5 percent of Fortune 500 companies have started official blogs. Companies such as Coca-cola, Microsoft and General Motors are blogging in order to better gauge public opinion of their work and products. Some companies are even hiring professional bloggers.

Here's a bit of a, to use Professor Strickland's phrase, quote dump to highlight the main points of discussion:

"We want it to be a dialogue," Grabert said. "We don't want it to be just another piece of our PR machine."

"Increasingly, people are finding information online from a variety of sources, including blogs," (Grabert) said. "It's important for companies to have a voice in that world."

"It's definitely a good way to get a sense of what the public is thinking," (Coustan) said.

"Bloggers stay longer on the site and go deeper," (Bloomberg) said.

"The conversations are going to go on whether you have a blog or not," (Bloomberg) said. "Why wouldn't you want to have that conversation in your own home -- where you have the home-court advantage?"

"If companies would just listen to what customers are saying," said Hallett, "they would learn so much."

So, what do you think about companies that have official blogs? Is this a positive or negative development for the blogosphere?

immunity, please

“Books and beer are the best and worst defense.” ~Sherman Alexie, The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fist Fight in Heaven

And that's the defense I'm going to use for my two-week hiatus from blogging. Sorry, all.

Perhaps I should explain a little. As per usual, the week before spring break was filled with assingments, tests and loads of other to-dos. (By the way, thanks for cancelling class, Professor Strickland.) This year, most of my school work fell during the beginning of the week, which was good and bad at the same time. So here's where books are my best - and honest - defense.

But then there is the beer factor. My last test was on Thursday, so I really did have reasonable time to pump out two blog entries. The problem? My brain - and thirst - had already checked out for the week. Instead of spending Thursday night faithfully in front of my computer, I hit up Old Chicago with my roommates and knocked off three or four more beers from the restaurant's 110 varieties, coming ever closer to getting my name on a plaque that says I completed Old Chicago's World Tour of Beers.

So again, I apologize for the lack of blogging that week.

In order to account for being MIA last week, we better expand that list to books, beer and the beach. And maybe to be fair, beer should be changed to booze in general.

I spring breaked for the first time this year. Three of my closest friends and I spent the week on South Padre Island in Texas, doing nothing but tanning, reading for pleasure and drinking. Normally, I wouldn't call this kind of vacation in my character - I'm more of a have-a-few-beers-at-the-Berg kind of partier. Really though, I'm glad I took the trip. It was a fairly crazy week and, honestly, I did a lot of things I'm not entirely proud of. But I don't regret a single minute of any of it.

Anywho, I'm back to being a faithful blogger now. Maybe I'll even try to be a little more faithful, to make up for before. Either way, hello again and cheers, all.