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March 31, 2006
The Gus Sindex, 2006
I was going to write up a full Sindex this year, but time is short and I thought this slide I just developed for a presentation on the master's thesis (that's the one on socioeconomic status and game literacies, for those of you playing along at home) -- which I am giving Saturday bright'n'early after a full day of conference tomorrow which will most likely be capped by unnecessary drinking and fraternizing -- does a fine job of summarizing just how far off the deep end I've gone.
sadly, only about three people in the world will actually understand why that's funny. I hate being an academic sometimes (she mumbled around the life-giving teat of mama academia clenched firmly between her teeth).
Posted by me at 1:46 AM | Comments (1)
March 29, 2006
Talking with Broughton
I had this great talk with Broughton yesterday. Here is a man whose career has ranged from military to medicine to art to society. I went in paranoid that the paper I am supposed to be presenting at his conference Saturday is a lumpen mass of statistics, nothing more, which in my understanding of the Frankfurt School (the goggles I have been wearing all semester) amounts to a potentially evil means of extracting meaning from humanity. We talked about things that came up at GDC -- the ways in which games are narrative, are systems, are realistic; more on that later.
I expressed my worries about games and addiction and he said that games can't be anything but therapeutic, as they are a magic circle space where the troubled can go to work out their problems safely. I worried that I didn't have any indication of the meaning of the game literacy practices of the students I am studying, of the identities they develop around games, which seemed troubling to me in light of the fact that this is a cultural studies conference. And I did go on a tear about how I worry that the games industry is more focused on creating narratives to control the player, rather than loose play spaces where players can work out new meanings.
And at the end he essentially said, What you have is a good solid piece of empirical sociology. I haven't seen enough of those lately. They're good for setting the basis of further study. Bring it in and present it, I think people should hear it.
How can a solution coming from such a complicated man be so simple? I will have to meditate on this. Perhaps not as a means to further procrastinate on the Foucault reading, though.
Posted by me at 9:49 AM | Comments (0)
Why "Ebonics" Isn't Bad English
Today in the course of other pursuits I stumbled across the Wikipedia entry for African American Vernacular English, and was duly bowled over. AAVE is also known as BEV or Ebonics. My first exposure to the topic was William Labov's seminal book on BEV, which quickly became a central pillar of the way I think about education, class, and intelligence. I am so, so pleased to find that thorough information on the topic is up online. I just wish it was easier to google.
Posted by me at 1:07 AM | Comments (0)
The Greatest Dancer
Now you can see for yourself -- Troll women are the best dancers anywhere. Sadly, their dance has been curtailed here. But still. OK, maybe the Gnome females give them some competition. But seriously. Combine those moves with the cackling laugh and you have one *wicked* little blue-skinned package.
*sigh* no. no, I'm not nostalgic.
Posted by me at 12:23 AM | Comments (1)
March 19, 2006
Fries And Propaganda Down Under, Part 2
Honorary cheese fries at unmemorable pub P.J. O'Brien's, The Rocks neighborhood, Sydney, Australia. Cheese fries are not a matter of course in Australia, so we forwent further reviews. However, for general flavor excellence, fry size ("wedges" are common in pubs here, while "chips" at the Red Oak brewpub were FOUR TO SIX TIMES THE BREADTH of McDonalds fries), enormity of quantity (for crying out loud, the basket was about as big as a child-sized shoebox, and heaped well above the rim!), and quality of banter, we include this review for your greasy delectation.
J: We should marry these guys and divorce them.
G: Seems like more trouble than it's worth. We should have settlements.
J: No, we need a wedding registry.
G: Yeah, totally, I could really use a wedding shower about now. Think about it, people who get married right out of college have all their housewares needs taken care of right away, while the rest of us have to fend for ourselves.
J: We could just throw one for ourselves, like Sarah Jessica Parker.
G: I want a breadmaker.
J: I could use a set of really good pots.
G: No, I need a salad spinner. I'd make more salad.
* * *
J: These definitely get honorary cheese fry status.
G: Yeah, they're good.
J: We were talking about cheese.
G: Yeah, the awful halloumi masquerading as feta on our pizza...
J: These olives on the pizza are so boring they're not worth eating.
G: No kidding, they're less interesting than the black ones you get in cans. Everything on this pizza is boring.
* * *
Some time later
J: There's more than one potato here. My guess is five potatoes. Good Irish potatoes -- the proper kind -- not the little red ones. (beat) We haven't really dented the fries.
G: (points to a dent)
* * *
G has knuckled under to peer pressure and purchased a Moleskine for this trip.
G: I like a notebook without lines.
J: Oh, I'm totally the opposite way. I have to have lines.
G: There's somthing thoroughly sexy about my handwriting when it's on a page with no lines on it.
J: That's going in.
G: (hands her the book)
J: No, you're the scribe.
G: I'm always the scribe these days. It's your turn.
J: You've earned the title of scribe permanently.
A group of local men come up.
Some guy: 'Scuse me lads, anyone sitting here? You mind?
J: Sure, and have some fries. (Guy takes one before she's done speaking.)
G: (sotto) Did we just get called lads?
SG: You writing about the fries?
J: Yeah. It's kind of scientific. (thinks) You know, it really is science. Methodological individualism.
G: (writes "methodological empiricism") It's clearly phenomenological.
J: Well, of course. Hey! Don't write empiricism! Methodological individualism! My darling Max (Weber)!
G: (crosses it out thoroughly and corrects)
Posted by me at 8:10 PM | Comments (1)
Fries and Propaganda Down Under, Part 1
Name Unrecorded Cafe, King's Cross neighborhood, Sydney, Australia. Joined by local sherpas Mary and Andrew.
On the menu, there is the beverage choice "soft drank."
Mary: I remember one time we were in Thailand and they spelled "burger" about six different ways. "Bugger," "booger..."
Andrew: And then there were pancakes, plancakes...
We compare passports. The stamps issued by China and Brazil are very fancy and elaborate.
A: They don't mind taking up an entire page of your precious passport.
There is mild confusion as we attempt to determine what type of coffee would best suit J.
A: We have our own terminology. (to waitress) I'll have a flat white.
J: Do they have drip coffee?
A: No, you probably want a long black.
Half the food arrives.
G: Can I try some of your bacon, Andrew?
J: Bacon! You are the worst vegetarian ever.
G: It looks like good bacon!
M: I should also have cutlery. Make the universal sign for knife and fork if you catch her eye again. (makes typical elbows-out sawing motion)
J: While I was in China, they were selling yogurt out of carts on the street. The carts would re-use the containers -- you'd buy the yogurt, eat it right there next to the cart, and then give back the container and they'd re-use it. My friends from the hostel were really into it. I said, you're inviting and courting and wooing hepatitis.
* * *
J: I'm doubtful about the quality of cheese fries coming out of this kitchen...
(they arrive)
G: They did the grill on top thing.
J: Excellent choice.
G: It doesn't smell like anything,
A: Probably what they call "tasty cheese." (Ed note: The Australians are a charmingly literal people. The coffee choices are generally named by appearance, the bluish nearby mountains are the Blue Mountains, the subway system is called CityRail, and cheddar, accordingly, is indeed universally called Tasty Cheese. See photo forthcoming in sydney album.)
G: The fries are bland.
J: Yeah, they lack sharpness.
M: (tries one) I should have had something to cleanse the palate.
J: (hands her a bottle of ketchup -- locally labelled "tomato sauce") These are spectacularly average fries.
G: They look like they should be better.
J: Yeah, with the golden brown on top. They're flavorless. Yeah, these are pretty bad. (beat, as G takes a giant clot of cheese and fries) How did I know you would take that one?
M: These are pretty typical of Australian fries. Not too fried, a little floppy.
J: They're pretty typical. They're not the worst we've had.
G: (wincing) They have the searing heat.
J: Which you hate, as has been described in your centerfold.
G: Dude, that's totally what we should do while we're here. We should take pictures for our cheese fries centerfolds. We could do it when we get to the hostel! Dan could help us.
J: Yeah, but then we'd have to make sure there wasn't excess white space in the centerfold.
* * *
M: We say "North American" cos we don't know the difference between Canadian and American. Kinda like Judeo-Christian.
Somewhere along the way, A notes that there is a US Postal Service mailbox on the street outside the cafe. I realize that I've been staring at it the entire time without recognizing the incongruity -- even though there is a Village Voice street box AND a Gotham Writers Workshop box on its other side! When I ask the guy sitting on top of the boxes what the hell is going on (see pictures), he tells me Saatchi and Saatchi is doing an advertisement for Crest toothpaste. He points out a badly-forged USA Today box down the street. Having paid for our awful fries, we walk towards it and chide the production staff leaning on it for filling the streets of Sydney with garbage. They call for quiet on the set, and a dry run begins. Scruffy hipsters in super-skinny jeans emerge from the crowd and begin leaping in the air, grabbing at something invisible which doubtless has something to do with Crest. I have been in Sydney for all of two hours, and I already feel like I've never left home.
Posted by me at 1:06 AM | Comments (1)
March 8, 2006
Big Dogme On Campus
While most of my professors only dream about transforming research for a digital age (Chuck's exempt), Lalitha Vasudevan, the professor leading my Digital Geographies class, lives that dream. Today she had us discuss our field observations, which we will be presenting a few weeks hence, under the stipulation that we may not use a simple print format. We as a class were supposed to develop additional criteria for the presentation. The ones we came up with reminded me of Dogme 95. So I wrote a parody. Roger and Mack, this bud's probably for you. I was channeling. :D
Posted by me at 12:28 AM | Comments (0)
March 6, 2006
God Loves Nutjobs
It looks like Pastor Fred Phelps, he of the "God Hates Fags" posters at funerals, has finally gone off the deep end: he's now picketing the funerals of fallen American soldiers. Soldiers who were asked, and told? you might wonder. No, apparently just ordinary straight soldiers. For the crime of "fighting for an army that represents a country that accepts homosexuality." Not an army which accepts homosexuality -- the straight-only army of a country which he thinks accepts homosexuality. I love it when nutjobs self-combust like this. Gives ya hope the world may naturally right itself rather than capsizing.
Posted by me at 10:56 PM | Comments (0)
March 4, 2006
Final Appearance
My World of Warcraft account is cancelled as of 2:39 AM PST on the 5th -- that's tonight. I plan to be on around midnight or one EST, if you'd like to join me...
Posted by me at 6:52 PM | Comments (1)
March 3, 2006
New blog
You may or may not have noticed by now that I've started up a new blog, The Phenomenologist. It may take a while before it becomes clear what's going on over there. Can you figure it out?
Posted by me at 11:35 PM | Comments (0)