Jeffrey Langstraat's blog

I've spent the weekend working on my dissertation proposal...put it to bed a while ago, just in time for the Oscars (Matt Dillon is still yummy). I'm turning it in for a fellowship tomorrow. The weekend started with me thinking I'd just clean up the draft I was working with, but noooooooo. I had to tear it apart and write a whole different proposal...48 pages later and I'm a bit tired. That brings me to the point of this post.

Over the past couple months, I've had an increasingly difficult time maintaining a consistent blogging schedule. I've been teaching a full load (nothing unusual with that) but also devoting more time to completing my academic work (I've been recovering academically from a depressive crisis I went through a few years ago. Finally caught up.) The past couple weeks in particular (in addition to the proposal, I cranked out a 27-page paper last weekend, graded 90 papers, and taught several classes. Something's got to give, and that something is blogging. If I'm going to finish this dissertation in the next year, I'm going to minimize my other commitments (I think that also means I'm going to miss my New Year's Resolution of dating more...but I've still got almost 10 months, so it's not dead yet.)

I do work that I love. Of course, there are parts of being an academic I'm not too fond of (does anyone like department meetings?), but teaching provides real pleasures for me. It's not something I do, but something I am. And I get to make a living doing it. I'm lucky.

This is one of those weeks where I'm reminded of why I do what I do. I've had a hard time getting into a groove this semester. I'm teaching three classes at two schools, and no two days of the week have the same schedule, so I spent the first couple weeks of the semester constantly asking myself, "Am I on the right campus? Which room am I supposed to be in right now?" (Plus, I'd quite simply forgotten how much work and time this three class/two campus thing takes.) I'm still not comfortable with my schedule (I'm a creature of habit, and the lack of routine is making me a little crazy), but I've gotten used to it enough that this week I finally really hit my stride in the classroom. Things (including me figuring out each group's personality) have finally fallen into place enough that I've got my flow back in the classroom.

In two of my classes, we were discussing Vilma Santiago-Irizarry's Medicalizing Ethnicity. It's a tough read for some of my students (highly abstract and theoretical, which can be difficult for students not used to consistently reading that kind of language), but asks what I think are some important questions. One of the points she raises is that in the implementation of the three bicultural, bilingual Latino psychiatric programs the deployment of "culture" served to actually erase certain forms of cultural difference (indeed to pathologize them). In other words, cultural sensitivity worked to maintain a certain form of normative cultural dominance. One of the things I'm asking them to do is to take a look at how certain cultural sensitivity/awareness programs on campus deploy "culture" to see if similar processes are at work.

I remember hearing this story on the radio a while back. It's one of those things that leaves you wondering just how low human beings can sink:

February 23,2006 | NEW YORK -- The owner of a New Jersey biomedical company and three other men have been indicted for alleging plotting to carve up cadavers from New York funeral homes and selling the bone and skin for transplants, authorities said Thursday.

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It is the latest chapter in a widening scandal involving scores of funeral homes and hundreds of looted bodies, including that of "Masterpiece Theatre" host Alistair Cooke, who died in March 2004.

The body parts have been tracked to several states where they were used in transplants.

Not only were bodies stolen from the families of the deceased, but documents were falsified such that people who receive these transplants may be receiving diseased tissues. It's just sick.

On Saturday night, I went to see Kate Clinton at the Somerville Theater on her "It's Come to This! 25th Anniversary Tour." I want you to think about that; while many people know her as a columnist for The Progressive, Kate Clinton has been making a living as a lesbian comic since 1981. Along with people like Marga Gomez and Lea DeLaria, Kate Clinton has been a queer political cultural pioneer. Here's her own diddy from the program notes:

It's come to this: for twenty five years, I have thanked you for coming out--out of the closet, out of your homes, out of your daily routines--to come to my shows. You have shown up through snowstorms, earthquakes, bomb scares, picket lines, transit strkes, orange alerts, breakups, epidemics, recessions, weddings, child care emergencies, juntas, peace time and war time. you have screamed, shouted, cried, cruised, smeared mascara, gotten hoarse, groaned, pounded your friends, gone quiet, been offended, moaned, whooped, lost bodily fluids, talked back.

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By showing up and laughing, we have put our bodies on the line. It has been good practice. It has come to this. We have made community. We have changed history. It has been a blast. Thank you for celebrating with me tonight!

Back in October, I wrote about a mini-controversy that erupted when the fact that Catholic Charities in Boston is, in order to comply with the Commonwealth's anti-discrimination laws, facilitating the adoption of hard to place children by gay couples. The four Massachusetts Bishops are none too happy, and are looking for ways to get around the Bay State's laws. Yesterday's Boston Globe reported:

The four Roman Catholic bishops of Massachusetts plan to seek permission from the state to exclude gay couples as adoptive parents, according to two board members of the church's largest social service agency who were briefed on the plan.

The decision follows a three-month study of the theological and practical impact of having Catholic Charities of Boston, the Boston Archdiocese's social service arm, place children with gay couples, given the Vatican's teaching that describes such adoptions are ''gravely immoral."

This decision to seek an exemption from state anti-discrimination rules pits the bishops against the 42-member board of Catholic Charities of Boston, which is made up of some of Boston's most prominent lay Catholics. The board voted unanimously in December in support of continuing to allow gay couples to adopt children.

I feel like I've finally recovered from a trip I took last weekend. I had some frequent flyer miles sitting around, so I scheduled a weekend trip to San Francisco, my first time in the city. Wow, what a gorgeous place. I did a little bit of playing, a lot of walking, and a whole lot more nothing. I got way too little sleep, and left the city, on Monday (missed the blizzard--yay!!), feeling refreshed, but not really rested.

When I go to a new city, I walk. I love to watch life in the city. The best time is in the morning, when the night people are heading to bed as the city prepares for the day. The residue from the previous night--a syringe here, a baggie there--is still visible, but not for long. Homeless people, those who were't woken up and shuffled off by the police, are waking up. Those that were awake all night sit in small groups talking, or fighting by a fountain. I love to see how the city lives. So, I walk and watch.

I was talking about this with a colleague when I got back, and she said, "Oh, you're a flâneur." I had never heard of the word before. Here's part of the wikipedia entry:

From WCVB in Boston:

A teenager accused of going on a rampage at a Massachusetts gay bar with a hatchet and a gun was captured Saturday in northern Arkansas after shootout with police.

State troopers said a local police officer and a woman accompanying the teenager were shot dead.

The suspect -- 18-year-old Jacob Robida -- was taken to a hospital in Springfield, Mo., after an exchange of gunfire with police in Norfork. Moments earlier, Robida allegedly shot Gassville police officer Jim Sell a few miles away from Norfork.

Unfortunately, at least one person is dead. (They are still not releasing information on one of the men wounded in the bar attack, and as far as I know, there's still at least one person in critical condition from that attack.)

This is just incredible (via Pandagon). One of the classic stories in Western literature, taken up by such literary giants as Marlowe, Göthe and Mann is inappropriate as it was adapted by Gounod because "it glorifies Satan in some way.