...on courtship in the 19th century

just discovered a fun-tastic blog written by a phd student who is studying the transformation of love and marriage through an analysis of personal ads:

advertising for love

fun :)

.

youth voices on michael jackson

it's hard not to be moved and overwhelmed by the outpouring of reflection, sadness, memories, and testimonials in response to the sudden death of michael jackson. what i've been particularly struck by, however, have been the responses of adolescents, many of whom were born within the last two decades and whose current music artists claim to be influenced by the musical stylings pioneered by a true individual.

here's a taste of what i've heard and read, from a youth perspective:

• youthradio.org - "Remembering the King of Pop: Audio Montage"
• eric (18) texts: "James Brown- December 25th. Aaliyah- August 25th. Left Eye- April 25th. Micheal Jackson- June 25th. How Random is dat...Pass It On" ... "that line-up is just saddening & ridiculous"
• LA youth - "Teens remember Michael Jackson"
• earth times - "Lebanon's teens mourn Michael Jackson"
  

new (literacies-related) reads on my summer 'must read' list

The Routledge Handbook of Multimodal Analysis (Routledge) - Edited by Carey Jewitt - out July 2009

Assessing New Literacies: Perspectives from the Classroom (Peter Lang) - Edited by Anne Burke & Roberta Hammett (and part of the New Literacies & Digital Epistemologies series edited by Colin Lankshear & Michele Knobel)

The Word and the World: The Cultural Politics of Literacy in Brazil (Hampton Press) - Lesley Bartlett

Handbook of Adolescent Literacy Research (Guilford Press) - Edited by Leila Christenbury, Randy Bomer, & Peter Smagorinsky

any other suggestions??

insight project presents: bird's eye view - a youth theater performance

The youth theater company,
the Insight Project, presents:

Bird’s Eye View

A staged reading followed by a discussion
of Justice and the Arts

Details:
Friday, May 8th @ 7:00 pm

@ Cowin Center - Teachers College, Columbia University, 525 W. 120th St., New York, NY 10027


Synopsis:
David’s got problems - a rap sheet, a schizophrenic uncle, and a pregnant girlfriend, just to name a few - and his friends’ solutions may be more trouble than help. How does a young man find a way to walk a straight path and still keep his head up in the streets?

Directions to the Cowin Center: Take the 1 train to 116th St., walk four blocks north on Broadway and turn right onto 120th St. Use the main entrance for Teachers College located on the north side of 120th St., between Broadway and Amsterdam. Follow signs for the Cowin Center.

The Insight Project is part of CASES CEP. For more information, go to www.cases.org

For more information about this performance, contact Lalitha Vasudevan:
email: lmv2102 AT columbia.edu | phone: 212-678-6660

interesting documentary, unsettling content

clip 1:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

clip 2:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

for more on this msnbc documentary, locked and loaded: kids and guns in america, see links on this page: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036750/

writing and literacies sig - website and newsletter

check out the writing and literacies sig website - join us this year for an excellent program in san diego!
also check out our latest newsletter, chock full of members' pub info, links, and info about this year's business meeting featuring eva lam and paul kei matsuda.

and now, a wordling of this year's program (based on the titles) - enjoy :)

links!!! media, storytelling, documentary...

a long overdue compilation of fabulous links i learned about while attending the making your media matter conference hosted by center for social media at american university.

and now, in no particular order:
http://media-democracy.net/
http://cmml.usc.edu/
http://www.meaningfulmedia.org/ - funders database
http://www.unheardvoicesproject.org/- job loss due to outsourcing
http://www.newmediawomen.org/ - 10k prize
http://www.newday.com/ - coop of social issue media makers; selling media to educ'l market
http://www.unnaturalcauses.org/
http://festival.sundance.org/2009/film_events/films/dirt_the_movie
http://cinematech.blogspot.com/
http://www.youtube.com/user/mediathatmatters
http://www.ijcentral.org/ - social network for int'l justice, focusing on icc
http://mobileactive.org/ - resource for activists using mobile techs
http://www.prx.org/ - public radio exchange
http://betsylevypaluck.com/Paluck_Green_AnnRev_2009.pdf - a report about 'prejudice reduction'
http://www.snagfilms.com/ - virtual movie theater
http://www.artsengine.net/index.php/ - indy media distributor
http://cinematech.blogspot.com/ - somebody's interesting 'bout cinema' blog
http://www.madeinla.com/ - about film 'made in l.a.' - interesting look at how a movement and a film are wrapped in each other
http://www.bavc.org/ - bay area video coalition
http://www.wardancethemovie.com/ - beautiful film - was discussed under the panel heading of 'what happens when you make a beautiful film about a dark subject'?
http://www.chimpanzeeproductions.com/ - the filmmaker of the CP film 'through a lens darkly' also featured in 'beautiful film' panel
http://silverdocs.com/ - afi/discover channel doc festival

at a glance: writing and literacies sig sessions at aera, 2009

1. Genres and Structures in Writing
Session type: Paper Discussion (formerly known as Roundtables)
Time: Tue, Apr 14 - 10:35am - 11:15am Place: San Diego Marriott Hotel & Marina, Marriott Hall Salon 4

2. Hybridity, Multimodality, and New Forms of Composing
Session type: Symposium
Time: Wed, Apr 15 - 8:15am - 10:15am Place: San Diego Convention Center, Room 28D

3. Literacies Between Borders and Across Contexts
Session type: Paper Session
Time: Thu, Apr 16 - 8:15am - 10:15am Place: San Diego Convention Center, Room 28B

4. LitScapes: Mapping the Terrain of Youth Identities, Spaces, and Texts
Session type: Symposium
Time: Thu, Apr 16 - 10:35am - 12:05pm Place: San Diego Convention Center, Room 28B

5. National Conference on Research in Language and Literacy Presents Authors of Its Series “On…” Series
Session type: Interactive Symposium
Time: Thu, Apr 16 - 2:15pm - 3:45pm Place: San Diego Convention Center, Room 28B

6. Sociocultural and Historical Perspectives on Literacy
Session type: Paper Session
Time: Thu, Apr 16 - 2:15pm - 3:45pm Place: San Diego Convention Center, Room 25B

7. Theorizing and Implementing New Directions in Writing and Literacy Research
Session type: Interactive Symposium
Time: Wed, Apr 15 - 2:15pm - 3:45pm Place: San Diego Convention Center, Room 28D

8. Twenty-Five Years of New Literacy Studies: Looking Back and Looking Ahead
Session type: Symposium
Time: Wed, Apr 15 - 10:35am - 12:05pm Place: San Diego Convention Center, Room 28D

9. Writing and Literacies SIG Business Meeting
Session type: Business Meeting
Time: Thu, Apr 16 - 6:15pm - 8:15pm Place: San Diego Convention Center, Room 28B

10. Writing Identities
Session type: Paper Discussion (formerly known as Roundtables)
Time: Tue, Apr 14 - 11:25am - 12:05pm Place: San Diego Marriott Hotel & Marina, Marriott Hall Salon 4

in gratitude

http://www.hulu.com/the-legacy-of-mlk

in anticipation...

Youth Theater Performance - this week in NYC!

Insight Project Presents a Staged Reading of Brazil, December 16-18

Insight Project is a comprehensive theatre-making class offered by the Court Employment Project (CEP), an alternative-to-incarceration program addressing the needs of court-involved youth at CASES. CASES Insight Project presents Brazil - a powerful meditation on hope and the distances between action and intention in the lives of seven young New Yorkers. Brazil will be presented as a staged reading from December 16-18th at 8pm, in the Lion Theatre at Theatre Row Studios, 410 W 42nd St, located between 9th and 10th Avenues.

For many of the student actors, Insight Project is their first exposure to theater, and their first experience having a public platform where they can communicate their personal narratives. The past performance cycle included five shows seen by a total audience of over 250 people.

Insight Project uses performance to engage communities in a conversation about the underlying issues of offending behavior. Insight Project student actors work collaboratively with writer-in-residence Todd Pate to create a script reflective of their resilient life experiences. Each cycle produces an original peformance exploring themes that come out of directed improvisation sessions with the company, writer-in-residence and CASES staff. Alumni receive support services as they further their performance interests, as well as personal and vocational goals. Insight Project is directed by CEP teacher Daniel Stageman.

Brazil runs three nights at the Lion Theatre at Theatre Row Studios, 410 West 42nd Street (between 9th and 10th Avenues), on December 16th, 17th, and 18th at 8pm. As the event will be presented as a staged reading, tickets are now free, though an RSVP is appreciated via phone at 212.279.4200, or online at www.ticketcentral.com listed as Insight Project presents: Brazil. Subways are A,C,E to Port Authority; N,R,Q,W,1,2,3,7 to Times Square.

***
CASES--THE CENTER FOR ALTERNATIVE SENTENCING AND EMPLOYMENT SERVICES, INC.
The mission of CASES is to increase the use and understanding of community sanctions that are fair, affordable, and consistent with public safety. www.cases.org .
***

CFP: Media in Transition 6: stone and papyrus, storage and transmission

it's baaaack! another call for papers for the 6th media in transition conference. i thoroughly enjoyed the 2005 meeting, which focused on the "work of stories," and this one looks like it will generate yet another excellent collection of papers and presentations

Media in Transition 6: stone and papyrus, storage and transmission

International Conference
April 24-26, 2009
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

CALL FOR PAPERS

In his seminal essay “The Bias of Communication” Harold Innis distinguishes between time-based and space-based media. Time-based media such as stone or clay, Innis agues, can be seen as durable, while space-based media such as paper or papyrus can be understood as portable, more fragile than stone but more powerful because capable of transmission, diffusion, connections across space. Speculating on this distinction, Innis develops an account of civilization grounded in the ways in which media forms shape trade, religion, government, economic and social structures, and the arts.

Our current era of prolonged and profound transition is surely as media-driven as the historical cultures Innis describes. His division between the durable and the portable is perhaps problematic in the age of the computer, but similar tensions define our contemporary situation. Digital communications have increased exponentially the speed with which information circulates. Moore's Law continues to hold, and with it a doubling of memory capacity every two years; we are poised to reach transmission speeds of 100 terabits per second, or something akin to transmitting the entire printed contents of the Library of Congress in under five seconds.

Such developments are simultaneously exhilarating and terrifying. They profoundly challenge efforts to maintain access to the vast printed and audio-visual inheritance of analog culture as well as efforts to understand and preserve the immense, enlarging universe of text, image and sound available in cyberspace.

What are the implications of these trends for historians who seek to understand the place of media in our own culture?

What challenges confront librarians and archivists who must supervise the migration of print culture to digital formats and who must also find ways to preserve and catalogue the vast enlarging universe of words and images generated by new technologies?

How are shifts in distribution and circulation affecting the stories we tell, the art we produce, the social structures and policies we construct?

What are the implications of this tension between storage and transmission for education, for individual and national identities, for notions of what is public and what is private?

We invite papers from scholars, journalists, media creators, teachers, writers and visual artists on these broad themes.

Potential topics might include:

• The digital archive
• The future of libraries and museums
• The past and future of the book
• Mobile media
• Historical systems of communication
• Media in the developing world
• Social networks
• Mapping media flows
• Approaches to media history
• Education and the changing media environment
• New forms of storytelling and expression
• Location-based entertainment
• Hyperlocal media and civic engagement
• New modes of circulation and distribution
• The transformation of television -- from broadcast to download
• Cosmopolitanism backlashes against media change
• Virtual worlds and digital tourism
• The continuity principle: what endures or resists digital transformation?
• The fate of reading

Submissions
Abstracts of no more than 500 words or full papers should be sent to Brad Seawell at seawell@mit.edu no later than Friday, Jan. 9, 2009. We will evaluate abstracts and full papers on a rolling basis and early submission is highly encouraged. All submissions should be sent as attachments in a Word format. Submitted material will be subject to editing by conference organizers. Email is preferred, but submissions can be mailed to:

Brad Seawell
MIT 14N-430
77 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02139

scenes from an election

tuesday afternoon, 11/4, along walnut street, from university city to west philly, a group of girls - ranging in age from 8, 9 years old up through high school ago, holding an obama/biden banner, and matching signs and chanting impromptu cheers, waving at passers-by and getting high-fived by strangers

...

three ten-year-olds playing a hybrid dodgeball/soccer game on the grounds of a high school respond to a joking question about whether they voted with a serious answer: of course! then, in unison, "obama!!!!" they return to playing their game, grins on their faces.

...

ms. edwards, a veteran resident of the neighborhood, known and loved (and possibly feared) by all, stands with a kind and menacing air and addresses each voter as he or she passes through the doors of the high school. she is very concerned with the condition of everyone's teeth and is overjoyed when she sees a beautiful set of pearly whites on one young man who has come to vote. she dotes on him, as only a (grand)motherly figure can do, on his way and on his way out. he grins wider, giving her more reason to continue her praise. "you made my day just now," says the young man, who was born in new york and whose parents emigrated from africa. he walks away with bounce in his step.

...

school financing and vouchers

Re: school financing
ldh encourages increased and strategic investments in order to get achievment gains; requires a rethinking of how $$ is spent in k-12 schooling. Re: vouchers, suggests looking at this report by IES, which states that vouchers have made no significant difference in student achievement: http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/pdf/20084023.pdf

some dispute between lgk and ldh about the impact of vouchers on student achievement. when invited by sf to list research that people should read, ldh offers the above IES report as one piece of research. lgk chuckled and said that tc is a school of education and should be able to find it.

editorializing aside, there was disagreement about how to invest in schooling. e.g., investing in the career ladder and support throughout a career vs. merit pay. this led to an interesting back and forth between the impact of alternative teacher certification programs. candidates have differences in how they aim to support and cultivate the teaching profession. Mccain apparently wants to put money – redirected funds from Title 2, prof dev funds – in programs like TFA, which is focused on achievement, and whose graudates go on to become leaders and founders of charter schools, like Michelle Rae (again). ldh disputed claims that TFA teachers stay, and cited research that indicates that alt cert, without any formal or prior support, decreases percentage of teachers who stay, and is counterintuitive to an effort towards cultivating a teaching profession - as she mentioned earlier, investing in a career ladder.

closing thoughts now... more to come...

role of education in campaigns

when asked about the role of education in each of the campaigns, both describe candidates' legislative commitments to "education," though difficult for mccain's advisor to overcome her candidates' record...

fuhrman presses: have the candidates given enough attention to education?
lgk: disputes ldh's claim that mccain has been brief in his mentions about education. notes that when mentions are made, not picked up in media. frustrating.

ldh: agrees with the point that media is lax in picking up on major educ speeches - not just a partisan issue. however, efforts must be led by someone who understands benefits of education. earlier, she made the claim that $1 investment in early childhood education yields $5-7 later in child's life in the form of decreased educational failure, remediation, etc.

lmv editorial (that's me :) ) - interesting point about early childhood ed... wondering whether we can fold in importance of reduced class sizes...

the nclb question - what would your candidate do when it comes up for reauthorization?
ldh: we need to rethink our assessment/examination system - e.g., like what other countries are doing, not just multiple choice, but inquiry driven work.
lgk: state standards and assessments need to stay in place. the problem of doing portfolios is that you can't compare kids. you can have fabulous, formative portfolios in the instructional process, but you can have a great question that you have to fill in. offers the following sites to be able to know where you stand in relation to other schools: greatschools.net

ldh - we're stuck in a 50s conception of standardized testing, and not thought about undertaking a different form of testing, auditing, monitoring -- and as a result, teaching higher order thinking skills, engendering greater inquiry, not just bubbling in all day.

lgk - fine if all students get the same test. no one should be bubbling in - that's a lousy school!

more to come..

candidates' education advisors debate @ tc

and we're off! the event, officially titled "education and the next president," has commenced with the welcome by pres. fuhrman and her call for greater attention to be paid to education, given its significance for the emerging global issues we face. she will moderate the discussion between lisa graham keegan, advisor to john mccain, and linda darling-hammond, advisor to barack obama.


we're learning about keegan and darling-hammond now, via fuhrman's intros.

the format: fuhrman will ask questions on a range of topics (45 minutes, of 2 minute responses), then each speaker will pose a question to the other. then, questions from the audience.

first question: how would barack obama differ from mccain as an education president?
ldh: obama would clearly be better. understands this from personal experience and also from analytic perspective - e.g. other countries pulling ahead, which have invested in early childhood ed, health care of children, teacher education funding, curriculum and asssessment directed pointed to 21st century skills, and increased college access. has a record of this congress.
mccain has typically voted against these investments in congress. not a high priority to him.

q to lgk: re: mccain's interest in joel klein's and al sharpton's work with educational equity project in nyc, compelling, and wants to support:
- increasing quality of teachers in high needs schools
- numbers of choices parents have about educating their kids

sf: importance of education to each of your campaigns - do you get (and how much) face time with him?

cfp: nctear 2009

Literacy, Culture, Learning, and Life in Schools: Research and Designs for Change
February 13-15, 2009; University of California, Los Angeles
Co-chairs: Kris Gutierrez and Ernest Morrell

The Assembly for Research of the National Council of Teachers of English announces a conference on “Literacy, Culture, Learning, and Life in Schools: Research and Designs for Change”, to be held February 13-15, 2009 at The University of California, Los Angeles in Los Angeles, CA. In this call, we would like researchers and educators to consider what it means to explore the connections between literacy theory and research and the study and design of powerful literacy learning spaces for youth.

After a generation of pioneering scholarship in literacy and learning theory and research we are still faced with extreme challenges, some methodological, some pertaining to applications of research to practice and policy. We are also still faced with the reality that class, race, and language background still largely define equity, access, and achievement in literacy classrooms and therefore, the life outcomes of students. With that in mind our goal is to convene literacy and learning scholars, theorists, activists, and practitioners around the globe to discuss the applications of recent movements in literacy and learning theory and research to classro om practice, to understanding classroom life, and to the development of progressive educational policy.

Key Goals

1. To understand how current movements in literacy and/or learning research can and should inform classroom life for historically marginalized students. This involves both the study of classroom life and the shaping of students’ experiences inside of classrooms.
2. To understand how recent advances in literacy research are reshaping the very tools that we use to understand literacy practices across a wide range of activity settings including schools and homes.
3. To assess design interventions that have applied literacy theory and research to classroom curricula and pedagogy in order to understand what we have learned about design research as a methodological approach and what we have learned about effecti ve literacy classroom practice.
4. To identify challenges, contradictions, and future directions for literacy researchers interested in the nexus of theory, literacy research, and literacy development among historically marginalized populations.
5. To consider the “appropriate” goals and outcomes of literacy research for radical citizenship, for classroom practice, for policy development, and for action for social change. (What do we want and how will we know if we are heading in the right direction?)
6. To articulate and develop powerful theories of literacy teaching and literacy learning that emerge from our interrogation of existing theory and research.

Key Questions

1. Q: What do we know about the applications of literacy and/or learning research to pedagogical practices in literacy classrooms with histories of underachievement? What are the core tenets of successful practices? What is the research base that supports the identification of these tenets?
2. Q: What are powerful examples of practice? What should we learned from studying these practices?
3. How do we best study literacy and learning inside and outside of classrooms?
4. Q: What is gained by broadening the focus from classrooms to studying larger ecologies? How do third generation activity theory, mutli-sited ethnographies, and recent work in the field problematize and push upon dichotomies of home/school, classrooms/not classrooms, etc?
5. Q: What are the various home, community, popular cultural, and new media literacies that students bring with them into classrooms? How are these li teracies being accessed and positioned within classrooms?
6. Q: Where do we need to go next with respect to making connections between theory, literacy research, and classroom practice?

We welcome proposals grounded in diverse perspectives, including, among others: the learning sciences, critical race, postcolonial, postmodern, multicultural, feminist and queer theories; critical discourse analysis; critical and anti-racist pedagogies; and ethnic, cultural, cross-cultural, design, experimental, quasi-experimental, case study, ethnography, historical and comparative/international st udies. We invite proposals that focus on empirical research including teacher/action research, as well as conceptual/theoretical work.

Proposals (no more than 2 single-spaced pages) should address the following: The research question(s), methodology, findings/issues/questions for discussion, and how the research will contribute to the conference conversation. If your paper is a conceptual/theoretical one, please describe your theoretical framework and argument and tell how it will contribute to the conference conversation. We are strongly encouraging the participati on of classroom teachers and graduate students so, if you are currently a classroom teacher or graduate student, please indicate so in your proposal. Please send all proposals to nctear2009@gmail.com. The deadline for conference submissions is December 1, 2008.

visualizing data

i saw this a while ago in nytimes and facebooked it, but have begun exploring it anew this week:

Many Eyes: http://services.alphaworks.ibm.com/manyeyes/home - presents ideas about how to visualize sets of data, including using wordle.net and other nifty apps.

rereading "reading next"

in prep for an article i'm working on, i've been doing some rereading of documents that produced within the last few years, which focus on the literacies of adolescents. one such set of documents are two reports put out by the carnegie corporation's advancing literacy project.
below: a rereading of the executive summary of "reading next: a vision for action and research in middle and high school literacy" (made possible by wordle.net)
(click to really see, and then consider what you see - and don't see)

new year, new possibilities, same ol' bullsh*T!

i'm rarely surprised by the continued rhetoric of pro-gun folks who say that we shouldn't blame the gun; that guns don't kill people, people kill people, etc... however, during her interview with charlie gibson on 20/20, sarah palin, when asked about gun control - specifically the fact that she does not support a ban on semi-automatic guns (a ban that over 70% of this country supports, btw), palin's response incensed me anew. palin and gibson had the following exchange:

charlie: isn't gun violence in america a health issue? we spend billions of dollars a year, every year, treating people who are victims of gun violence. nothing we can do about that?

sarah: do you think that all of that gun violence, though, is caused by people pulling a trigger who would have followed any law anyway?

she goes on to worry about the constraints that gun control laws may place constraints on the 2nd amendment rights of "law abiding citizens" and states that "it's going to be the bad guys who have the guns."

having spent most of the nearly 15 years talking, learning, and thinking with adolescents living in two of the major northeastern cities in the united states, there is fact that remains uncontested: guns are readily available, and in many cases more readily available than what one might consider "basic needs" - e.g., food, shelter, utilities... i say this not to sensationalize the lives of the young people with whom i've spent time, but rather to highlight an assumption that is embedded in palin's statement above: that people who use guns to commit violent acts are not and would not be "law abiding citizens", under any circumstance, and more importantly, that guns are only misused by "bad guys"... what would she (and others who share her view) say, i wonder, when asked to consider the reality of a thriving gun market in our urban neighborhoods; the overabundance of and ready access to automatic and semi-automatic weapons must be taken seriously, and not set within a pedestrian framework of good and bad, law-abiding and unlawful,

the likely truth is that lifetime gun association members aren't thinking about the lives lost and dreams squandered when they repeatedly lobby against legislation that would, in no way, hinder their hunting and sport-related gun needs. unless there is a sport that involves literally shattering game into a million pieces, i'm at a loss when it comes to understanding how a ban on semi-automatic 'weapons of mass destruction' theatens anyone's hunting 'privilege' and gun toting rights.

do i favor a land without guns. certainly. but the larger issue is this: if legislators continue to associate gun violence with an inherent 'bad' trait or disposition, we will only continue the cycle of incarceration, rising health care costs, and urban neighborhoods whose populations are largely under some form of correctional control. a limit on the sheer numbers of guns on the streets and in the hands of children will have an impact in the reduction of, at the very least, gun violence. additionally, when we shift our gaze away from an ontological assumption of illegality, we are better able to address problems in effective and useful ways. if we ban semi-automatic weapons, and we increase support for, e.g., higher education, we open up possibilities that are not only about not doing something, but also about pursuing new avenues. this is not, contrary to popular belief, a fairytale.

as a final rejoinder to ms. palin's assertion, i offer this video:


click here for more on andrés idarraga