July | 2008 | voxygen.net

From the monthly archives: July 2008

On Vacation

By ~LS~ On July 30, 2008 · 1 Comment · In The Quotidian (yadda yadda) and tagged Tagged With: Tampa, Travel

When Species Meet — Chapters 3 and 4

By ~LS~ On July 26, 2008 · 1 Comment · In Rhetoric and tagged Tagged With: Haraway, Pets, Rhetoric, Science, Technoculture

I don’t really have much commentary on Chapter 4. I saw it as a case study in science studies and caring for animals situated within breeding pedigree dogs. Maybe I’m missing something. As for Chapter 3, I struggled with this chapter more than with other chapters. So first I’m gonna spin out what I got from the chapter (without the nuances, which would add years to this process).

Chapter 3

The chapter is about how we deal ethically with other non-human species, specifically lab animals. “Instrumental action with animals is not the enemy” – sometimes we have to have lab animals. This puts her on very dangerous territory with PETA and animal rights activists, as she says. The crux of this chapter IMO is how to construct a rationale for her position that fits within what is ethical or conscionable to her. Given what she has written thus far about [...]

Read Full Article →

David Harvey, Marx, Haraway

By ~LS~ On July 25, 2008 · Add Comment · In Rhetoric and tagged Tagged With: Capitalism, Haraway, Rhetoric, Technoculture

Yesterday I found the greatest link to DavidHarvey.org. David Harvey is a professor of Geography at CUNY. He’s a marxist, and a prolific writer (ten books), including one I read called The Condition of Postmodernity, and he’s wicked smart. Every year for the past…who knows how many years, he teaches a course that is a close reading of VOl. I of Capital. Last year, someone recorded his lectures on 13 videos and now you can see them on his website. I spent two hours today listening to the introduction to the class, which covered a close reading of the first six pages of the book. I took five typed pages of notes. Mostly what Harvey discussed was how to read Marx, using the first section of Chapter 1 as a model. He emphasized repeatedly the dynamism involved in reading Marx’s notion of the commodity as a [...]

Read Full Article →

My latest fantasy and other life things

By ~LS~ On July 24, 2008 · 3 Comments · In The Quotidian (yadda yadda) and tagged Tagged With: Gratitudes, What I Did Today

My latest fantasy:

I want to work at Digipen, the computer gaming school in Seattle. That is where friend and former student, Malia G., went to school. I went to the website and they were hiring four positions in general education. I drafted my cover letter and sent an email asking questions, only to find that they already filled the positions. But they are hiring next year as well. How exciting would that be? I got all wrapped up in the fantasy about working there, imagining how I would teach my classes, etc. It got me to thinking that I -could- teach the rhetoric of cyberculture class at BRCC under the entertainment technology curriculum. So maybe I will investigate that. I don’t know how proprietary that group of folks is about their curriculum.

Other random musings:

In other news, we are going to ZoSo tonight at the Varsity. [...]

Read Full Article →

Amateur Porn

By ~LS~ On July 23, 2008 · 4 Comments · In Feminism, Pop Culture, The Web and tagged Tagged With: Consumption, Feminism, Media Ecology, Pop Culture, Sex, Sexism

One of the things new media critics point out is the way that new media technologies turn consumers into producers. Nowhere is this more true than in amateur porn production. I just read an article in Wired about how the porn industry is feeling the economic crunch. One of the reasons that the porn industry is posting losses is the endless free supply of amateur porn. Of course, despite the losses, the porn industry is still thriving, but it makes me think of the relationship between amateur and professional porn.

The whole idea of amateur porn raises a host of issues about women’s autonomy and subjectivity for me. All the feminist arguments about exploitation, victimization, hate speech, and objectification become more complicated within the context of amateur porn.

1. One can say that in amateur porn, women have choice and even control (though the notion of choice is always [...]

Read Full Article →

Americans Deeper in Debt

By ~LS~ On July 22, 2008 · 1 Comment · In Politics and tagged Tagged With: Consumption, Money

My relationship with money is very strange. I’m constantly comparing myself to other people to see how I’m doing financially and I’m never satisfied with my status. I live in a shoebox of a little house, I drive a low end car, most of my “stuff” is low end (my computer, my phones, my mp3 player, my coffee, my groceries, etc.). I’m never happy. I always marvel at how other people can afford SUVs and private school tuition. According to all the stats I’ve read, we are at the upper end of income in Baton Rouge. I know I don’t live in an exceptionally rich part of town, but I look at my neighbors’ yards, cars, houses, and I feel inadequate. I recall bell hooks, when writing about her BMW (maybe it was in Where We Stand: Class Matters), saying something about feeling this way as a child of poverty [...]

Read Full Article →

Page 1 of 412 3 4 »

On Vacation

When Species Meet — Chapters 3 and 4

David Harvey, Marx, Haraway

My latest fantasy and other life things

Amateur Porn

Americans Deeper in Debt

Categories

Archives

Blogroll

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Meta

Catch me if you can!

On Vacation

When Species Meet — Chapters 3 and 4

David Harvey, Marx, Haraway

My latest fantasy and other life things

Amateur Porn

Americans Deeper in Debt

Categories

Archives

Tags

Blogroll

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Meta

Catch me if you can!