From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Thu Feb 12 10:00:54 1998 Date: Thu, 12 Feb 1998 10:00:52 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Retrieving the papers Greetings and welcome to the seminar! I am writing to let you know that the URL now works and you will be able to get the papers without problems. Best, Martha E. Gimenez PSN Founding Editor From Gartrell@hawaii.edu Thu Feb 12 12:16:26 1998 Date: Thu, 12 Feb 1998 09:18:49 -1000 From: John Gartrell To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: Retrieving the papers Martha: Merci. I did get the instructions. As a new experience, it is bound to be interesting. John Martha Gimenez wrote: > Greetings and welcome to the seminar! > > I am writing to let you know that the URL now works and you will be able > to get the papers without problems. > > Best, > > Martha E. Gimenez > PSN Founding Editor From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Wed Feb 18 11:22:04 1998 Date: Wed, 18 Feb 1998 11:22:02 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Welcome to the Seminar On behalf of Gary Marx, I would like to welcome you to our on line seminar. If you have joined but have not read the paper yet, remember that you can find the seminar papers at the following url http://csf.colorado.edu/psn/seminars or you can send mail to listproc@csf.colorado.edu with this message: get psn-seminars aspiring-sociologists I read Gary's paper with pleasure; I found it fun, informative and useful, especially because I have been struggling with my writing. He is absolutely right; once one breaks the initial barriers, writing becomes increasingly easier. I have just finished the first draft of a long paper and can't wait to start work on the next two! Depending on our current work and stage in our careers we will focus on different aspects of this paper and will ask different questions. I will start by asking Gary to tell us why, in his view, "social change without poetry is in serious trouble." Is it an observation similar to Emma Goldmann's view on dancing and revolution? Martha ******************************* Martha E. Gimenez Department of Sociology Campus Box 327 University of Colorado at Boulder Boulder, Colorado 80309 Voice: 303-492-7080 Fax: 303-492-5105 From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Thu Feb 19 10:59:15 1998 Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 10:59:12 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Social change and poetry (FWD) Gary is having some email problems and asked me to forward this message. Martha ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 09:04:43 -0800 (PST) From: gary marx To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Martha Gimenez asks, why is "social change without poetry" in serious trouble? (mandate 2). There I meant that our efforts to generate systematic, empirically accurate, logical and sophisticated data on which to base social change will be further enhanced if they have aesthetic, emotional, spiritual, and evocative qualities. Beauty, humor, playfulness, symbols and even ambiguity (in limited contexts) and an element of mystery can enhance the process and the product, and can reach the reader in a way that the lifeless prose and numbers that dominate much of the profession never can. Of course this should not be in lieu of sloppy or fuzzy thinking. There is a wonderful quote somewhere from Whitehead about the limitations of clarity in settings that may be too complex for our models. Social researchers can benefit from drawing upon the humanities' side of their split personality. We can be more than passionless engineers with a sterile mode of communication. Perhaps buried within the remark is the notion that our work should, where possible, be artful as well as technical. From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Thu Feb 19 15:30:56 1998 Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 15:30:52 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: academic lives and meaning (fwd) I am forwarding this on behalf of Gary marx ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 13:37:31 -0800 (PST) From: gary marx To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: academic lives and meaning Dear Seminar Participants: I will be please to respond to any questions regarding the three posted articles but I am as well interested in your answers to the issues they deal with? These questions are directed to those just beginnning as well as those further along in their careers. what are your goals? why do you study sociology? beyond the obvious questions such as, "will I find a job" or be able to change jobs?", what are the major concerns you have about work life? waht the major tensions or unresolved issues that you think most about? do you know the difference between the disipline and the profession? where do you think you will be in your career five years from now? ten? have you identified types of work, questions or persons that you would like t, or do, emulate in your research and life? if you were independently wealthy would you still be seeking, or continue a career in sociology? what if you knew you had only ten years to left to live? five? one? what upsets you most about being a graduate student or a begining assistant professor? what gives you the most plealsure? what three or four (or more?) ideas do you feel it is most important to pass on to those just starting in the field? What would you recommend that students and colleagues read to help deal with these questions? if you are established in your career what do you know now that you wish you knew when you were starting out? at least some of the 37 imperatives can be seen as controversial do you agree with all of them (e.g., write books don't read them; take short cuts; don't be scriptocentric; don't stay a specialist; don't join the thought police; being a scientist and a political actor; not basing a research agenda around your identity, have fun). I would be disappointed if no one challenges at least some of those. It is ok to disagree and ask probing questions! Gary T. Marx From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Fri Feb 20 10:37:19 1998 Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 10:37:15 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: teaching as a sociologist (fwd) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 17:47:44 -0700 (MST) From: Brett Johnson To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: teaching as a sociologist First off, I would like to thank Gary and Martha for putting together this seminar. I invite you to read my message and share your insights! I am a 3rd year doctoral student at CU-Boulder. I came to graduate school to get the appropriate training and the credentials to teach sociology at the college level. I am interested in teaching sociology because of the meaningful interactions that I have with students and the intellectual stimulation that I receive from being an academic. The classes that I teach have two broad and exciting goals: to make students' lives more fulfilling and to make the world a better place. Sometimes these are contradictory goals but usually they are complementary. Teaching is the most fulfilling labor activity that I have every been involved in or of any activity I can conceptualize. My students also seem to significantly grow from my interactions with them. Currently I am dealing with the issue of becoming a prolific writer so that I can write a dissertation and become a scholar that Gary describes in his paper concerning the 37 moral imperatives of a sociologist. I believe that I am a well-versed young scholar and have an ability to conceptualize abstract theoretical perspectives but I have little interest in writing about these topics. I would rather talk and teach about them. Even I though I feel that I benefit from the writing process and that I am a very able writer, writing is difficult for me because I do not receive as much fulfillment from it as from direct human interaction. I am Marcuse's ideal as my eros (creative impulse) runs wild and I don't like to defer gratification. Teaching provides that immediate gratification as I can see students appreciating my hours of work and my insights. I value the enterprise of writing but I would rather share my insights in other ways. Much of my teaching revolves around very simple ideas. I help my students see how they can build community around them, counteract alienation in their lives, and have value-rational motivations to their actions. These are very old ideas in our discipline. I see my job as finding ways to present these ideas to students so that their lives can be transformed so that they can actively fight and change the shortfalls of modernity and late capitalism. I see my actions counteracting apathy, egoism, anomie, and alienation. What more could I ask for? *** Is there a place in the discipline for a person like me who wants to devote the lion's share of her/his energies to sharing sociological knowledge instead of creating it in a written form? **** I not sure that there is a place for me (as I am now), so I am currently working on developing a routine for writing on a daily basis. From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Fri Feb 20 11:38:10 1998 Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 11:38:07 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.Colorado.EDU Subject: Forwarding mail Dear seminar subscribers: We seem to be experiencing a problem with the distribution of mail; when I forward a message, it is distributed but when some of you do it, it does not work. This is why I forwarded Brett's message today. Perhaps the silence in our seminar is due not only to the initial difficulties inherent in starting a conversation among people who do not know each other; it may be that some of you sent messages which were not distributed. I am therefore writing to ask you to send me your messages to the seminar and I will forward them on your behalf. my address: gimenez@csf.colorado.edu Look forward to your contributions to the seminar. Martha E. Gimenez Department of Sociology Campus Box 327 University of Colorado at Boulder Boulder, Colorado 80309 Voice: 303-492-7080 Fax: 303-492-5105 From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Fri Feb 20 11:44:13 1998 Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 11:44:04 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: Social change and poetry (FWD) (fwd) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 21:28:19 -0500 (EST) From: Carol Black To: Gary Marx on Aspiring Sociologists Subject: Re: Social change and poetry (FWD) As a beginning graduate student in Sociology, I hesitate to jump into the pool here, but then again, how else will I learn anything? There are many questions running through my mind, from reading Prof. Marx's first paper, and his list of questions today. I need a little time to formulate answers, and more questions. However, I do have one beginning question for Prof. Marx and others. What would you say is the difference between Cultural Anthropology (as a discipline) and Sociology (as the same)?? This is something I struggled with, in deciding which field to enter. Where are the boundaries between Cultural Anth./ Sociology/ Communication/ Cultural Studies... Linguistics...? It seems to me our disciplines cross boundaries. And so, looking toward the future, I see more of a trend toward Interdisciplinary research, and interdisciplinary degrees/ Departments. I would be interested in the perspective of those who have more experience in the various disciplines. Or is this a waste of time, to consider? For example, POETRY, as you mention, adds a humanistic quality to sociological views. I have seen the same dialogue in anthropology journals. ( I wrote poetry as a hobby before taking scholarship seriously. It remains one of the more creative outlets of expression for me.) cfblack@omni.cc.purdue.edu - Carol F. Black Purdue Univ./West Lafayette,IN From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Fri Feb 20 12:17:46 1998 Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 12:17:44 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Previously sent to the seminar (fwd) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 10:44:51 -0800 From: Earl Babbie To: gimenez@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Previously sent to the seminar At 10:37 2/20/98 -0700, Brett Johnson wrote: > >Even I though I feel that I benefit from the writing process and >that I am a very able writer, writing is difficult for me because I do not >receive as much fulfillment from it as from direct human interaction. I am >Marcuse's ideal as my eros (creative impulse) runs wild and I don't like >to defer gratification. Teaching provides that immediate gratification >as I can see students appreciating my hours of work and my insights. I >value the enterprise of writing but I would rather share my insights in >other ways. Actually, the internet may offer the solution to this dilemma. You can get immediate responses to things you communicate through writing, and you can pull together the evolution of an idea through a series of interactions and publish it as an article or book. I've found the net a great device for trying out and polishing ideas. earl ----------------------------------------------------------- kth Law of CyberSpace: We are all, as individuals, in over our heads. ----------------------------------------------------------- Earl Babbie Tel: 714-997-6565 babbie@chapman.edu Fax: 714-281-6213 http://www.chapman.edu/wilkinson/socsci/sociology/Faculty/Babbie/ From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Fri Feb 20 15:25:09 1998 Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 15:25:02 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Vocational Pleasure (fwd) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 17:19:54 -0500 (EST) From: JS8852@cnsvax.albany.edu To: gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Subject: Vocational Pleasure I met Gary very briefly a few years ago at a panel at the Easterns a few years ago. When I then contacted him over email he practiced imperative no. 26 "Don't be selfish! Give of your time and your thoughts to others." One of the things that Gary gave me at that time was a copy of the Moral Imperatives essay he had submitted to The American Sociologist. Since then I've passed it along to graduate student friends here in the department of sociology at SUNY-Albany and have even given a copy or two to undergraduate soc majors. In the essay Gary references Mills in more than one place. One of the things some of us graduate students talk about is how history is intersecting with our biographies, Mills' definition of The Sociological Imagination. For instance, the characteristics of globalization and the demise of decent welfare practices reminds me that I have a toothache and no dental plan and no money to see a dentist. Similarly because of widespread downsizing and or hiring freezes more and more grad students are being asked to do more and more labor for less and less pay. Now in 'The Coming of Postindustrial Society' Daniel Bell put forth the claim that the key axial principle in The Information Society is KNOWLEDGE and more specifically theoretical knowledge. Well I have taken and passed my doctoral comprehensive examinations here in 'sociological theory' and 'the sociology of technology.' But my tooth still hurts. And oh yes, another key characteristic of prevalent theories of both globalization and postindustrialism is the utilization of information technology to increase productivity while simultaneously saving on labor costs. Why not think about your relationship to the increasing prevalence of the utilization of computers in our profession before you jump on the bandwagon and design a website for your classes that promotes various forms of inequalities in intricate ways? And let us also pay homage to Gary's work on the spector of the rise of a culture that promotes the uses of information technology and in the process normalizes a wide variety of forms of electronic surveillance? (imagine violins playing sad music in a minor key as you reflect on the above passage then imagine an interlude to the type of ragtime piano music used in slapstick comedies) Saving Grace: Graduate students are really really smart people. Imperative no. 22--Create Real and Virtual Communities includes this quote "With respect to the search for intellectual community, it doesn't get much better than graduate school." Well here at Albany some of us discovered that a cafeteria in the basement of the dorm has a 'all you can eat' lunch for $4.37 with tax. Whenever we can a bunch of go over there and load up our plates with food and between filling our faces and stomachs we test out our latest 'brainstorm' thesis or whine about the world or whatever. We might not have any money or a dental plan but these are the smartest people on the planet. It is during these occasions that we also combine and practice imperatives nos. 35--Have fun! Enjoy what you do! and no. 36--Have a sense of humor. For instance one of us can very seriously attempt to present the characteristics of globalization as ideology and reality or recent readings in new identies and all of us will listen very carefully and sincerely but sooner or later one of the astute listeners will offer up a well thought out observation that will turn the table to hardy and heartfelt laughter. Walking back to the department together still talking and still laughing, maybe a couple of pieces of fruit or a sandwich stuffed into the bottom of a knapsack for later (no surveillance cameras installed in the cafe yet) I feel that my occupational decision to become an academic sociologist is a wonderful way to live. Now I'm definately not offering an apologetic or justification for our contemporary epic of widespread neo-conservative ruthless organizational practices, there are so many who can do that so much better than I, but what I am saying is that having the chance to have lunch on a fairly regular basis with people who are really, really, smart who happen to be sociologists enlivens my spirit. And let's face that common claim going around 5 years ago that there would be a massive shortage of Ph.D.'s in America by the year 2,000 has almost 2 full years to go before we can accurately begin the body count. Till then it's all you eat a couple of times of a week. Joseph Sullivan ABD, 5th year Department of Sociology SUNY-Albany From scheff@sscf.ucsb.edu Wed Feb 18 12:07:11 1998 Date: Wed, 18 Feb 1998 11:07:02 -0800 (PST) From: Tom Scheff To: Gary Marx on Aspiriing Sociologists Subject: Seminar Gary, I found your 37 suggestions stimulating. But also confusing, because there are so many, and because some of them argue both sides: what to do about runaway disciplinarity? Embrace and reject it? How? Could you condense your suggestions to three or four? Tom Thomas J. Scheff, Professor Emeritus Dept of Sociology, UCSB, Santa Barbara, CA. 93105 Phone 805 893 3510 Fax 805 893 3324 Web http://sscf.ucsb.edu/~scheff/scheff.html From jwood@mail.sdsu.edu Wed Feb 18 14:58:10 1998 Wed, 18 Feb 1998 13:58:05 -0800 (PST) Date: Wed, 18 Feb 1998 13:58:05 -0800 (PST) To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu From: "James L. Wood" Subject: Re: Welcome to the Seminar Thanks to you and Gary for the invitation! It looks most interesting. Jim >On behalf of Gary Marx, I would like to welcome you to our on line >seminar. If you have joined but have not read the paper yet, remember >that you can find the seminar papers at the following url > > http://csf.colorado.edu/psn/seminars > >or you can send mail to listproc@csf.colorado.edu >with this message: > > get psn-seminars aspiring-sociologists > >I read Gary's paper with pleasure; I found it fun, informative and >useful, especially because I have been struggling with my writing. He is >absolutely right; once one breaks the initial barriers, writing becomes >increasingly easier. I have just finished the first draft of a long paper >and can't wait to start work on the next two! > >Depending on our current work and stage in our careers we will focus on >different aspects of this paper and will ask different questions. I will >start by asking Gary to tell us why, in his view, "social change without >poetry is in serious trouble." Is it an observation similar to Emma >Goldmann's view on dancing and revolution? > >Martha > >******************************* >Martha E. Gimenez >Department of Sociology >Campus Box 327 >University of Colorado at Boulder >Boulder, Colorado 80309 >Voice: 303-492-7080 >Fax: 303-492-5105 James L. Wood From lord_g@crob.flint.umich.edu Thu Feb 19 12:45:56 1998 From: "George F. Lord" To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 14:40:24 EST Subject: Re: Social change and poetry If I could add to the need of poetry (or Aesthetics) in social change, I believe it is in Habermas that he argues that for a critical theory to be liberating it must be (1) scientific, allow us to examine the world in as objective a fashion as possible, (2) moral, allow us to ask questions about what is right and wrong, and (3) Aesthetic (or poetic), allowing us to imagine how it might be. I have just printed out and begun to read the essays and look forward to the discussion. I feel in reading Gary's response below that I still want to know why social change without poetry is in serious trouble. That is, I think many of us would agree with the statement, but what is it about the academic enterprise or what might we draw from our sociological understanding of knowledge to support this contention? And perhaps more importantly how do we change this in our everyday lives, perhaps we try to implement the 37 moral imperatives?? George Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 10:59:12 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: Gary Marx on Aspiring Sociologists Subject: Social change and poetry (FWD) Gary is having some email problems and asked me to forward this message. Martha ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 09:04:43 -0800 (PST) From: gary marx To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Martha Gimenez asks, why is "social change without poetry" in serious trouble? (mandate 2). There I meant that our efforts to generate systematic, empirically accurate, logical and sophisticated data on which to base social change will be further enhanced if they have aesthetic, emotional, spiritual, and evocative qualities. Beauty, humor, playfulness, symbols and even ambiguity (in limited contexts) and an element of mystery can enhance the process and the product, and can reach the reader in a way that the lifeless prose and numbers that dominate much of the profession never can. Of course this should not be in lieu of sloppy or fuzzy thinking. There is a wonderful quote somewhere from Whitehead about the limitations of clarity in settings that may be too complex for our models. Social researchers can benefit from drawing upon the humanities' side of their split personality. We can be more than passionless engineers with a sterile mode of communication. Perhaps buried within the remark is the notion that our work should, where possible, be artful as well as technical. George Lord Department of Sociology University of Michigan - Flint e-mail lord_g@flint.crob.umich.edu voice (810) 762-3340 fax (810) 762-3687 From covi@crew.umich.edu Fri Feb 20 12:55:30 1998 To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: academic lives and meaning Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 14:55:25 -0500 From: "Lisa M. Covi" Hi everyone, My name is Lisa Covi and I just met Gary last Tuesday and I'm very interested in the topic of this conference. I've studied how sociologists use electronic resources in their research and am also interested in learning more about the professional life of sociologists. I'm technically a member of the ASA, but my Ph.D. is in Information and Computer Science. I study how people use networked technologies with naturalistic methods from social science. I'm currently a Research Fellow (post-doc) at the School of Information at University of Michigan. >What are your goals? I would like to raise people's consciousness about how information technology embodies assumptions about social behavior and the ways that certain socialf behaviors are constrained or enabled by information technology. More simply, I like to write and this is a general topic which I feel qualified to study and contribute. >Why do you study sociology? Sociology is the home discipline for many theorists who study organizations and societies, two levels of analysis that are important to my work. >What are the major concerns you have about work life? what are the >major tensions or unresolved issues that you think most about? I am concerned about the combining teaching and research activities in such ways that spur these different experiences. There is an interesting article that discusses how to combine competing needs to be general, accurate and simple that I like: Wanous, John P. (1981). A new look at teaching "versus" research. EXCHANGE: The Organizational Behavior Teaching Journal, vol. vi, no. 4, 9-13. Another concern I have is about collaboration versus single authorship. I find that as a prospective faculty member, prospective colleagues are very concerned about who contributed what part of different ideas which I think can be a false distinction when I work in research teams. It seems in many organizations people get rewarded for individual contributions although much work is accomplished with the cooperation of many people and I'm not sure how to reconcile this in my authorship patterns. >So you know the difference between the disipline and the profession? This is an interesting question. I think disciplinary labels are used to simplify what is a complex research profession. Disciplines are lenses through which you can view problems with the knowledge structures they provide. >Where do you think you will be in your career five years from now? ten? I think I am fairly preoccupied with the incentives of tenure and promotion. I am interested in pursuing a tenure-track faculty career because I would like to influence decision-making about the future of higher education. However, today it was suggested to me that there may be revolution with wholesale layoffs of the established faculty in order to further a new organization of higher education. I suppose I am a proponent of change from within, which is why I pursue my goals the way I do. >Have you identified types of work, questions or persons that you would >like to, or do, emulate in your research and life? I like exploratory naturalistic study. I like pursuing research questions that are so new that there are no immediate clear answers and providing descriptive evidence for further work. As far as people go, I admire conceptual researchers who are grounded in realist perspectives and have enough integrity to thoughtfully consider alternative explanations. >If you were independently wealthy would you still be seeking, or >continue a career in sociology? what if you knew you had only ten >years to left to live? five? one? This is my second career and it chose me rather than me choosing it. I enjoy what I do but I sometime feel frustrated that there is not enough time in the week to do more of it. >What upsets you most about being a graduate student or a begining >assistant professor? what gives you the most pleasure? I feel upset by the lack of formal recognition for post-docs within the university. I cannot write research grants or earn fellowships because as a temporary employee, bureaucratically I'm not recognized. I'm also very frustrated by the amount of time I have to spend in order to push paperwork through the system. I derrive the greatest pleasure from giving voice in my work to recognizable concerns from professions or a lesser known body of work. I also enjoy facilitating other people's (i.e., students) connections between their interests and current work they may not know about. >What three or four (or more?) ideas do you feel it is most important >to pass on to those just starting in the field? What would you >recommend that students and colleagues read to help deal with these >questions? For students, pick your department and advisor carefully. I've seen many people waste valuable career time because they did not extend their consideration to programs that better fit their interests or paid too little attention to signals that advisors were giving them about their progress or achievement in their programs. Read some biographies of people in your desired field and dissertation-advice books. For women, read Emily Toth's "Ms. Mentor's impeccable advice for women in academia" to get a flavor of some issues you may face. If you don't like to read or write, you've chosen the wrong profession. >If you are established in your career what do you know now that you >wish you knew when you were starting out? I came back to this as a career. Although it was frustrating sometimes, I think outside work experience sensitized me to particular work domains and problems. However, if I had to do over, I'd try to be better prepared for the "culture shock" when returning to being a full-time student. Lisa From wilson@fau.edu Fri Feb 20 12:58:43 1998 Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 15:04:47 -0500 (EST) To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu From: "Thomas C. Wilson" Subject: Re: teaching as a sociologist (fwd) Re: Brett Johnson's question "Is there a place in the discipline for a person like me who wants to devote the lion's share of her/his energies to sharing sociological knowledge instead of creating it in a written form? **** There surely is! There's plenty of small universities and colleges--more in the east and midwest than in the west--where teaching is emphasized and research (writing) is not. Many states have extensive junior or community college systems, too. Advantages: you can share sociological knowledge while remaining free of research requirements, and even earn tenure in the process (at some schools). But there are disadvantages, too: heavy teaching loads are common (e.g., 4 courses per semester); salary is relatively low; students tend to be less prepared and motivated than in Boulder; and the teaching-only role is marginalized in the discipline. At 10:37 AM 2/20/98 -0700, you wrote: > >---------- Forwarded message ---------- >Date: Thu, 19 Feb 1998 17:47:44 -0700 (MST) >From: Brett Johnson >To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu >Subject: teaching as a sociologist > > >First off, I would like to thank Gary and Martha for putting together >this seminar. I invite you to read my message and share your insights! > >I am a 3rd year doctoral student at CU-Boulder. I came to graduate >school to get the appropriate training and the credentials to teach >sociology at the college level. I am interested in teaching sociology >because of the meaningful interactions that I have with students and the >intellectual stimulation that I receive from being an academic. > >The classes that I teach have two broad and exciting goals: to make >students' lives more fulfilling and to make the world a better place. >Sometimes these are contradictory goals but usually they are complementary. >Teaching is the most fulfilling labor activity that I have every been >involved in or of any activity I can conceptualize. My students also seem >to significantly grow from my interactions with them. > >Currently I am dealing with the issue of becoming a prolific writer so >that I can write a dissertation and become a scholar that Gary describes >in his paper concerning the 37 moral imperatives of a sociologist. I >believe that I am a well-versed young scholar and have an ability to >conceptualize abstract theoretical perspectives but I have little >interest in writing about these topics. I would rather talk and teach >about them. > >Even I though I feel that I benefit from the writing process and >that I am a very able writer, writing is difficult for me because I do not >receive as much fulfillment from it as from direct human interaction. I am >Marcuse's ideal as my eros (creative impulse) runs wild and I don't like >to defer gratification. Teaching provides that immediate gratification >as I can see students appreciating my hours of work and my insights. I >value the enterprise of writing but I would rather share my insights in >other ways. > >Much of my teaching revolves around very simple ideas. I help my >students see how they can build community around them, counteract >alienation in their lives, and have value-rational motivations to their >actions. These are very old ideas in our discipline. I see my job as >finding ways to present these ideas to students so that their lives can be >transformed so that they can actively fight and change the shortfalls of >modernity and late capitalism. I see my actions counteracting apathy, egoism, >anomie, and alienation. What more could I ask for? > >*** Is there a place in the discipline for a person like me who wants to >devote the lion's share of her/his energies to sharing sociological >knowledge instead of creating it in a written form? **** > >I not sure that there is a place for me (as I am now), so I am currently >working on developing a routine for writing on a daily basis. > > Thomas C. Wilson, Professor Department of Sociology Florida Atlantic University Boca Raton FL 33431 E-mail: wilson@fau.edu Phone: 561-367-3273 From brich@mail.transy.edu Fri Feb 20 13:11:31 1998 for ; Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 15:16:53 -0800 From: "Brian Rich" To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: Social change and poetry (FWD) (fwd) Carol and colleagues Hi, I teach at a small liberal arts college and am currently very preoccupied with questions posed by this "cyberseminar." I am in my fourth year on the job, came from a big research school (Berkeley) and have been the "Program Director" for going on three years of a sociology/anthropology/ communications program. My preoccupations are centrally about questions like: what am I doing teaching sociology? what is the possibility of making meaning in the long term as an academic? for whom do I work? and why? A couple of years ago I thought I had most of these questions fairly reasonably and fairly satisfactorily answered. Now I don't think so. So I am interested for personal-social-political reasons, as all good sociologists should be... All the social sciences should become more interdisciplinary and are, because of the blending and overlapping of topical concerns, as well as the multidimensional nature of so many of our questions. In my little program here, I have come to see that soc. and anth. and comm. share many things and that the shrinking of the globe makes all three disciplines more interdependent. It sometimes seems like it is our bibliographies (or put otherwise, canonical readings) that differentiate us. That's fodder for a joke, I'm sure... How about a joke? My psych colleague told me this. Rene Descartes walks into a bar and sits down. The bartender asks him "would you like a snifter of brandy tonight Rene?" Descartes replies "I think not" - ***poof*** he disappears.... I'll keep listening in. Brian -- Dr. Brian L. Rich, Asst. Professor of Sociology Transylvania University 300 N. Broadway Lexington, KY 40508-1797 phone: 606/233-8191 fax: 606/233-8797 From dassbach@mtu.edu Fri Feb 20 13:54:05 1998 From: "Carl H.A. Dassbach" To: Subject: Lets be frank... Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 16:02:52 -0500 boundary="----=_NextPart_000_013C_01BD3E19.005F6C00" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_013C_01BD3E19.005F6C00 charset="iso-8859-1" I don't mean to be offensive just brutally honest - In my opinion, Marx's 37 so-called moral imperatives strike me as patronizing, condescending, to a certain extent insulting and way "off the mark." This isn't practical information or advice, its idealized disinformation about the sanctity of the discipline of sociology, the pureness and holiness of the endeavor and the importance of merit over connections. What aspiring sociologists need is not a set of moral imperatives but warnings about the "down and dirty" nature of academia and the highly politicized nature of the discipline as a profession. My advice to to aspiring (non-tenured) sociologists takes the form of 7 practical suggestions for survival in the academic jungle. 1. Trust no one. 2. Shut your mouth 3. Be nice. 4. Kiss the asses that should be kissed and step on whoever you can, whenever and wherever you can. 5. Network and be an insider. 6. Do quantitative criminology or whatever else is "hot" at the moment. 7. Write the same article at least 5 times, each time with a different title and a slightly different spin. Am I bitter - not at all. All I can say is that those who do this seem to get somewhere (however you define "somewhere"- salary, professional recognition, administrative positions, etc.) in this profession/discipline and those who don't, don't. I don't do this, in fact, I can't - this behavior is antithetical to everything I believe in and stand for (some of us are still trapped in the 1960s). Besides, even if you win this rat race, you're still a rat. --------------------------- Carl H.A. Dassbach DASSBACH@MTU.EDU Dept. of Social Sciences (906)487-2115 - Phone Michigan Technological Univ. (906)487-2468 - Fax Houghton, MI 49931 (906)482-8405 - Private ------=_NextPart_000_013C_01BD3E19.005F6C00 name="Carl H.A Dassbach.vcf" filename="Carl H.A Dassbach.vcf" BEGIN:VCARD VERSION:2.1 N:Dassbach;Carl;H.A FN:Carl H.A Dassbach ORG:Dept. of Social Sciences TEL;WORK;VOICE:(906)487-2115 TEL;HOME;VOICE:(906)482-8405 TEL;WORK;FAX:(906)487-2468 ADR;WORK;ENCODING=3DQUOTED-PRINTABLE:;;Michigan Tech. = Univ.=3D0D=3D0A1400 Townsend Drive;Houghton;MI;49931;USA LABEL;WORK;ENCODING=3DQUOTED-PRINTABLE:Michigan Tech. = Univ.=3D0D=3D0A1400 Townsend Drive=3D0D=3D0AHoughton, MI = 49931=3D0D=3D0AU=3D SA ADR;HOME:;;500 Quincy St.;Houghton;MI;49931;USA LABEL;HOME;ENCODING=3DQUOTED-PRINTABLE:500 Quincy St.=3D0D=3D0AHoughton, = MI 49931=3D0D=3D0AUSA EMAIL;PREF;INTERNET:dassbach@mtu.edu REV:19980220T210250Z END:VCARD ------=_NextPart_000_013C_01BD3E19.005F6C00-- From scheff@sscf.ucsb.edu Fri Feb 20 14:44:47 1998 Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 13:44:29 -0800 (PST) From: Tom Scheff To: PSN-Seminars Subject: Comment Gary, I found your 37 suggestions stimulating. But also confusing, because there are so many, and because some of them argue both sides: what to do about runaway disciplinarity? Embrace and reject it? How can one do both? Could you condense your suggestions to the most important three or four? Tom Thomas J. Scheff, Professor Emeritus Dept of Sociology, UCSB, Santa Barbara, CA. 93105 Phone 805 893 3510 Fax 805 893 3324 Web http://sscf.ucsb.edu/~scheff/scheff.html From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Fri Feb 20 17:47:44 1998 Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 17:47:41 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Listserv blues are over :) Yes, from now on, just send your mail to psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Best, Martha *************************************************************************** Martha E. Gimenez Department of Sociology Campus Box 327 University of Colorado at Boulder Boulder, Colorado 80309 Voice: 303-492-7080 Fax: 303-492-5105 From TODonoghue@aol.com Fri Feb 20 20:52:52 1998 From: TODonoghue@aol.com by imo23.mx.aol.com (IMOv12/Dec1997) id GOIZa16600 Date: Fri, 20 Feb 1998 22:52:31 EST To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: Lets be frank... Hi Everybody, Carl Dassbach has a point! He is honest and the truth hurts. Leadership is absent in Sociology, or at least what is seen seems uninspiring. A couple of sessions in Toronto that needed direction were packed full with "names," not necessarily the most qualified; it is so disappointing! The culture of ASA and American sociology are awash with, to use Carl's crude term, "asskissing." BTW, good to see Tom Scheff and Earl Babbie get into the trenches with the foot soldiers on these bulletin boards: perhaps there is hope. Tim O'Donoghue. From babbie@chapman.edu Sat Feb 21 07:22:00 1998 Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 06:22:03 -0800 To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu From: Earl Babbie Subject: Re: Lets be frank... At 22:52 2/20/98 EST, Tim O'Donoghue wrote: >Carl Dassbach has a point! He is honest and the truth hurts. In thirty or so years as a sociologist and ASA member, I think I've experienced all the ills Carl detailed, and my first-hand and second-hand experience tell me they're still afoot in the land of sociology. I agree that his comments are honest and accurate--and it really hurts. What was missing for me in Carl's message was that it's not completely that way. My closest friends are sociologists (I currently teach in a department where an attack on one of us is unconditionally an attack on all of us, no questions asked), the most exciting thoughts I think are sociological, and I am still convinced that sociology is an idea whose time has come. I believe our species has survived about as long as it can without using sociology to the fullest. This is not to deny for a moment the accuracy of Carl's comments. The question is, which kind of sociology will prevail? How can we determine which will prevail? OMIGOD! That sounds like a question of social change. Wait! That sounds suscipiously sociological. I would suggest the first thing we know about such matters is that going into agreement with the inevitability of the "bad sociology" is to make it more real. As an alternative, I think we should focus on the kind of sociology we want--and shift the general agreement more in that direction. I think that was the spirit of Gary's original remarks, and I'm interested in hearing others' visions for the "good sociology." Earl ----------------------------------------------------------- kth Law of CyberSpace: We are all, as individuals, in over our heads. ----------------------------------------------------------- Earl Babbie Tel: 714-997-6565 babbie@chapman.edu Fax: 714-281-6213 http://www.chapman.edu/wilkinson/socsci/sociology/Faculty/Babbie/ From mwtyrrel@ccs.carleton.ca Sat Feb 21 09:14:54 1998 Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 11:21:54 -0500 From: "Marc W.D. Tyrrell" To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: academic lives and meaning (fwd) This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------D8C19E0BA3D4FF7640402659 Hello All, I thought that I should follow through on Gary's questions. By way of an introduction, my name is Marc Tyrrell, and I am a PhD Candidate (ABD) at Carleton University (Ottawa, Canada). > what are your goals? At an immediate level, to find a position where I will be able to follow my research interests. > why do you study sociology? Several other people have commented on the growing interdisciplinary nature of social science, and this is quite apparent in my own program (we are a combined sociology/anthropology department). Why sociology? Where else can you study questions of both immediate relevance and also, at the same time, study long term processes? > beyond the obvious questions such as, "will I find a job" or be able to > change jobs?", what are the major concerns you have about work life? waht > the major tensions or unresolved issues that you think most about? Primarily, I want to be in a position to inspire students. Okay, corny but it is true. I have taught several courses now, and watching the expressions of people go from boredom to fascination and a drive to find out more is an incredible reward. Probably the major concern I have, and this is conditioned by the institutional environment I am operating in, is the lack of institutional support for innovative teaching, research and program development. > do you know the difference between the disipline and the profession? Certainly, and in many ways I echo Carl Dassbach's condemnation of the "reality" of the situation. > where do you think you will be in your career five years from now? ten? Unknown. I know where I want to be, teaching at a smaller institution. I suspect that I will not be in Canada, since the options right now are highly limited. > have you identified types of work, questions or persons that you would > like t, or do, emulate in your research and life? This is really a multi-faceted question. As far as types of work are concerned, I would place myself pretty squarely in the mold of the old (circa 1920's) Chicago school. As far as exemplars are concerned, I would have to say that I associate with Malinowski, Harrold Innis, and Wm Foote Whyte. > if you were independently wealthy would you still be seeking, or continue > a career in sociology? what if you knew you had only ten years to left to > live? five? one? Yup. It is a question of vocation. > what upsets you most about being a graduate student or a begining > assistant professor? what gives you the most plealsure? Probably the most upsetting condition is the lack of institutional support coupled with an atmosphere where the search for problems outweighs the search for opportunities by 10 to 1. On the whole, I tend to get the most pleasure out of the teaching I have done, and the ongoing work I do with a variety of students and some faculty. This is probably a long enough post for now. More later . Marc --------------D8C19E0BA3D4FF7640402659 begin: vcard fn: Marc W.D. Tyrrell n: Tyrrell;Marc W.D. org: Dept. of Soc/Anth, Carleton University email;internet: mwtyrrel@ccs.carleton.ca title: PhD Candidate x-mozilla-cpt: ;0 x-mozilla-html: TRUE version: 2.1 end: vcard --------------D8C19E0BA3D4FF7640402659-- From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Sat Feb 21 11:46:25 1998 Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 11:46:23 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: meaning and academic lives (fwd) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 09:58:11 -0800 (PST) From: gary marx To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: meaning and academic lives I repeat below what I wrote yesterday and will hope to send more today. My response to messages up to 2/27 at 5pm est apparently did not get through (this is complicated by having 4 email addresses in 3 geographical places, with as they say, an ambuilatory "meat space" --none of which we are told is supposed to matter in the great "meet" space of the coming age after modernism. Carole Black hesitates to jump in--but go for it. If you don't who will? In this case there is nothing to lose but a little time. Writing helps us to see where we are and what we are about, even if it is tentative. Implied in this means of communication is more informality and fewer expectations of a finished product. Re the difference between cultural anthro and soc its a bit like looking at the earth from the moon and trying to distinguish Paris, Texas from Paris, France--you can do it if you look close enough (and then the differences may seem great) but it is a struggle from afar and then you don't know a whole lot more once you have done it. I prefer to think of what I do as "social studies" which can incorporate quantitative and qualitative studies and cultural, social and political dimensions. It is all so interwined that the distinctions are minor in the grander scheme of things. Look to the 19th century where the great thinkers thought about issues and intellectual and social problems and didn't worry about somewhat arbitrary and accidental discipline boundaries and their sometimes even more rigid internal doctrinal and methodological borders. Go for the ideas (and with gusto) and you will learn more and be more understood and appreciated by your relatives and wider audiences. The main difference between cultural anthro and sociology (of the more interpretive sort) are social structural and interactional. What is shared is much greater than what separates. They are different groups like rival guilds. I find it troubling to see how much energy gets wasted worrying about disciplinary purity. I have sat through too many faculty metings in which the disciplinary patriotism and purity of colleagues are examined. The line is "yes, this is good work, but is this person "really" a sociologist?" However what is good for the soul and for broad understanding may not be good for your career in the short run. I think Carol is correct that the trend is toward interdisciplinarity, but this won't be a quick revolution and the disciplines will hang on. They are more likely to implode than to be done in by administrative fiat. Re poetry Professor Richard Brown of Maryland and Laurel Richardson of Ohio State have written thoughtfully on these matters. I used the poetry sentence to symbolize an artistic approach more generally and did not mean to restrict it just to that form. I don't find it personally rewarding to be a one-trick pony and I feel bad that the disciplines in lock-step with the specialization process are ever more restrictive (and even where there is tolerance for lots of flowers, one is expected to carry one kind and not a mixed boquet). I hope Carol will continue to write poetry and not give up. But also don't necessarily compartmentalize this, but reflect on it as a social form with correlates to be either analyzed, or to be used in sociological communication. Re following your muse vs. playing the game. That is always a tricky issue. It is easy for privileged people with tenure to give advice. In the 60s we never had to worry because there were so few new PhDs and so many jobs (relatively speaking). I think one needs a balance and you do have to smell the coffee even if for health reasons you don't drink it. One strategy is to play along until you get tenure and then be true to your intellectual beliefs and feelings. My former fellow graduate student Earl Babbie whose contributions to bringing sociological ideas to wider audiences I value, comments on the issue of writing vs. teaching. I think this is partly a style issue. Some of us need face to face contact and immediate interaction (and for professiorial types, validation) others can hide away and just write, confident that what they do will matter to others they never see, or not caring very much because writing is so personal and an effort to figure it out for one's self. I find it easier to defer gratification and just write, although I do like to dribble out published pieces rather than having the surprise imact of a new book. I also would like to believe that I the audience response has become less important with age and the thing as an end in itself more important. Re one of the questions I asked, I would write even if I could retire and if I knew that my life would end soon. What I admire in others is the ability to sustain the passion, whether for teaching, research or applying sociological ideas. As an observer of the academic scene for almost 4 decades, what I find saddest is not the mistaken directions I think the field often takes or the damage from undue politicization, but the lack of caring and the burning-out that many demonstrate over time. This relates to Brett Johnson's question about is there a place for teachers vs. researchers. Of course, in fact given current trends in the states one might ask the opposite question. Social resarch (apart from that of a very applied nature) might become just a hobbyist's activity as it was in much of the 19th Century. Will researchers who have been indirectly subsidized by their institutions have a role in an age of distanced learning and the increased bureaucratization of the academy via managment by objectives and the exploitation of part-time teachers? A few basic facts that one doesn't see in busy research universities as a graduate student. Most sociologists are in teaching settings. Most PhDs regardless of fields do not write much beyond their PhDs, in social fields most of those who write an article or book do not go on to write a second or third etc. What I think matters is that one brings a sense of craft and honesty and hopefully if it doesn't sound too corny, even love, to the task, regardless of whether it is teaching, applying or researching. One issue is just quantitative.There are a bit over 100 PhD granting schools for sociology in the U.S. and more than 3000 institutions of higher learning. There are not enough research settings to go around. For what its worth, if I had to choose the most satisfying aspects of my career, it would be the lives touched through teaching. But it takes work and YOU have to go out of your way to stay in touch with your former students. Also one can to a degree shift the emphasis from teaching and research over time and then back again. One can also use research ideas in teaching. So I would say to Brett that if teaching works for you terrific. You are fortunate. The time to worry and to wonder if this is the right activity for you is when none of it works. Gary T. Marx home page: ://socsci.colorado.edu/~marxg/garyhome.html From scheff@sscf.ucsb.edu Sat Feb 21 12:02:21 1998 Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 11:02:14 -0800 (PST) From: Tom Scheff To: Gary Marx on Aspiring Sociologists Subject: Re: Lets be frank... Earl, My view of the good sociology emphasizes interdisciplinarity, as in many of the responses here. But I would go further toward the creation of an integrated social science, with sociology merging with the other disciplines. Particularly, incorporating psychology. I think that social science without psychology is a empty husk. A connection with psychology is particularly important to those of you who want to be good teachers. Undergraduates do not share the absurd prejudice that most social scientists have. They want to understand their own lives, as well as their society. I have always used psychological understanding as a path toward understanding social structures. Tom Thomas J. Scheff, Professor Emeritus Dept of Sociology, UCSB, Santa Barbara, CA. 93105 Phone 805 893 3510 Fax 805 893 3324 Web http://sscf.ucsb.edu/~scheff/scheff.html From glenn@sobek.Colorado.EDU Sat Feb 21 13:10:03 1998 Sat, 21 Feb 1998 13:09:59 -0700 (MST) Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 13:09:58 -0700 (MST) From: Glenn Muschert To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: inadequacy, Star Wars, Hello colleagues, I'm very pleased to participate in the virtual seminar. Thank you to Gary Marx for hosting it, and for making his papers available to us all. Also, thanks to Martha Gimenez, who has been the force of production behind PSN. I am four years into my graduate career in sociology, with two years yet to go. I am now attempting to make the transition, it seems successfully, from being a student sociologist to professional sociologist. The most remarkable thing I have learned in the past year or so, has not been academic, but it has involved my personal approach to conducting research. My insight is this: It's not necessary to be outrageously intelligent to do good work. There is no substitute for consistently engaging your research material, and the better part of producing good scholarship is commitment, perserverance. Sure, we happen upon interesting findings serendipitously, but chance favors those who are prepared. At least that's what Pasteur said, and he ought to know. Realizing this has made me more patient with myself and my work. I can see that sooner or later things will pan out, as long as I engage my material consistently. Anything worth having in life is worth committing to. I used to feel a sense of inadeqauacy, feeling that others were just more intelligent than I am. That caused me to work hard, but always approaching things as if I were trying to dig my way out of a hole. This is not an issue any more, I am thankful. Perhaps this is something that every new scholar has to tackle before s/he can produce. After all, before every creative act, one must confront oneself, and this is not any easy task. But having good mentors can also be instrumental in helping junior scholars through this. The better my relationships become with my mentors, the better able I am to do my work. After all, scholarship is not an individual act; it emerges out of a field. It has astonished me how much variance I observe in professors' attitudes towards students and the research. Some are simply jerks, whom students and colleagues ignore. I don't want to talk about them. But I do want to mention that professors seem to take on a wide variety of roles. This is where literature comes in to play, because in real life we act out mythical roles. Choose any story, and you will be able to find interesting parallels between the events and characters in the story, and those in real life. And which real person fills which role changes depending on whom you ask. Let's look at Star Wars characters and sociology: + Some people play Ben Kenobi, the wizened sage who teaches the youngster the ways of the force. Of course, remember that he takes the hit and goes down, a self-sacrifice to prevent evil from taking over. + Some people play Darth Vader, the voice of the dark side, corruption. His voice is metallic, and his breathing mechanical. But don't forget that his methods are extremely powerful. Who wouldn't like ocasionally to have the ability to choke others from afar? + Han Solo, the rogue, the C. Wright Mills character. He tries to act like he doesn't care, is self-interested, but he can't help but get caught in the good fight. + Luke Skywalker, the bright-eyed youth, clutching his light-sabre in the desire to save the galaxy. He doesn't know what the force is, but he can feel it when he closes his eyes. + Princess Lea, leader of the rebel alliance. Let's face it, in real life she would have been crushed along with Skywalker and Han Solo in the trash compactor in the death star. That is, she'd have an adjunct position at North West Territories Community College. + Chewbacca, the fuzzy thing. No one, except the rogue can understand what it says, but we all know it's on the side of the "good guys." + Jabba the Hut, gets all the grants, enslaves the leader of the rebel alliance, and keeps spitting out disgusting material, which his pandering apostles keep eating up. + Lando Calrissian, sells out his friends to the highest bidder, who is either the evil empire or Colt 45, whoever gets to him first. Then he feels bad about it, and saves his friend who has been freeze-dried. + Yoda, lives in some god-forsaken place, talks funny, has funny mannerisms, but somehow has developed an exquisite understanding of the force. Young Jedis seek him out wherever he may be. But if he's so smart, then how come no one else knows about him? + C3PO, the droid, overly concerned with issues of protocol. A real bureaucratic insider. He gets blown up, then put back together by Chewbacca. + R2D2, the other droid, who is happy to go around speaking a language which no one else understands, doing calculations in his head. + The Ewoks, little creatures who fight hard and make fun music. Our undergraduate students. + The Emperor, as word on the streets has it, Talcott Parsons, but no one is sure - they've never actually read his work. That is, at least not since C. Wright Mills wrote about it. See what I mean? Before I go on, I should admit that I see myself as a composite of Han Solo, Lando Calrissian, R2D2 and C3PO. It took me until my second year of graduate school to understand what sociology is, and even now I have a hard time to articulate that understanding. There is a wide variablility among sociologists, in terms of how they see their roles. We observe cynics and optimists, and everywhere in between. Glenn Glenn W. Muschert Department of Sociology University of Colorado at Boulder Campus Box 327 Boulder, CO 80309-0327 U.S.A. voice: 303.492.1415 email: glenn@sobek.colorado.edu WWW URL: http://socsci.colorado.edu/~glenn/home.html From glenn@sobek.Colorado.EDU Sat Feb 21 13:11:01 1998 Sat, 21 Feb 1998 13:10:54 -0700 (MST) Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 13:10:54 -0700 (MST) From: Glenn Muschert To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: re: one of Gary's questions No, I don't understand the difference between the discipline and the profession. Can you explain that, Gary? Glenn Glenn W. Muschert Department of Sociology University of Colorado at Boulder Campus Box 327 Boulder, CO 80309-0327 U.S.A. voice: 303.492.1415 email: glenn@sobek.colorado.edu WWW URL: http://socsci.colorado.edu/~glenn/home.html From MARXGARY@WWIC.SI.EDU Sat Feb 21 13:59:47 1998 Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 15:57:06 -0500 From: GARY MARX To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: meaning and academic lives Tom Scheff notes that there may be too many suggestions and that some are conflict. I certainly plead guilty. I admit to often being dazzled by the world and its richness and variety and to casting very broad and inclusive nets so as not to miss anything and because empirical examples are very satisfying in their concreteness (one of the secrets of Goffman's enduring appeal). I often do my sociology via lists (as with a current paper on anonymity in computer and other forms of communication which I would be glad to send to anyone). I began with a list of situations in which it was valued or not valued and just thought about them and looked for patterns. In generating a forceful and graspable arguement a lot can get lost because the level of abstraction forces us to leave too much out. On the other hand data without concepts and theory are like jello without a mold. Erving Goffman once said something like that for a nickle and a good theory you could buy a cup of coffee. It might take $2.00 today but the point is clear. I imagine that if I had to I could prioritize the suggestions and that there may be a few master themes running throughout --with going back and reviewing I would stress honesty, scholarship, integrity, sharing, civility, skepticism but not overwhelming cynicism, humility, breadth, persistence, a life outside of your work. But there I am again with too many. Part of the difference may again just be one of style and suggests why we need many types of sociologists. I'm more comfortable offering lots of ideas and have found that my shotgun rather than laser approach is most likely to get students involved and to be provocative. I also would justify what can correclty be seen as a failure to follow through and sometimes probaboly sloppyness by the need for a division of labor and I prefer the kind of breadth the article offers to what may seem to be a more artificial and constricted pairing down to a set of highly integrated ideas. In addition since the article does not purport to explain anything I think conflict in ideas and failure to closely link them is more acceptable. Finally let me offer strong agreement with Tom's call for an integrated social science that attends to persons. As one who has studied or worked with Goffman, Turner, Seeman, the Langs and Roger Brown and Stanley Milgram the need is great. Yet two caveats. While as Tom says one can "use psychological understanding as a path toward understanding social structures" the reverse must be true as well. One soc. of knowledge reason sociologists shy away from the former is that it so easily causes us to be blind to the latter. There are also political reasons in that the former approach too easily leads into a denial of historica, cultural and social structural influences on behavior and subjectivity which ties too easily into a status quo enhancing world view in which social outcomes are always blamed only on individual actions. Tom asks what to do about runaway disciplinarity? That and some of the questions from others poses a good issue about being our brothers and sisters keepers. How far do we go with that when life is short and there is a lot to do? I recall as a student at Berkeley in the 60s feeling a strong need to change sociology. A Congressman who came to DC at about that time had more grandiose plans he wanted to change the world. Now he is content to go home at the end of the day with a little dignity. I hope that via writing example in might be slowed down. I also think there is a lurking functionalist argument in which if it gets too far removed and too serving only of the needs of the profession that it will weaken. The energy in the various interdisciplinary fields speaks loudly. I was glad to hear from Joseph Sullivan again. I enjoyed our discussions at the Easterns. That encounter illustrates how important it can be for graduate students to approach colleagues they don't know and begin conversations. It is important to reach out. Sometimes the person you approach may not respond appropriately but most of the time (academic egos being what they are and pretty undernourished in the U.S.) they will be flattered. Also you can offer them something either new information or questions or help them see they dont make as much sense as they think they do. Your warm description of your graduate group brought good memories and a question. What happens to that promised collegiality when we get out into the world. Where does it go? There is a great line in Sara Davidson's novel (can't recall the title but something like loose change). She moves from Berkeley to Columbia and asks a student "where do people hangout?" The question is met with disbelief and the student says something like "no one has time for that." I could suggest a few hypotheses for where it goes 1) the expanding demands of career and life beyond work don't permit it. there is little time for the joys of sociability apart from work and family. 2) competition sets in and there is a fear of either giving one's ideas away or a desire not to feel jealous of peers who may be doing better than you are 3) burnout and depression and the death of the dream. At any event Joseph captures one of the great joys of this line of work. You are a subsidized dreamer and honored for talkling and wondering. Nice work if you can get it and have the personality for it. Brian Rich raised all the right questions re why teach, can a long term academic career be meaningful, who do we work for and why? He felt he had satisfactory answers but now doesn't think so. But he neglects to tell us why not? what changed? why the doubts? I liked the Descartes joke. I would encourage you to try and make up jokes as well. Murray Davis in a fine book called "What's So Funny" does just that to illustrate his points about the sociology of humor. I have had students do that in my humor class (which at MIT was met with comments such as "so that's what you clowns do" and "you must be joking" and "are you kidding?." Question: "how many sociologists does it take to change a light bulb?" Answer: "that isn't funny." From MARXGARY@WWIC.SI.EDU Sat Feb 21 15:27:26 1998 Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 17:24:35 -0500 From: GARY MARX To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: academic lives and meaning I enjoyed reading the responses of LIsa Covi and Marc Tyrell. It sounds like you both are well situated in examining these issues. I don't know if Marc had work experience before entering graduate school but Lisa has clearly profited from her prior years in the work world in reflecting on this stuff. That reminded me of how much I got out of listening and talking to older graduate students as I was starting out. Carl Dassbach has a point as Tim O'Donoghue suggests. But in making it so rhetorically he may lose something in persuasiveness. Strong rhetoric works best when backed up by representative empirical examples and by well worked out logic. Certainly there is a negative side to the profession. But what field doesn't have this? Is it somehow worse in sociology or in the university than beyond? I don't think so. My paper was not offered as a photographic depiction of the ways of the field. It is an explicitly normative statement inspired by the fact that the field often falls so far short of what is desirable. I doubt that Carl would find it more acceptable to argue for the reverse of the 37 points. Realisim, down and dirty, hard ball and all the rest of the John Wayne, tell it like it is stuff has a surface, nitty gritty appeal in the face of the obfuscation that language and diplomacy can involve. But in my empirical experience most of his 7 practical suggestions (which are great as talking points) are exactly what one should do to NOT get tenure (being nice and networking are the exceptions). Even if they are college professors, colleagues are not stupid and most will see through such game playing. Trust, gradually dolled out is vital. Not opening your mouth conveys indifference or lack of understanding or lack of courage. What matters is how you speak out, not failing to speak. That is why civility and being a good listener is important to career success. I would say speak often, but carefully and with forethought, logic and evidence and try not to demonize opponents. Good talk is also a way of being noticed. Kiss assess and step on people (4) sounds inconsistent and again a way to not get tenure. The quantitativae tilt is there, but it is not all-defining. There are many outlets for non-quantiative types (and for those who prefer this method or whose problems can best be responded to using them this makes good sense). A lot depends on the setting. Try to find a job where your preferred methods are valued by your enivronment. That is if you have such a preference (I don't like or advocate the quan/qual choosing up sides), we ought to be defined by ideas and questions, not our methods and should use whatever we can to advance knowledge. The last thing you want to do is write the same article 5 times (or even 4, maybe two or three times if different aspects can be developed or audiences reached). Among the most common reasons for denying tenure today is the claim that "there is nothing really new here relative to the person's earlier work" and "this doesn't go beyond the thesis." Carl says that he is still trapped in the 1960s. But that legacy is varied and I view my suggestions as deeply rooted in my 60s experience as a student at Berkeley which imbued me with the idealism the article trys to express. I do not suggest that sociological insights, academic excellence, civility, hardwork and clean living will bring you fame and fortune and happiness or anything else. But they are ahead of amoral machiavellism, even if that may sometimes success (in the short run). From babbie@chapman.edu Sat Feb 21 18:10:11 1998 Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 13:37:36 -0800 To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu From: Earl Babbie Subject: Re: Lets be frank... At 11:02 2/21/98 -0800, Thomas Scheff wrote: >Earl, > >My view of the good sociology emphasizes interdisciplinarity, as in >many of the responses here. But I would go further toward the creation >of an integrated social science, with sociology merging with the other >disciplines. Particularly, incorporating psychology. I think that >social science without psychology is a empty husk. Tom, I've always felt (and said, sometimes unwisely) that most of the fields you are talking about (economics, poly sci, etc) are subfields of sociology. Although I mean that as the highest of compliments, they sometimes take it wrong. Psychology is more problematic for me than for you. I think we need to "link up" or "interface" but I think our fundamental paradigms preclude a merger. I know you've spoke and written on behalf of the merger, but I have trouble stretching my mind around that possibility. Earl PS: Gary says we were fellow graduate students; he neglects to say we were office-mates for a time. (Then he double-crossed us all by getting his degree and leaving.) ----------------------------------------------------------- kth Law of CyberSpace: We are all, as individuals, in over our heads. ----------------------------------------------------------- Earl Babbie Tel: 714-997-6565 babbie@chapman.edu Fax: 714-281-6213 http://www.chapman.edu/wilkinson/socsci/sociology/Faculty/Babbie/ From scheff@sscf.ucsb.edu Sat Feb 21 18:39:31 1998 Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 17:39:25 -0800 (PST) From: Tom Scheff To: Gary Marx on Aspiring Sociologists Subject: Re: meaning and academic lives Earl and Gary, Earl: If it is any consolation, I am not thinking of merger with psychology as it actually exists in psychology and psychiatry departments. I think most of what they do is sterile. Rather a psychology composed of the best thinking and research in academic and clinical work, especially in the last thirty years. Gary: Telling me about concrete examples is preaching to the converted. My last three books have been about generating theory using concrete examples, systematically. I was also Goffman's student, but I find fault with his dismissal of theory. I think he was unable to develop a theory because he didn't really get into his examples, they were under-analyzed. He was starting to move toward analyzing examples in his last book. If he hadn't died young, I think he would have come to have more respect for theory. Tom Thomas J. Scheff, Professor Emeritus Dept of Sociology, UCSB, Santa Barbara, CA. 93105 Phone 805 893 3510 Fax 805 893 3324 Web http://sscf.ucsb.edu/~scheff/scheff.html From mwtyrrel@ccs.carleton.ca Sun Feb 22 08:29:16 1998 Date: Sun, 22 Feb 1998 10:36:21 -0500 From: "Marc W.D. Tyrrell" To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: academic lives and meaning This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------265A352551C8EBF7E2C03D6B --------------DF70D5A14D08F86FB5B60AEC Hi Folks, GARY MARX wrote: > I enjoyed reading the responses of Lisa Covi and Marc Tyrell. It sounds > like you both are well situated in examining these issues. I don't know if > Marc had work experience before entering graduate school but Lisa has > clearly profited from her prior years in the work world in reflecting on > this stuff. That reminded me of how much I got out of listening and talking > to older graduate students as I was starting out. I must admit that I get a lot out of it too. Gary wondered if I had work experience before entering graduate school, and I thought that it would be worthwhile to go into that for a bit. In many ways, I am one of those people who went to university too early (17)... I ended up droping out after my third year because I was too interetsed and involved in politics. For the next six years I worked in retail, ran a theatre company, performed as a singer, and ran a games company. In between my MA and my PhD, I worked as a recruiter for a temp agency, and I have been doing contract work for various government departments during the PhD. In many ways, grad school has been similar to the life style I had in the theatre and in the gaming company (I ran both at the same time). Certainly the collegiality with other grad students and with a number of the faculty have been reminiscent, although I have sometimes found the artificiality of the disciplinary boundaries to be quite frustrating. As Gary noted I find it troubling to see how much energy gets wasted worrying about disciplinary purity. I have sat through too many faculty metings in which the disciplinary patriotism and purity of colleagues are examined. The line is "yes, this is good work, but is this person "really" a sociologist?" I have noted that the sense of disciplinary purity seems to reach the taboo point if any discussion of biological reality is brought up. As Tom noted, A connection with psychology is particularly important to those of you who want to be good teachers. Undergraduates do not share the absurd prejudice that most social scientists have. They want to understand their own lives, as well as their society. I have always used psychological understanding as a path toward understanding social structures. While I readily understand the reticence to engage in questions of biology, the legacy of simplistic biological reductionism being what it is, I really do have to wonder about some people's commitment to the "quest for knowledge". Let me illustrate this with a simple example. At the 1996 ASA meetings, I was at a roundtable on the sociology of emotions. An acquaintance of mine from Salzburg had just presented his paper and one of the participants was asking him if he felt that people became socialized to certain aspects of high engagement sports. My colleague looked a little confused, so I asked the questioner if he meant did people get addicted to a norepinephrin rush?, a question which was supported by my colleague. There was silence at the table for about 15 seconds, as if I had asked people if they liked to molest babies, then the topic changed. My colleague and I looked at each other and shrugged. In this instance, "disciplinary purity" was an excuse for ignorance. After that experience, I had to ask myself how can people understand social structures if they don't understand people? BTW, the primary reason I actually got into the area is because I am studying the outplacement ("career transition") industry and the emotional reactions to being fired are a core part of the industry. While I can agree with Gary's comment that "... what is good for the soul and for broad understanding may not be good for your career in the short run", I still find the situation to be "objectionable" . Marc --------------DF70D5A14D08F86FB5B60AEC Hi Folks,

GARY MARX wrote:

I enjoyed reading the responses of Lisa Covi and Marc Tyrell. It sounds
like you both are well situated in examining these issues. I don't know if
Marc had work experience before entering graduate school but Lisa has
clearly profited from her prior years in the work world in reflecting on
this stuff. That reminded me of how much I got out of listening and talking
to older graduate students as I was starting out.
I must admit that I get a lot out of it too. Gary wondered if I had work experience before entering graduate school, and I thought that it would be worthwhile to go into that for a bit. In many ways, I am one of those people who went to university too early (17)... I ended up droping out after my third year because I was too interetsed and involved in politics. For the next six years I worked in retail, ran a theatre company, performed as a singer, and ran a games company. In between my MA and my PhD, I worked as a recruiter for a temp agency, and I have been doing contract work for various government departments during the PhD.

In many ways, grad school has been similar to the life style I had in the theatre and in the gaming company (I ran both at the same time). Certainly the collegiality with other grad students and with a number of the faculty have been reminiscent, although I have sometimes found the artificiality of the disciplinary boundaries to be quite frustrating. As Gary noted
 

     I find it troubling to see how much energy gets wasted worrying
    about disciplinary purity. I have sat through too many faculty metings in
    which the disciplinary patriotism and purity of colleagues are examined.
    The line is "yes, this is good work, but is this person "really" a
    sociologist?"
I have noted that the sense of disciplinary purity seems to reach the taboo point if any discussion of biological reality is brought up. As Tom noted,
 
    A connection with psychology is particularly important to those of you
    who want to be good teachers. Undergraduates do not share the absurd
    prejudice that most social scientists have. They want to understand their
    own lives, as well as their society. I have always used psychological
    understanding as a path toward understanding social structures.
While I readily understand the reticence to engage in questions of biology, the legacy of simplistic biological reductionism being what it is, I really do have to wonder about some people's commitment to the "quest for knowledge". Let me illustrate this with a simple example. At the 1996 ASA meetings, I was at a roundtable on the sociology of emotions. An acquaintance of mine from Salzburg had just presented his paper and one of the participants was asking him if he felt that people became socialized to certain aspects of high engagement sports. My colleague looked a little confused, so I asked the questioner if he meant did people get addicted to a norepinephrin rush?, a question which was supported by my colleague. There was silence at the table for about 15 seconds, as if I had asked people if they liked to molest babies, then the topic changed. My colleague and I looked at each other and shrugged.

In this instance, "disciplinary purity" was an excuse for ignorance. After that experience, I had to ask myself how can people understand social structures if they don't understand people? BTW, the primary reason I actually got into the area is because I am studying the outplacement ("career transition") industry and the emotional reactions to being fired are a core part of the industry. While I can agree with Gary's comment that "... what is good for the soul and for broad understanding may not be good for your career in the short run", I still find the situation to be "objectionable" <to put it mildly!>.

Marc
 
  --------------DF70D5A14D08F86FB5B60AEC-- --------------265A352551C8EBF7E2C03D6B begin: vcard fn: Marc W.D. Tyrrell n: Tyrrell;Marc W.D. org: Dept. of Soc/Anth, Carleton University email;internet: mwtyrrel@ccs.carleton.ca title: PhD Candidate x-mozilla-cpt: ;0 x-mozilla-html: TRUE version: 2.1 end: vcard --------------265A352551C8EBF7E2C03D6B-- From Markus.Wiemker@post.rwth-aachen.de Mon Feb 23 02:43:19 1998 Date: Sat, 21 Feb 1998 14:20:34 -0800 From: Markus Wiemker To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: Offtopic !Does anybody know an american or international mailing list for sociology? Sorry for offtopic!!! Does anybody know an american or international mailing list for sociology? Thanks Markus Wiemker Student of Media Sociology, Tutor RWTH Aachen, Germany From R.Miller@queens-belfast.ac.uk Mon Feb 23 04:27:16 1998 by fujin.qub.ac.uk (SMI-8.6/SMI-SVR4) id LAA07098; Mon, 23 Feb 1998 11:25:31 GMT From: Robert Miller To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: Offtopic !Does anybody know an american or international mailing list for sociology? Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 11:29:32 +0000 () On Sat, 21 Feb 1998 14:20:34 -0800 Markus Wiemker wrote: > Sorry for offtopic!!! > > Does anybody know an american or international mailing list for sociology? > > Thanks > > Markus Wiemker > Student of Media Sociology, Tutor > RWTH Aachen, Germany > > The European Sociological Association maintains an e-mail discussion list/bulleting board at: european-sociologist@mailbase.ac.uk To subscribe send the message: join european-sociologist yourfirstname yourlastname to: mailbase@mailbase.acuk ---------------------- Robert Miller R.Miller@queens-belfast.ac.uk From cgardne@iupui.edu Mon Feb 23 06:06:26 1998 Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 08:06:23 -0500 (EST) From: Carol B Gardner To: Gary Marx on Aspiring Sociologists Subject: Re: Offtopic !Does anybody know an american or international mailing list for sociology? b-h Dear Markus (& All): No, I don't know of such a list but (as a professor--OK, not the same thing as a Professor under the European system) would very much like this for information too, both for myself & for students who've asked. . . . So I second the query. Peace, Carol Carol Brooks Gardner Sociology/Indiana University--Indianapolis Indianapolis, IN 46202-5140 USA On Sat, 21 Feb 1998, Markus Wiemker wrote: > Sorry for offtopic!!! > > Does anybody know an american or international mailing list for sociology? > > Thanks > > Markus Wiemker > Student of Media Sociology, Tutor > RWTH Aachen, Germany > > From MARXGARY@WWIC.SI.EDU Mon Feb 23 07:40:29 1998 Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 09:38:12 -0500 From: GARY MARX To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: academic lives and meaning Glenn Muschert asks what is the difference between the discipline and the profession. The profession refers to organized groups of sociologists such as the ASA. Whereas the discipline refers to the invisible cultural themes that help define what the field stands for and means to its' practitioners. The profession seeks to advance the interests of its members (or more properly of those who choose to participate, I think the majority of sociology PhDs do not join the ASA and less than 1/3 of those who do vote). While the ASA seeks to support research and academic freedom, many of its activities in advancing members' interests or political goals --such as through providing insurance and credit cards, space for the widest possible participation in the association's activities (while also considering the idea that sociologists be licensed), and fostering social change, have little to do with advancing knowledge. Over time the emphasis placed on the professional rather than the intellectual has become more pronounced. As one who is naturally suspicous of the greedy and hegemonic nature of organizations (which to exist must have borders based on cultural ideas of inclusion and exclusion and demand loyalty) because of allthe tendencies for power to perpetuate itself in the face of our lofty ideas, my allegiance is much more to the discipline and its guiding questions and ideas than to the profession. Intellectual independence is precious and too much involvement in the affairs of the profession may undercut that and may also serve as an alternative to doing one's academic work. Glenn's application of pop culture ala Stear Wars is much appreciated and exaclty the kind of thing I wish there were more of in sociology. The comparison of Han Solo to Mills also brought image of Bogart in Casa Blanca. If I ever teach a methods course again I will certainly do a unit on communicating sociology via popular culture and fiction and will attend to the use of analogies and metaphors. Glenn's point about intelligence is also well taken. We are not even sure what it is and it is obviously multi-dimensional and context specific. If you have managed to get through a four year school and have been admited to gradaute school and are succeeding there then it is likely you can succeed in the field in some form. Hard work and desire are central/ One can do little about inherited abilities anyway. But we are given the choice of how hard we work. Glenn is very honest in reporting that he used to feel that others were more intelligent. Perhaps some were. One of the dirty little secrets of starting out in the profession is that most people feel that way and those who are most arrogant and self-assured probably feel it most of all. The key is to be the best that you can be and to compare yourself to yourself and your own goals. Do you know more now than when your were a junior? than in your first year of graduate school? can you identity intellectual goals that you are moving toward --learning new methods, theories, languages, fields? Marc Tyrell's description of his work experiences suggests that he will do well in sociology because he brings a lot from his outside work to his current work. If one has both marginal and establishment jobs all the better! It also puts you in a special group who have been police officers or prison guards, in prison, ridden the rails, professional athletes, junior high school teachers etc. The wake up call and reality check that these experiences offer is vital in the face of our tendency to abstract out the ideal type aspects which necessarily damages the empirical richness. I have cleaned toilets and washed dishes, sold newspapers, breathed the chemicals of a furrier, camp counselor, worked in factories and on a farm and in retail sporting goods and clothes stores and been a traveling salesman. My parents required that I work my way through college as a character building device, although they could have easily paid my way. The work experience along with travel to Mexico and Guatemala and a later year spent traveling around the world close to the land and people (including going by land from Iran to Calcutta) sparked my sociological interests , an underdog awareness and triggered questions I still think about. This is part of the marginity I mentioned in the article. To keep fresh you need to keep breaking out of the familar. One way to do this as an academic is to teach in other places. But to make this happen you must seek out the chance for a semester or year teaching elsewhere. Marc says he understands the need for game playing but finds it distasteful. But life ain't like they tell you in Sunday school or civics text books. So what's an honest person to do? drop out and be a nonviolent Ted? No thanks. There is a great line in Woody Allen's latest film in which he says, "between the Pope and air conditioning, I'll take air conditioning." Devote one's life to social change? Perhaps, but most persons have neither the personality, nor the skills, nor the perserverance for that. As my children hovered between adolesence and adulthood with all the passion and confusion that may entail, I defined maturity for them as knowing when to compromise and when to hold out. I opt for fighting the big battles. As Sartre argues in "Dirty Hands" we are all guilty to a degree. Things are so intermngled that absolute purity is impossible. As with artists we have to draw the line somewhere and some modest degree of playing the game is probably necessary. The key is having a moral calculus that tells you when it is necessary to rock the boat or to just say no. From carrigja@uwec.edu Mon Feb 23 08:16:48 1998 Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 09:20:49 -0600 To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu From: Jacqueline Carrigan Subject: Re: Lets be frank... Being a first year assistant prof, I am losing my idealized vision of the profession quite quickly. Even though many sociologists tackle the cruel realities of the modern Capitalist system in their works, we are all still embedded in it. Academia and departments of sociology are not separate from the economy from which they emerge. As for the postindustrial era being a time for valuing theoretical knowledge, it is important to keep in mind that the knowledge that is valued is that which produced profit, because profit is still the motivating force in this society. Jackie Carrigan University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire At 10:52 PM 2/20/98 EST, you wrote: >Hi Everybody, > >Carl Dassbach has a point! He is honest and the truth hurts. Leadership is >absent in Sociology, or at least what is seen seems uninspiring. A couple of >sessions in Toronto that needed direction were packed full with "names," not >necessarily the most qualified; it is so disappointing! The culture of ASA and >American sociology are awash with, to use Carl's crude term, "asskissing." >BTW, good to see Tom Scheff and Earl Babbie get into the trenches with the >foot soldiers on these bulletin boards: perhaps there is hope. > >Tim O'Donoghue. > > From covi@crew.umich.edu Mon Feb 23 08:35:11 1998 id KAA09647; Mon, 23 Feb 1998 10:35:08 -0500 (EST) To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: Lets be frank... <3.0.1.32.19980223092049.0095e100@uwec.edu> Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 10:35:07 -0500 From: "Lisa M. Covi" As a postdoc on the job market, I wonder about the differences between being a sociologist in a business school differs from being a sociologist in a sociology department. I would imagine social science faculty may be more attuned the the limits and pitfalls of the profession because of their field of study than, for instance, computer scientists or chemists. I think that as in friendship, one must sometimes choose to overlook the faults of those we care about, I must necessarily overlook some of the limitations of faculty life if I want to participate in academic decision-making. However, I would rather be an independent scholar (Gross, 1982) than join a department that wants me to become someone that I don't respect. Lisa Covi University of Michigan Gross, Ronald. 1982. The Independent Scholar's Handbook. Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press. In message <3.0.1.32.19980223092049.0095e100@uwec.edu>, Jacqueline Carrigan writes: >Being a first year assistant prof, I am losing my idealized vision of the >profession quite quickly. Even though many sociologists tackle the cruel >realities of the modern Capitalist system in their works, we are all still >embedded in it. Academia and departments of sociology are not separate >from the economy from which they emerge. As for the postindustrial era >being a time for valuing theoretical knowledge, it is important to keep in >mind that the knowledge that is valued is that which produced profit, >because profit is still the motivating force in this society. > >Jackie Carrigan >University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire From JS8852@cnsvax.albany.edu Mon Feb 23 08:45:06 1998 From: JS8852@cnsvax.albany.edu id <01ITWYD2OGV88YC3MV@cnsvax.albany.edu> for PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu; Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 10:44:09 -0500 (EST) Subject: Moral Calculus To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Joseph Sullivan, 5th year, SUNY-Albany here... Gary: What I, and others in my social network, like most about your Moral Imperatives essay is that the imperatives present us with a sustained framework that we can use to think about and discuss our relationship to both the profession and discipline of sociology. Many of the imperatives are challenging. Many of the imperatives promote a variety of border crossings, some intellectual, some professional, some political, some cultural etc. Border crossings can be dangerous my friend, you know that very well. So we trust our hearts sometimes but sometimes our hearts lead us to truths that, if voiced, do sound like cannonshots in quiet rooms. So speaking truth to power is always a situation where (if I have read your essay and comments here carefully enough to understand them) a degree of voluntarism is necessary and present. Common characteristics of my lunch bunch: All of my graduate student friends share some common characteristics. They are all concerned about contemporary historical and therefore social dilemma's. This is good because it produces the passion necessary to sustain the development of a career in a profession where monetary security and accompanying rewards are postponed for most of one's life. And most of us have a strong sense that we are not satisfied with the ways in which our particular sociological interests are either being treated or ignored by contemporary sociology, which as you stated in your last contribution to the list, includes a lot of nested organizational power. The rare breed: Over the past few years I have learned many, many things about the discipline and the profession. Given how I constructed an ideal type of graduate student who is politically passionate, I've watched myself and others make what could have been major public relations blunders if not for the a mutually shared understanding that debate is crucial to the well being of the discipline. Now I should tell you all that I've been getting called down to the principal's office all of my life, crackling loudspeakers have proclaimed, "Will Joseph Sullivan please report to the office, Joseph Sullivan report to the office." After most of these occasions I get a good nights sleep because I've felt I was involved in 'the right thing.' For instance, during two separate job interviews for adjunct jobs, I've spoken up about some of my key theoretical frameworks and background assumptions regarding some 'touchy' sociological themes and areas. I walked out of both of those interviews with a strong sense that there was no way I'd get hired and in both cases I got hired and in one particular case the discussion got a little testy. But here is where power and professional civility intersect. The rare breed invites open discussion and debate, sometimes passionate, and then transcends political disputes with invitations to lunch or coffee. I've met a few of these rare breeds and I want to be one. Humility and a good sense of humor are so critical during the social process of learning when and where to speak up or shut up. Foot goes into mouth, crisis management looms, remember to invite someone new into your social circle, especially at professional conferences that we attend to primarily get together with old friends in between meetings and paper presentations. Big mistake: Gary and I have mentioned to the list that we met each other at the Easterns in Boston a few years ago. Gary was presenting a paper at a panel that interested me and I introduced myself during the mulling about period after the presentation. We walked out of the room together chatting and then split up, I walked outside the hotel to smoke and as I walked along I noticed Gary in a coffee shop sitting at a table by himself. Rather than put my cigarette out and go into the coffee shop and request some professional company and cordiality I passed by. That was of course before I read the moral imperatives. Joseph Sullivan From dassbach@mtu.edu Mon Feb 23 08:51:50 1998 From: "Carl H.A. Dassbach" To: Subject: E-mail problems. Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 11:00:51 -0500 charset="iso-8859-1" Some type of problem occurred between my server and local computer and, as a consequence, I have been unable to fully read or reply to e-mails. I did see that my posting "lets be frank" evoked some responses but I did not fully read these or any other messages sent to me. Are we archiving these messages? If so, where? If anyone has sent me messages, would they please resend them. My apologies. Carl Dassbach --------------------------- Carl H.A. Dassbach DASSBACH@MTU.EDU Dept. of Social Sciences (906)487-2115 - Phone Michigan Technological Univ. (906)487-2468 - Fax Houghton, MI 49931 (906)482-8405 - Private From myersc@okway.okstate.edu Mon Feb 23 09:20:44 1998 From: myersc@okway.okstate.edu Date: Mon, 23 Feb 98 10:19:53 -0600 To: Subject: PSN Messages When I receive mail from the list it is a forward therefore there is no originating address information. May I request that members include their email address in their message in case we would like to make a private reply or request? Christina Myers CMIS Team- GRA Department of Sociology Oklahoma State University myersc@okway.okstate.edu From mwtyrrel@ccs.carleton.ca Mon Feb 23 10:26:26 1998 Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 12:32:30 -0500 From: "Marc W.D. Tyrrell" To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Re: academic lives and meaning This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------93FC173D0338DB6F2B555AB9 --------------43DAFE805BC801C4C8A400EA Hi Folks, GARY MARX wrote: > Marc Tyrell's description of his work experiences suggests that he will > do well in sociology because he brings a lot from his outside work to his > current work. If one has both marginal and establishment jobs all the > better! It also puts you in a special group who have been police officers > or prison guards, in prison, ridden the rails, professional athletes, junior > high school teachers etc. The wake up call and reality check that > these experiences offer is vital in the face of our tendency to abstract > out the ideal type aspects which necessarily damages the empirical > richness. I hope so . Anyway, you'r point about reality checks is well taken. When I was doing most of my fieldwork several years ago, I found myself shifting back and forth between outplacement offices and our department. I always found it informative that the time I spent at the outplacement offices was "upbeat", optimistic and hopeful. Always looking for opportunities, and very "collegial" (i.e. sharing experiences, job leads, stories, etc.). Most of my time in the department was "downbeat", pessimistic, and without hope. Always looking for the problems and trying to deal with the effects of restructing (e.g. we have lost 10 faculty in the last three years with no replacements and an increased student enrolment) and the lack of resources. While the collegiality was very high amongst some of the faculty, many of the others were introverted and "living in an illusion". It was definately a "learning experience" . > [snip] This is part of the marginity I mentioned in the article. To keep > fresh you need to keep breaking out of the familar. One way to do this as > an academic is to teach in other places. But to make this happen you > must seek out the chance for a semester or year teaching elsewhere. Maybe we should look at creating sociological "fieldschools" modeled on those in archaeology. I can just see the advertisments right now... Sociological Fieldwork Opportunities in Samana, the Dominican Republic The Department of Sociology is pleased to announce the creation of a fieldschool in the Dominican Republic. Students will engage in a variety of research situations ranging from tourism studies (co-sponsored by the Gan Bahia Hotel), to development issues (co-sponsored by the town council of Samana), to ethnographic studies 9co-sponsored with the Department of Anthropology). 53.330 3cr Introduction to Tourism Research 3 weeks; cost US$850 May 5th - 26th 53.331 3cr Intermediate Tourism Research 3 weeks; cost US$850 May 27th - June 17th 53.340 3cr Development Issues I 3 weeks; cost US$850 June 18th - July 9th 53.341 3cr Development Issues II 3 weeks; cost US$850 July 10th - July 31st 53.440 6cr Advanced Topics in Development 6 weeks; cost US$1700 June 18th - July 31st 56.440 6cr Etnographic Research 6 weeks; cost US$1700 May 5th - June 17th For more information, contact the Department of Sociology > Marc says he understands the need for game playing but finds it > distasteful. But life ain't like they tell you in Sunday school or civics text > books. So what's an honest person to do? drop out and be a nonviolent > Ted? No thanks. True, which is why I chose the word "distasteful". Dropping out isn't an option, per se, but being able to recognize the existence of a game and the necessity of playing it doesn't mean that the game has to be internalized as the "goal". I suspect that I use the concept of "distaste" as a way of not interiorising games I do not wish to be involved with. Then again, that doesn't mean that we shouldn't learn how to play them, and to play them well [snip] As my children hovered between adolesence > and adulthood with all the passion and confusion that may entail, I > defined maturity for them as knowing when to compromise and when to > hold out. I opt for fighting the big battles. As Sartre argues in "Dirty > Hands" we are all guilty to a degree. Things are so intermngled that > absolute purity is impossible. As with artists we have to draw the line > somewhere and some modest degree of playing the game is probably > necessary. The key is having a moral calculus that tells you when it is > necessary to rock the boat or to just say no. Quite true, and I agree with you completely on the necessity for an individual moral calculus. Besides, compromise in action does not necessarily entail compromise in ideals and the recognition that ideals can, and probably must, change over time. Marc --------------43DAFE805BC801C4C8A400EA Hi Folks,

GARY MARX wrote:

Marc Tyrell's description of his work experiences suggests that he will
do well in sociology because he brings a lot from his outside work to his
current work. If one has both marginal and establishment jobs all the
better! It also puts you in a special group who have been police officers
or prison guards, in prison, ridden the rails,  professional athletes, junior
high school teachers etc. The wake up call and reality check that
these experiences offer is vital in the face of our tendency to abstract
out the ideal type aspects which necessarily damages the empirical
richness.
I hope so <grin>. Anyway, you'r point about reality checks is well taken. When I was doing most of my fieldwork several years ago, I found myself shifting back and forth between outplacement offices and our department. I always found it informative that the time I spent at the outplacement offices was "upbeat", optimistic and hopeful. Always looking for opportunities, and very "collegial" (i.e. sharing experiences, job leads, stories, etc.). Most of my time in the department was "downbeat", pessimistic, and without hope. Always looking for the problems and trying to deal with the effects of restructing (e.g. we have lost 10 faculty in the last three years with no replacements and an increased student enrolment) and the lack of resources. While the collegiality was very high amongst some of the faculty, many of the others were introverted and "living in an illusion". It was definately a "learning experience" <grin>.
[snip] This is part of the marginity I mentioned in the article. To keep
fresh you need to keep breaking out of the familar. One way to do this as
an academic is to teach in other places.  But to make this happen you
must seek out the chance for a semester or year teaching elsewhere.
Maybe we should look at creating sociological "fieldschools" modeled on those in archaeology. I can just see the advertisments right now... 

Sociological Fieldwork Opportunities in Samana, the Dominican Republic

The Department of Sociology is pleased to announce the creation of a fieldschool in the Dominican Republic. Students will engage in a variety of research situations ranging from tourism studies (co-sponsored by the Gan Bahia Hotel), to development issues (co-sponsored by the town council of Samana), to ethnographic studies 9co-sponsored with the Department of Anthropology).

53.330    3cr    Introduction to Tourism Research            3 weeks; cost US$850        May 5th - 26th
53.331    3cr    Intermediate Tourism Research                3 weeks; cost US$850        May 27th - June 17th

53.340    3cr    Development Issues I                                3 weeks; cost US$850        June 18th - July 9th
53.341    3cr    Development Issues II                               3 weeks; cost US$850        July 10th - July 31st
53.440    6cr    Advanced Topics in Development             6 weeks; cost US$1700       June 18th - July 31st

56.440    6cr    Etnographic Research                                6 weeks; cost US$1700       May 5th - June 17th

For more information, contact the Department of Sociology

Marc says he understands the need for game playing but finds it
distasteful. But life ain't like they tell you in Sunday school  or civics text
books. So what's an honest person to do? drop out and be a nonviolent
Ted? No thanks.
True, which is why I chose the word "distasteful". Dropping out isn't an option, per se, but being able to recognize the existence of a game and the necessity of playing it doesn't mean that the game has to be internalized as the "goal". I suspect that I use the concept of "distaste" as a way of not interiorising games I do not wish to be involved with. Then again, that doesn't mean that we shouldn't learn how to play them, and to play them well <grin..
[snip] As my children hovered between adolesence
and adulthood with all the passion and confusion that may entail, I
defined maturity for them as knowing when to compromise and when to
hold out. I opt for fighting the big battles. As Sartre argues in "Dirty
Hands" we are all guilty to a degree. Things are so intermngled that
absolute purity is impossible. As with artists we have to draw the line
somewhere and some modest degree of playing the game is probably
necessary. The key is having a moral calculus that tells you when it is
necessary to rock the boat or to just say no.
Quite true, and I agree with you completely on the necessity for an individual moral calculus. Besides, compromise in action does not necessarily entail compromise in ideals and the recognition that ideals can, and probably must, change over time.

Marc --------------43DAFE805BC801C4C8A400EA-- --------------93FC173D0338DB6F2B555AB9 begin: vcard fn: Marc W.D. Tyrrell n: Tyrrell;Marc W.D. org: Dept. of Soc/Anth, Carleton University email;internet: mwtyrrel@ccs.carleton.ca title: PhD Candidate x-mozilla-cpt: ;0 x-mozilla-html: TRUE version: 2.1 end: vcard --------------93FC173D0338DB6F2B555AB9-- From dassbach@mtu.edu Mon Feb 23 10:31:44 1998 Mon, 23 Feb 1998 12:28:55 -0500 (EST) Mon, 23 Feb 1998 12:28:54 -0500 (EST) Mon, 23 Feb 1998 12:28:53 -0500 (EST) From: "Carl H.A. Dassbach" To: "Earl Babbie" Subject: Re: I sent this to PSN Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 12:38:04 -0500 boundary="----=_NextPart_000_002D_01BD4057.E2F0B480" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_002D_01BD4057.E2F0B480 charset="iso-8859-1" -----Original Message----- From: Earl Babbie To: dassbach@mtu.edu Date: Monday, February 23, 1998 11:11 AM Subject: I sent this to PSN >At 22:52 2/20/98 EST, Tim O'Donoghue wrote: > >>Carl Dassbach has a point! He is honest and the truth hurts. > >In thirty or so years as a sociologist and ASA member, I think I've >experienced all the ills Carl detailed, and my first-hand and second-hand >experience tell me they're still afoot in the land of sociology. I agree >that his comments are honest and accurate--and it really hurts. > ------ material deleted ------- >I would suggest the first thing we know about such matters is that going >into agreement with the inevitability of the "bad sociology" is to make it >more real. As an alternative, I think we should focus on the kind of >sociology we want--and shift the general agreement more in that direction. >I think that was the spirit of Gary's original remarks, and I'm interested >in hearing others' visions for the "good sociology." Thank you, Earl, for sending your message. Good sociology, in my mind, is by definition critical sociology (As Marx remarked "the ruthless critique of all things existing.") As sociologists (not as academics or administrators), our interest should be social justice in the broadest sense of the term. If so, our "enemy" is inequality in all and any of its forms. Certainly, there are many forms of inequality but, as far as I am concerned, class inequalities (and what underlies class inequality, namely, exploitation) are the most fundamental and disturbing problems. I have difficulty accepting a Bill Gates and company with their billions, when 30% of the American population does not have access to adequate health care because they lack insurance (as far as I know, the US is the only industrialized nation where we find this travesty). I think billionaires should be ostracized not admired (and Rodeo Drive burned) in a society where between 8 and 10 million people go to bed with empty stomachs every night. All our knowledge of society, i.e., sociology, should be guided by our interests. If our interests are equality, social justice and a rational reconstruction of society, our knowledge will reflect this. I think that this is clearly evident in the work of C. Wright Mills and one of the reasons Mills is so powerful (and also was he was marginalized by mainstream - Columbia - sociology - all his life). Unfortunately, sociology has lost this critical interest. In part due to the fact that ideology of science has overtaken sociology. As a result, the partisan has been replaced by the scientist and "praxis" has been replaced by "scientific objectivity." Increasingly, sociology as a discipline has come to gauge the validity of research and intellectual endeavors in the ability to express results in numbers, formulas and abstract jargon and to gauge the prestige of its practitioners in their ability to win the money needed to perform this type of research. This type of research became the raw material for technocrats to create policy and policy, as we know, is malleable and negotiable. A second reason for the disarray of sociology is the prevalence of identity politics in the discipline. We have become so obsessed with the politics of identity that we have lost sight of the our fundamental unity as human beings and as non-owners of the means of production. As Marx points out in the JEWISH QUESTION, the issue is not the emancipation of Jews and Christians but human emancipation. Identity politics and post-modernism have moved sociology away from its interest in human emancipation and equality (there can be no master narrative pomos tell us) and focused concerns on specific groups (each narrative is valid) to the point that sociologists are fighting among themselves about which group is "more" oppressed or more "exploited" and therefore deserves to be recognized and aided (if one is to be politically correct). I say return to the master narrative of Marx - perhaps it was phallocentric and patriarchical - but we can eliminate these defects and still retain its fundamental concern with equality, social justice and the rational reconstruction of society. Carl Dassbach --------------------------- Carl H.A. Dassbach DASSBACH@MTU.EDU Dept. of Social Sciences (906)487-2115 - Phone Michigan Technological Univ. (906)487-2468 - Fax Houghton, MI 49931 (906)482-8405 - Private ------=_NextPart_000_002D_01BD4057.E2F0B480 name="Carl H.A Dassbach.vcf" filename="Carl H.A Dassbach.vcf" BEGIN:VCARD VERSION:2.1 N:Dassbach;Carl;H.A FN:Carl H.A Dassbach ORG:Dept. of Social Sciences TEL;WORK;VOICE:(906)487-2115 TEL;HOME;VOICE:(906)482-8405 TEL;WORK;FAX:(906)487-2468 ADR;WORK;ENCODING=3DQUOTED-PRINTABLE:;;Michigan Tech. = Univ.=3D0D=3D0A1400 Townsend Drive;Houghton;MI;49931;USA LABEL;WORK;ENCODING=3DQUOTED-PRINTABLE:Michigan Tech. = Univ.=3D0D=3D0A1400 Townsend Drive=3D0D=3D0AHoughton, MI = 49931=3D0D=3D0AU=3D SA ADR;HOME:;;500 Quincy St.;Houghton;MI;49931;USA LABEL;HOME;ENCODING=3DQUOTED-PRINTABLE:500 Quincy St.=3D0D=3D0AHoughton, = MI 49931=3D0D=3D0AUSA EMAIL;PREF;INTERNET:dassbach@mtu.edu REV:19980223T173804Z END:VCARD ------=_NextPart_000_002D_01BD4057.E2F0B480-- From babbie@chapman.edu Mon Feb 23 11:04:09 1998 Mon, 23 Feb 1998 10:03:46 -0800 (PST) Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 09:59:06 -0800 To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu From: Earl Babbie Subject: Re: I sent this to PSN At 12:38 2/23/98 -0500, Carl wrote: >Good sociology, in my mind, is by definition critical sociology (As Marx >remarked "the ruthless critique of all things existing.") Gary, Karl, or Groucho? I can imagine all of them saying that. I think I agree with all the social evils you cite and have worked sociologically and avocationally against all or most of them. The difference I think we have is that I feel ALL the arrows in sociology's quivver can be brought to bear on those evils. Number-crunching statistical studies, for example, can document those evils in ways that will influence SOME policy-makers more strongly than impassioned ethnographic accounts or moral injunctions. When I first became involved in the issue of world hunger in 1977, I was struck by how much time and energy was devoted to debates over the RIGHT way to end hunger, when experience showed that many of them worked: that there were many ways to end hunger. It seemed to me that we should rejoice in the abundance of solutions rather than worry about which was holier than which. I think we have the same opportunity in sociology. Our higgest initial obstacle, I believe, is the extent to which sociology's contribution is still ignored. My campaign of the past several years is "Sociology as an idea whose time has come," by which I mean to include ALL of sociology: including the points of view I disagree with and the ones that contradict each other. I also mean to include sociology's subfields, such as political science, criminology, and Tom Scheff's version of psychology. Earl ----------------------------------------------------------- kth Law of CyberSpace: We are all, as individuals, in over our heads. ----------------------------------------------------------- Earl Babbie Tel: 714-997-6565 babbie@chapman.edu Fax: 714-281-6213 http://www.chapman.edu/wilkinson/socsci/sociology/Faculty/Babbie/ From jwood@mail.sdsu.edu Mon Feb 23 17:50:23 1998 Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 16:50:19 -0800 (PST) To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu From: "James L. Wood" Subject: CETI Critique in Chronicle of Higher Education THE CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION OPINION February 20, 1998 In California, a Dangerous Deal With Technology Companies By JAMES L. WOOD An unprecedented partnership between four large technology corporations and the California State University System has been postponed until at least May, in the face of widespread opposition from employees and students. It is highly unlikely, however, that their serious concerns about the plan, known as the California Education Technology Initiative, can be addressed by then. If the university proceeds with the arrangement, it may have grave consequences for higher education, not only on C.S.U.'s 23 campuses, but across the country, as corporations seek similar sweetheart deals elsewhere. C.S.U. administrators portray the initiative as a win-win deal, in which the university system will gain $300-million in upgraded technology, and the corporate partners -- Fujitsu, GTE, Hughes Electronics, and Microsoft -- will turn a profit. Under the 10-year partnership, the four corporations would provide $300-million worth of high-speed Internet access, desktop computers, educational and other software, training, and support services. This massive technology upgrade would be paid for initially through loans secured by the corporations, in addition to C.S.U.'s $100-million annual budget for technology and telephone service (a $1-billion commitment by the university over the life of the agreement). The corporations have asked the system's university presidents to sign off on the financial arrangement before it is made final, and the academic senates of several of the campuses are seeking a legal injunction from the California attorney general to prevent the deal from going through without agreement by all of the university's major constituencies. Under the terms of the proposed arrangement, it appears that the corporate partners would be the exclusive providers of technology purchased by the campuses, an arrangement the companies have indicated would be necessary for them to realize a profit. The companies have said they will offer the best prices for the technology. If they did not -- or if the technology they offered was not the best-suited to a campus's educational needs -- presumably campuses could award technology contracts to other companies. Those purchases, however, would fall outside of the corporate/university budget arranged by the partnership. The companies also would be given access to university directories, including information about C.S.U.'s 344,000 students, 37,000 employees, and 1.7 million alumni, to help the companies market to those audiences products such as computers, paging services, television sets, and telephone calling cards. James M. Rosser, president of the university system's Los Angeles campus and head of the committee overseeing efforts to upgrade C.S.U.'s technological infrastructure, says the partnership is the best way for the system to get state-of-the-art technology, because the Legislature is unlikely to provide the money needed (Letter to the Editor, The Chronicle, January 30). However, C.S.U. students have good reason for dubbing the partnership the "Corporate Educational Takeover Initiative." Questions remain -- not only about the real financial costs to the university system, but also about the partnership's implications for teaching, intellectual property, and hiring. Although discussions have been going on for about two years -- and administrators claim that they have consulted with all of C.S.U.'s constituencies -- the majority of the university's employees and students, as well as the Legislature, knew nothing of the deal until last fall, when the executive committee of the faculty association on the Fresno campus distributed a pointed critique of the possible partnership. The basic terms of the arrangement still have not been presented straightforwardly, and they seem to change weekly. Nonetheless, on the basis of e-mail discussions with faculty members and administrators, information from C.S.U.'s World-Wide Web site, and internal university documents, it is possible to glean an outline of the plan and to see the dangers it presents. On its surface, the partnership raises obvious financial and legal questions. Could C.S.U. be held fully or partially responsible if one or more of its partners withdrew from the arrangement? In such a case, would extra fees have to be levied on students to pay for the upgraded technology? Would the agreement effectively give the four corporations a monopoly on providing technology for the system? None of those questions has been answered definitively. The companies claim that C.S.U. employees and students would not be limited to purchasing only their equipment and software. However, it's worth considering that the U.S. Department of Justice has sued one of the corporations, Microsoft, for anti-competitive business practices, because Microsoft "bundles" its software programs together, making the purchase of other manufacturers' programs redundant or making it difficult to install other software programs. Why does the C.S.U. administration believe that Microsoft and its partners will operate any differently with the university? At the very least, the arrangement would centralize buying decisions about computer technology for the entire C.S.U. system, impeding the ability of individual campuses to tailor purchases of technology to their individual educational and research needs. What about the effects on students' education? Because profit making is the partners' central mission, the corporations will surely pressure the university to shift scarce resources from upper-level and graduate courses, with small enrollments, to introductory courses with more "customers." The corporations also could pressure their campus partners to create a disproportionate number of distance-learning courses. One of the "products" that the corporations plan to sell is lecture courses developed (presumably) by C.S.U. professors. The more distance courses offered -- or even required -- the more money the corporations would make. The university system's administrators thus far have refused to assure faculty members, officially, that any such broad curricular changes would be submitted to oversight by the academic senates on each campus, which review all regularly taught courses. It is not yet clear whether the corporate partners plan to stipulate in their contract a minimum number of distance-learning courses that the university would have to offer or require of its students. Even if they did not, their regular contacts with C.S.U. administrators would no doubt encourage those administrators to view distance learning favorably. If California's community colleges were to join the partnership, as both C.S.U. and the corporate partners anticipate, courses delivered in an "altered format" -- such as distance learning -- would be subject to faculty oversight, because state law requires such oversight at community colleges. But state law is not enough: To avoid protracted court battles, that stipulation should be an explicit part of any partnership contract. While professors around the country are still debating the pros and cons of distance learning, no curriculum, no matter what its advantages, should be dictated by corporations more concerned with their bottom lines than with academic quality or integrity. Distance learning also raises issues of intellectual-property rights for faculty members who develop on-line courses. An existing agreement between C.S.U. and its faculty union, the California Faculty Association, states that professors and the university will share any profits made from such courses. The corporations have indicated a willingness to adhere to that agreement, but faculty members will need to insure that such an agreement is part of any final contract. Finally, what if the companies' educational products become outdated, or they charge exorbitant fees for upgrades of the programs that they originally install? In a computer world dominated by fast changes and quick obsolescence, other corporations might well have the advanced technology needed -- for educational reasons -- by C.S.U. faculty members and students. The university would be forced to come up with additional money to purchase products from other companies -- if, indeed, the contract allowed them to. The proposed agreement also raises other important concerns. Might computer personnel be replaced with "more qualified" employees -- that is to say, contract workers more familiar with technologies produced by the corporations in the partnership? Might professors who teach introductory-level courses such as Biology 101 find their services no longer needed, if such courses could be taught by "star" professors on other campuses via computer? An early document that C.S.U. received from the corporate partners stated: "It would be unrealistic to expect that the introduction of new technology tools and related automation of currently labor-intensive activities would have no effect on staffing." Even if university work related to the partnership were performed by university employees, could they be asked to work on other campuses in the C.S.U. system? Projecting a need to restructure job content "to meet corporation, technology, and operational needs," the same document predicted that "job functions could be relocated which may trigger a job relocation decision by an incumbent C.S.U. employee" -- a decision that the companies admitted "may not be favorably received." Indications are strong that, just as curricular changes may not be subject to approval by the academic senates, these labor issues may not go through the collective-bargaining procedures to which all C.S.U. employment issues have been submitted since the 1980s. The corporate partners initially said that some work related to the partnership would be exempt from these procedures. When controversy ensued, they sent out e-mail messages assuring faculty and staff members that they intended to retain university personnel. Once again, though, without a final agreement, the legal status of such issues remains unsettled. It seems that, in effect, the proposed partnership would commercialize higher education, allowing profit motives, rather than pedagogical ones, to drive university policies regarding curriculum and employment. It is unnerving to think that major changes could be made to educational and employment policies without the agreement of faculty and staff members. We must be informed of the actual contractual arrangement being proposed, and we must be given time to scrutinize it, comment on it, and agree to any provisions affecting educational and employment issues. If employees of other university systems don't pay attention to negotiations over this proposed corporate partnership,it won't be long before they find their universities facing the same challenges. James L. Wood is a professor and chairman of the department of sociology at San Diego State University. He chairs the political-action/legislative committee of the campus's branch of the California Faculty Association. Copyright (c) 1998 by The Chronicle of Higher Education http://chronicle.com Date: 02/20/98 Section: Opinion Page: B6 Search The Chronicle The current Chronicle Copyright & reprints Feedback Front page | Guide to the site | Today's news | Information technology | Colloquy | Washington | New grant competitions | This Week's Chronicle | Chronicle archive | Information Bank | Jobs | Advertisers | About The Chronicle | Help James L. Wood James L. Wood From JS8852@cnsvax.albany.edu Mon Feb 23 20:34:24 1998 From: JS8852@cnsvax.albany.edu id <01ITXMVLCPEE8X10ZA@cnsvax.albany.edu> for PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu; Date: Mon, 23 Feb 1998 22:34:14 -0500 (EST) Subject: Troubling Computerization To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu Wow...Professor Wood's account of that computer mess doesn't come as a surprise to me but yikes! A couple of applicable citations from the sociology of computerization: "The choice was ratified or approved by top management, but little of the content of the change or the full range of its purposes or intended impacts was revealed in the process. Arguably, the choice was linked to organizational strategy, but given that, as the divisional manager explained, strategy consisted largely of the admonition to "cut costs, improve productivity, and lose heads," it would be difficult to argue that strategy was an explicit guide to choice." From 'What Machines Can't Do: Politics and Technology in the Industrial Enterprise' by Robert J. Thomas, 1994, University of California Press (now there's an irony), p. 215. "Perhaps the most compelling reality that drives managers to a narrowly conceived emphasis on automation is the web of economic logic in which they must operate. Frequently, new expenditures for technology can be justified only as a capital substitution for labor." From 'In the Age of the Smart Machine: The Future of Work and Power' by Shoshana Zuboff, 1988, Basic Books, p. 248. "And yet the process of historical transition toward an informational society and a global economy is characterized by the widespread deterioration of living and working conditions for labor....As argued above, these trends do not stem from the structural logic of the informational paradigm, but are the result of the current restructuring capital-labor relationships, helped by the powerful tools provided by new information technologies, and facilitated by an new organizational form, the network enterprise." From 'The Rise of the Network Society' Volume 1 of the 3 volume set titled 'The Information Age: Economy, Society, and Culture' by Manuel Castells, (volume 1, 1996), Blackwell, p. 273. "People must be convinced that the human burdens of an information age-- unemployment, de-skilling, the disruption of many social patterns--are worth bearing. Once again, those who push the plow are told they ride a golden chariot." From Chapter 6, 'Mythinformation' in 'The Whale and the Reactor: A Search for Limits in an Age of High Technoloy' by Langdon Winner, 1986, U. of Chicago Press, p. 115. And last but certainly not least: "We are far from being a maximum-security society, but the trend is toward--rather than away--from this. What Orwell did not anticipate or develop was the possibility that one could have a society where significant inroads were made on privacy, liberty, and autonomy, even in a relatively nonviolent environment with democratic forms and the presumed bulwarks against totalitarianism in place. The velvet glove is replacing (or at least hiding) the iron fist." From 'Undercover: Police Surveillance in America' by Gary Marx, 1988, University of California Press, p. 232. From jwood@mail.sdsu.edu Tue Feb 24 18:25:07 1998 Date: Tue, 24 Feb 1998 17:25:04 -0800 (PST) To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu From: "James L. Wood" Subject: Re: Troubling Computerization Many thanks for the series of quotes, which are unfortunately too close for comfort! Jim >Wow...Professor Wood's account of that computer mess doesn't come as a >surprise to me but yikes! > >A couple of applicable citations from the sociology of computerization: > "The choice was ratified or approved by top management, but little of >the content of the change or the full range of its purposes or intended >impacts was revealed in the process. Arguably, the choice was linked >to organizational strategy, but given that, as the divisional manager >explained, strategy consisted largely of the admonition to "cut costs, >improve productivity, and lose heads," it would be difficult to argue >that strategy was an explicit guide to choice." > From 'What Machines Can't Do: Politics and Technology in the Industrial > Enterprise' by Robert J. Thomas, 1994, University of California > Press (now there's an irony), p. 215. > > "Perhaps the most compelling reality that drives managers to a narrowly >conceived emphasis on automation is the web of economic logic in which >they must operate. Frequently, new expenditures for technology can be >justified only as a capital substitution for labor." > From 'In the Age of the Smart Machine: The Future of Work and Power' > by Shoshana Zuboff, 1988, Basic Books, p. 248. > > "And yet the process of historical transition toward an informational >society and a global economy is characterized by the widespread >deterioration of living and working conditions for labor....As argued >above, these trends do not stem from the structural logic of the >informational paradigm, but are the result of the current restructuring >capital-labor relationships, helped by the powerful tools provided by >new information technologies, and facilitated by an new organizational >form, the network enterprise." > From 'The Rise of the Network Society' Volume 1 of the 3 volume >set titled 'The Information Age: Economy, Society, and Culture' by >Manuel Castells, (volume 1, 1996), Blackwell, p. 273. > > "People must be convinced that the human burdens of an information age-- >unemployment, de-skilling, the disruption of many social patterns--are >worth bearing. Once again, those who push the plow are told they ride >a golden chariot." > From Chapter 6, 'Mythinformation' in 'The Whale and the Reactor: A >Search for Limits in an Age of High Technoloy' by Langdon Winner, 1986, >U. of Chicago Press, p. 115. > > > >And last but certainly not least: > "We are far from being a maximum-security society, but the trend is >toward--rather than away--from this. What Orwell did not anticipate or >develop was the possibility that one could have a society where >significant inroads were made on privacy, liberty, and autonomy, even >in a relatively nonviolent environment with democratic forms and the >presumed bulwarks against totalitarianism in place. The velvet glove >is replacing (or at least hiding) the iron fist." > From 'Undercover: Police Surveillance in America' by Gary Marx, 1988, >University of California Press, p. 232. James L. Wood From gimenez@csf.Colorado.EDU Wed Feb 25 15:43:50 1998 Date: Wed, 25 Feb 1998 15:43:48 -0700 (MST) From: Martha Gimenez To: psn-seminars@csf.colorado.edu Subject: Thank you Gary I am writing to thank Gary for sharing his wisdom with us during these few days, and the participants for their contributions. Reading Gary's papers was inspiring and I must say his enthusiasm and humor did wonders for me at a time when I have been struggling to write and feeling once in a while overwhelmed by cosmic and metaphysical anxiety :) Martha ************************************************ Martha E. Gimenez Department of Sociology Campus Box 327 University of Colorado at Boulder Boulder, Colorado 80309 Voice: 303-492-7080 Fax: 303-492-5105 From jwood@mail.sdsu.edu Wed Feb 25 16:56:02 1998 Date: Wed, 25 Feb 1998 15:55:58 -0800 (PST) To: PSN-Seminars@csf.colorado.edu From: "James L. Wood" Subject: Re: Thank you Gary Ditto for me! Jim >I am writing to thank Gary for sharing his wisdom with us during these few >days, and the participants for their contributions. Reading Gary's papers >was inspiring and I must say his enthusiasm and humor did wonders for me >at a time when I have been struggling to write and feeling once in a while >overwhelmed by cosmic and metaphysical anxiety :) > >Martha > >************************************************ >Martha E. Gimenez >Department of Sociology >Campus Box 327 >University of Colorado at Boulder >Boulder, Colorado 80309 >Voice: 303-492-7080 >Fax: 303-492-5105 James L. Wood