ser mujer en la academia

Last night I attended and spoke a dinner reception put on by the Cosmos Club Foundation as one of the invited Cosmos Scholars, whose work had been supported by the foundation in 2012. It was a fancy affair in the club’s headquarters near Dupont Circle, and as I entered the building with Dr. B I whispered “I feel like I’m sneaking into a fancy hotel to use the bathroom.”

On the second floor of the building we checked in, put on our name tags, and went to our assigned table to leave our bags. As I was putting my coat on the back of my chair, a member of the club—Mr. HB, as I shall call him—introduced himself first to Dr. B, and to myself only to offer to take my coat to the coat check.

Fair enough, I thought. This is what I get for bringing as my guest a faculty member who is young enough to appear to be a student as well. My advisor, usually referred to as Leapfrog in these posts, was otherwise engaged, receiving an award for outstanding teaching and mentoring at the university.

Dr. B and I quickly found the open bar (this is precisely why I asked him to be my guest), and the Georgetown professor ahead of us in line began chatting us up. Again, he assumed that Dr. B was the honoree, and asked about my research after B indicated that it was worthy of conversation. The three of us moved to a room I would describe as something of a conservatory. There he told us a bit about the history of the club, noting that it was not until 1988 that women were allowed to enter via the front door or go above the first floor. Well, then….congratulations to me for getting to the second floor I suppose...

Right about this time, Mr. HB returned with a ticket for the coat check, which he handed to Dr. B. “I believe this is for your wife’s coat,” he said. Oh my. And now congratulations to me for being downgraded to attendance as someone’s wife.    

Ok, so maybe I set myself up for this. I attended a swanky, bougie, white event, in which there were plenty of female award recipients, but only 4 people of color in a room of about 100. I’m wondering how they were feeling. And further, rather than attending with my grandfatherly 70 year old white male advisor, I asked a faculty member who is more friend than colleague to put on a tie (accounting for ½ his yearly tie quota) and have some free cocktails with me.

Fair enough.

But in a world where the glass ceiling is sometimes said to not exist, I can’t help that notice in the two weeks that I’ve been a doctor, it seems more and more apparent.

The other instance(s) in which this felt apparent was during and shortly after my defense itself. I stood at the front of the room talking for over an hour and the most common compliment I received after officially being welcomed into “the realm of the anointed” (in Leapfrog’s terms) was that I looked beautiful or that my dress was very pretty. “I sounded smart, right?” I asked my mother afterwards. “Oh, yes. And you looked beautiful too.”

Perhaps that’s a mother’s place. But friends, colleagues, they said the same thing. This was right around the time Obama made inappropriate comments about California Attorney General Kamala Harris (as recapped on Jezebel). Sure, I’m not the first to point to this larger trend, it just struck me as surprising, because I come from a department that is so conscious of gender issues. That is so committed to social justice. Because in general, we try to be so overly cautious and respectful of our colleagues. And sure, I like being told I look nice in certain situations (though, as I’ve mentioned before the true way to my heart is to comment on my intelligence), but not at the event that was a culmination of six years of academic work. I think Brett was the only one that got it right. Though apparently she commented on how she liked my dress to my mother, on facebook she wrote: And she was brilliant--thoughtful, poised, riveting.

que hace un hogar?

i write from thousands of miles away, both physically and mentally. but i am thinking about my friends in washington, dc tonight.

i remember one bright day in early october, i wandered to mcpherson square, expecting a large crowd. or structures. or something. i arrived and didn't even see a sizable crowd mingling. was i in the wrong place? i walked toward freedom square, met some friends and walked back. we commenced a GA with about 20 people. and though there were some scuffles about whether the "people" from "new york" should be mediating, things went smoothly.

one main topic of discussion was sleeping. everyone was aware of the national park service regulations banning camping. instead, people suggested, sidewalks were fair game. eventually over the course of 2 weeks. people began sleeping on the ground in the park. using cardboard. using sleeping bags. eventually, a few tents went up. i was out of town for the weekend at the end of october, and when i returned, it was like a different place. dominated by tent structures. a true home to sleeping quarters. and even when the occubarn was pulled down, mcpherson kept its atmosphere of collegiality and homeyness.

then, one night, awake with a cough, i watched the livestreaming of zuccotti park being evicted. and i thought to myself, "i'm not sure how dc got lucky, but we have such a respectful relationship with our enforcers." i chuckled lightly at the the general assembly in mid-october when the fire department came to remove the generator that was being used for meals and technology. after our amazing attorney JL intervened, the fireperson walked away with an arm raised shrugging "power to the people."

as other life concerns began to take hold, and as the direction of occupy dc moved away from my specific tactical preferences, my face became more scarce at mcpherson square. but i've maintained a vested interest. i truly care about what happens there. i have friends, acquaintances, and colleagues at mcpherson. i know of at least two occupregnancies. i am invested. not only in the people, but in the project.

and so, from thousands of miles away, i awaited news today, of what would become of mcpherson, as the national park police began, for the first time in four months, to enforce the camping ban. and it seems the spirits are still good. the hopes are still high. this is not the end. and i won't be surprised in two weeks, when the attention is gone, and sleeping bags start slowly creeping in again.

más cerca del hogar

(cross-posted @ fieldnotes)

In Orin Starn’s 1991 article, “Missing the Revolution,” he chastised anthropologists for missing signs of the rise of Sendero Luminoso [Shining Path], the Peruvian Maoist insurgent organization. He suggests anthropologists were too absorbed in Andeanism, a term he borrows from Edward Said’s Orientalism, to mean depictions of life in the Andes that portray contemporary peoples as outside the flow of modern history (395). Because of their narrow focus, they missed the important politics and historical dynamics that fomented the rise of groups like Shining Path. As he wrote, for hundreds of anthropologists…the rise of the Shining Path came as a complete surprise” (395).

Many anthropologists took this call to heart, and much recent work on the Andes has indeed centered on working-class and rural peoples’ protest, political work, and revolution. Scholars such as Forrest Hylton and Sinclair Thomson highlight the “revolutionary spirit” of indigenous and mestizo Bolivians. Indeed, strong movements opposing neoliberal economic policies and multinational corporations’ ownership of many of Bolivia’s natural resources have been politically effective. One of the most heightened moments of this movement was the inauguration of Evo Morales, Bolivia’s (and the hemisphere’s) first indigenous president. In speeches celebrating his inauguration, Evo emphasized both his indigeneity and revolutionary ideology with statements such as “I say to you, my Indian brothers and sisters from America concentrated here in Bolivia, the 500 year campaign of resistance has not been in vain. This democratic, cultural fight is part of the fight of our ancestors; it is the continuity of the fight of Tupaj Katari, of Che Guevara.” In this small statement, he links himself and his supporters not only to leftist revolutions in Latin America of the last century, but also to a much longer lineage of anti-colonialism, anti-imperialism, and anti-exploitation that has existed since subaltern Bolivians resisted their colonial exploiters. Revolution then is not something that happened in the past, but something that is the continuity between “then” and “now.”




These historical revolutions penetrate many citizens’ understandings of “Bolivianness” today. When I arrived in La Paz for the first time in July 2009, I did so on the eve of the annual celebration Día de La Paz. All over the city banners were hung in celebration of “200 Años Libre.” In 1809 several uprisings against royalist forces began in La Paz. Though insurgent troops did not succeed in a decisive victory over Spanish forces until 1825, it is the beginning of the campaign that is remembered as the year of freedom. On July 16, 1809 Pedro Domingo Murillo famously declared that the Bolivia revolution was igniting a fire that no one could put out. Though Murillo was hung in the Plaza de los Españoles that night, the plaza was renamed for him and he is remembered as a voice of the revolution. In 2009 banners around La Paz proclaimed, “Somos un fuego qué no se apaga!” [We are a fire that cannot be extinguished].

And so, to me, Bolivia lived up to its reputation as a hotbed of revolution. I had always (though self-consciously) romanticized Bolivian revolution a bit. [I've also written about Bolivian protest here and here]. I was continually impressed by the ways miners, teachers, and health workers could simply block off a road could and force the president into negotiations for salary increases, as had happened a few weeks after I arrived in La Paz in April 2011. I was awestruck at the “revolutionary pride” Hylton and Thomson had described, and always wondered why Bolivians were so effective at protest, while people in the US just seemed totally incapable.

Well, now, perhaps, times…they are a’changin…




Occupy Wall Street is now almost a month old, and cities like Boston, Chicago, Philly, and Madison, and Minneapolis, (and of course my beloved DC's Occupy K Street) have similar occupations afoot. I’m still my cynical self and despite my semi-sporadic presence at DC General Assembly meetings, I’m not 100% convinced the REVOLUTION is immanent. I’d still consider myself hopeful though.

I’ve been taking fieldnotes on what I’ve experienced. I guess its just habit these days. But after reading a conference paper of mine on the representation [and/or imaginary] of Bolivian protest, my advisor suggested I develop it into a longer article for publication and incorporate some stuff on the Arab Spring and Occupy Movement. I’m still unsure if I will actually do that, but its made me think more critically about what is going on.




But here, I’m going to take time to comment on what to me has seemed the biggest debate associated with occupations: Specific Demands vs. Problematizing the Status Quo. From big news outlets such as the New York Times, and Wall Street Journal down to small scale political bloggers all emphasize the major weakness of the(se) movement(s) being a lack of specific demands. And much of the grassroots organizing communities (though certainly not all) have countered that essentially, it is not their job to write laws, and if the government had been doing their job all along, we wouldn’t be in this mess [I saw this summed up in a photo of a man with a sign at some occupation somewhere and now for the life of me can’t find the picture].

I’m still unsure where I fall in this debate. But the most cogent examination of this I’ve seen thus far has suggested we must “Turn the Shame Around.”

An unjust system’s first line of defense is shame. As long as we’re ashamed to admit that we’re victims, as long as we’re ashamed to identify with the other losers, we’re helpless.

It would be great to have a 10-point plan that solves everything. It would be great to have a party that endorses that plan and a get-out-the-vote movement to put that party into office. But none of that is going to happen until large numbers of us cast off our shame, until we turn the shame around: We need to stop being ashamed that we couldn’t crack the top 1%, and instead cast shame on an economic system that only works for 1%. The people who defend that immoral system and profit from it — they should be ashamed, not us.

He compares this movement to those of LGBT rights and Feminism, suggesting that before specific aims can be approached, a politics of visibility must emerge. He of course links to We are the 99%, which may be considered the first (or at least best publicized) online repository of shame shifting. [see also Matt Taibbi’s piece on Common Dreams]

He concludes

The old rules still apply. We’re going to need policies. We’re going to need agendas and lists of demands. We’re going to need leaders to represent us and armies of volunteers to knock on doors and make phone calls and write letters to the editor. We’re going to have to register millions of voters and get them to the polls. None of that is going to happen automatically just because people lose their shame about being victims of an economy run by and for the 1%.

But I don’t believe that stuff is going to happen at all — not on the scale we need — until people lose their shame about being victims and losers. It’s just a first step, but I don’t think we can skip it.




And so, I bring us back to the materiality of representation. As Butler (1998) and Fraser (1997) famously (for nerds like me) hashed out, representation is not “merely cultural.” Representations carry material consequences. For the luchadoras, using the image of the chola not only exploits but also reproduces indigenous women’s vulnerability to physical and structural harm, at times furthing the cycle of violence and subordination. For Occupiers, representation either grants legitimacy, leading to increased attention and solidarity, or delegitimizes the movement as fringe. So, to use Spivak’s (1988) notion that representation may be conceived of in two senses, the “re-presentation” of a group deeply impacts their ability to be spoken for in political representation.

So, yes, we Occupiers must eventually demand specific actions. But given the states of visibility and representation at the moment, we must still work on building solidarity, and strength. If we narrow our demands too early, they will not be heard. At the moment, the Nation is Waiting for Protesters to Clearly Articulate Demands Before Ignoring Them.

see more of my pictures on J & M's "letter to an @narquista in the oven"

en casa

This morning as I reluctantly pulled myself out of bed just to be stood up on a skype call, I thought to myself, “at least I’m in the land where hot showers are dependable.”

No such luck. I have discovered that the shower in my new home—in the belly of the beast, home of the Washington Concensus—likes very much to vascillate every 3 seconds or so, between what might be described as “cool” and “really freaking hot.”

Psht. I might as well be in La Paz then.

I would have 15 Bs lunches. Any pirata I could think of. A sunny afternoon on the roof. T’tkos mystery drinks. The excitement of dodging left turns. Api with Ramiro. Authentic salteñas. A visit to my favorite laundry man. My boy Sammy. Cebras. A cab ride to Zona Sur. Los Auténticos Decadentes. Lucha libre. Telephone calls instead of Skype.

But here I have some great things too. Phô. Fast internet. Cool nights in the garden. Maker’s Mark. The excitement of dodging undergrads. Wine with my roommates. Authentic tacos. Laundry that takes 2 hours instead of 36. My cohort. Leap. Rides home with the windows down. Wilson Phillips. Low altitude footie. Telephone calls instead of Skype.

papas fritas

there was a period of time when i constantly craved fries. these were the JC days, and options were abundant, though not always satisfying. there was the 24 hour mcdonalds, and plenty of drunken (usually crying) nights were accompanied by them. later i graduated to hollywood chicken, where the fries were tasty, but paled in comparison to the pizzarolls. but really, the crowning glory was white star, with their crispy steak 'n shake sized fries with just the right amount of seasoning. but even those couldn't compare to the pommes frites on second avenue.

in the years since, i've discovered the garlic fries at looking glass, and have drunkenly waxed on about how every bar with food should have a basket of fries for under $3. i've had district 2's disappointingly overpriced fries with truffle oil. and 4P's (still overpriced) sweetpotato fries opened up new possibilities. but when salon moved to cathedral ave. i started buying the $2.5o bags of frozen fries at giant and never shut up about how i'd beat the system. despite the rarity with which i eat "fast food" these days, i've even tried wendy's new natural cut, sea salt fries twice (conclusion: they are no better than wendy's previous fries, and in fact are worse than most fast food fries). though i wouldn't necessarily claim to be a connoisseur, i probably pay more attention to fried potatoes than your average fry eater.

salchipapas

and my first two weeks in la paz this time i had my fair share of fries. with sandwiches, in poutine, even with a hamburger. yes, i even tried salchipapas one fateful night (or 2). but they lacked something. is it possible i've grown out of my fry phase? i've moved on to mashed potatoes (pure de papas), and even the kinds that come out of a bag just seem so delicious these days. creamy, buttery, salt & peppery. utterly delicious. i still can't get enough ketchup, so the chips have their place, but in a way, i think fieldwork has brought on a new life phase. at least in my eating habbits. so, this place has changed me in a way more profound than perhaps even i realize. is 2am too late to go make my packet of kris pure de papas?

de donde eres?

well, in the last week i've been asked about twice daily where i'm from. and i don't know how to answer.

of course, there's the problem i've had for years. i was born on the west coast. grew up in the midwest. went to school in chicago. lived in new york. resided in DC.

but i could always fall back on the place i currently lived. the place i paid rent. where my car was registered. where i voted. where i paid taxes. but now that's over. my stuff lives in my parents' basement and closets. i sleep in a bed in chicago. my affiliation is with a school in DC. and in a week, i will physically be in Bolivia.

and so i stutter. i hesitate. i look to other people to answer for me. because i am no longer from anywhere. i am only to somewhere. to illinois. to chicago. a bolivia. and with my fromness, in a way, my history is obscured. if i'm not from dc, i have no school, i have no purpose.


leaving dc has been difficult. its the end of an era in a way. and i'm not sure i'm entirely ready for the next era. i'm hesitating about all kinds of things. but in a way, i suppose bolivia has come to symbolize a release. a relief. a place where i can just be. and there the answers are easy.

soy de los estados unidos.

hasta luego

today i cleaned out my drawer. just a simple desk drawer. one that has not always been mine, and is sure in the course of a few months to no longer be remembered as mine. i inherited it from audrey, just over 3 years ago. and in a way, it has been my home. it has been my stability.

grad school is a tumultuous time. it is a time over overwork, underpay, urgency, stagnation, and extremes. gaping holes and overfilled plates. all night cubicle sessions. yoga in workspaces. couch naps. margarita binges. star gazing outside of institutions you reject. deconstructing institutions you must accept and trying to reconcile the institutions you simultaneously love and hate. it is tearing yourself apart, while forcefully defending yourself when others try to do the same. it is finding yourself and losing yourself. it is losing the world and finding it again.

and my drawer was my home in all this. and in a way, cleaning out my drawer was an archaeology of grad school life (in both a binford sense and a foucaultian one). i unearthed the relics of the last 4 years. contemporary theory articles. pre-bolivia papers. approvals from all 4 comps. conference schedules. old printed emails. books, and food, and telephones, and other assorted ephemera.

and now all that remains are 4 library books.

this drawer has been a home to me more than any apartment i've occupied in DC. its is my box of essentials. my first-aid kit (whiskey). it has held soccer cleats and cookies. dissertation proposals and graded undergrad exams.

and then at the end of the day i went to my last dissertation seminar. possibly ever. and audrey was there. and ted was there. and everyone in between. and in a way it felt like a generational menagerie. a foucaultian geneology. and abby gave me some old phones that might work on gsm 1900. and i gave mahri a tent that used to be julie's. there's something so nice about the passing of goods. not only because they're useful, but because they have a history. and that history centers around this space/place. this ambition. this process.

and i said goodbye to david (though hopefully not for the last time before i leave). david who i first got to know through a shared experience of breakups. david to whom i've alluded my darkest secrets. david who shook my hand during orientation, and provided us all with a swanky party atop a downtown law office building. david who let me cry to him for 10 minutes after passing my defense.

this is not the end. it is only a new phase. but really, it is the end to some things. and its time for that end, but that doesn't mean i'm ready.

embalajar 1

i'm packing up things from the place i've lived the longest since leaving my parents' home (only slightly longer than 912 hamlin). this is a place that has felt like home. a place i've lived.

and so, i'm going through a box of papers i've been toting around for about 6 years. i thought i'd share this gem. i'm not sure when i wrote it, but it was between a national geographic map of north american cultures and a copy of my 2006 tax returns.

we once drove over the mountain

a 2 hour trip at 11 pm

just to consume illegal substances

and return 5 hours later

hung over, sore, exhausted.

we stayed up all night chanting

in a language we didn't understand

and unknowingly ruined the cake.

we were enigmas of the desert

unbridled, unburdened, young, strong, and restless.

but we can't keep it up any more.

we fly in from the east coast

now 2 less than we were

wearing nice shoes

with purses and 3 piece suits

here we are somehow adult, still drinking vodka

from plastic bottles

but we can't stay up past 12

we are slowly dying, our adopted clan

as we cling to that language we only

borrowed superficially.

en el distrito

it was one of those dc days.

the morning started with some reading in the center of union station. then off to library of congress. after attempting some academic-y stuff there, i gave up and checked out their exhibit called "exploring the early americas." aside from cringing at the fact that one might discount everything that happened in the hemisphere prior to 1492 by refering to colón's landing and its aftermath as "early," i enjoyed the exhibit. it was heavily maya focused, with a mere display case each for taíno, inca, and aztec. but there were some pretty fantastic old maps. i would have liked more maps of course, but alas. i suppose my disappointment was that they were very spaced out. 1502, 1516, and then we jump to the 1700s.

i headed out of LoC toward the mall, but as i passed the lower senate park, i saw a bunch of folks standing around in bright orange shirts, with signs and a loudspeaker. as i got closer i could see the iconic round blue NOW "keep abortion legal" signs, so i crossed the street to see what was what. i stood at the back for a moment, leaning on a tree, feeling very much like the new anthropologist trying hard to participate/observe, but feeling mostly like a voyeur. shortly after though, i recognized ilianorama in the crowd and went to stand by her. i heard the last speaker, and then the crowd went off to march in solidarity with planned parenthood, and i continued west toward the mall.

i have been telling myself for two years that when i get the winter blues, i really should just head straight for the national botanical garden and revive my warm weather spirits, but today was the first time i actually took myself up on the suggestion. i found a lovely bench in the middle of the jungle room and actually got through about 100 pages. i ended my garden experience by wandering around the desert room and medicinal plant room, then headed toward the metro stopping by the sculpture garden along the way.

this evening i met mattt and company (jbosch, brot, et al) at my favorite place for revolutionary cuisine. i had some pasta (first meal of the day!) and some drinks. we thought about moving to the raven after dinner, but were worried it'd be too crowded, so mattt & i went on a reconnaissance mission. indeed the bird was over crowded as we peeked in through the new (but nonetheless, held together by duck tape) picture window. greg noticed me from behind the bar and gave a wave, but we didn't brave the crowd. we just returned to papa karl's and left shortly after.

on my way home, i rounded the corner and ran into katieq of the woco days. turns out she's getting a phd at american now too. funny how those things happen.

there was nothing terribly out of the ordinary about today other than that i made a point to really live in this city in which i'm located. i ran into old and new friends, took advantage of the wonderful smithsonian institution, and even got some work done (though never enough!). i wish i had days like this more often, however. it felt full and fun and fulfilling. and i've only got 3 weeks left here. i need to make the most of it.

viviendo con yo

i caught myself today, thinking "i can't wait until i live alone."

its no secret certain things around here endlessly drive me crazy. maybe i'm just too old. maybe by 30(ish) we're too set in our ways to gracefully live with the rules of those with whom we disagree. different household ideologies*...

and the little things get me so frustrated. i keep telling myself the daily frustrations are a small trade off for living in a nice building in a location i enjoy. but the truth is, i think 1/2 the reason i want this grant is that it will give me an excuse to move out asap.

and i can't help but notice the gendered nature of household ideologies i've observed. the first time i lived with others in an independent household (meaning, not a university dormitory) outside of my parents' home (for an extended period of time) was when i lived with folks on hamlin. we managed to get along pretty well, and divide chores and such, but not without the "chore wheel" created by the other woman living in the apartment. when she left and i lived with 3 men, the chore wheel when down the toilet and things deteriorated to the point that i refused to do dishes because no one else would. i kept 1 set of dishes in my room, which i washed in the bathroom sink after each meal, because the kitchen sink was so full of quickly molding boy-used dishes.

later in life, i lived with cutsofbeef, who defied gender stereotypes in many ways. on friday nights he liked to drink a bottle of wine, do some baking, and clean the apartment with no small amount of method products. which of course was perfectly fine with me. but my point here is not that he defied the construct i'm setting up. my point is that he felt no need to regiment cleaning. it was something done when someone wants to do it or sees a need for it. there was no need for charts, schedules, or lists. cleaning was managed laissez faire. its only been women i've lived with that have needed hard and fast schedules, rules, and routines.

and its this regimentation and surveillance that drives me crazy. i live in a foucaultian cleaning panopticon. i get emails asking when i will be mopping the floor, or askance comments about whether i used the "correct" cleaning product for a certain task. maybe its my own fault for being non-confrontational, but i'm mad as hell and i'm not going to take it any more. except that i probably will.

and then the other side of all this is, i actually will never live alone again. my little house in the country and my garden apartment at the bottom of the hill will be my only forays. however, when i move, i will get to live with someone who i, for the most part, actually share much household ideology. if anything, i'm the clean(er) freak. but there is little nagging or passive agressive insinuations about the frequency or method by which cleaning occurs. sure i probably strongly suggest on occasion that there is way too much dust hiding beneath the couch, and he can't understand why anyone would use any product other than bon ami (or perhaps feigns ignorance that anyone could possibly think anything else might be effective). but on the whole, we agree on cleaning, cooking, energy usage, and clutter levels. and that is one of the most reassuring things i can think of.

* i'm either coining or misusing the term household ideology. either way, what i mean is simply the cooking, cleaning, technology & resource use, and organizational patterns of the home to which people ascribe a level of neutral naturalness and common sensicality. ie. it is obviously totally logical to clean the bathroom once a week, or is obviously totally logical to clean the bathroom bathroom when it seems to be getting "dirty."

en cordura y el miedo

i went to the stewart/colbert rally to restore sanity and/or fear. mostly i went because it was here, and seemed to be what all the cool kids were doing. But I allowed myself the privilege of claiming my involvement was something of "participant observation" given my research interests in the efficacy of various forms of (performative) social movements.

As per usual, my thoughts on the rally were not without critique. Was this just another vagina monologues/take back the night/national coming out day stunt to promote decidedly neoliberal ideologies and distract us from the real issues all in the guise of progressive politics? Well, pretty much, yes.

But as faux mia pointed out over vegan breakfast, protest in the U.S. doesn't work (anymore?). So we've moved on to something else. Something more corporate. Something less overtly (but still covertly) political. Something that appeals to desires of the masses and does not contradict or question the ideological indoctrination they've experienced since their reagan-era births. perhaps its as lukacs and postone suggest-the commodity fetishism pervades all aspects of life. we can't escape it, even in our efforts to express dissent.

celebrity is the new politics. We have wrestlers and bodybuilders that have become governors, and presidents that have been compared to paris hilton (not that i'm saying it was an astute comparison). corrupt governors get recruited for reality tv shows. politics is celebrity and celebrity is politics. hell, have we already forgotten that colbert actually tried to run in south carolina?

and this phenomenon is perhaps not unlike the cholita luchadora phenomenon. the overt political connections are not clearly defined, but it is a spectacular event that cannot truly be understood without analyzing it as political. it speaks to social relations, but in a way that is digestible to the crowd that gathers for it. it does not push the boundaries too far.

so then, the real question is: what is the effect? will we being to understand political rallies as forms of entertainment (which is basically why i went, as well as the middle-aged african-american guy next to me on the bus "well, its saturday, and its something to do."), complete with celebrity music performances and professional athletes video-conferenced in? will they become just another outlet for coca-cola or comedy central to sell their wares? and if so, does this necessarily forclose the possibility that they can contribute to progressive political action?

i suppose in both cases, only time will tell. but if performance truly is a space in which social relations become more clear and possibilities of change are envisioned, then we might be on to something here.

bebiendo

i've recently realized i have a bar to call my own. and it happened on accident i suppose.

back in the days when the bar formerly known as El Camino was known as its former and current name (which shall not be named...) i stopped by with the boys on thursday nights to claim my status as "lady" and thus, free appetizers. on friday's i'd go with B for our free 9-10pm well drinks, competing to see who could drink more (until she went to rehab). in the beginning, i hated the place, and would have much rather gone to Guillo's. but alas, by the time the place shed its pseudo-mexican interior, i was joining softball teams, friends with the barbacks, and showing up solo.

and somewhere along the way, i've realized that this is how you know a bar is "yours": you have no hesitation to go it alone.

and now i find myself happily, unexpectedly, wandering into the bird on friday afternoons. and people shout my name as i walk in (i mean, really, who hasn't always wanted to be "Norm!"). Greg asks if i want a yuengling--amusing because it was just a fluke that i ordered it the first time, but i'll go with it. i help people with crossword puzzles, and get updates on the pool to see if Ralph really will get married (he did). but that's the afternoon. its easy to shout names and remember beers when the lighting is good and there are 3 people in attendance.

but saturday night, i wandered in around 10:30, and heard the same "Nell!" as i sauntered in with a birthday crowd. now something magical happens to the bird around 8pm most days. the disgruntled government workers have their fill of schlitz and wander home, while skinny jean donning 24 year olds with unkempt hair filter in. the bartender starts carding. and they stop keeping tabs. and with this transformation, i never expect special treatment. but alas. John (who i had not seen or talked to since the spring) called my name from behind the bar, took my order, and told me my drink was on the house. and i breathed a sigh of relief.

in a way, i had come home. not just to the bar, but to the neighborhood. to the community. to the city. and maybe its silly to say that community exists in a neighborhood bar. or maybe it just makes me an alcoholic. but i would argue that its a public sphere in a habermasian way. i've had conversations (or arguments) ranging from immigration law, to charter schools, to heroin addiction. i've critiqued the capitalist economy, and then gone to the atm to pay my tab. and i've cursed myself many a time for ending up at the raven, because i always drink one too many drinks and can't sleep, but the reason i go back and stay too long is not the schlitz. its the people. good conversation and feeling like i belong. and isn't that what everybody's really looking for? and you can't entirely control where you find it, i suppose.

la isla playa larga

leaving scammellot (too) is always a bit painful. but truthfully, this time i went in not knowing what to expect. all of my previous scammellots have been parties. 10 kids filling the house. el capitán flowing liberally. people i've known for what feels like forever. half-nude, manual strobe-light dance parties, firecrackers aimed squarely as human flesh, bonfires ignited with rustoleum, bloody marys in the morning, beer in the afternoon, and tequila in the evening. and someone always wakes up where they're not supposed to.

but this was not that. just my best friend, JC, and i (not even el capitán made it this time). tits was busy, fiend visiting the lady, JC recently single, and the r___ living the [practically] married life. and so it was calm. sure we began the day with beer. we ran to the beach, jumped in the water, removed garments, and let the waves lap us around. we dug our feet into the sand and talked about blush-worthy topics. i extolled the virtues of the ring, and discussed the intricacies of NAMBLA. and it was just as magical as any other scammellot.

and so, as i dropped them in the municipal parking lot on route 9 and turned back south, i had a tear in my eye. not because i'd miss them, or because i'll have to wait at least 6 months before i can dig my feet in the sand again, but because i always fear i'll never find people like them again.

every year the distance between LBI and dc seems further. every year i plan more and take fewer trips to the city. every year it gets harder. and coming back always makes dc feel foreign and uninviting.

but then this evening i ran into my favorite st.louis/chicago/dc resident, and planned for catching up. i gossiped with raf at the conference. i had brief conversations with the jag about fieldwork. and though its no replacement, the people here are truly great. they'll just never live up to dancing in a thunderstorm to blind mellon.

bigotes: fieldnotes

just a snippet from the other night.

a crowd of archaeologists (professors and graduate students) gather at a bar. they order a few pitchers of beer and chat in the patio area which overlooks a busy dc street. those at the far end of the table barely notice when JR wanders in from the street and takes the open chair next to his advisor. from down here, nothing looks amiss. and then dan (the advisor says):

"What happened?[and with barely a pause for breath] I don't like it"

JR replies:

"It was a mistake and a tragedy"

Alas, JR's clippers were broken and he unknowingly shaved a stripe into his beard while trying to trim it. So the whole thing had to go.

Now, as you may guess, he's a rather light haired italian man, so from the far end of the table in the dim evening hour, the beard's absence was barely visible. But Dan, given his proximity, continued to discuss the problems with beardless archaeologists (and i'm not touching that gendered dynamic).

I questioned JR and he said in the last few years he had only shaved for work, never had a goatee, and would certainly grow the beard back as soon as possible. he just didn't feel like himself without it.

abd

so i defended my dissertation proposal yesterday. dissertation PROPOSAL. don't get any ideas. so, yes. i'm ABD. all but dissertation. but really it should be written aBd. all BUT dissertation. that's an important "but."

and it wasn't as exciting, relieving, exhilarating, climactic as i thought. in fact after i finished i just sort of felt disappointed. i'm not sure in what. myself? the experience? the conclusions the four of us drew about my research question? i'm not sure. but i cried. right there in the hallway. in front of d'vine. and not in a single tear running down my cheek sort of way but in a my throat is closing up and i can't speak and my face gets contorted and i want to close my eyes tightly and open my mouth widely and let the stress all pour out through my eyes sort of way. and then when i finally removed myself from the situation, i went to the history bathroom and had a good loud wailing cry for about 15 minutes until some other unsuspecting woman came in. i figured i'd better quiet down, shut myself up, and get on with things (which involved free sorbet and seeing h-gill's new giant television).

but this is not a good sign. if this is how i react to the PROPOSAL defense, what's going to happen when i defend the real thing. in front of friends and colleagues. in public. where anyone with a ph.d. can ask a question. damn.

but really the point of all this is (unfortunately) that i ended up watching the season finale of the real world tonight (they were in new orleans for anyone like me who might be clueless). and they all leave the house one by one and talk about how much they've grown and grown together and come to love one another and how they can't imagine what it would have been like without each and every one.

and i suddenly realized: someday i have to leave grad school.

it was heartwrenching when rumagin, tune, and rodo al left at the same time. and its still empty without them. but at some point, i will have to walk away and leave everyone behind. sure, some of my cohort will already have made their way into the world. rodo's already there. the partridge has left prematurely, and otto's about to run off to Mugabe-land. but at some point jules, jag, futurama, k-pearl, jtorres, and all those others i've grown close to will have to turn our backs and go off into the world we've been avoiding for so long.

and maybe the gradualness of the process makes it easier. maybe the ending of coursework, and then fieldwork, and then shutting yourself up in a windowless room (not so different from a cube) to actually write the damn thing provides an adequate transition period.

but these people are special to me. different from the rez. different from 409. and certainly different from my high school friends. but we have seen each other at our worst, and supported each other at our best. because we know we are not alone. and not just in a "damn if i don't question you maybe dolores will think we actually understand this stuff and not put me on the spot" sort of way, but in a true sense. because we know that in the end what makes you better and stronger makes me wiser too. and our interests are disparate, and our theories conflict. but i trust and love these people so much.

and they've taught me so much too. i was commenting to h-gill over sorbet yesterday, that there are all these things i have strong opinions about that i really don't know the details of. but when you have a friend writing a dissertation on a topic, and they tell you michelle rhee is the devil you trust them. and you may pick up on the reasons along the way, but because they're less urgent than the protests in potosi, you don't remember the details. so you just blindly agree that south african casinos obscure the inequalities of post apartheid and hunting practices in queros can only really be understood in light of eco-tourism. and i stand by that.

and maybe i'm just getting a little sappy, but i hope i know these people forever. i hope i run into them at aaas for decades to come and someday we're all department chairs and have some sort of reunion in a random marriot room and drink margaritas and reminisce about cactus cantina. because i think that hope is the only thing that will make walking away from this place and these people possible.

a casa (de nuevo)

a year & 1/2 ago, i wrote about coming back to dc from chicago. about resetting my computer's clock.

i've just done it again. school is about to start, and i'm painfully missing all that i left behind. but the strange thing is, i felt that way upon arriving in chicago 3 months ago.

the week before i left was magical in a way. it was one of those times when the senses are heightened and everything is urgent. And this was due in no small part to the immanent departure of several good friends. Having earned post graduate degrees, all were bound for greater adventures...in the UK, South America, and the Texas (yes, the Texas). And we celebrated in style. Late night margarita-fueled romps through our favorite garden. Galavants through the woods in the pouring rain. BBQs turned dance lessons. Jack Daniels-inspired antics, and a long night that began with Japanese bar karaoke and ended at 4 am the the Chesapeake basement.

The city felt alive and I wanted to kiss everyone. I wanted to pour myself into their lives the way Carolina kept pouring wine into my glass. But time was running out, and we had spent too many of our opportunities simply staring at maps in the cubicles. These moments were all we had left.

carolina pours me more wine

And then after staying up until 4am and stealing the Chesapeake basement bed from ben, i awoke on a wednesday morning at 8am. I with my wrinkled, sweat-soaked clothes from the night before and unbrushed teeth, shared a metro car with the world of good government workers, off to a boring wednesday in the office. And I wanted to shout at them "Don't you realize? I'll never see them again!" But alas, they went about listening to their ipods, reading free papers, and generally trying not to make eye contact with anyone. And then I loaded up the car and left.

I arrived in Heytown, and then Chicago a bit melancholy. For a few weeks I regretted my decision. But slowly the pain faded. I didn't think about those I left behind every day. I didn't wish to be at deluxe or cantina with the jag and futurama. I fit myself back into chicago. I ran into old friends on the street. I saw my sister as much as I liked. I went for bike rides, and brewed beer, made ice cream, and escaped the city for more rural settings. and it felt like home.

and then responsibility (or however one might refer to grad school) ripped me away and back here. and again, i'm going through withdrawal. i want to buy cheap avocados at tiangis. i miss my walks down Milwaukee ave. i'd rather be back watching world cup with 100 mexicans in a cuban cafe. salvadorans just won't cut it. i want my yoga room and basil plant back. i want postone. i want to sleep beside someone.

i suppose its a never ending (and i mean that figuratively...it better end) cycle of becoming comfortable and then ripping yourself away. Perhaps I'm lucky to have two homes, but that also means that one is never completely home. there's always something missing. perhaps this is the postmodern condition in which space and time are both compressed and stretched. perhaps this is the direction we're all moving. but one thing i know is tomorrow afternoon i will see the great majority of the people i love who live in this city. and i can't freaking wait to go have a drink with them.

a volver

I've been back in the district for a week and am rather sad I'm no longer writing posts from the big brown couch. But perhaps what is saddest is that the big brown couch is moving. Not far, but I'll never sit on it and stare out above all the 2nd story windows again.

I've been a bit down since I've been back. I attribute this mostly to my hermit-like behavior. But a grad student's end-of-summer bank account, lack of strict schedule, and looming book chapter deadline have joined forces (a la captain planet's planeteers) to keep me shut up in my room or buried away in the cubes.

But speaking of the planeteers, In a little more than one week's time I'll be on my way back to 1/4 of the corners to see my bilagaana, the admiral kelsey wolye (wolye), get hitched. And speaking of getting hitched...keep your eyes peeled for some interesting blog posts in the near future. But until then, a pretty little picture to remind me that the florescent lights of the cubes are not the only light in the world.

gregory bald nc/tn

estados iguales

i am quite intrigued by this map. it makes some interesting points, and i'm curious to know how the blue/red would break down on it (not that i endorse such a binary system....)

but what i find most interesting is the fact that DC is "preserved as is." if the point of the map is to envision a more equal form of representation, it seems silly to "preserve" one (but certainly not the only) of the worst examples of blatant disenfranchisement in the nation.

gotta keep on fighting taxation without representation!

mis amores

i'm having one of those days where i feel like everyone i love is a million miles away. which i suppose is true. one of those days where i really wish i had someone i felt close to in dc. i guess i'm always swinging this way and that about friends here.

the one positive thing about all this is it seems like it won't be so hard to leave eventually.

ok, that's really all i have to say. just a pointless, slightly-depressed 1am rant. this blog is really going downhill

volviendo

i'm back in the district after a month & 1/2 of simultaneously roaming and re-settling in the windy city. the house is warm, and my hands are sweaty and to me it smells like summer in my room. i'm always a little wired when i finish that drive. i blame it on the dr. pepper, but really it probably has more to do with 12 hours of minimal movement and maximal thinking. the body is about to collapse, but the brain won't shut down.

in any case, au classes start tomorrow. though i'm not actually taking any real courses there, so i don't start my umd class until next week. but i do start TAing anthro of american life tomorrow afternoon; a course in which i will lecture about WWE wrestling and possibly midwestern state fair butter sculpture. i can't wait to see what these kids think of me. i suppose it will be a bit of a reality check after the undergrads nearly knighted me last semester. but given the circumstances, i really shouldn't have let it go to my head.

anyway, here goes the last real semester of classes (if this even counts as a "real semester of classes")......