why is it so difficult for me to bring myself down a notch? just quiet my brain down so it stops obsessing over infinite complexities and the suffocating web of the world so that I can focus on one small thing at a time. it was that simple...
food access : number of grocery stores : poverty rates : food justice projects
OBVIO po.
maybe i need to start meditating to calm this sucka down.
Friday, February 6, 2009
Sunday, January 11, 2009
por fin...
finishing that paper was exactly what i needed...
after I sent it i immediately went into my room in cleared off my desk of all last quarter's clutter...threw away extra credit assignments from all sixty students, filed away notebooks and readers, and amazingly, my head suddenly is light and clutter-free! finally!
now onto this quarter....eep.
after I sent it i immediately went into my room in cleared off my desk of all last quarter's clutter...threw away extra credit assignments from all sixty students, filed away notebooks and readers, and amazingly, my head suddenly is light and clutter-free! finally!
now onto this quarter....eep.
Friday, January 9, 2009
2009 mighty fine
return to seattle, not rain nor sleet nor snow will keep me away!
determined to make this year and this quarter more of a compromise, so that academia will not control my every move. other realms must be allowed to speak as well...the art and the words and the music and the physically stimulating, not just mental...if I am to survive this I need that balanza and sustainability.
the doubt is still there...if this is the right path...and despite many doors opening for me here and many words of encouragement, i still can't seem to find the groove that fits. prolonged sensations of writers block, or speakers block, or thinkers block, where i feel i cannot mold myself into this regiment. doubt that i am capable of fulfilling such a mold, doubt that i could be happy molding myself as such.
would it be so bad to get a masters and go teach community college? to establish myself in oakland and just teach, since i have already affirmed that teaching is what i am after, is what i am capable of and am most fulfilled by. it is not that i don't believe i could keep up with all these academics, keep up with the banter and dichotomies and loathsome jargon...if i really wanted to i could...but do i want to? everytime i sit in on a lecture such as today's, discussing the neoliberal neglect of black ghettos in the US, i get really excited about the subject until the lecturer starts spouting jargon so thick you lose sight of the injustice present....global tropes? c'mon now...this knowledge needs to be accessible, needs to empower....it doesn't need to be reiterated in a language so dense that it can only be discussed in a room full of academic ego-strokers. i was completely deflated...although his research interested me, his language left me with a sour taste in my mouth. it made me want to succeed in this arena, to conquer it all, only so that i could later unravel the very system that spawned me. to gain acknowledgement and credibility you must fit this mold of academic reason and robotic analysis...i want to shatter these molds of legitimacy...you do not need to conform to such a rigid structure for your thought processes, your knowledge, to have value.
if i am to continue down this path, which i will be for at least another two years, i need to focus my thoughts on what is important to me and what is important to my education. recognizing the legitimacy and voice of those who are normally deemed powerless, the 'subjects' who are not allowed to use their own voice to represent themselves. empowerment through education...local forms of knowledge and skills that we don't often allow access to the academic realm of knowledge. social movements, acts of solidarity, empowerment through disobedience...the sort of actions that make my eyes water everytime i see a group of people unified for acknowledgement....that surely is a sign that i should be involved with that.
the questions remaining are how and where. i want to draw connections between the local (domestic) and the local (international)...i want to create something that gives voice to others...but if others are writing there own could that still count for my dissertation? a patchwork quilt of voices, from three different regions, working towards a common cause? an activity they all partake in, in which they write what they believe is necessary for the future, for educating and empowering their community...could be! or maybe more than three regions...maybe several countries, throughout the americas...spending two or three months in each place...offering my time and labor and gathering voices in the midst of it...could such a dream be made a reality??
i just need to plow my own path amdst all this...i have never been conventional...now is not a time to start...
determined to make this year and this quarter more of a compromise, so that academia will not control my every move. other realms must be allowed to speak as well...the art and the words and the music and the physically stimulating, not just mental...if I am to survive this I need that balanza and sustainability.
the doubt is still there...if this is the right path...and despite many doors opening for me here and many words of encouragement, i still can't seem to find the groove that fits. prolonged sensations of writers block, or speakers block, or thinkers block, where i feel i cannot mold myself into this regiment. doubt that i am capable of fulfilling such a mold, doubt that i could be happy molding myself as such.
would it be so bad to get a masters and go teach community college? to establish myself in oakland and just teach, since i have already affirmed that teaching is what i am after, is what i am capable of and am most fulfilled by. it is not that i don't believe i could keep up with all these academics, keep up with the banter and dichotomies and loathsome jargon...if i really wanted to i could...but do i want to? everytime i sit in on a lecture such as today's, discussing the neoliberal neglect of black ghettos in the US, i get really excited about the subject until the lecturer starts spouting jargon so thick you lose sight of the injustice present....global tropes? c'mon now...this knowledge needs to be accessible, needs to empower....it doesn't need to be reiterated in a language so dense that it can only be discussed in a room full of academic ego-strokers. i was completely deflated...although his research interested me, his language left me with a sour taste in my mouth. it made me want to succeed in this arena, to conquer it all, only so that i could later unravel the very system that spawned me. to gain acknowledgement and credibility you must fit this mold of academic reason and robotic analysis...i want to shatter these molds of legitimacy...you do not need to conform to such a rigid structure for your thought processes, your knowledge, to have value.
if i am to continue down this path, which i will be for at least another two years, i need to focus my thoughts on what is important to me and what is important to my education. recognizing the legitimacy and voice of those who are normally deemed powerless, the 'subjects' who are not allowed to use their own voice to represent themselves. empowerment through education...local forms of knowledge and skills that we don't often allow access to the academic realm of knowledge. social movements, acts of solidarity, empowerment through disobedience...the sort of actions that make my eyes water everytime i see a group of people unified for acknowledgement....that surely is a sign that i should be involved with that.
the questions remaining are how and where. i want to draw connections between the local (domestic) and the local (international)...i want to create something that gives voice to others...but if others are writing there own could that still count for my dissertation? a patchwork quilt of voices, from three different regions, working towards a common cause? an activity they all partake in, in which they write what they believe is necessary for the future, for educating and empowering their community...could be! or maybe more than three regions...maybe several countries, throughout the americas...spending two or three months in each place...offering my time and labor and gathering voices in the midst of it...could such a dream be made a reality??
i just need to plow my own path amdst all this...i have never been conventional...now is not a time to start...
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
ode to cannibalizm, five hundred and twelve
your demand for criticism, the constant all-devouring cannibalism from whence we came, is stifiling and oppressive in the same way you seek to end oppression with your critical gaze. insistent, ferocious demand for dissection of meager remains to reach some ultimate truth or ultimate equality that will never truly quench your thirst...the purpose and joy of critique is not about reaching utopia, but cannibalizing all that surrounds us, creating an oppressive reality in which the fear of offense bears brittle bones and nothing is sacred. what a barren, fearful world we create to criticize...and for what purpose, my darling academic?
***
you say that objectivity is unattainable, that each much define his own, and that any conclusion reached will eventually be unconcluded. yet that does not prevent you from classifying the micro-macro-chingo out of anything and all, seeking a semblance of meaning and anihilating any. how can these lessons be so encompassing and yet so blind, so unaware of the fallacies committed, so ignorant to the unison of meaning present, and how your own analysis analyzes itself out of relevance.
***
you say that objectivity is unattainable, that each much define his own, and that any conclusion reached will eventually be unconcluded. yet that does not prevent you from classifying the micro-macro-chingo out of anything and all, seeking a semblance of meaning and anihilating any. how can these lessons be so encompassing and yet so blind, so unaware of the fallacies committed, so ignorant to the unison of meaning present, and how your own analysis analyzes itself out of relevance.
Monday, October 20, 2008
equivoquismo abysmo
so you find me in seattle, or i find myself here. and this is the first real "seattlesque" day, rainy and blustery and a persistent 7am sort of light filtering through the windows. couple this with a sore throat, a general lethargy for anything remotely productive (unless you consider cooking warm foods productive...i do) and a reluctance to leave the comfort of this big blanketed couch. oh wireless internet, how you only encourage this!!
did i make the right decision? do i ever? yes. although in the thick of it it may never seem to be true. education is a good thing, leaving home maybe not so much but this does keep me on my toes, keep me thirsting for some sort of familiarity and thus seeking the warmth of good hearts and un-presumptuous natures. this is my home now, however temporary or permanent it may be, and and i am okay with that. but some energy and creativity and humor in others would really help me swallow all this change.
did i make the right decision? do i ever? yes. although in the thick of it it may never seem to be true. education is a good thing, leaving home maybe not so much but this does keep me on my toes, keep me thirsting for some sort of familiarity and thus seeking the warmth of good hearts and un-presumptuous natures. this is my home now, however temporary or permanent it may be, and and i am okay with that. but some energy and creativity and humor in others would really help me swallow all this change.
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