End of my Grant Funding

The grant funding that's allowed me to work outside of my home department (the English department) ends next week. Translation? Back to the English department, about which I am less than thrilled. Sure, I like teaching and all, but the department atmosphere leaves something to be desired.

Besides that, I really don't like the beginning of any new semester -- the next of which is rapidly approaching. Fall semesters always bring a swarm of new graduate students -- eager, bright-eyed, somewhat uneducated, and delightfully full of themselves. Sure, I was all of those things too when I started grad school. When you're new here, the world really does revolve around you. You get to know all the other new students, the professors and staff are as friendly as they get, and the second year grads are willing to take you under their wing.

As a new graduate student in such a large department, the only strange thing you might notice are the ghosts. You'll hear a graduate student's name floated around a little and you'll get the feeling that person is important, accomplished, or otherwise notable. Perhaps, you find yourself dropping that person's name into conversation too for some reason. Strange thing is, that by the end of the year, you've never met, nor seen, this notable graduate student ghost. The ghosts are legendary for their "work" (or lack of) but altogether absent.

Does she even take classes any more? Does he teach composition? She's probably off writing her dissertation. He's studying for his exams...

McJob

I'm a third year Ph.D. student. I have more education than 95% of the U.S. population...

I'm stuffing envelopes and being paid by the hour.

EPA CHEERS Study Cancelled

According to Stephen Johnson, acting administrator to the EPA (and Bush's nominee), CHEERS "was designed to fill critical data gaps in our understanding of how children may be exposed to pesticides (such as bug spray) and chemicals currently used in households." Families in Duval County, FL would receive $970 in payment, a camcorder, and children's clothing in exchange for their participation. Critics of the study were quick to point out that the study was in a low income area and feared families might expose children to pesticides in order to participate.

Apparently, CHEERS has been cancelled. John Heilprin (AP) attributed the cancellation to Sen. Boxer and Sen. Nelson, reporting that the senators would block confirmation of Pres. Bush's nomination for EPA leadership if the study was not discontinued immediately.

Nelson said that the study used "infants in my state [Florida] as guinea pigs" and questioned the involvement of the American Chemistry Council (ACC), calling their financial investment; "a dangerous potential conflict of interest."

Heilprin's article
Kirkpatric Article with great Nelson quotes
Statement on CHEERS website
EPA Press Release

Cultural Studies: Poetic over Rhetoric?

Here is the question -- does the discipline of cultural studies value poetic over rhetoric? And if so, what does this mean to the future of the field?

I tend to endorse a somewhat Derridean poststructuralist view of meaning-making. I believe that nothing is stable -- for a reader, every sign is affected by context, situated in a historical and personal moment, and will necessarily be altered by/in the future. In this sense, language and cultural texts deny access to any real "truth" -- it only allows access to contextual, unstable meanings.

In an attempt to answer the question above, I'd suggest that the English studies still endorses a somewhat limited definition of "rhetoric," and thus it seems that we privilege poetic. "Poetic" (consumption of texts) has a very broad and fluid identity in cultural studies projects. The texts served up for analysis are broadly defined -- written texts, music, art, advertising, film....etc. However, when analysis does occur -- when theory occurs -- we don't think of this as production or as a rhetorical act. Our view of rhetoric is very narrow, and seems only to include production of physical objects. Because theory is intangible, it isn't considered rhetorical.

At this point

At this particular point in my educational career, I have to finish up an 'incomplete' from last semester before I can start thinking about taking my doctoral exams. The course was a specially approved directed study designed to fulfill my last remaining Ph.D. coursework requirement.

Why couldn't I take a real class intead of a directed study? Because the class I needed wasn't offered, and it looks like it may never be offered. My department fell to peices about a year ago, and one of the many casualties was our prestigious "rhetoric & composition" program. For specific reasons I dare not type (including faculty infighting, sexual harassment grievances, misuse of funds....) we lost most of our rhet/comp faculty, and thus, most of our classes.

Some of our graduate students followed faculty members to other universities, and some are just gone. I'm still here though -- far enough along in my program that going to a different university would have meant tacking on a few more years until I'm crowned a "doctor" (and screw the hood... when I graduate I want to be crowned). So I am one of a few lone graduate students in rhetoric and composition at my school, which is a terrible position to be in. There is only one faculty member that is willing to work with me, and to the rest of the department, I'm virtually a ghost -- a reminder of a department that is no longer with us. I don't know the new faculty or any of the new graduate students. I'm so absent from any departmental happenings that when, by chance, I see someone I used to know, they look at me as if to say "Is that her? I thought she left..."

Pope John Paul II

Pożegnalny.... a niech Bóg da odpoczynek jego duszy...

Thoughts on Schiavo

First off, I don't mean to diminish the significance of the events surrounding the Terri Schiavo case (nor do I mean to diminish the woman's life). However, what's been most fascinating about the Schiavo case is its function as a case study in the American media crisis -- baised, uninformed, careless, and unaccountable.

Regardless of what was "right" in this terrible situation, I quickly noticed the linguistic bias inherent in the local Tampa stations' reporting of the events -- big haired newspeople labled those individuals who wanted Terri to live as "Terri supporters" or "those who support Terri's life." In our world of binaries, that means that everyone who isn't a Terri supporter must be against Terri. I was a little surprised to see the same sorts of language issues at play in national news media.

Propagated on national news coverage, many neo-con talking-heads used the Schiavo case intensify the language game in order to advance their agendas (or at least attack the "other side"). On March 23, Rush Limbaugh suggested that liberals "want this woman to die because Christian conservatives want her to live." A day later, Joe Scarborough questioned why liberals "are cheering for Terri's death" when they fight to save the lives of whales and spotted owls.

It's most sad, I think, because I really believed that most Americans wanted what was best for Terri Schiavo and her family -- even though there was much debate over what would be best. I believed most Americans' hearts were pure. While commentators allowing bias to slip into their language is careless and irresponsible, the suggestion that liberals were cheering Terri's death is inexcusable.