2 November 2005
Today:
Work. Interspersed with naps and several pooping adventures. I have to wonder if it’s the vitamins.
Tutoring (paid). 2 hours. 3 students. One is slightly resistant and impatient each week, but he is not confrontational. Another is one of my classmates. No difficulties arise; I have no afterthoughts, unlike yesterday. The student wasn’t really articulating what she wanted help with and I wasn’t really getting that she was being passive and deferring to my “authority” as the tutor who “knows best” in this really timid, girly, middle class way until near the end. We did get something accomplished, but it made me a bit more aware of the different communication styles students have (and I can’t be bitchy and judgmental about the fact that she was passive and girly and middle class. Not when tutoring or reflecting upon it).
Why does my left eye keep twitching?
Food. Chili hummos red bean chicken wrap from the union. Not bad.
Class. Discourse Analysis. Topic: Discursive Psychology. Interesting to me because the were was talk of “the self” and the measurement of peoples’ attitudes. I am obsessed with theories about the formation/construction of the self because my self is especially fractured (all of our selves are constantly in flux due to postmodern schizophrenia and/or other factors, supposedly [convincingly to me] but I do feel that some people are somewhat more stable than others)…
Forum: It’s about bilingual education and breaking new ground, building bridges, forging new pathways…something like that. Hoped for some impassioned words, some idea of how to help with the change. But her talk was mostly just history and she was tired. Maybe the question and answer session would have actually been the worthwhile part this time, but I had to get up. I went with a classmate, and another classmate showed up, and a crackpot acquaintance was there also, so it was slightly social. But what to do about this language issue. So hard to penetrate the societal views. Language is power, it’s a social construction, we form ourselves in part (or wholly, some would argue) through our speech acts. It’s so complicated. Standard English : yes. Room for “other” dialects/ways of speaking (thinking) also: Yes.
Library: Return books I checked out this morning about feminism and discourse, feminist linguistics. Poop. (4 hours later! Not 10 minutes or a half an hour later!). Find an additional article about the discourse/construction of women’s glossy magazines in Australia. Run into another classmate, chat lengthily, share some concerns. I explain that I am “bitchy” in class but “a lot of fun” outside of class and invite him for a beer sometime. Not to flirt but to reach out. He’s not from here. I feel alienated enough, and I have friends and family here…
Home. Haven’t pooped yet. Water the cat. Check the email. Need to exercise but am feeling really lackadaisical. Thinking about politics. Judge Alito and the Christian right and Guantanamo bay prisoners (sp). The closed session the Democrats finally called and Bill Frist’s reactionary outburst. Yeah, Reid challenged you. Finally someone grew some balls. Get over it. Damn it’s about time though. Come on get stronger Democrats. I don’t have a lot of faith in them but they are the lesser of the two evils. There are some pretty cool reps too: Kohl and Feingold are pretty progressive, that Nancy lady from CA is cool, Maxine Waters rules although I haven’t heard much about her in a long time. There is so much shit happening; it’s tough to process it all. I am listening to the news a lot more now while I work and I’m working, and checking email, so sometimes crucial tidbits fly past me. That’s why it’s better when I read about the news, but I don’t have a lot of time. NPR is allright. It doesn’t annoy me as much as it used to when I was younger. I listen to Democracy Now too and I found these half hour shows connected to the leftbusinessobserver web site, so I got to hear an interview with this woman who wrote a book called Female Chauvinist Pigs which I am very interested in reading. And the editor of the Progressive magazine also does interviews that he pod casts. That access is cool.
I am very afraid about this Alito thing. Fuck that guy, fuck Bush. I need to work to retain a woman’s right to reproductive freedom, but why is that one of the main issues all these crazies continually focus on? Why do they have to work so hard to tear that law down when people are starving and the poverty rate is soaring? They believe the bootstraps myth obviously, but they must not understand that it’s simply not possible for everyone to become middle/upper class. There aren’t enough jobs, even if many more people were better educated, etc. That’s complicated, I need to research that idea but man. I can’t believe we have 2 more years of him. But Kerry was so wishy washy…something. If Gore runs again I may really have to move to Canada….
Today:
Work. Interspersed with naps and several pooping adventures. I have to wonder if it’s the vitamins.
Tutoring (paid). 2 hours. 3 students. One is slightly resistant and impatient each week, but he is not confrontational. Another is one of my classmates. No difficulties arise; I have no afterthoughts, unlike yesterday. The student wasn’t really articulating what she wanted help with and I wasn’t really getting that she was being passive and deferring to my “authority” as the tutor who “knows best” in this really timid, girly, middle class way until near the end. We did get something accomplished, but it made me a bit more aware of the different communication styles students have (and I can’t be bitchy and judgmental about the fact that she was passive and girly and middle class. Not when tutoring or reflecting upon it).
Why does my left eye keep twitching?
Food. Chili hummos red bean chicken wrap from the union. Not bad.
Class. Discourse Analysis. Topic: Discursive Psychology. Interesting to me because the were was talk of “the self” and the measurement of peoples’ attitudes. I am obsessed with theories about the formation/construction of the self because my self is especially fractured (all of our selves are constantly in flux due to postmodern schizophrenia and/or other factors, supposedly [convincingly to me] but I do feel that some people are somewhat more stable than others)…
Forum: It’s about bilingual education and breaking new ground, building bridges, forging new pathways…something like that. Hoped for some impassioned words, some idea of how to help with the change. But her talk was mostly just history and she was tired. Maybe the question and answer session would have actually been the worthwhile part this time, but I had to get up. I went with a classmate, and another classmate showed up, and a crackpot acquaintance was there also, so it was slightly social. But what to do about this language issue. So hard to penetrate the societal views. Language is power, it’s a social construction, we form ourselves in part (or wholly, some would argue) through our speech acts. It’s so complicated. Standard English : yes. Room for “other” dialects/ways of speaking (thinking) also: Yes.
Library: Return books I checked out this morning about feminism and discourse, feminist linguistics. Poop. (4 hours later! Not 10 minutes or a half an hour later!). Find an additional article about the discourse/construction of women’s glossy magazines in Australia. Run into another classmate, chat lengthily, share some concerns. I explain that I am “bitchy” in class but “a lot of fun” outside of class and invite him for a beer sometime. Not to flirt but to reach out. He’s not from here. I feel alienated enough, and I have friends and family here…
Home. Haven’t pooped yet. Water the cat. Check the email. Need to exercise but am feeling really lackadaisical. Thinking about politics. Judge Alito and the Christian right and Guantanamo bay prisoners (sp). The closed session the Democrats finally called and Bill Frist’s reactionary outburst. Yeah, Reid challenged you. Finally someone grew some balls. Get over it. Damn it’s about time though. Come on get stronger Democrats. I don’t have a lot of faith in them but they are the lesser of the two evils. There are some pretty cool reps too: Kohl and Feingold are pretty progressive, that Nancy lady from CA is cool, Maxine Waters rules although I haven’t heard much about her in a long time. There is so much shit happening; it’s tough to process it all. I am listening to the news a lot more now while I work and I’m working, and checking email, so sometimes crucial tidbits fly past me. That’s why it’s better when I read about the news, but I don’t have a lot of time. NPR is allright. It doesn’t annoy me as much as it used to when I was younger. I listen to Democracy Now too and I found these half hour shows connected to the leftbusinessobserver web site, so I got to hear an interview with this woman who wrote a book called Female Chauvinist Pigs which I am very interested in reading. And the editor of the Progressive magazine also does interviews that he pod casts. That access is cool.
I am very afraid about this Alito thing. Fuck that guy, fuck Bush. I need to work to retain a woman’s right to reproductive freedom, but why is that one of the main issues all these crazies continually focus on? Why do they have to work so hard to tear that law down when people are starving and the poverty rate is soaring? They believe the bootstraps myth obviously, but they must not understand that it’s simply not possible for everyone to become middle/upper class. There aren’t enough jobs, even if many more people were better educated, etc. That’s complicated, I need to research that idea but man. I can’t believe we have 2 more years of him. But Kerry was so wishy washy…something. If Gore runs again I may really have to move to Canada….
posted by Jen Threat at
8:08 PM
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