Topic of the Week: Aesthetics.
Must It Be Accompanied by Suffering?
We speak of art as a means of expression. So how do we explain artists like Basquiat and Modigliani? That's a real question, not a discussion question for which I can guide you to reasonable alternative answers. There's that old myth that genius must suffer in order to realize itself. I don't think I buy that. It's got to be hard to see the world differently, but I don't buy that suffering must be part of that difference. Suffering is social. We'll think on that.
I would have settled for showing you a smaller detail and avoided the line, but that broke off part of the oval pattern.I find a remarkable sense of peace in Modigliani's juxtaposition of oval shapes. I wanted you to be able to imagine the oval. That same gentle oval is present in much of Modigliani's work. And his characteristic elongation of the neck, of the body. It reminds me of a dear friend, an artist, who used to claim that we are all going to mutate back to dinosaurs if we don't learn to deal with each other. Yes, yes. That seems like a distinct possibility. But I want to be one of the ones with those long necks, so I can eat the leaves off of trees. So you can see why Modigliani appeals to me.
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Four versions of jeanne's dinosaurs fantasized after Modigliani
OK, so they were influenced a little by Niki de Saint Phalle, too.
For readings on Modigiliani and Basquiat: Modigliani and Index of works on Basquiat.
Debriefing the Naked Space Exhibit
Poster from the Gallery Exhibit
NEWS and Announcements:
- Military Abuse in Iraq and New Hypertext Poem for Summer
The Table of Contents for What Have We Done to Her? to US? contains one summary and discussion of Charles Derber's The Wilding of America. and several articles I've backed up for summary and discussion.
The impetus for this new poem came on the front page of the New York Times this morning. From a Picture of Pride to a Symbol of Abuse in Iraq By James Dao.
Published: May 7, 2004. Backup.
Over the next few weeks I'll finish Freeing the Feminine Other by including those gallery pieces that weren't up on the Internet and completeing the atrributions I didn't have before the Gallery Exhibit.
Over the summer, contributions may be sent for What Have We Done to Her? to US?
- Debriefing the Hypertext Poem from Naked Space, Spring 2004
- Conference Options Under Consideration
Thursday through Saturday, September 23-25, 2004, Hampton Inn, Downtown/French Quarter Area, New Orleans. Conference on intersection of race, class, and gender, covering both practice and research, and including community activists. jeanne is considering a submission. Those interested should contact her soon. Deadline for application is June 30, 2004.
2004 Race, Gender & Class Annual Conference Southern University at New Orleans, hosting.
Grades for Spring 2004 Classes
These are notes from the exhibit. I'll go for the sign up sheets later, but not everyone got to sign in because I lost the book on Thursday. We found it again. This doesn't include any of my notes from my record book. Just notes so far. Be sure to check the list as I continue to put it up this week end and tomorrow. If I'm missing something by Monday, e-mail me, with a cc to Pat at patriciaacone@hotmail.com. I'm planning to send the grades in from here. jeanne
Readings for Fall 2004 Classes
These readings will go up all summer, as I prepare the Fall classes. I'm trying to give you definitions of concepts and resources along with the readings. If you have a question email me with a carbon copy to Pat patriciaacone@hotmail.com in case they screw up my email again. I'll be glad to answer. This will make review and discussion in the Fall lots easier, honest. jeanne
- Sociology of Agencies: Soc. 328
- Eve Arnold's It's All In A Day's Work Some of the discussion is up, but will be moved to separate file.
- Complicity: Local to National to International Agencies are administrative bodies. They exist on all these levels. What can they do when harm results from the application of their decisions? Who is accountable? Who is accountable for the prisoners we took in Iraq? What about the local veterans' associations?
Consider the need to clarify terms, to forgive, to understand clearly what the key issues are, and to give the agencies a good faith hearing, as well as the citizens. Do the police believe we give them a good faith hearing? Do veterans? What is our responsibility to deal with any misperceptions?
- Andre Gunder Frank's World System Discussion questions included. See if you can see applications to the performance evaluation of agencies, based on this discussion of Andre Gunder Frank's work.
Consider the role that dominant discourse plays in our knee jerk responses to questions such as this. Does dominant discourse always work on the side of the authorities in whom power is vested?
- ideology and social theory by Lynne Owens. Consider two things. How can we maintain civility AND subversion in our classroom discussions? How can agency personnel maintain civility AND subversion with clients, with each other? Why is that important? Consider illocutionary discourse and knowingness in your answer.
- Sociology of Law: Soc. 367
- Complicity: Local to National to International What role does local governance play in feedback and input to national and international law?
- Andre Gunder Frank's World System Discussion questions included. See if you can see applications of complicity in the harm caused by our national laws, based on this discussion of Andre Gunder Frank's work. What if we did rape Latin America?
Consider that the primary focus of local governance is getting the trash picked up and seeing that services are available and timely. So the trick here is, how do we conceptually link the local governance to the national and the international? Participation at a local level is participation; that's the opposite of apathetic and indifferent. Participation sends a message that the people are involved, committed, willing to take action. What else? Getting the trash picked up, and a community that's willing to support that job well done, might be another way to give evidence of a no-nonsense approach to holding people accountable for what they're supposed to do.
- Andre Gunder Frank's World System Discussion questions included. How can we decide locally whether or not to permit Wal-Mart to come into our community, alter its governance process, and lower expectations of governance, if we've never ever discusssed our expectations of governance. Is there a microcosm of the world system in our own community? In terms of the law and the legal system? Would Wal-Mart's demand that city could not alter its contract have altered who made the laws locally? Who did you talk to about this? What does that tell you about dominant discourse locally?
- Moot Court: The Skills of Governance Discourse: Soc. 370
- Women and Poverty: Feminist Theoretical Contributions: Soc.395
- Complicity: Local to National to International Some of the old games we used to play in sociology, like Simsoc, showed that help was afforded to the poor and disadvantaged more often by those nearest them on the wealth and power scale than by those in positions of high power and great wealth. That's not dissimilar from what we used to find in stratification studies that showed that people tend to know in greater detail people near their own social class than those in a social class far from their own. What does that suggest about whether poverty is a conspiracy by the rich to get the poor? Does that muddy up the class war perception a little?
Consider that dominant discourse permits the wealthy to KNOW that there are agencies to take care of the poor. Then consider whether that same dominant discourse operates amongst the working poor as they contemplate the non-working "lazy" poor.
- Andre Gunder Frank's World System Discussion questions included. Where does capitalism see the fault of failure in its world system? Where does the early world system as Andre Gunder Frank proposes it see the fault of failure in the system?
Consider where the system we're considering sees the fault of failure in that system: in the individual who could succeed with the right attitude and effort, or in the system that needs structural adjustment. Could be wiped out if everyone was just willing to try hard and work? Consider work in developing countries and work in developed countries and work in undeveloping countries. Consider the effects of work fleeing to other markets. How would Andre Gunder Frank's vision of the world system explain poverty and where would his system see the solution to failures?
A Range of Sources on Global Events
Left/Right Perspectives - Cursor - New York Times
Arts and Letters Daily - The Economist - The Guardian
Wall Street Journal -The Weekly Standard - The Nation
Los Angeles Times - Chicago Tribune - The Washington Post
Cursor's Al Jazeera Archive - Ha'aretz - Palestine Monitor
Indymedia - Mother Jones - BBC News - New Profile
Progressive Sociologists Network
Evaluating Internet Resources
Evaluating Hoax Email with samples, including an old one about charging for email that's going around again. Link updated March 29, 2004.
Evaluating Internet Resources Library Site at University of North Carolina. Don't forget to question. This is a good detailed source. Link checked March 29, 2004.
Using Academic Language and Visuals Effectively:
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Merriam-Webster Dictionary Search:
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Internet Mission Photography Archive
Dictionary of Critical Sociology
Maintained by Robert E. Mazur, Associate Professor, Iowa State University, Sociology.
Words of Art: Front Page
Wonderful Fine Arts dictionary at Okanagan University College in Canada.
Will cover many of the terms social theory shares with literary theory.
APA Style Style sheet for Psychology. Good reference for proper rules of citation.
Twenty-five Easy Steps Toward a Correctly-Formatted Paper or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love MLA
A Justice Site
jeannecurran@habermas.org
Who To Take: