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Current Issue: Volume 26, No. 5 , Week of February 19, 2006

Love Is About Sharing Memories

jeanne's first version of love is about sharing memories

Just in Time for Mardi Gras Next Week

NEWS and Announcements Site Map
News and Announcements from the Department of Criminal Justice, UWP
News and Announcements from the Department of Sociology, CSUDH

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WWW www.habermas.org

California State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Created: February 19, 2006
Latest Update: February 19, 2006
E-Mail Icon jeannecurran@habermas.org
takata@uwp.edu

Topic of the Week:

Love Is About Sharing Memories

This week's Topic just seems like a natural. We speak of love so much, in the sense of caring for the Other, of being aware of many perspectives, each of which has its own validity, that when I saw today's article in the New York Times, I couldn't resist. (Modern Love: Loved and Lost? It's O.K., Especially if You Win By Veronica Chambers, Sunday Styles, the New York Times, February 19, 2006. Backup.)

"DATING for me was always like that video game: you try to follow the dance moves, and the further you get in the game, the trickier the moves become, until you are just a flailing mess. I was clingy and desperate and wore my heart on my sleeve, falling madly in love repeatedly, only to meet with heartbreaking rejection at every turn.

Now, that's a tale I can relate to. When I was about fourteen, I went through a serious depression. I was worried I would never develop a personality. Adolescence sucks if you don't have someone around to reassure you. Does anyone else remember those nagging doubts? Veronica Chambers was willing to wait. Pat was gonna be a Catholic nun! But she had six children. I kept marrying best friends and then wearing them out. I mean, they were nice guys, really neat people. I just literally wore them out. Then I finally married Arnold, with one of Carol Telesky's daughters, Laura, as my Maid of Honor, and another of her daughters, Donna, as Arnold's Best Man. Since then, Arnold has almost worn ME out.

So I could relate to Veronica Chambers' story. My husbands would have probably left me forlorn and broken-hearted if I had ever slowed down enough to let them get a word in. Marriage is about living together, and about having the fortitude to wait until you find someone you won't drive to desperation. It's about the dogs and cats who live with you, the kids you have, the crazy places you go, and the crazy things you do together. And maybe, for some of us, it's about the friends we never marry, but who help us make the memories love is made of.

Why did I have to stop to post this on the way to No Child Left Behind? Because that's what matters, that you're loved. And no standardized test is ever gonna do that for you. School should be a time when young people, or old, older, oldest people, for that matter, come together with the joy that is learning to play, to experiment, to try out friends and others, and to save the memories. Veronica Chambers' article gave me a baseline from which to measure how well we're doing with not leaving any child behind.

Brenda said this beautifully in Message No. 10186 on transform_dom:

"A Child can be 79 years old, I am not leaving her behind . . ."

In a world in which love is alive, no one is left behind.

February 20, 2006, jeanne added:

Love is sharing good times and bad. Love is seeing the broader picture that includes others. Monday morning I found Karen Crouse's article on Joey Cheek, and thought of Brenda's kindness to a 79 year-old woman. Love is remembering others and sharing your joy in living.

There are lots of serious things wrong with the No Child Left Behind Program. Most of them include focussing on what children can't do instead of what they can, and helping them grow from there. We arleady knew they were failing tests. We don't need to give them more tests to fail. We need to love them, respect them, believe in them.

Joey Cheek recognized this principle in his gift of $40,000 to "Right to Play, a humanitarian organization based in Toronto that is focused on helping disadvantaged children through sports." Cheek Makes the Most Out of Gold After Missing Out on Crimson by Karen Crouse, New York Times, Monday, February 20, 2006. Backup. Joey Cheek won a

Chad Hedrick, in an NBC interview, spoke of the concern he had that young people give up at an early age if they don't skate well enough to win medals. Hedrick emphasized the joy of the sport and that all should be encouraged to play for the joy of playing. I still remember the fun I had playing tennis after school in high school. At the end of two years I finally hit the ball over the net, and the teacher was ecstatic. No, I'm not disabled; just klutzy. But I like Chad Hedrick's understanding of the klutzy folks, too.

And finally, today, I checked out the Interview with Shani Davis and Joey Cheek after their gold, silver medals win in the Olympics. The quick interviews on NBC glossed over the tensions on the long-track skating tensions when Shani Davis refused to skate the Pursuit. They just pointed out there were tensions. In the Q & A's on the Olympic Speed Skating site, Shani explained; and he and Joey Creek showed great respect for one another. This emphasizes the importance of not limiting ourselves to sound bites and the need to listen in good faith to the validity claims of all.

DAVIS: Ever since I was a kid, I would joke around with my friend and I would say, 'man, someday I want to win the 1,000 meter. Because I was always going the 1,000 meter at the pack-style. It gave me just enough time to get up to speed because a lot of kids would beat me in the one lap when I was a midget and a juvenile and stuff like that. So I started thinking about having the opportunity to be able to chase that dream to win the 1,000. It's kind of complicated because all my life it was individual events, you know? Short track had the team events. You train with the national team and you go to relay camps and things like this, and you train to be part of the team if you make that team. And I was pre-qualified in the 1,000, I was pre-qualified in the 1,500 and I was pre-qualified in the 5,000. At the Olympic Trials for long track, they named an Olympic team And they also named other people just to come here who did not make the Olympic team to skate the pursuit.

I'm going to say this again, I'll say this 100 times. After the Olympics in 2002 when I went there I didn't partake in anything, I wasn't even able to practice because I wasn't named the fifth man, they took six people. I told myself I would never, ever take anyone else's opportunity to skate at the Olympic Games if I there was something I was going for myself at the Olympic Games. And I stuck to my word.

And when asked: "How do you feel you skated tonight?" Cheek responded that he couldn't top Davis's story about feeling like a candy bar in a vending machine. He just wanted a medal, to be chosen, too. Clear evidence that he had been listening to Davis, and acknowledgement of a respect for the analogy. That was followed by the excellent question, " What would you each take from each other's skating?" and the attentive, thoughtful answers each gave.

I'm so glad that I went out on the Internet to give you more information on all this. It made my day.

love and peace, jeanne

NEWS, Announcements, and

Current Events Discussion Topics:

  • Joining Discussion and Learning Records Groups on Yahoo:

  • Grade Corrections, Fall 2005:

    We processed lots of grades, removing the Incompletes on Wednesday. It'll take them a few days to go through the channels and get posted. I haven't picked up the new messages on learning records yet. Will try to get to these tomorrow.

    These incompletes were the resulto of my inability to pick up your messages from transform_dom when we hit almost 10,000 messages. I need you to post them on learning records jeanne January 25, 2006.

    Note that jeanne's e-mail is not functioning properly. That's jeannecurran@habermaas.org Reach me at tranform_dom until I can get it fixed.

  • Grade Corrections, Fall 2005:

    We processed lots of grades, removing the Incompletes on Wednesday. It'll take them a few days to go through the channels and get posted. I haven't picked up the new messages on learning records yet. Will try to get to these tomorrow.

    These incompletes came about because I couldn't find your posts when we hit almost 10,000 posts. I need you to post the numbers of your posts or just submit another copy of them to learning records, so that I can post them on the site for your future access. This was a computer glitch that occurred when we had to use Yahoo for our listserv. Please don't give me a printed version. I can't possibly retype those. From learning records, I can cut and paste them to our learning records. jeanne January 25, 2006.

  • Learning Records, Fall 2005:

  • New Office

    Our office is across the hall from where we used to be, SBS -B325. They moved us out of SBS B326 during the last week of classes, while I was having a reaction to the radiation therapy. All our stuff got moved across the hall, but it's in no condition for immediate use. We hope to get moved in by late January. jeanne

  • Syllabi for Spring 2006

    Syllabus for Sociology 395_01: No Child Left Behind Undergraduate Section. In Room SAC 3162, in the Old High School Buildings parallel to the Gym buildings.

    Please use the undergraduate syllabus until I can get the Graduate syllabus up. Quite enough there for you to start with. Friday, February 3, 2006. jeanne

  • Sites You Might Want to Check Out:

    http://www.quackwatch.org/index.html Quackwatch, a website maintained by Stephen Barrett, M.D.

    "Quackwatch, Inc. . . . is a nonprofit corporation whose purpose is to combat health-related frauds, myths, fads, and fallacies. Its primary focus is on quackery-related information that is difficult or impossible to get elsewhere. Founded by Dr. Stephen Barrett in 1969 as the Lehigh Valley Committee Against Health Fraud, it was incorporated in 1970. In 1997, it assumed its current name and began developing a worldwide network of volunteers and expert advisors. . . . "

  • Call for Papers
    Casazine - Online Magazine for members of Casa. "CASA offers a platform for people to discuss and combine efforts and information working towards social transformation. For more information on CASA 2005 Borders, Markets, Movements and to find out about the summer meeting CASA 2006: Constructing Social Change go to http://www.casa.manifestor.org/." Jeanne joined this group a couple of years ago, though she couldn't make their summer meeting. I think our goals fit. Some of you should consider following this. I think their summer meeting this year might be in Montreal. Check out the site. Contribute a paper to CASAZINE.

  • Conference in June 2006

    Please check out the proposal I submitted on Christmas Eve. If you want to go, we need to start thinking about money NOW!

  • The Ecstasy Exhibit at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art through February 20. Just a few weeks left. jeanne
    "Ecstasy" is the trippy, messy, highly entertaining survey put together by Paul Schimmel of the Museum of Contemporary Art here. It sprawls through the Geffen Contemporary, the museum's cavernous warehouse in Little Tokyo, which too often begs for attention but is now jammed with blissed-out mobs.

    Visual Sociology

      jeanne's imaginary of The Culture of Denial: Villon, 15th Century, Courbet, 19th Century

      The Culture of Denial: Villon, 15th Century, Courbet, 19th Century
      The Ballad of the Hanged - Ballade des Pendus
      by François Villon (1431 - 14-?)
      Around the time of Jeanne d"Arc

    • In the computer image above I was trying to capture the the culture of modernism, and perhaps of postmodernism as well, that came to accept images of horror, like the dead rabbits, deer, chickens, etc. or the skulls, that were often a part of still life scenes along side a bowl of fruit. I borrowed the bowl of fruit from Courbet, but it hardly looks like his, as the links will show you. Then I called it the Culture of Denial.

      I think what I had in mind about five years ago, when I did that image, was the crazy juxtaposition (postmodernity) that we came face to face with as we realized that the enlightenment wasn't all we had thought it would be. I think I meant, or at least I can reinterpret today the cognitive dissonance of old ideas of gross cruelty nestled contentedly next to ideas of peace and respect for mother earth.

      This interpretation, along with a card featuring the computer image, would be an excellent favor to offer a stranger with whom you would like to talk about this strange juxtaposition of violence and peace.

      And then there are the beautiful lines,

      Frères humains qui après nous vivez, n'ayez les coeurs contre nous endurcis . . .
      (frair u men' ki apray noo' vi vay, nay yay lay ker' cone tra noo' on dure see . . . ) transliteration - the French sounded out roughly

      Human Bros who live long after we have gone,
      let not your hearts be hardened against us . . .

    Lectures, Notes, and Texts

    Academic Resources

  • SquiggleResource Literacy

    • Urban Legends Reference Pages. They post rumors and scams and phony e-mails circulating, to offer you a quick check. It worked for me. I entered "Fat Boy" as a google seacrch, and when I saw the Snopes.com link, I knew it would help, and it did. To not check your sources is as grievous as to plagiarize someone else's information and writing. A Page from Urban Legends As an Example.

    • the-artists.org Good quick reference site with many of the artists, art schools, and visual approaches to present social issue that we discuss. Added April 8, 2005.

    • Plagiarism Watch www.streetgangs.com site. The intelligent and effective use of resources means that you have to be careful not to plagiarize other people's material. We have several files on plagiarism, but I think the one that might make the most sense to you is this complaint on streetgangs.com. They give you samples of sites that have taken their material without citation, even at colleges, and they also give you examples of sites that have used their material with proper attribution. I find the irony poetic, and hope that their message will get through to you the importance of attribution. Dr. O'Connor on his Mega Criminal Justice site led me to streetgangs.com and noted that others frequently hack into the site. For that reason I have created a backup copy for your use in case you cannot access the actual site. Please be sure to attribute any citation to streetgangs.com. jeanne Backup.

      You might want to consider also the information on Dr.Woo Suk Hwang of South Korea:

      "Therapeutic Cloning Was a Fraud"
      By Hsien Hsien Lei, PhD | Related entries in Genetic Engineering

      One of the year’s biggest stories in bioscience appears to have been make-believe. In May, scientists in South Korea announced they’d been able to clone eleven embryonic stem cell lines containing the DNA of patients who suffered from diseases such as Parkinson’s, diabetes, and spinal cord injury. The hope was that the cloned stem cells could be used therapeutically via transplantation without fear of rejection.

      Now Dr. Woo Suk Hwang has admitted to fabricating the results. Nine of the 11 colonies of stem cells featured in the study published in the journal Science apparently don’t exist and the other two may not have been real either. The researchers involved have asked Science to retract their paper." From geneticsandhealth.com, consulted on December 26, 2005.

    Using Academic Language Effectively

    Merriam-Webster Dictionary Search:

    and Careers

    • Resumes:

    • Letters of Recommendation:

      • Letters of Recommendation: How to get me to respond to your request. Many of you need letters. If you will follow this format, I can do them quickly and make them good.
      • Dog Letters If you do not give me adequate information, but do manage to get my attention, you may end up with a dog letter. That is a letter that says that you work well with people, that you are enthusiastic, that you persist at getting things done, and that everyone likes you. Of course, my dog gets along well with people, brings his ball to them, is enthusiastic, and persists at getting them to take his ball. Everyone likes my dog. That's a dog letter. It's so general it could be about my dog. jeanne

    • Career Options You Might Not Have Considered

      • visual media and their interdependence with other means of knowing to understand that we are not totally rational creatures deciding things apart from our feelings and values. Wolfowitz (new President of the World Bank to aid developing countries AND principle advocate of the Iraq War) might feel very differently when he is exposed to visual and aural images of the poor developing countries that have not before been his primary concern. So we want to know how best to present those developing countries visually. And we might find that we can have a career doing that sort of thing, so it does reflect on us as individuals. Added April 2, 2005.

    That Was Fun! Sneaky Strokes and Flying Good Dogs

    Flying Dog is also a painting by Zhang Kai. Best I've ever come across to illustrate our site with magic numbers and unicorns and whipped cream cats and now, flying dogs, oh, and Faupel's Flying Fish.:

    • Icons and acronyms and what they mean in Internet Speak

    • Index of Nice Things We've Said to Each Other

      • I Was Scared of Statistics

      • It Feels Good to Make a Difference

      • The Site Goes On - You're Always Welcome Back
        • From Angelique Hawley on December 16, 2005: Message No. 9072 on transform_dom.
          Merry Christmas! Jeannne and Pat and all the marvelous students at CSUDH that has shared in "Naked Space"

          I wish I had a lot of money so that I could reward all of you properly. Transform_domDigest is so wonderful.

          I can recall when being one of the first users in 2004 and I see we are at digest 594. my how time flies when we are learning and having fun.

          Jeanne you and Pat are the bomb!

          I continue to read the digest although I am not taking any of your classes now. The digests have been more informative than the school paper. Please continue to keep it going.

          Get rest ! I hope to see you .

    • Flying Good Dogs: Whenever something happens in this or any other class that works out well, that inspires you, that helps in studying, whatever, take a few minutes to send us an e-mail. We'll post it where all of us can learn from it, including other teachers.