Headrush - Ed Webb's Dickinson Blog

Tahrir, 2 Feb 2012

2012-02-02T18:28:00.001-05:00

Tahrir, 2 Feb 2012, a set on Flickr.

Photos from the 30 year commemoration of the Hama massacre and Ahly protests.

Nil desperandum

2011-12-21T16:05:00.001-05:00

There are so many reasons to be gloomy about the future of the planet and our species, and of the US (where I currently live) in particular. But every so often something comes along to put a big grin on my face and remind me not to give up hope.

"The USS Oak Hill returned to the naval base at Virginia Beach, Va., after almost three months at sea training in Central America. As homecoming approached, the crew and the ship's family readiness group sold $1 raffle tickets to pick the sailor to be first off the ship to deliver the coveted first kiss on the dock. Petty Officer 2nd Class Marissa Gaeta bought 50 tickets and won, the newspaper reports. Navy officials said it was the first time on record that a same-sex couple was chosen to kiss first upon a ship's return, the Associated Press reports.

Here's how The Virginian-Pilot reported the precedent-shattering event of the post "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" era:

Her girlfriend of two years, Petty Officer 3rd Class Citlalic Snell, was waiting when she crossed the brow. They kissed. The crowd cheered. And with that, another vestige of the policy that forced gays to serve in secrecy vanished."

My main hope lies in our ability to learn. We can get better.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Singing 'bout a Revolution - post script

2011-12-05T13:07:00.000-05:00

Apparently Philip Glass is very alive to the connections between his opera and current politics. You can read briefly about his interaction with Occupy Wall Street last week here.

An ironic note I forgot to include in my original post. The major sponsor of simulcasts from the Met is Bloomberg.

Singing 'bout a Revolution

2011-11-20T01:35:00.000-05:00

If there's anything more 1% than opera, I'm not sure what it is. It's expensive to put on, expensive to watch, and very elitist. But it wasn't always that way - it is historically a popular artform, meaning of the people and for the people, even if not by the people.

I'm not on opera-goer or even much of an opera-lover. But I'd go a long way to hear anything Philip Glass does. So I was very fortunate yesterday to be able to enjoy a live HD simulcast from the Metropolitan Opera of NYC via a cinema in Harrisburg of his great opera about the South African years of Mohandas Gandhi, Satyagraha.

It's a minimalist opera in Sanskrit. It's probably not what people are automatically reaching for when they look for protest songs for Occupy Wall St. But I think it has its place in the music of 2011, a year of global popular protest movements. As my friend and colleague Amy Wlodarski has pointed out, #Occupy is a diverse movement with a diverse soundtrack. But Gandhi's strategy of non-violent protest, putting bodies in public space to defend beliefs and values, has marked all this year's remarkable uprisings. Truth force, the act of witnessing, the end and the means entwined - it's in the streets, and it was there in beautiful, spectacular power in the Met's production.

Opera is spectacle above all, and must be witnessed, so I'm not going to try to describe what I saw and heard. Rather I'd like to draw readers' attention to some of the meaning of the waves of Sanskrit that washed over audiences in NYC and around the world:

Between theory and practice, some talk as they were two — making a separation and a difference between them. Yet wise men know that both can be gained in applying oneself whole heartedly to one. For the high estate attained by men of contemplative theory, that same state achieve the men of action. So act as the ancient of days old, performing works as spiritual exercise.

With senses freed, the wise man should act,
longing to bring about the welfare and coherence
of the world. Therefore, perform unceasingly
the works that must be done, for the
man detached who labors on to the highest
must win through. This is how the saints attained
success. Moreover, you should embrace
action for the upholding, the welfare of your
own kind. Whatever the noblest does, that too
will others do: the standard that he sets all the
world will follow.

In what for others is night, therein is the man
of self-restraint wide awake, separate from passion
and hate, self-possessed and drawing near
to calm serenity. This is the athlete of the spirit,
whose ground remains unmoved, whole soul
stands firmly on it. This is the fixed, still state
which sustains even at the time of death the athletes
of the spirit, who even then set forth, some
to return, some never to return. Outstanding is
he whose soul views in the selfsame way comrades
and enemies, loving all alike.

And Gandhi's final prayer, alone on the stage, with Dr Martin Luther King foreshadowed behind him, ends thus:

I come into being age after age and take a
visible shape and move a man with men for the
protection of good, thrusting the evil back and
setting virtue on her seat again.

The whole libretto is worth reading, and is not long.

I don't know that we're going to see flash mobs springing up around the world to sing excerpts from the Bhagavad Gita in solidarity with the poor and oppressed. But wouldn't it be a better, saner world, if that were to happen?

Bruce Sterling finds a niche in Genoa

2011-11-07T13:15:00.001-05:00

via flickr.com

Photo courtesy of @bruces flickr stream

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Egypt's Elections

2011-11-02T11:50:00.000-04:00

Congratulations to Tunisia on the first post-revolutionary election. I'll be posting on En-Nahda's victory soon. For now I am thinking more about Egypt's upcoming elections. I recommend the great explanation of the new electoral system by Egyptian political scientist Mazen Hassan here.

As Mazen points out, the system favours strong parties, which in the long run might be a good thing. In the short run it will disadvantage most of the revolutionaries and help the Muslim Brotherhood most of all. Note also his prediction of increasing polarization between Islamist and secular camps. The constitutional debates will be fierce. This is likely to push the Brotherhood and Salafists to cooperate, even though they have real and important differences. On the other hand, all predictions must come with heavy caveats - divisions within camps could be as important as those between.

Birthdays

2011-09-22T19:36:00.000-04:00

Happy birthday to Bilbo and Frodo Baggins, Nick Cave, and Helena.

On the riots

2011-08-09T11:56:00.002-04:00

I posted the following comment in response to Sarah Carr's excellent and touching blog post about the London Riots. It turned out to be more or less the blogpost I've been incubating for the past 24 hours, so I reproduce it here.

I lived at the top of Crystal Palace park for a year and a half when I moved back to London from Cairo at the end of the 1990s. Couldn’t afford to live closer in, so commuted from there to work in the centre. Commuting was one of the reasons I quit my (safe, government) job 18 months later and moved to the US. Croydon was soul-destroying then, but not as grungy and run-down as you describe it here.

On my last few visits to Austerity Britain(TM) I have been struck by both increasingly visible poverty and increasing electronic surveillance, particularly in urban areas. Public spaces are tense, fearful, surveilled. You can’t pull out a camera at a station. But their cameras are watching you from several angles. It’s not healthy at all. Orwellian, alienated.

Some on Twitter etc have been evoking the start of the Thatcher era. It strikes me that what Thatcher started, her successors have been working to complete. She proclaimed that ‘there is no such thing as society’ and then did all she could to make that true. Community, solidarity, egalitarianism – all dying or dead, for the most part. I suspect if you could ask the rioters what they’re doing, they would give some variation on a nihilist theme. Why destroy? Because they can. We have trained our young people to be acquisitive, atomized, unempathetic.

The smugness of Egyptian commentators may be unattractive or misplaced. The Egyptian state and its security agents are far, far worse than anything Britain has ever come up with. But I think Thatcher would have been laughed at for proclaiming that there is no such thing as society in Egypt. #jan25 was in part Egyptian society asserting itself against a predatory state. What we see in the UK at the moment is large-scale predation within society itself. I just hope that the clean-up crews, Turkish ‘popular committees,’ and other assertions of positive social solidarity prevail and signal the start of a different kind of rebalancing in the UK – the rebirth of real society (not Cameron’s goofy Big Society malarkey).

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Food Price Volatility and Stress Points

2011-08-07T11:33:00.000-04:00

Oxfam's useful map of food stress points (http://www.oxfam.org/en/grow/food-price-volatility-map) shows very few such points in the Middle East & North Africa. This is quite striking, given the role of food costs in protests across the region over the past several decades, including this year. Is the absence due to Oxfam's methodology, due to the comparatively greater desperation of situations elsewhere, or some other factor?

In error

2011-07-31T01:39:00.001-04:00

If one's DJ moniker is Dr Funk, one might reasonably consider oneself immune to requests for Rod Stewart, no?

Apparently, one would be in error.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Big Sky

2011-07-09T12:27:00.001-04:00

There's nothing like the desert.

Amplify’d from picasaweb.google.com

Free as a bird - over Wadi Rum, Jordan
Read more at picasaweb.google.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/nzukkf

So long, Saleh/sling yer 'ook/insert your own caption #Yemen #YF

2011-06-10T09:40:00.001-04:00

A nice cartoon from Carlos Latuff.

Amplify’d from twitpic.com

See more at twitpic.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/mnmmjV

Best animated gif ever?

2011-06-10T02:06:00.001-04:00

This gif appeared on a post on the always interesting Dangerous Minds blog, without attribution (so far - a couple of us asked in the comments section). The post is about a fake eHarmony video by someone pretending to really, really, really love cats. It's amusing enough, I guess, as fake videos go. But the gif is just perfect.

Amplify’d from www.dangerousminds.net

See more at www.dangerousminds.net

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/mjyCfY

Antidote to nationalism

2011-05-31T09:04:00.001-04:00

I know there is no antidote, really - nationalism is too useful for state elites everywhere to keep the rest of us in line. But still, there ought to be one. This might help a bit.

Amplify’d from tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com

See more at tywkiwdbi.blogspot.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/jRUi5x

Contemporary illiteracies

2011-05-27T21:41:00.003-04:00

I will develop this further, I think. See also the discussion on @LisaMLane's blog about citations here: http://lisahistory.net/wordpress/?p=926

Comments welcome.

Amplify’d from twitter.com

RT @divbyzero: Literally Unbelievable: People who think The Onion is real http://is.gd/91kzHw >been reflecting on this. Decontextualization.

(cont.) Much of the information we get online these days is stripped of context. We follow a link from Twitter or elsewhere. Disorienting.

(cont.) We get text without context, becoming thereby more prone to misinterpretation. Believing Onion stories shared on #FB tip of iceberg.

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/j6iSwG

2011-05-25T15:29:00.001-04:00

One of my favorite things in the world is a 'thank you' note from a student. The one I got today came with a very fancy box of Guylian chocolate, which is absolutely very welcome. But the note is what I get to keep, and the satisfaction it represents of having been useful to someone.

Such notes almost always come from those students whom it is no burden to teach and mentor, of course. The pleasure is in doing the job. The note is the pleasant, lingering aftertaste. http://bit.ly/jLRZuH

2011-05-25T15:28:00.001-04:00

For academics, this is a better time of year to make resolutions than the end of December, since that falls in the middle of the working year. So now that my last grades are submitted, and I can turn to the projects left uncompleted during the school year and the new ones for the summer and beyond, I'll be devoting some attention to re-assessing priorities, habits etc.

Resolution 1: get back to using Amplify more. It's all about the conversation, after all. http://bit.ly/mGVuwJ

What happened Yesterday in Sanaa

2011-05-22T23:46:00.002-04:00

A Yemeni friend emailed me the following. I relay it with no further comment:

Good Morning / evening Ladies & Gentle men,

Hope you are doing well and everything is going as you like.

The purpose of this email is to clarify the position of the Yemeni youth regarding the trapping of foreign diplomats inside the UAE embassy today (U.S., EU, Gulf and others) by Pro President Saleh armed-thugs ( http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2011/05/201152216373928689.html).

This happened while Yemenis and the whole world was waiting for them to head toward the presidential palace to reach a historical political solution for the revolution that have started over a 100 days ago in Yemen. Millions of people ( Men & WOMEN) have been out in the streets demanding the president to step-down after a 33 years of an authoritarian regime ( Ex Friday May,15th http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_bLpdznHoQ) lead Yemen to be one of the poorest countries in the world with more than 40 % of the population living on less than 2.00 dollars a day. That is while the wealth of the president and his regimes exceeds billions of dollars; stolen from the resources of Yemen. Yemenis have been in the streets totally peacefully and have a proven an attitude that we are not exaggerating if we think we deserve the Nobel prize for peace; 68 million weapons are in the hands of the people and NOT a single bullet was shot by the people; running very peaceful revolution. While more than 184 protesters were killed and thousands of injuries in different attacks by the security forces and regime snippers. In one Friday alone, more than 52 were killed and over 500 were injured when a security snippers( wearing civic clothes) opened fire at protesters after they finished their Friday prayer in Change Square in Sanaa.

What happened Yesterday was the following:

Saleh government high officials made some of their armed-thugs go surround the UAE embassy in Yemen while the world diplomats were inside to prevent them from going to the presidential palace to make Saleh sign the GCC initiative that will lead to him stepping down in thirty days. This was not just a real violation of all the international and diplomacy norms and morality, but an insult to the culture of all Yemenis. We , by NO WAY, agree with such attitude, accept it or tolerate it. Our culture of hospitably and kindness toward anyone made us a shamed to see such a behavior happen in our land and ordered and supported by President Saleh. If this says anything, it tells you how much we have been suffering from this regime and what he is willing to do to remain in power; each and every ugly dirty shamful behavior.This happened while the people of Yemen were celebrating the 21st anniversary of the Unification of Yemen.!!!

We , The Youth of Yemen, truly apologize for such irresponsible militant behavior that happed by a regime willing to kill even all Yemenis to stay in power. This does not represent us nor our culture, nor our religion or our morality. There is only one group in Yemen who would agree with such behavior in addition to the regime; It is Al-qaeda.

As we strongly condemn such a behavior that put the life of international diplomats in danger, we ask you for your support in gaining our freedom and right to have a democratic peaceful Yemen. We have been suffering and witnessing the death of our family members, friends and colleagues in our PEACEFUL path toward freedom and there is NO WAY we are stepping one move backward.

Saleh Yesterday made a speech that can literally be considered a declaration of war among the Yemeni people and we are expecting things to get more violent in the next few days, but we are committed to remain a peaceful revolution. We will continue our struggle toward a democratic country inspired by the global values and the peaceful struggles toward freedoms. But we need a lot of international support. The international aid that is still flowing to the country is umbilical cord to Saleh's regime and using military assistance to oppress civil protesters. Yemen's situation is complicated and Saleh is leading the country toward a chaos that if the international community doesn't do an immediate strong action to stop it will be less controllable in the future. And we are worry the situation will reach a point as Martin Luther King also described once " "The choice is not between violence and nonviolence but between nonviolence and nonexistence."

More importantly, and again as Martin Luther King said once " A threat to justice anywhere, is a threat to justice everywhere", we believe it is the same in Yemen. We call on all those who believe in life, one with dignity, to support Yemeni people in their struggle. Injustice in Yemen, serves NO ONE in the world but those who have extremist ideas.

We totally understand the western concern of Al-qaeda spread in Yemen if Saleh leaves, but we can assure you 100 % that we are NOT knocking Saleh down to replace him with Anwar Al-awlaki or a like. The success of this revolution will be one of the best strategy to fight Al-qaeda in Yemen. It will enhance the peaceful processes of engaging in political life and will make the responsibility of any government, the responsibility of all Yemenis. Saleh's wars against Al-qaeda for the last 10 years were never about who will in charge of Yemen. Instead, it was more about who will be in charge of Al-qaeda.Only him and them have this much violence agenda in their mind. And we even have hundreds of evidences that he was NO serious in this war; except to get more money, legitimacy and military aid. People are the real allies, not dictators. Dictators come and go and only people remain.

Again, the purpose of this email is just to apologize to the People of GCC, USA And EU of what happened by Saleh and his regime. This , again, by no way represent us. And the best way to make sure no such irresponsible action happens again, is to support the Yemeni people in their peaceful legitimate demands and desires in having a life; one with dignity.

Prayers for Yemen and Thank You very much for your time.

In the name of Freedom,

Yemeni Youth Activists

Preparing for the Mother of all MOOCs

2011-05-20T22:29:00.000-04:00

elearnspace › This will be fun: Mother of all MOOCs

I probably don't have time for this.

I just signed up anyway.

All learning, all the time.

What to call the mediations of this event? #media260

2011-05-02T21:12:00.001-04:00

Rafael Alvarado asks an excellent question (read from the bottom up). Can anyone help answer it?

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Multitasking

2011-04-25T20:45:00.003-04:00

What to do with an 11 year old on a warm spring evening? a) Teach him to use the lawnmower; b) debate who were the most influential & important figures of the Renaissance; c) both.

Chose c)

(From Amplify: http://bit.ly/e3RS9L)

Magnolia Tree

2011-04-18T19:02:00.001-04:00

The tree next to our house - I hesitate to call it 'our' tree since
it's been there for decades, seeing many families come and go - the
tree we live next to has exploded into spring fireworks over the past
few days. Amazing.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

2011-04-12T11:25:00.001-04:00

Oh, Amplify! Why the change from 'recommend' to 'like'? The former was about the conversation, the latter is about egoization. Don't turn into Facebook. Really. http://bit.ly/dMAXbk

A little knowledge...

2011-03-28T12:12:00.001-04:00

The power of a great diagram.

The message is exactly right, too.

Amplify’d from www.smbc-comics.com

See more at www.smbc-comics.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/gWiL7P

MENA online - links for class discussion on Tuesday 29 March #media260

2011-03-27T12:15:00.000-04:00

This week we will continue consideration of censorship with a particular focus on the internet. For Tuesday, please read the links below, some of which focus on Egypt, some on the MENA region or the world. On Thursday we will focus on Syria.

Questions to help frame your reading:

What is the real impact of the internet on MENA societies? What is the extent of its reach? How can we sort out hype from reality?
How are governments using the internet? How are they limiting citizens' uses of the internet? What works?
Most people spend most of their online time engaged in things other than politics - do such activities also matter politically?

When Happened When Mubarak Shut off Egypt's Internet - Computational History
tags: visualisation mapping twitter #jan25 Egypt protests internet
Sorting through claims about the internet and revolutions, part 1
Typology
tags: internet Egypt #jan25 protests twitter facebook socialmedia analysis
Egypt's big disconnect | Andrew McLaughlin | Comment is free | The Guardian
tags: #jan25 Egypt protests authoritarianism censorship technology internet
- The internet cutoff shows how the details of infrastructure matter. Despite having no large-scale or centralised censorship apparatus, Egypt was still able to shut down its communications in a matter of minutes.
Egypt Leaves the Internet - Renesys Blog
tags: internet Egypt #jan25 censorship
Blogging And Tweeting, Egyptians Push For Change : NPR
tags: Egypt politics internet twitter facebook social media social networking socialmedia socialnetworking
BBC News - Egypt's homosexuals find home in cyberspace
tags: egypt authoritarianism rights homosexuality homophobia internet film
Dean Pintak's Blog - The Edward R. Murrow College of Communication
tags: blog internet Egypt UAE phones mobile
'Enemies of the Internet': Not Just For Dictators Anymore
tags: internet censorship KSA Egypt Syria Iran RSF
World Day Against Cyber-Censorship: new “Enemies of the Internet” list - Reporters Without Borders
tags: censorship internet MENA RSF
- “One in three of the world’s Internet users does not have access to an unrestricted Internet,”
World day against cyber-censorship - 12 March 2011
tags: internet censorship RSF data

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Iraq: storytelling with links #media260 #ds106

2011-03-25T10:18:00.002-04:00

An Iraqi friend sent me the following. It is very economical. The links tell the story, the quotation provides the commentary/punchline.

------------------

world/in_iraq_us_special_forces_gearing_up_to_leave/2011/02/27/ABbGWYRB_story.html?wprss=rss_politics

http://www.tennessean.com/article/20110325/NEWS02/103250335/1972

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/i-lost-my-moral-compass-how-a-young-us-soldier-triggered-an-abuse-scandal-in-afghanistan-2252475.html

http://newamericamedia.org/2011/03/eight-years-of-occupation-in-iraq-eight-years-of-misery.php

“If you stick a knife nine inches into my back and pull it out three inches, that is not progress. Even if you pull it all the way out, that is not progress. Progress is healing the wound, and America hasn’t even begun to pull out the knife.”
El Hajj Malik El Shabazz (Malcolm X)

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Thug life: Pro-Mubarak bullies break their silence | Al-Masry Al-Youm: Today's News from Egypt

2011-03-21T17:08:00.001-04:00

Al-Masry Al-Youm's English edition has a quite remarkable interview with two of the former Egyptian regime's enforcers. Click the link to read it all. Choice quotations below.

Thug life: Pro-Mubarak bullies break their silence | Al-Masry Al-Youm: Today's News from Egypt

The brutal attack came during the early hours of 3 February, and with it, what Abdel Kader describes as “a wake-up call. I realized these weren’t a bunch of sissy kids, and that they weren’t just having fun. They were fighting for something, and they were putting up a brave fight.”

Abdel Kader pauses before continuing. “They were willing to die for what they believed in, and I was fighting them because I had been paid LE200. The thought of it broke my heart.”
“I am a drug dealer,” he admits. “I am not going to deny it. But I am only a drug dealer because the police bullied me into becoming one.”
“They threw me in jail to show me what it would be like, and then took me back out so I could sell their drugs for them.”

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my links are here.

On getting to the point: the storytelling genius of Steely Dan #ds106 #media260

2011-03-21T01:31:00.002-04:00

One doesn't have to subscribe to alarming (and probably alarmist) tales of diminishing attention spans to recognize that this sentence, given the medium in which it appears, runs the risk of being just too damn long. In blogging, brevity is usually desirable. It pays to get to the point.

This does not mean that blogs should be dry, inexpressive, unembellished. Twitter and haiku have both shown that brevity can be a spur to creativity, a productive constraint. It is possible to express a great deal in few words.

Songwriting, too, imposes limits. Lyrics in most popular genres are comparable in length to short poems rather than short stories. And too often those lyrics say very little. The banal recycled phrases littering the radio dial (an old media metaphor that's just about hanging in there) tell us nothing much.

But some songwriters tell us stories worth hearing. Two of the best are Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, particularly when working together as Steely Dan. You don't have to enjoy the music to appreciate the economy with which they can draw you into a world, a situation, an emotional drama in the space of the first line or two. They draw on science fiction, Hollywood (in particular film noir), and a sleazy sensibility. Their characters are seedy, their narrative style terse and ironic.

Here are a few song openings that illustrate this skill in getting right into the middle of the action and create a need to know what happens next. Many are from Katy Lied (1975), The Royal Scam (1976) and Gaucho (1980): almost any song from those albums would fit here - great collections of stories.

Read and enjoy. If you have particular favorite examples of the great storytelling opening, by great songwriters in any genre, I would welcome examples in the comments.

Agents of the law
Luckless pedestrian
I know you're out there
With rage in your eyes and your megaphones
(Don't Take Me Alive - probably my favorite example of the economic scene-setting opening)

When Black Friday comes
I'll stand down by the door
And catch the grey men when they
Dive from the fourteenth floor
(Black Friday - striking imagery, immediately evocative of stock market crashes and financial meltdown but using concrete acts to reflect those abstractions)

Rose darling come to me
Snake Mary's gone to bed
(Rose Darling - so simple, but in 10 words we have: three characters - one with a fascinating name; the implication of illicit sex - made explicit in the next two lines; and an invitation to one of the characters that draws in the listener as well - "come to me")

Katy tried
I was halfway crucified
I was on the other side
Of no tomorrow
You walked in
And my life began again
Just when I'd spent the last piaster
I could borrow
(Dr Wu - again, three characters: here Katy, the person the song is addressed to, and the narrator; note how 'piaster' economically places us in exotic territory for a western audience: the whole song is a kind of bitter-sweet orientalist fantasy)

I remember the thirty-five sweet goodbyes
When you put me on the Wolverine
Up to Annandale
(My Old School - this could end well, this could end badly - this being Becker & Fagen, the latter is a safe bet)

Charlie Freak had but one thing to call his own
Three weight ounce pure golden ring no precious stone
(Charlie Freak - you know this will end badly for poor Charlie)

Babs and Clean Willie were in love they said
So in love the preacher's face turned red
Soon everybody knew the thing was dead
He shouts, she bites, they wrangle through the night
(Haitian Divorce - summary of a hot-burning, fast-burning-out romance in three lines; the fourth line puts us into the interminable present of a failed marriage)

Where did the bastard run
Is he still around?
Now you gotta tell me everything you did baby
(Everything You Did - real menace here: will the narrator take revenge?)

We're gonna break out the hats and hooters
When Josie comes home
We're gonna rev up the motor scooters
When Josie comes home to stay
We're gonna park in the street
(Josie - wow, who is this girl? What else are they going to do? Bet it will be fun)

Way back when
In Sixty-seven
I was the dandy
Of Gamma Chi
Sweet things from Boston
So young and willing
Moved down to Scarsdale
Where the hell am I?
(Hey Nineteen - one of many great later Dan songs about aging gracelessly; nostalgia established from the first three words)

6:05
Outside the stadium
Special delivery
For Hoops McCann
(Glamor Profession - drug dealing in Hollywood; straight into the action)

The wind was driving in my face
The smell of prickly pear
[My rival - show me my rival]
The milk truck eased into my space
Somebody screamed somewhere
(My Rival - pure film noir)

Johnny's playroom
Is a bunker filled with sand
(Third World Man - what's Johnny playing at?)

Bad news breaking in 18A
Missy's kitty turn inside out she say
(Two Against Nature - now that's just not right)

It must have been my lucky Thursday
Your dad went on that spree
Before the crew could put out the fires
You hopped a bus for NYC
(Janie Runaway - watch out, Janie! Here's a whole news report about a drunken rampage, a fire, a runaway teenager plus the perspective of the narrator/predator introduced in four lines.)

(Images and lyrics from www.steelydan.com)

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Nietzsche on Objectivity

2011-03-19T17:15:00.001-04:00

But might there not be an illusion in even the loftiest interpretation of the word objectivity? For in this sense the word implies a state of mind in the historian in which he contemplates an event so purely, with all its motives and all its consequences, that it has no effect on his subjectivity. It connotes that aesthetic phenomenon, that detachment from personal interest by which a painter, in a stormy landscape threatened by lightning and thunder or on an angry sea, perceives his own inner image; it connotes complete immersion in things. But it is superstitious to suppose that the image which things reveal to a man so attuned reproduces their empirical reality. Or are we to suppose that in these moments things actively sketch, paint, or photograph themselves, so to speak, upon a purely passive mind? This would be a mythology, and a bad mythology at that.

~ "History in the Service and Disservice of Life" in Unmodern Observations (Yale: 1990), 115

Image: http://www.lyra.it/scuola/moodle/mod/resource/view.php?id=187 (CC)

Thanks as ever, Fritz!

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Storytelling defeats factual explanation - a smart guy with an Uglydoll avatar explains

2011-03-19T11:09:00.002-04:00

I love this pithy analysis of why it is so hard to explain complex events to general audiences or readerships.
Start at the bottom, as with all twitter feeds:

Arclight works in the nuclear industry and has been providing some great technical analysis of the Fukushima disaster.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Visualisation: correlation & causation

2011-03-17T10:15:00.001-04:00

(Or visualization, if you must)

A great teaching aid for explaining the limits of inference, from the Sources And Methods blog.

Thanks to Erik Hanson, who shared this via Google Reader & Buzz - https://profiles.google.com/erikalanhanson#erikalanhanson/about

Amplify’d from sourcesandmethods.blogspot.com

Passport Ownership Cures Diabetes (Analytic Traps)

It proves conclusively that passport ownership is a cheap and easy cure for diabetes, right? I mean, look at the maps! There is almost a perfect correlation between the so-called "diabetes belt" in the south and the lack of ownership of passports in the same region. Increase the number of passport holders and the diabetes epidemic is over!

If you have ever heard the classic scientific warning that "correlation does not imply causation" and did not understand what that saying meant, this is a perfect example. Just because two things are happening at the same time does not necessarily mean that one caused the other.

Analysts typically spring this trap when the connection is not as obviously flawed as it is in this case. The human mind is extremely good at seeing patterns -- even when they are not there.

Does correlation never indicate causation? No, that is clearly false as well. In fact, correlation is a necessary condition for causation -- necessary but not sufficient.

The best way to expose this trap appears to be to imagine the counterfactual. In the case above, imagine what it would be like if all those southerners actually had passports. Would that, in turn, reduce any of the known risk factors for diabetes? Unlikely. It would appear to be merely a coincidence.

See more at sourcesandmethods.blogspot.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/gSs1UR

Google before you Tweet

2011-03-09T14:52:00.001-05:00

From Cory Doctorow's Craphound via Erik Hanson's Google Reader items shared on Google Buzz (https://profiles.google.com/erikalanhanson/about). Whole lot of Google going on.

O tempora o mores

Amplify’d from imgur.com

See more at imgur.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/dKiTjr

On the 100th International Women's Day, a Salute

2011-03-07T21:58:00.001-05:00

To all the amazing women everywhere: thank you.

Info on events here: http://www.internationalwomensday.com/

Image: Mohammed Abed/AFP/Getty Images

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Ashton punk'd; hacking with a message about hacking

2011-03-03T11:42:00.001-05:00

As social media take on greater roles in political action, the insecurity of many services needs greater attention from users and the public more broadly. Twitter & Facebook remain relatively easy to hack, apparently. At least Ashton's account appears to have been hacked by someone with a conscience and a message.

Those using social media for political organizing should make passwords as complex as possible, force https: and SSL where possible to combat Firesheep and similar threats (http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/25/firesheep/), and consider using TOR (https://www.torproject.org/).

Amplify’d from www.mediaite.com

See more at www.mediaite.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bsmfp

Tom Friedman credits Americans, Israelis, aliens, El Nino, bedbugs for Arab uprisings

2011-03-02T13:39:00.001-05:00

URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/02/opinion/02friedman.html

Tom is often preposterous. Today he may have achieved preposterousness (preposterosity?) of such epic proportions that it disrupts the fabric of space-time. Don't read it with coffee or any other drink close to hand if you value your reading device - spraying often damages electronics.

If you must read it, read this also - http://inanities.org/2011/03/this-is-just-the-start-and-it-never-fucking-ends/

And then if you want a more informed take on how the wave of revolutions came about, read @3arabawy here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/02/egypt-revolution-mubarak-wall-of-fear

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bsb2c

Free Writing tips of the day

2011-02-28T23:51:00.001-05:00

'Simplistic' does not mean the same as 'simple.'
'Militaristic' does not mean the same as 'military.'

You're welcome.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Important document found somewhere in North Africa

2011-02-22T23:08:00.002-05:00

Dictator Playbook - 2011 edition

Phase 1

I hear you.
Now shut up and go home so my thugs can arrest you all one by one.
Who's your daddy?

Phase 2

Jeep. Umbrella.

Phase 3

Still here, eh? What's wrong with you? Did you see the umbrella?
I know, it must be:

Al Jazeera
Yankee imperialism
Al Qa'ida
Psychedelic drugs
Al Jazeera
British imperialism
Zionist conspiracies
Al Jazeera

Stay where you are so my thugs can shoot you.

Phase 4

Honey, did you remember to refuel the jet after your last trip to Monte Carlo?

Phase 5

The rest is silence

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Another #jan25 revolution song, made of chants, sung in #Tahrir

2011-02-15T11:09:00.001-05:00

Via @lisang

Amplify’d from www.youtube.com

The name of the singer is RAMY ESSAM.
This is the genuine revolution song,
Unlike the songs which were written afterwards, this was performed live during the most dramatic moments of the revolution, in the square itself (it is called TAHRIR square - liberation square), when the gangs of Mubarak were on the way to attack them.

The genius of the song is that the lyrics comprised of all the most popular chants and slogans of the revolution which were heard on the streets.
Read more at www.youtube.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/hNAsjp

Bahraini (and Egyptian, and Tunisian, and Iranian and Yemeni) nationalism - the flags

2011-02-15T02:01:00.003-05:00

It is common, when discussing the Middle East & North Africa and its history of colonial and neo-colonial manipulation, to draw attention to the artificial nature of many of the states of the region (as if states elsewhere were somehow natural formations), borders imposed from without, historical identities ignored by the strokes of imperial cartographers' pens. It's a narrative that matters.

But what also matters is the lived experience of people today. Yes, Bahrainis cannot as easily appeal to hundreds or even thousands of years of distinctive 'national' identity in the way Egyptians, Iranians, Yemenis or Tunisians can. But witness how the flag is waved with pride by protesters, how the slogans appeal to national identity and national unity - neither Sunni, nor Shi'ite, but simply Bahraini, an echo of the #jan25 slogan of neither Muslim, nor Christian, but simply Egyptian (I paraphrase).

The wave of protests across the region both reflects national pride and identities, and reinforces them. This may be a regional movement, a spark leaping through the pan-Arab media of Al-Jazeera first, and social media second. But it is also a series of very national movements, mutually supportive but each with a distinctive identity. And a great deal of pride.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Redemption Song #jan25

2011-02-11T19:48:00.002-05:00

Voice of Freedom, unofficial anthem of the Egyptian revolution, with a video shot during the protests and featuring protesters. Great use of today's tools to celebrate amazing events.

Amplify’d from www.youtube.com

See more at www.youtube.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/eKEM9b

#jan25 punks not gonna take it any more

2011-02-09T13:37:00.000-05:00

More #jan25-inspired music. This time it's Taqwacore (Muslim Punk).

Tahrir square dance by Sunny Ali and the Kid

Wael Ghonim Interview # jan25

2011-02-08T23:53:00.002-05:00

Wael Ghonim Interview, originally uploaded by stevegarfield.

A visualization of Wael's powerful interview with Dream TV, shortly after his release from State Security detention. His focus is clear.

Created with wordle.net by Steve Garfield, posted on Flickr.

#jan25 Hip-Hop

2011-02-07T20:49:00.002-05:00

There is already a fair amount of music associated with the Egyptian revolution.

Here's what they're singing in Tahrir Square:

Tragically, Ahmed Basiony's electronica is tied to it by his death at the hands of the regime - http://www.dangerousminds.net/comments/egyptian_sound_visual_artist_ahmed_basiony_dies_in_cairo_during_revolu/

In a more uplifting way, we have the songs of Egyptians and others celebrating the uprising and urging the process onward. Here's something new:

Amplify’d from www.youtube.com

See more at www.youtube.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/fHYSHt

What's at stake with #jan25

2011-02-05T11:29:00.001-05:00

The clips below give you a sense, but the whole article is not much longer and is well worth reading. It is probably the clearest and pithiest statement of events and what is at stake in Egypt's revolution that I have read so far.

Amplify’d from www.guardian.co.uk

Egypt: Why 25 January will be a date enshrined in the country's history

On the day the people decided to sever their final links with the days of the pharoahs, the rebirth of a nation began

The demands of the protesters were beautifully crystallised in two chants: "The people want the regime down" and "Bread, freedom and human dignity". In political terms, the first demand relates to dismantling the authoritarian regime and installing democracy in Egypt. This means breaking down a culture of corruption emodied in the ruling NDP party, and restructuring the state security police to focus on criminal activities rather than meddle with the political process in defence of the status quo.

New political facts have emerged from this "revolution". The Egyptian people have demonstrated that they may be patient and peaceful to a fault, but they surely know how to make their voices heard at home and around the world. The way these spontaneous demonstrations took place and maintained a unity of demands, despite the blackout on mobile communication and stoppage of internet service, proves that a new collective conscience has been born in Egypt. In fact, Egypt itself has in these last few days been reborn.

Ayman Nour, leader of the El Ghad party, was imprisoned in 2005 by President Mubarak and released on health grounds in 2009.

Wael Nawara is a leading Egyptian writer.
Read more at www.guardian.co.uk

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/etCIit

#jan25 media mediated. Via @3arabawy

2011-02-03T16:30:00.001-05:00

Old tech, new tech, online, offline - this revolution has used everything.

Amplify’d from www.arabawy.org

Graffiti on one of the buildings in Tahrir Square: Twitter, Al-Jazeera, Facebook…
Read more at www.arabawy.org

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/fP39Jw

Whatever happens next, #jan25 has already changed Egypt for the better

2011-01-31T10:41:00.002-05:00

Egyptians are redefining themselves through collective struggle.

The sacrifices of the Tunisians who started this wave of change are yielding all kinds of strange and wonderful fruit.

Amplify’d from www.youtube.com

See more at www.youtube.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/iaboeo

Egypt #jan25 - state of exception

2011-01-30T04:53:00.003-05:00

Egyptian state TV and radio have announced that Al Jazeera's office will be closed and its journalists' licenses revoked. This is ominous. And, of course, odious.

But on whose authority has this been done? There is no Minister of Information, after all. The TV & Radio building is heavily defended by the army's armoured vehicles, but that does not signify that the army is directly in charge. On the other hand, with ex-air force officers as President and Prime Minister, and the ex-army head of intelligence as Vice President, there is little doubt that, as it has been since 1952, Egypt is ruled by the armed forces.

The revolt/revolution/uprising presents many absurdities and ambiguities. The curfews that are not curfews, since the streets are thronged with citizens and popular committees organized as armed neighbourhood watches, with apparent approval of the army. The looters and rioters who are police officers and other agents of the state. The President's late-night address announcing the dissolution of his cabinet, in which his uncanny resemblance to Bela Lugosi - pallid, heavy - gave corporeal expression of the undead nature of his regime, hanging on well beyond its natural life.

All these absurdities (and there are many more, most tragicomic, others simply tragic) are enabled by the larger absurdity of a three-decade state of emergency. Egyptians are demanding, and deserve, what so many of us take for granted. The rule of law. An absence of arbitrary exercise of excessive state power. Fundamental freedoms.

The increased army presence to which Egyptians woke up today on the streets of Cairo, Suez, Alexandria, and now Sharm El Sheikh (which must have at least tacit approval from Israel, since the Sinai is demilitarized under the Camp David Agreement) may presage a palace coup, an orderly constitutional transition to a Soleiman-led government, an attempt to draw out the slow death of Mubarak family rule, or some other possibility. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.

In the meantime, Al Jazeera continues to report, for now. And its reporters and others look set to continue to get word out one way or another about whatever is about to take place. One of the happiest absurdities is that the regime's attempts to turn Egypt into an information black hole have mostly provoked journalists and activists to find ingenious ways to keep the world informed, and have drawn ever more attention to the stunning events taking place.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Egypt: regime in search of a survival strategy #jan25

2011-01-29T11:51:00.003-05:00

President Mubarak's televised address late last night promised all sorts of things the protests have not been demanding - another cabinet reshuffle, principally - but not the one demand all protesters seem to agree on, his own resignation. Today a new Prime Minister has been named - the former Minister of Aviation and an Air Vice-Marshall, he has to be a military man.

And another non-demand has been fulfilled with the appointment of Omar Soleiman as Vice President (the first such appointment in Mubarak's 30 years in power). Soleiman is head of the Egyptian General Intelligence Service (EGIS), and has been one Mubarak's closest allies and advisers for many years. As well as his key role in spying and counter-terrorism, Soleiman is chiefly noteworthy for his role as a kind of super-diplomat, particularly in handling sensitive missions related to the Israel/Palestine dossier. He has good relations with the US, UK and other key allies. The crowds in Tahrir Square have already reacted negatively to the appointment. But if Mubarak steps down, Soleiman may be one of the few with sufficient authority over the military to manage a transition to a democratic system (if he is so inclined - all this remains to be seen, of course).

Meanwhile, we can see another element of the regime's survival strategy. A ruling party member spoke to Al Jazeera English (by far the best English-language coverage among mass media organizations) and tried to paint the protesters as looters and thieves. If I'm reading the twitter stream correctly, though, it seems most likely that the looting and robberies going on in parts of Cairo tonight are chiefly the work of baltagis, the thugs who have traditionally acted as enforcers for the police and state security, and possibly of released and/or escaped prisoners. Residents are forming committees and patrols to defend their streets and properties, but mostly they do not have access to firearms, unlike the thugs. The army is not intervening, apparently, and the police have melted away. This suits the regime just fine - they will be able to crack down hard on all the demonstrations in the name of restoring order. The situation is indeed, as it was just described on Al Jazeera, terrifying. Someone is calling in to AJ from Maadi, and asks "where are the police who were shooting the demonstrators?" They're gone. It's up to the army now to choose whether this is their business. I hope they make the right decision.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Saturated #jan25

2011-01-28T11:04:00.001-05:00

There is so much to say about events in Egypt. But I'm too glued to Al Jazeera and Twitter (#jan25) to properly compose even the first of what will surely be many blogposts. Surreal to be sitting here in a sleepy small town half way around the world with the snow falling outside, seeing images and hearing news of the country I lived in for much of the '90s rising up in ways that would have been hard to imagine even a couple of months ago.

The events of Sidi Bouzid have changed so much. Quite how much we won't know for some time.

For now, watch the army as the curfew comes into effect. Will they enter Suez and Alexandria? Will they arrest or fire on curfew breakers in Cairo? There aren't enough prisons to hold this many people. Utterly extraordinary days.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Egypt is not Tunisia. But the struggle is the same

2011-01-26T09:31:00.002-05:00

The punditocracy say, correctly, that Egypt is not Tunisia. Juan Cole correctly identifies two key questions we need to answer to understand where things are going in Egypt - http://www.juancole.com/2011/01/egypt-forbids-protests-a-day-after-it-was-shaken-by-thousands-of-demonstrators-3-killed.html - 1. Are these 'food riots' protesting over cost of living issues alone, or are they an expression of a broader desire for political reform? 2. What will the military do?

On the first, the near absence of the usual political actors from these events - the Brotherhood in particular - should not distract us from the explicitly political demands being voiced and frustrations being expressed. The chants, the statements to media from participants, the buzz on social media all suggest a broader set of complaints than the socio-economic. Yes, the Mubarak government's failure to deliver a decent standard of living for the majority of Egyptians must matter a great deal (as did Ben Ali's similar failures in Tunisia). But Egyptians also seem to want the freedoms recently won in Tunisia - to assemble, to express themselves, to have a real say in how they are governed. 'Food riots' can be calmed with tweaks to economic policy. A more general revolt cannot. Too early to decide, but I think this is about more than the economy.

On the second point, Egypt parts company with Tunisia more obviously. The latter's relatively small, professional army has not been intertwined with the regime. The decision of the head of the army not to join the police in brutally quelling popular demonstrations but rather at times to protect ordinary citizens from the police was absolutely essential. In Egypt the military and paramilitary forces of the state form a sprawling military-industrial complex with a very deep interest in the survival of the regime. It seems most unlikely that any elements of the armed forces would defect to the protestors' side in significant strength or even remain neutral between state and citizens.

But these are clearly unpredictable times. There is uncertainty and disagreement within the regime over succession issues as Mubarak ages. Egypt may yet surprise us.

And from the perspective of the protesters, Egypt and Tunisia are far more similar than they are different:

Amplify’d from twitter.com

@zemeken
zemeken

Support our Egyptian friends! 2 Hashtags #Jan25 & #sidibouzid same battle! Warning: Freedom is contagious! #Egypt #Tunisia #Mubarak

8 minutes ago

Read more at twitter.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/goJvPT

DS106 Assignment: Short story about something that happened to me recently

2011-01-16T20:07:00.000-05:00

Last week I was there:

This week I am here:

Tunisia: army dissension?

2011-01-10T06:02:00.001-05:00

There has been disappointingly little coverage of the dramatic events in Tunisia in most of the western media. Twitter has been an invaluable source, particularly given the censorship regime in Tunisia. But questions of reliability obviously apply.

What has most caught my attention today has been tweets like the one below suggesting that the Tunisian army chief of staff has been sacked on account of his refusal to order troops to fire on demonstrators. If it is true, then no wonder that army officers are angry, as reported below. In many revolts and revolutions, the moment the army stops taking orders from the head of government is the moment that real change becomes possible.

At the moment, we don't have enough information to know if Tunisia is at that point. But if it is, the implications probably go much wider. Algeria is also seeing unrest, and there are tensions of different sorts in many other countries of the region.

On the other hand, authoritarian regimes in the region have proven resilient, and have had a long time to learn to adapt to and resist pressure from within and without.

Watch carefully.

Amplify’d from twitter.com

@tounssi7or
tounssi7or

URGENT : le général Ammar est écarté vu qu'il a refusé de tirer sur les civils,.des officiers de l'armee sont en colére, #sidibouzid #tunsia

58 seconds ago

via web

Read more at twitter.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/hJbaVr

Tunus Hurra?

2011-01-05T03:46:00.001-05:00

It's impossible to say what the consequences of the demonstrations in Tunisia will be. But it is striking that they seem to be maintaining momentum, despite predictable repression. This story is generally under-reported in the English language media, with the exception of Al Jazeera.

Amplify’d from www.al-bab.com

Tunisia:
the battle for free speech

Where freedom of speech is not allowed, people still find ways to express their message. Students at an engineering institute in Tunis arranged themselves to spell out the words "tunus hurra" (Free Tunisia) on Monday. Schools and colleges in the capital had been surrounded by security forces to prevent students from demonstrating on the streets.

Al-Jazeera has a round-up of recent events here. It has also set up a
special web page headed "Trouble in Tunisia" which compiles all its recent recent reports, along with an interactive map showing where the protests are occurring.

The nawaat blog continues to provide videos and reports of each day's events, and
crowdvoice.org is compiling articles from a variety of sources.

The Reporters Without Borders website has good overview of the Tunisian government's
intensified efforts to censor the internet

TUNISIAN JOKE doing the rounds on Twitter:

Q. How do you say "Imelda Marcos" in
Arabic?

A. "Leila
Trabelsi".
Read more at www.al-bab.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/gEPfM4

Beefheart, RIP

2010-12-18T23:59:00.002-05:00

A further experiment for #ds106, and a very humble homage to the late Captain. Made with GIMP.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Berlusconi Agonistes

2010-12-17T10:02:00.002-05:00

Comedy gold. The subversive power of social media has one of its finest moments. Couldn't happen to a more deserving target.

Amplify’d from www.guardian.co.uk

Tweet revenge: Italians bombard EU summit wall with Silvio Berlusconi insults

"Berlusconi pays for sex, for votes, for mafia protection, for everything he can buy. What he cannot buy will be stolen," one tweet read.

"Berlusconi is a mafioso but he make laws for be not judged," said another.

But it was the messages sent by mpietropoli, an Italian designer, that caused the council press team to take down the system when he started bombarding it with quotes from the Italian leader, including some praising Mussolini.
"Mussolini never killed anyone. Mussolini used to send people on vacation in internal exile," he posted – a quote from the PM.
"[I cannot] think that there are so many pricks around who would vote against their own best interests," mpietropoli also tweeted – another Berlusconi quote.

If anyone from the Italian delegation saw it, it would hurt their sensibility
Read more at www.guardian.co.uk

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/e0Oqng

Edufunk?

2010-12-16T23:32:00.001-05:00

Here is my second attempt at an animated gif for the ds106 MOOC.

Source: Schaefer Beer Commercial, an extra on Hans Fjellestad's excellent documentary Moog (2004).

Process:
1. Captured frames from the DVD using Cyberlink PowerDVD 8 (bundled with my Fujitsu convertible tablet running Windows 7).
2. Pasted the captured images to GIMP as layers.
3. Applied the filter from the Filters>Animation>Blend, adding only two frames between each layer and a blur setting of 1 to get that funky/blurry boogie effect.
4. Export as .gif
5. Groove.

Living in Fear of the Reverend

2010-12-16T01:38:00.000-05:00

Jim Groom's doing a MOOC* - check it out here. Be afraid.

And then join the fun.

*Massive Open Online Course

Who tweets?

2010-12-09T20:41:00.002-05:00

I suspect some of these findings will surprise some observers. Note in particular that the idea that Twitter is shunned by younger web users is not well supported by this data, although they did not survey pre-adult teens.

Amplify’d from www.pewinternet.org

Young adults – Internet users ages 18-29 are significantly more likely to use Twitter than older adults.

African-Americans and Latinos – Minority internet users are more than twice as likely to use Twitter as are white internet users.

Urbanites – Urban residents are roughly twice as likely to use Twitter as rural dwellers.
Read more at www.pewinternet.org

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/dL5OAT

Whitehead's definition of education

2010-11-27T00:48:00.004-05:00

Education is the acquisition of the art of the utilization of knowledge. This is an art very difficult to impart. Whenever a text-book is written of real educational worth, you may be quite certain that some reviewer will say that it will be difficult to teach from it. Of course it will be difficult to teach from it. If it were easy, the book ought to be burned; for it cannot be educational.

~ Alfred North Whitehead, "The Aims of Education" in The Aims of Education and Other Essays (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1959 [orig. 1929]), pp. 6-7

Whitehead knew a thing or two, I reckon. I'm not thrilled with that 'utilization' when a plain, honest 'use' would do as well or better. The 'impart' I like a lot, though - it seems to evoke the passing on of a craft or, in his term, art, a quite personal and interpersonal process. I don't much hold with book burning, but I do endorse the concept that education is (and should be) difficult. If neither educator nor learner is pushed out of her or his comfort zone, it is likely that little learning is taking place. I think Lisa M Lane would agree with me on that.

There is much else to enjoy and play with in Whitehead's essay, originally his 1916 Presidential address to the Mathematical Association of England and first published in his The Organization of Thought (1917), and I'm sure bits of it will pop up on my blogs etc from time to time. For the moment, let us simply consider his assertion that "the central problem of all education" is that of "keeping knowledge alive, of preventing it from becoming inert" (ibid., p. 7). He argues that education is "radically infected with inert ideas" (p. 2):

Every intellectual revolution which has ever stirred humanity into greatness has been a passionate protest against inert ideas. Then, alas, with pathetic ignorance of human psychology, it has proceeded by some educational scheme to bind humanity afresh with inert ideas of its own fashioning (p. 2).

That fits political revolutions as well as intellectual ones - certainly Jacobins have been fond, once in power, of grand schemes of imposed homogeneity of thought and culture from above. The French Revolution and Napoleon gave us a powerful and much-emulated model of industrialized education. The current fad for standards understood as what can be tested on a mass scale is an echo of that. And it is an intellectual dead end, as my first year seminar students have been telling me as they reflect upon their prior educational experiences (Whitehead called the universal external examination 'deadly' because it "kills the best part of culture" (p. 8)).

I am by no means convinced that the reason for this lies in ignorance of human psychology, though. I think it lies in the politics of education. Once a revolution has happened, it creates a new set of interests, a new elite, a new set of power relations that depend upon the ideas that drove the revolution becoming fixed and hegemonic. Becoming inert, in Whitehead's term. The only way to avoid this pattern is perpetual revolution.

Perpetual revolution is uncomfortable. So is real education.

Image of A.N. Whitehead from the blog of Steven Shaviro, a fellow fan

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Socratic method for the digital age? SOCRAIT

2010-11-26T14:09:00.003-05:00

@busynessgirl has an interesting proposal here for "SOCRAIT" - a personal, flexible learning system built around socratic questioning, guided by learning coaches and assessed by 'socratic scholars.' Her idea includes having students master core knowledge/facts via online question banks, freeing educators to "focus on the learning that surrounds technical knowledge instead (e.g., problem solving, analysis, creativity, applications)."

This strikes me as a more sophisticated version of the way many (most? all?) U.S. states and some other countries test driving - a bank of basic questions of facts, prepared more or less unguided and tested by computer, while the applied knowledge is nurtured by a driving instructor and tested by a human examiner. Not a bad way of doing things at all.

At Dickinson we now do something similar with International Studies seniors. A written exam tests core concepts. An oral exam moves up Bloom's taxonomy to test application, creativity etc.

I like it.

Article (PDF): http://bit.ly/socraitpdf

http://bit.ly/e5BOlD

English through the ages - want!

2010-11-22T00:47:00.000-05:00

Every so often an exhibition or play or concert comes along that makes me desperately wish I was back in the UK. Here's the most recent example:

English through the ages

tags: language English history

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Both Sides Now?

2010-11-10T18:26:00.001-05:00

Who teaches young Americans that there are two sides to every issue?

And do they ever grow out of it?

The world is complex. Most issues in human affairs cannot be reduced to two sides without considerable violence to the truth. Is it the two-party system that conditions so many of the students I encounter to use binary formulas for social, cultural, or political phenomena? "We should hear both sides" "What about the other side?" "There are two sides to every story." No. Usually there are many more than two. Sometimes there is only one. Occasionally there are two sides.

Perhaps it's the fault of the Oxbridge Union tradition of debating, the artificial construct of a proposition to be confirmed or denied. That's fun. Sometimes illuminating. But it's a poor approximation of the world, particularly the world of human affairs.

We could look to Carl Schmitt's agonistic concept of the political, where identities and conflicts are not only reducible to 'them and us,' but rely fundamentally on identification of and hostility toward the Other. But I'm reasonably confident few undergraduates are taught by Schmittians or Straussians, or read The Concept of the Political as part of their preparation for college.

I'm pretty sure we shouldn't blame Joni

So, where does the binary thinking come from? Answers welcome.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Rare Opportunity to study water/environment

2010-11-03T14:42:00.002-04:00

Are you a young professional in the US - journalist, early-career academic or military, work in politics or environmental management - interested in studying environmental issues such as water sharing, desert horticulture, and eco-tourism? If you are, or if you know someone who fits that description, here's an opportunity you should know about:

A month studying in Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, all travel and most other expenses covered.

Spread the word!

http://bit.ly/cJmsQo

Political Colours/Colors

2010-11-03T08:44:00.002-04:00

It seems I woke up in a red state.

Despite ten years of living in the US and adjusting to many of the local idiosyncracies, I still have not got used to how the mapping of colours onto politics is reversed here. Pretty much anywhere else in the world a statement like that above would mean something like there was a socialist or communist revolution overnight. Here it means that a majority of those Pennsylvanians who voted chose plutocratic candidates. Across the world, red means left. Here it means right.

Youse guys are weird.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Ambition

2010-11-01T20:02:00.002-04:00

Conversation with the 8 year old on the way back from her Brownies meeting. Leaves whisper in the gathering dusk. The air hints of winter.

"Do you know the youngest person to get one of those things, where you can't invent something because someone already invented it?"

"A patent? No - how old?"

"Ten! But she was five when she invented it. It was a step stool that folded."

A description follows. Then the news that her class will soon have an 'invention convention' where each student must bring along something she or he has invented. Not a challenge for my junk-collecting, fantastic machine-building kid. She thinks she might adapt an existing invention, her telephone made of wood, string, and a plastic bottle holder.

"I will invent a telephone that talks to dead people."

That's my girl. Properly brought up.

"I think I'll call it 'Hello, Mr. Dead'..."

I can't help but wonder if her teacher will appreciate this fine, creepy mind.

I love it.

http://amplify.com/u/ee8q

Political philosophy meets the ultimate alien menace

2010-10-29T09:05:00.003-04:00

"Doctor Who and Philosophy" hits the shelves 1 December. I'm quite excited, having received some review copies yesterday. This will probably be the only time I get my name in or on anything real to do with the Doctor. And Daleks! So cool. Not only that, but I got to discuss some of my political theory heroes like Hannah Arendt and Max Horkheimer.

Run, don't walk!

Actually, you have a month, so I guess you could walk. Or preorder it. You know, whatever.

Amplify’d from twitter.com

@pchop
Mark Wardecker

"Should the Daleks Be Exterminated?" by @edwebb and me in Doctor Who and Philosophy: http://twitpic.com/31qaka http://twitpic.com/31qao3

See more at twitter.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/e6x1

No, you can not has cheezburger: it taek too much water

2010-10-15T14:35:00.003-04:00

Given the expanding population, given increasing demand for water for production and other purposes tied to industrialization, given the decaying infrastructure of those parts of the world already using more than their share, this problem is really, really not simply going to solve itself. We can all do something to help, even if only the relatively simple things like shorter showers or washing the car less often. Please learn about this issue and do what you can.

Amplify’d from blogactionday.change.org

Five Facts About Water You Might Not Know

1. Unsafe drinking water and lack of sanitation kills more people every year than all forms of violence, including war.

2. More people have access to a cell phone than to a toilet. Today, 2.5 billion people lack access to toilets.

3. Every day, women and children in Africa walk a combined total of 109 million hours to get water.

4. It takes 6.3 gallons of water to produce just one hamburger. That 6.3 gallons covers everything from watering the wheat for the bun and providing water for the cow to cooking the patty and baking the bun. And that’s just one meal! It would take over 1.8 billion gallons of water to make just one hamburger for every person in the United States.

5. The average American uses 159 gallons of water every day – more than 15 times the average person in the developing world.

Read more at blogactionday.change.org

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/ciq6It

US holidays of dubious merit (one of a series)

2010-10-08T14:24:00.002-04:00

One of my kids is studying Columbus in school at the moment. I wish he was taught more ambiguously, celebrated less. But I guess USA citizens need their foundational myths like the rest of us. Should I send her to school with a copy of this card?

Amplify’d from www.someecards.com

See more at www.someecards.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/atizJS

Fear of Blogging?

2010-10-01T12:05:00.006-04:00

Writing is hard. Image by Anthony Anaxagorou - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Writing_Poems.jpeg

Students in my Science Friction: Dystopian Visions seminar are drafting blog posts, and will then give each other feedback before posting them online. So it seems only fair that I write a post as well.

It is striking how in a group of 14 students of similar age there is a wide variation in response to the requirement to blog for class. Some embrace it. Some grow to like it. Some are unexcited.

The more I teach with digital technology, the more confident I am that generalizations about 'digital natives' etc are misguided. As with most new tools and technologies, adoption and adaptation will be varied and unpredictable. And some of us oldsters still have things to teach the young'uns, and to learn from them.

And the street will find its own use for almost everything. Even blogging.

The Sinister Everyday

2010-09-20T22:26:00.003-04:00

Utopian/Dystopian promise from an iron-on patch

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

dnt txt n drv

2010-09-20T16:07:00.001-04:00

Amplify’d from www.slate.com

See more at www.slate.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/brKoEz

Holy RSS growth, Batman!

2010-09-19T10:04:00.002-04:00

The first graph shows growth in number of users of Google Reader, the second the number of items read (or, I guess, at least glanced at) via Reader. Bryan Alexander and others have recently wondered out loud about whether use is actually declining, or about to. I know I use it daily, and encourage my students to do so. As with many tools from the past few years, a minority seem to really, really take to it, while the majority seem to drop it when it is no longer required for a course (I don't have hard numbers on that - anecdote only).

So, what do you think? Is RSS dying, and Reader declining in usefulness? Or will we see these graphs go onwards and upwards?

Amplify’d from googlereader.blogspot.com

Since Reader's fifth anniversary is also approaching (though it feels like yesterday, Reader was launched on October 7, 2005), we thought it might be a good time to reflect on how Reader has grown over the past few years. While we were busy redesigning (twice!), making friends with Buzz and iGoogle, translating, breaking up, gossiping and playing, more and more people picked up the Reader habit. Here's a graph of Reader users over time (where "user" is defined as someone who has used Reader at least once a week):

See more at googlereader.blogspot.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/crpNyP

Copies of the Quran were burnt in parts of the US. Should this be more widely reported?

2010-09-15T13:58:00.002-04:00

The media is in a bind over this. Reporting publicity stunts plays into the hands of those undertaking them. On the other hand, hate crimes and Islamophobia are issues of public concern and need to be part of discussion in communities and nationally.

Given the hyperabundance of information these days, it's not as if failing to report on these crimes will prevent people from finding out about them. But it does have a deleterious effect on the quality of national discussion on these issues if it is entirely framed so as to encompass only the ridiculous Terry Jones and the only tangentially connected Park 51 issue. I think the national media should be reporting incidents like these and analyzing them.

Amplify’d from www.uppermichiganssource.com

The Islamic Center of East Lansing posted pictures on-line after vandals burned a Qur'an in front of its Mosque on Saturday. The Center says vandals then scattered torn pages from holy text in the streets. The incident is being investigated by the FBI as a possible hate crime, but it didn’t make national headlines.

The reason? Many news outlets including NBC have made it a policy not to provide video during or after any acts of hate involving the Qur'an.
NBC25 found this out when it called the network’s wire service asking if it would make interviews with Muslims affected in East Lansing and video gathered by the Lansing NBC affiliate available. NBC News Channel refused.
This raises several questions. Should acts of hate ever be censored? If they should be censored, when? Is this dangerous? Does it lead to unfair or inaccurate reporting?
In NBC’s case it may have lead to inaccurate reporting.
While NBC decided not to cover Qur'an burnings in the U.S. over the weekend, it did cover a deadly riot in India Monday that came in reaction to news of a Qur'an burning.
NBC’s script sent out over the wires to all of its affiliates says, “Thirteen Qur'an protesters were killed in clashes with police Monday in confrontations across Kashmir after rumors a Qur'an was burned in the United States… The main incident that incited the riots was a planned Qur'an burning in Florida, which was canceled. Iranian T-V repeatedly showed another Qur'an burning that reportedly took place in Tennessee.”
NBC calls the burning in Tennessee a "rumor" in its script from the NBC News Channel Foreign News Desk, however a producer at the NBC News Channel National News Desk say affiliate stations in Tennessee notified them of Qur'an burnings that took place over the weekend.

Dr. Mohammed Saleem of the Flint Islamic Center says he understands the decision to censor, and believes it was made to prevent violence and acts of hate.
Dr. Saleem also says it is not serving the intended purpose at this point. People know about the burnings and are already reacting with deadly consequences overseas.
“If everybody knows, let’s talk about it, so that at least we can explain to the common person where we are,” says Dr. Saleem.
He says he hopes Muslims across the world will try to lead an interfaith dialogue aimed at achieving peace and understanding with those of other faiths, so such violence stops.
The Islamic Center of East Lansing which was targeted with the burned Qur'an said on its website, "The Islamic Center of East Lansing calls for a tolerant response in the face of this unfortunate incident. We condemn any act of violent protest anywhere in the world."

Censoring hate, Local Qur'an burning ignored by national media

Read more at www.uppermichiganssource.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/a86me0

paleofuture.tv [episode 00000]

2010-09-14T00:28:00.002-04:00

via paleofuture.com

Mmmmm, the future never tasted so good as it did in the past. Er...

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Family income and test performance in DC public schools

2010-08-30T08:15:00.001-04:00

Test scores are a very effective measure of family income.

Via Will Richardson http://twitter.com/willrich45/statuses/22518392484

Amplify’d from gfbrandenburg.wordpress.com

See more at gfbrandenburg.wordpress.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/d3Kfmj

The medium is the message

2010-08-26T01:38:00.001-04:00

And can perhaps speak from beyond the grave. Which is what a medium is supposed to be able to facilitate, after all.

Amplify’d from www.psfk.com

There are numerous ways to preserve your memory after you die: a gravestone, a scholarship, or perhaps an urn. However, a unique website offers a radically novel way to do so– as a vinyl record.

And Vinyly will use the ashes of the deceased, and mix them into a batch of vinyl, which is then pressed into a run of about 30 discs. A special voice over can be added, as well as any backing sounds or music.

Andvinyly

[via Urb]
Read more at www.psfk.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/9x5NgD

Iran's Retro Rocketship Drone #atompunk #retrofuturism

2010-08-22T11:14:00.001-04:00

The aesthetics are quite striking: Iranian drones seem to have taken their design cues from mid-20th century science fiction. Doesn't this set look like it's constructed out of castoffs from 50s B movies?

Amplify’d from news.yahoo.com

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad unveiled on Sunday a new long-range drone, dubbed Karar, which reportedly can bomb targets at high speed, state television reported.
Read more at news.yahoo.com

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/aQui7h

Race to the bottom in a nutshell

2010-08-20T16:49:00.001-04:00

Of course, many/most US corporations would love to get away with abuses, so they have a selective affection for the rules. And it's not all about China, either. But the image is pretty effective.

Amplify’d from www.slate.com

See more at www.slate.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/8xtl

Free Internet Press :: Iraq's Garden Of Eden - Restoring The Paradise That Saddam Destroyed

2010-08-02T10:57:00.002-04:00

http://freeinternetpress.com/story.php?sid=26500

Heroic efforts under incredibly difficult circumstances to restore the marshlands. Inspiring.

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/cnymNp

What student evaluations mean

2010-06-13T14:27:00.001-04:00

I'd like to see this kind of study replicated in different environments. Based on anecdote and my own evaluations, I'd say this doesn't hold for the liberal arts college environment where I teach. I suppose what matters is what students value. Many of my students seem to appreciate being pushed harder: courses rated as particularly challenging tend to be the ones where I get higher scores across most measures. http://bit.ly/9lp2mI

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Language games

2010-05-29T19:09:00.001-04:00

"Top kill" was macho, and (unintentionally?) gothic. A "lower marine riser package cap" sounds like a bawdy joke from a revue aimed at sailors. There's bizarre pleasure to be found in these weird language games. But the reality to which they relate is relentlessly grim. http://bit.ly/c5Sw4q

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Living Earth Simulator

2010-05-19T19:39:00.001-04:00

Well, good luck with that. http://bit.ly/cXET9t

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

PR doubt

2010-05-08T17:47:00.001-04:00

The man has a point. Publics are, on the whole, woefully underinformed about voting systems. On the other hand, as an advocate of voting reform in general, and PR in particular since the Thatcher era, l don't care how we get there. http://bit.ly/9ogmMy

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Humble Bundle - Game Developers Doin' It Right

2010-05-05T01:04:00.002-04:00

Go to http://www.wolfire.com/humble to pay what you like for five cross-platform games from indy developers (they work on Mac, Linux, Windows). You decide how much of what you pay should go to the developers, and how much to either or both of their designated charities. Hurry - six days left. And if I'm not convincing enough, I'm sure this wonderfully cheesy rap will do the trick:

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

A fine legal statement of what secularism is about

2010-04-29T14:27:00.001-04:00

Very nicely put, m'lud. http://bit.ly/bn9lxW

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

#debill dystopia

2010-04-16T08:29:00.001-04:00

Cory making sense. #debill is a disaster. http://bit.ly/djCQeo

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Prezi on the fly

2010-04-14T00:55:00.001-04:00

I love Prezi as a collaborative classroom tool; but here, as so often, Howard transcends. http://bit.ly/d1wYmf

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Charles Babbage, blogger

2010-03-30T11:17:00.004-04:00

Perhaps it were wiser for present reputation to offer nothing but profoundly meditated plans, but I do not think knowledge will be most advanced by that course; such sparks may kindle the energies of other minds more favorably circumstanced for pursuing the enquiries.

http://bit.ly/d3EcQZ

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

How to produce a good conference panel in the age of Twitter

2010-03-28T22:03:00.003-04:00

Broadcast is over. Sage on the stage is dying. The audience is not what it was.

Jay Rosen sets out ten steps he and fellow panelists took to 'avoid being killed in the backchannel' at SXSW this year. But, as one of the commenters notes, this is good advice simply for putting together and running a good conference panel. The more conference organizers and participants prepare in this way, the more productive everyone's conference experiences will be.

http://bit.ly/a5Wb7x

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Happy Earth Day, Pennsyltucky

2010-03-28T18:08:00.003-04:00

I spent some of this morning with my kids and others cleaning up and preparing a farm stand run by a local non-profit, serving locally-grown food and unused grocery store items to a poorer part of town.

Someone else chose to celebrate Earth Day by dumping several bags of trash by our garage.

Thank you to both sets of people for reminding me why as a species we really don't deserve this planet, but schmuckiness is not evenlydistributed through the population.

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Email management: sound advice undermined by font choice.

2010-03-27T13:57:00.001-04:00

Chart is good. Font is ridiculous. Medium is the message. I'm going to have to remake it with a real font (unless someone beats me to it). http://bit.ly/aywurP

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Is that your lunch or a biological weapon?

2010-03-23T14:04:00.001-04:00

More than 1,000,000 Scoville units? I surrender. http://bit.ly/a1lUCi

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Turning Education Up to 11?

2010-03-21T00:28:00.002-04:00

Amplify + education = ? How would that work? To the extent that Amplify combines social bookmarking and annotation or commentary, on the one hand, and blogging (micro-, midi-, and now full-blown) on the other, it replicates or parallels tools I already use in and out of the classroom - diigo, blogs, and twitter (read more here). It also plays well with those other tools - I was particularly grateful when the team added diigo to the integrated services. The question for me is whether there is added value in combining elements of these things in one platform in a formal educational context. Informally, I learn from Amplify every day. I am clearly an active and enthusiastic user. Can and should that transfer in some formal way to my role as educator? I'll be thinking about it, experimenting a bit, probably. And reporting back on my Amplify blog. In the meantime, I would welcome input from educators, learners, researchers, and everyone else, with ideas on what Amplify can do for education here: http://bit.ly/d4NgLa

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Do George & Dave's Work For Them: Future of Education

2010-03-17T09:13:00.003-04:00

Go go go! I'm leaning toward an opera, but may settle for a drawing. http://bit.ly/90xtww

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Pedagogy of fun, continued (again)

2010-03-15T15:48:00.001-04:00

It's nice when smart folks at MIT add some patina of credibility to my, frankly, instinctive and un-researched advocacy of fun as the best pedagogy. http://bit.ly/cUB4xM

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Imperial Decline on theFront Page

2010-03-06T10:50:00.002-05:00

The front page of today's NY Times has two stories of what imperial decline looks like in the metropole, alongside the usual fare of overreach - Iraq, Somalia, Yemen. There is a wistful, almost elegiac tone, as the reporters address us from among the crumbling edifices of the ruined powerhouse of the U.S. industrial empire and the dysfunctional heart of the Empire State.

From Detroit:

Michigan Central is in a class of its own. Some city officials consider it among the ugliest behemoths to pockmark Detroit and have ordered its demolition, but others see it as the industrial age’s most gracious relic, a Beaux Arts gem turned gothic from neglect but steeped in haunting beauty.

Now Detroit has become embroiled in an urgent debate over how to save what is perhaps its most iconic ruin — and in the process, some insist, give the demoralized city a much needed boost.

“People compare it to Roman ruins”

And from Albany:

To wander into the grand pile of stone that is the State Capitol, to walk its cavernous sandstone and marble halls, is to find an absurdist play in its third act.

A tragedy, then. Who plays the role of the barbarians at the gate? Not the desperate Haitian refugees crammed into tiny apartments. Not the fearful Greeks rioting in Athens. Not the massive reserve army of the US unemployed - that's "strikingly good," opines an economic analyst. Not even, probably, the disturbed "gunman" who died in a lone assault on the Pentagon. He might well have been a "terrorist" if he had a different religion and ethnicity, as might the pilot of the suicide attack on the IRS in Texas. Then again, maybe not, some parts of the press are trying to be more responsible in such matters.

There is no apparent horde of barbarians in this story. Unless, of course, it is we who are pulling the empire apart. Distracted by our circuses - the Oscars and baseball make the front page, too - and demanding to be saved rather than getting off our arses and changing ourselves and our communities. The front page business stories are about GM reopening 661 dealerships rather than deal with expensive arbitration and "a Washington envoy" traveling the country selling hope, handing out cash, creating few jobs.

We did this. There are villains aplenty: in the financial sector, in the military-industrial complex, in parts of the media. But we bought the whole thing. Thought we could consume our way to an ever-brighter future. Borrow, spend, demand to be distracted and entertained, expect someone else to pay the cost. And now expect someone else to make it better.

We've seen this play before. If anyone shows up at the gates, it won't be the cavalry.

http://bit.ly/aIKaLe

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

OK Go - This Too Shall Pass - RGM version

2010-03-02T10:57:00.001-05:00

Wonderful http://bit.ly/cXJYnA

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Four ordinary lives in extraordinary places?

2010-02-28T23:56:00.001-05:00

I very much hope this documentary series lives up to its considerable potential as a teaching tool (in the broadest sense). http://bit.ly/anZCn1

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous

Sovereignty is a performance; borders are consensual illusions (until they aren't)

2010-02-28T20:36:00.002-05:00

Posted via email from edwebb's posterous

Redundant Headline is Redundant

2010-02-26T09:30:00.002-05:00

"Mystical Form of Islam Suits Sufis in Pakistan" In other news, Protestant form of Christianity suits Lutherans in Germany. Monasticism suits Benedictines. Practicing Catholics not averse to attending Mass.

The difficulty for subeditors comes from the general ignorance of the US readership, even the relatively (on average) educated and cosmopolitan NYT readership, about Islam. The point of the story is to describe a Sufi festival and thereby introduce the idea that there is more than one Islam, and some Islams are relatively benign from a secularized Western perspective. They dance! They talk to women reporters! They smoke pot!

Good. It needs to be said - this is indeed still news to too many westerners. But it ends up being a rather muddled story because too much has to be explained, and the thrust of the story - not all Muslims are austere and fanatical, some are relaxed and groovy - is not quite enough to make a real news item, so there has to be a political twist. The slightly ridiculous headline springs from the odd nature of the story itself.

How about NYT get someone who actually understands religious communities in Central and South Asia to do a feature for the magazine, and do it right?

http://bit.ly/d1O3Lv

Posted via web from edwebb's posterous