Let's get this started again!

Some might start a new blog. Give up on the past, chalk it up to childhood antics. Get excited about a new project ("we could make a tumblr!"). How many blogs have we seen, become fascinated with, and then noticed that they haven't been updated in two years? How many projects have we started only to let die, drift away in our past conscience. On the Internet or elsewhere.

Sometimes it's necessary. Some projects serve their purpose before they're completed. Sometimes we get caught up in other "more important" stuff, so we can't dedicate the time or the energy that we'd like to our old projects.

But fuck that. I don't have time to start another project. But I do have time to reawaken an old one. And the people who started "gut the house" are too badass to leave behind in past conscience.

Maybe this is a rallying cry? Maybe I'm just bored or feel like I've become complicit. Maybe I want to reconnect to my old friends. (I miss you!!!)

Let's tear it up.

"The Pimp's Slaves" NY Times Article

Here is a link to Frank Rich's New York Times article titled "The Pimps' Slaves." Check it out.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/16/opinion/16kristof.html?ex=1206417600&en=6b434f464f3d3e57&ei=5070&emc=eta1

12/18/07

i havent much to say but for the consistency's sake, i figured i would throw a post out there. ive been thinking about how feminism can be used monolitically as a crutch, maybe like most -isms get used as crutches to an over-simplification. this maybe not sound coherent, but hear me out. those who stride forth and proclaim ardently their affiliation and dedication to feminism (myself included) find a hard time understanding when women (and men for that matter) do not take on the same points of view. and furthermore, it can be those who are so resolute in their beliefs that fail to effectively translate the theoretical and discursive underpinnings of their stances. extremists, though not radicals, can be bad news bears when it comes to a productive conversation. advocates of feminism who fail to recognize the vitality of different feminisms make coalitions impossible.

now i am not just speaking of the obvious tensions that evoke broad discussions multiculturalism vs. universalism. i mean to look more specifically at how my own opinions and beliefs have evolved on a very personal level. i think its valid to say that people can identify with parties and movements and theories that have a definite and concrete set of questions and answers. example : the democratic party is like a tangible entity, hence the availbility of such a party base. its like subscribing to the template. i see this as the most flagrant failure of those who claim their 'liberal' status. maybe that is what im talking about, im thinking about the ways in which we subscribe to the templates of 'American' feminism without turning the critical lens on the racism and classism that pervades it. but then we get back into the world of isms and ists. i need a means of conceptualization that does not find itself stuck in poststructuralism or feminism or socialism etc. etc. i guess my problem is that its so easy to espose something as doctrine without even needing to understand more than its basic pillars. but maybe thats what makes things reachable. and then we have to include the ideas of agency and access.

yea, this post isnt coherent at all. itd do us better to have a conversation. i guess my point is that in my younger days i found strength in the title of a feminist but more recently, i find more solace in the notion that feminism and feminists are hardly coherent and collectively consolidated.

just something ive been thinking about. hope all is well rounding out '07!

trading cards.

Theory.org.uk has a set of 21 trading cards for some popular theorists throughout the ages. Some of them are quite funny. Its also a pretty cool website that has info about media studies, critical studies, resources, projects, etc etc. check it out if you feel compelled...

trading cards: http://www.theorycards.org.uk/main.htm



main index: http://www.theory.org.uk/index.htm

nussbaum vs. butler round 1

martha nussbaum, the universalist HR philosopher takes a few hits at judith butler. and by a few hits, i mean she attacks her entire philosophical approach. a good read, but take it with a grain of salt.

make sure to check the letters to editor section after her piece. Gayatri Spivak, Joan Scott, Nancy Fraser chime in amongst others. Nussbaum replies.

http://www.arlindo-correia.com/100702.html

a letter.

dear gay and lesbian rights activists,

i hate you. and you know what else, i dont really like Ellen either. She's not really that funny and shes sterilized herself of sexuality via NBC (or whatever network it is that shes sold out to). I don't really find much liberation in Miller Light floats in gay pride parades while there are still Man Law commericals out there. Fuck you, Advocate magazine. Hear me out, corporate homos and power lesbians suck. The L Word is blatantly racist (yet i still watch it). Gay marriage will not solve all your problems. I want to be with the freaks. I want to be a freak. Don't get me wrong, I understand from where you are coming, but what is it really going to do? Will we be further entrenched in the quagmire of liberal politics that fail time and time again to recognize the structural and institutional problems within the discourse of 'sexual freedom'? Where is the queer? I understand that there are a multitude of areas for subversion even within the liberal gay and les politics, but it doesnt impress me.

Single gender education

I know I'm not technically a U of I GWS major any more (though I think it's a lifelong title, really). But here's a GWS related conflict for you. I'm teaching in a coed high school now, and the other day, a teacher who was using my classroom made the comment that he thought all high school should be separated by gender. He used to work at an all boys' high school. Having attended an all girls' high school myself (which I loved) I tend to agree with him. I don't specifically track how often students of different genders raise their hands or do any other behavior. but I do notice that they spend a LOT of time during the day discussing who is dating whom, who is eyeing whom across the room, who is passing notes to whom during class, who is paying extra careful attention to their appearance for whom, etc. The whole environment is very heteronormative (though I suppose dividing anything into two genders would be heteronormative, too) and very different from how I went through my four years of high school. So, one part of me knows that my high school experience played a major role in cultivating a lot of the things I like about myself now. And the other part of me says that treating people differently or separately based on gender only reinforcees the dichotomy and naturalizes the social construct. I've been telling myself that gender divided schools are an appropriate response to the fact that we can't avoid that boys and girls are raised differently and therefore may need different things. But it seems like that just feeds into the cycle rather than interrupting it. Thoughts? Does anyone even still read this thing?