tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13904056836748455752024-03-13T07:40:26.660-07:00The Monkey Steals the Peaches!The ramblings of a recently-minted MA recipient, a crusty sailor adrift in a sea of incompetence and immorality (dagnabbit!). History, Culture, Politics, Sports, Academia. If you can figure out what the title of my blog means you get a cookie.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.comBlogger45125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-68793407424282273182012-12-04T14:58:00.002-08:002012-12-04T14:58:52.387-08:00Is anyone reading this thing?According to "statistics," it looks like people read this blog even though I never post on it. Weird.
In honor of you, my loyal audience, sticking with me, <a href="http://music-mix.ew.com/2012/12/04/dmx-sings-rudolph/">here</a> is something to make the holiday season more enjoyable.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-60237330878542682632011-10-07T09:02:00.000-07:002011-10-07T09:26:49.024-07:00PossibilitiesToday the wifewoman and I are taking home a new car (generously owned by the bank). She will learn how to drive and then I will have a free chauffer for the rest of my life. Yay!Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-74509346873986615182011-01-29T08:25:00.001-08:002011-01-29T08:30:16.975-08:00TrepidationI am heading out this afternoon to interview for a part-time gig teaching history to children. I am incredibly nervous. I also am currently unemployed and see very little avenues for me to get a job in the future, which puts even more pressure on my to NOT EFF UP.<br /><br />Goddam crippling self-doubt!<br /><br />On a further note, the Egypt thing is pretty interesting: here is my man <a href="http://zunguzungu.wordpress.com/2011/01/28/egypt/#comment-6201">Zunguzungu's</a> collection of information, and here is <a href="http://texasinafrica.blogspot.com/2011/01/why-cairo-wont-be-tunis.html">Texas in Africa</a>Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-61417129274378065532011-01-26T20:10:00.000-08:002011-01-26T20:16:26.275-08:00Back back y'allJust got back from what can generously be called a... year-long hiatus. I was in China, and the efforts it took to get on blogspot were just not worth the crap that came out of my fingertips. But in America, all my half-formed ideas can be thrown out with no real effort, and like the proverbial stack of ninja stars rapidly being flicked away with little accuracy, hopefully one of my thoughts can stick. To something. I do not know, similes are not really my thing.<br /><br />I hope to learn Mandarin (HSK 4), become a more solid bboy, and dunk, by the end of this year. Those are my unofficial New Year's resolutions. I am also going TRY and blog more, but I keep telling myself that and it never works out. Consider it a secondary resolution.<br /><br />I also just realized that somebody who I gave a shout out to actually responded. Did NOT expect that to happen... I need to figure out the intricacies of blogging. And by intricacies of blogging, I mean when somebody comments on a post.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-89938580931242631232010-11-18T05:38:00.001-08:002010-11-18T06:07:03.039-08:00Where was this guy when I was writing my Thesis?.So <a href="http://zunguzungu.wordpress.com/2010/11/15/the-plagiarism-fetish/">Zunguzungu</a> posted something on plagiarism, itself picked up from <a href="http://chronicle.com/article/The-Shadow-Scholar/125329/">Da Chronic(ill)</a> and it really got me thinking. See, I already live in society where cheating in education is... not quite accepted, but not quite frowned upon either. I can put up some more juicy stuff on edits (My favorite story so far is about Chinese 'shooters;, dudes who are paid to ace English exams and who work pretty out in the open, except when it comes to actually taking the exam). Now, I only give simple exams, and while I did have dreams of teaching writing once, my dreams were crushed under the boot of the admins here. Still, when I cannot successfully explain to the kids I am mentoring for graduate school that, 'I do not care if everyone else in China is doing it, writing your own letter of recommendation and having a professor sign off on it is NOT COOL' I mean I must take a good, hard look at what kind of education produces these ideas.<br /><br />And the answer is simple: The Perfect Republican Educational System.<br /><br />All testing. Abstinence. No teacher's unions. Schools are only judged by the amount of high-wage earners they produced. Nobody has the foggiest notion of what 'critical thinking' looks like. Students are in cutthroat competition with one another for grades, which at some point down the line actually do equal money (though I have yet to figure out the formula).<br /><br />Anybody who has taught in China can talk about the frustration of asking a question to one student and having their immediate neighbors murmur the answer to them. Still, what do I expect when their whole lives the only thing that matters is THE RIGHT ANSWER. How you get such an answer is pish-posh. Rather than combat the culture of cheating (which is a Quixotic quest if there ever was one, because you must change the entire <a href="http://www.hackwriters.com/Teachingchina.htm">educational system in China</a>), I just design my classes so there is no real way you can cheat (interviews, music videos, team activities, et al). Still, I have the luxury of teaching Oral English (and by teaching, I mean just looking like a white guy and showing up, the only two requirements to do the job), so actual classes (like Marketing or Management) with actual exams are an entirely different kettle of fish (and I totally plan on relaying some of the all-time GREAT cheating stories from my colleagues...)<br /><br />Which brings us back to the fear of plagiarism in the first place: perhaps it is from our 'Western notions of individualism' (rolls eyes), but what do you expect when the United States tertiary educational system has been going to hell for three decades. The university-as-business model is complete bullcrap and I would rather end the facade now and just declare universities trade-schools and figure out ways get actual centers of higher learning built. An essay is not just an assignment to be done, but a demonstration of thought. I ran a (disastrous) attempt at making drafts mandatory for students' first essays back when I was a TA, because... well, somebody had to teach them how to write. Did not work out that well, but still. However, as we shortchange education in the crazy belief that universities are only valuable if they prepare us for the job market, guess what, more kids are not going to see ANY value in writing their own papers, because the grade they get for their work is the reward for their relatively meager investment. The actual essay itself is worthless, and instructors have been kind of pointing to that fact. Sigh.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-54275399926533829932010-11-12T17:04:00.000-08:002010-11-12T17:07:04.234-08:00I wonder what Irrational Patriotism looks like?<a href="http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20101018a2.html">This</a> reminds me of this one time when this dude called for 'responsible White Supremacists' or some such.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-17914241430374114652010-11-11T01:16:00.000-08:002010-11-11T01:51:15.711-08:00What is wrong with me?So TNC <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/11/the-campaign-against-mean-people/66354/#disqus_thread">picked up</a> on something that I saw posted on <a href="http://prospect.org/cs/articles?article=giving_bullies_a_pass">The American Prospect</a>. Basically, a campaign to end anti-gay bullying in school has morphed into a softer attempt to point out the injustices of school bullies in general. Well-meaning leftists, step back! Or some such. I find this position of 'unique oppression' philosophically infuriating, but that is not what is being argued for here. Instead, as TNC so eloquently argues: <br /><br />"I think sometimes, we should accept that we don't understand--at least not yet. There's nothing wrong with just being angered and appalled, but not quite getting the full depth of the experience.<br /><br />The chasm is real. And bridges are built. not conjured."<br /><br />All well and good, except that I could not disagree more (and once again partake in internecine leftist infighting). Still, I am not going to argue TNC now on a tactical level (though in the wake of the Obama administrations pretty weak record on gay rights, I do not think pushing for specific gay-friendly policies is a winner at this juncture). I am just a guy on the computer, and because I have contributed so little to the LGBT cause (there was a benefit march literally twenty minutes away that I did not go to, christ I'm useless), I have not earned the right to disagree with TNC and his peeps on his hometurf.<br /><br />Instead, I am looking at myself. I have a vision of a universal society, of universal humanity. Of treating everyone with dignity and respect. I also have a much darker vision of everyone being the same (however defined), and rather than celebrating our differences I want us to have none. It is the only way I can function. The universal versus the provincial )if one would allow me the opportunity to call the suffering of the LGBT community as 'provincial') is the defining point of my liberal vision. And the more time I spend reading and thinking, I realize just how far away I am from... the acceptable Left? The current Left? Whatever it is, I am not (though I wish I were). It does come down to this idea of the Universal though, and without it, I see no reason to not just be a Republican. I realize that this gets into discussion of Privilege, or Derailing, et al., but if the defending the Provincial is what I am supposed to do, I cannot do it. The fact that TNC and his peeps passionately agree with this just make me... wonder: what is wrong with me?Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-25931081609144137782010-10-21T06:39:00.000-07:002010-10-21T06:42:26.119-07:00More Links than a cosplay convention in SeattleMichael Lee and Mike Prada tellin' it like it is<a href="http://voiceonthefloor.com/?p=31"></a><br /><br />Dr. Marshall with some really interesting stuff on <a href="http://wayneandwax.com/?p=82">art and representation</a>Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-34747848307104113992010-10-21T06:36:00.001-07:002010-10-21T06:37:14.620-07:00I love China!My Chinese teacher rocks. I wanted to commit suicide after taking the first part of my practice exam but she held my hand (figuratively) and guided me through it. Good job China!Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-78715229864626266982010-07-01T20:56:00.000-07:002010-07-01T21:06:05.087-07:00Get it get it Ghana<a href="http://africasacountry.com/2010/07/01/ghana-jama/">Get it Ghana</a><br /><br />Thanks to <a href="http://africasacountry.com/">Africa is a Country</a> for the jamWinslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-80205689430135516812010-04-26T20:57:00.000-07:002010-04-26T22:46:01.674-07:00C'mon Skip!<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_iFCDGx2hsgQ/S9ZoNeghrmI/AAAAAAAAABE/z6Pq3_CrcoQ/s1600/gates.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 297px; height: 400px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_iFCDGx2hsgQ/S9ZoNeghrmI/AAAAAAAAABE/z6Pq3_CrcoQ/s400/gates.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5464669778597752418" /></a><br />Last Christmas I organized a potluck for the foreign and Chinese faculty at my university. It was a glorious affair, except for a few expected screw-ups (Somebody jacked the Secret Santa gifts!). One big problem was that my friend rented a sound system, and in the course of the evening we lost one of the two microphones. Now, it was not technically my responsibility, and because I was not assigned to watch the thing, it was not technically my fault that it was lost, but because the entire event was organized by me I felt hella guilty. I called up my dude and offered to split the cost of a new mike with him. Basically, the idea of fault and blame were irrelevant. What mattered was that something went wrong, it made the event look bad (and hurt the chances of people ever trusting the foreigners again), and it could be rectified.<br /><br />This story was not told as an example my benign leadership skills( as my wife pointed out, a real leader would have made sure the mike was not lost in the first place), but as an imperfect corollary about life. Sometimes stuff goes bad, it might not be your fault, but it’s in everyone’s interest that it be made right.<br /><br />I view racism through the same lense.<br /><br />So my dad tipped me off on <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/23/opinion/23gates.html?src=mv">this</a> Op-Ed by Skip Gates against Reparations for slavery, but it did not really interest me because, well, I do not see a massive debate surrounding the issue. Then Shani at PB put up something <a href="http://cgersh.wordpress.com/2010/04/23/original-sin/">interesting</a> on it, and I realized that regardless of the lack of debate on Reparations, the piece is <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/04/inverse-nationalism/39463/">making</a> <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/26/opinion/l26slavery.html?hpw">waves</a>. Now, as for Gates’ general argument itself, there is nothing particularly offensive. Slavery was complex. Africans did it too. Reparations for slavery is not gonna fly because its stuck in whirlpool of guilt. Gotcha.<br /><br />However, serious discussions of Reparations (such as <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Debt-What-America-Owes-Blacks/dp/0452282101">this</a> by Randall Robinson, who I am not a fan of, and a lot of stuff by Charles Ogletree, who I am a fan of) do not look at just slavery, but Jim Crow and ongoing structural inequalities. Yeah, I have read and been around shoddy-ass arguments that take slavery to be the main historical injustice that must be, but the serious philosophical discussions talk about other stuff too. So Gates is arguing against a… not a straw-man exactly (I have talked to people who believe this stuff, to be sure, but they are not serious people) but the Reparations JV team. He ignores the Varsity squad. Also, outside of the fevered imaginations of white conservatives, Reparations is not the most pressing issue for a lot of Black Americans. Who is he arguing against then? <br /><br />Well, nobody. This is kinda screwy because race is already a touchy-ass subject in the American cultural arena, but by bringing in the concept of blame he makes people concentrate on the wrong issues. Gates knows all this, and I have a sneaking suspicion he just floated this out there to get the Tea Partiers and Republicans all riled up. Still, I expected better from him (Gates is my homeboy for <a href="http://web.ccsu.edu/afstudy/updtwin2k.htm#Response">taking</a> on that clown Ali Mazrui… get em tiger).<br /><br />Now, if Gates was talking about the invention and the perpetuation of Race, then he would have an interesting piece on his hands...Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-83411761311150590242010-04-23T23:32:00.000-07:002010-04-24T00:00:51.861-07:00On Teaching Black Power in China<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_iFCDGx2hsgQ/S9KXDmHKqJI/AAAAAAAAAA8/ASNTUwmuMTw/s1600/Liu.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 184px; height: 196px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_iFCDGx2hsgQ/S9KXDmHKqJI/AAAAAAAAAA8/ASNTUwmuMTw/s400/Liu.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5463595385979840658" /></a><br />So I managed to convince my university to let me teach a course on American Popular Culture that explores the emergence of Hip Hop and how it becomes (arguably) the dominant expression of American Youth Culture. Keep in mind that I am teaching this in China, as an English teacher. What that means is that, because I look white, I am qualified to only teach English or things that are guaranteed to make money (like Accounting, or Biology). Social Science and/or the Humanities? Hell to the no. <br /><br />Still, I persevered and managed to successfully press my admins for this class, and now that I am teaching it I had to completely redo my syllabus (which was expected, I have no idea what the class is going to be like and it takes a month to really get a decent flow going). Basically I wanted to talk about people in America that many students might not have heard of, or even cared that much about. I wanted to talk about how governments can inadvertently (or deliberately) screw over people, and what that means for culture. I wanted to inculcate a sense of critical analysis, that taking learning is much more than reading texts without question. Really subversive stuff, basically. So I got through two weeks of class and then I wanted to teach about Black Power and Puerto Rican Nationalism. Race and nationalism are kind of a different beast here than in the United States, but even so I had to expose the kids to some Malcolm and Stokely (I said expose, I do not have the time or the resources to devote more than 15 minutes to this, because I have a lot to get through). The kids could not quite figure out what institutional racism means, and how that is different from individual racism (the term I always get is 'discrimination). I knew I could not do it justice so I just went ahead and did the whole 'read it at home' copout. What was the most surprising, and something I would love to delve into, was their reaction to Malcolm.<br /><br />I located Black Power as the opposite of Civil Rights (yeah, I know the whole ‘two sides of the same coin’ deal and the cross-pollination of both ‘movements’, if they can be judged discretely, this was for pedagogy dammit!). I took two early Malcolm quotes, stuff that was easy to understand (the most crucial perquisite when teaching anything to the students is level of vocabulary) and I wanted to see what the students would make of them. They understood the meaning (huzzah!), and I wanted to put these quotes into a context of radicalism and the rejection of the status quo. I asked for what this Black Nationalist language sounded like, and everyone said it sounded like MLK. That was the LAST person I wanted them to say. I busted out some Sun Yatsen and Pan-Asianism, and broke out a little Mao, but the kids were not convinced. I could not understand how they did not see the connections between racial nationalism in the United States and in China. After talking with my dad about it, he said of course they would not, because the idea of civil rights cannot be differentiated between racial nationalism in China. When I put on some James Brown ‘Say it Loud, I’m Black and I’m Proud’, some of the students were bustin out with the song and replaced ‘Yellow’ with ‘Black’, which to me is really interesting. I asked the students if they were proud of their race, and the majority of them agreed. And then I asked them what proud meant, and whether it exists in isolation or in relation to other things. Are you proud to be Yellow because it’s a good race, meaning other races are not as good? Are you proud to be Yellow because it’s a better race? Just some light probing. When I start getting into conscious Hip Hop this is going to get even more interesting.<br /><br />And yeah, I know how generally race works here (Liu Xiang, the Olympic hurdler’s immortal lines from 2004: “My victory has proved that athletes with yellow skin can run as fast as those with black and white skins.“), but I do not know how people teach about race. This is something I am going to investigate.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-47850571799688361472010-03-16T20:45:00.000-07:002010-03-16T20:48:25.511-07:00Sweet Jebus I HATE FirewallsOk, I am in China, the government censors stuff, I have been trying to get over it with a vpn, it has not worked, so I am at my boi's place right now, reveling in the glories of unfettered internet access. I will try to post something once a week. Which was about my rate when I did not have the Great Firewall to contend with. <br /><br />PS PASS HEALTHCARE CONGRESS! DO NOT EFF THIS UP!Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-68933526011923762642009-08-03T16:50:00.001-07:002009-08-03T17:24:06.912-07:00Random IshCourtesy of <a href="http://morethanastance.com/blog/videos/2009/07/raging-phoenix-the-citizen-kane-of-b-boy-martial-arts-movies/">these guys</a>. Thats the second-best Thai-bboy-martial arts movie I have ever seen. And the joke is courtesy of Monkey Island.<br /><br /><a href="http://ta-nehisicoates.theatlantic.com/archives/2009/07/portraiture_colonialism_and_racism.php">This</a> was an interesting discussion on Coates about art and colonialism. And I think Invisman52 is a twit, but that might just be me. <br /><br />An <a href="http://www.gngwane.com/2009/07/towards-a-confederated-united-states-of-africa-between-a6-and-the-african-union-authority.html">interesting</a> piece on the United States of Africa, though I have to do a full-write up on its implications. Long story short, I am not a fan. But I always enjoy reading Ngwane's stuff.<br /><br />And I watched almost every episode of the Justice League and Batman Beyond thanks to Coate's <a href="http://ta-nehisicoates.theatlantic.com/archives/2009/07/things_all_nerd_fathers_must_do_before_they_die_pt_2.php">thing on Bruce Timm</a>. Christ, Justice League is AMAZING, Batman Beyond was not as good as I thought, though the latter handles race better than the former. A future post if there ever was one.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-72962918064680980372009-08-03T13:46:00.000-07:002009-08-03T17:21:40.722-07:00One day closer to death...Jerry Seinfeld:<br />Well, birthdays are merely symbolic of how another year has gone by and how little we've grown. No matter how desperate we are that someday a better self will emerge, with each flicker of the candles on the cake, we know it's not to be, that for the rest of our sad, wretched pathetic lives, this is who we are to the bitter end. Inevitably, irrevocably; happy birthday? No such thing.<br /><br />July 26th is my birthday. The CIA was created on that day. Evita Peron died. Fidel Castro's July 26th Movement was named after that day. In short, that day is tied to crazy-ass people. I am no different, as my wife can vouch for my crazy-assness. Which brings us to the subject of this post.<br /><br />I actually find nothing particularly important about my birthday. I do not really look forward to it, I have no interest in having a party thrown for me, and really it is just another day. Indeed, the only reason I look forward to it at all is because I got married on that day (well, legally we were married on the 25th but the Wedding was the 26th), and it gives me an opportunity to bring people together and to get my wife kick-ass presents (that I secretly want for myself). I dunno, I just realized that I do not feel any different on my birthday, and that realization just makes the day seem... abritrary and shallow. Other people's birthdays are a big deal to me, but my own? Meh. It might have to do with my birthday being in the summer, which traditionally meant that a lot of my friends from school could not attend, or the fact that a lego set will no longer fill me with joy, but I have everything I could want, and what do you get for the man that has everything?Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-29198236760816156412009-07-29T14:52:00.000-07:002009-07-29T15:00:13.420-07:00Link Wednesday!Another week, another page of links!<br /><br />And by page, I mean like two:<br /><br />Yes Alex, <a href="http://blogs.ssrc.org/darfur/2009/07/22/bringing-back-the-state/">bring back the state</a>. Anything the dude writes is worth reading (though his takedown of the head of the ICC was straight character-assassination), but the linguistic and mental constructions of statehood are really interesting to me.<br /><br />And <a href="http://allafrica.com/stories/200907290012.html">this</a> is an interesting development... not. Besides some of the nuttiness of Nigerian Hausas, this is not really that big a deal, and this is just a notch up the usual rioting in the country (which kills tens of thousands of people every year). I am curious to see if this is the result of the tons of money the Saudis and Iranians have thrown to West Africa as part of their international missionary rivalry. And props to the Nigerian government for stopping this stuff fast, though sending in the tanks to move people was a tad heavy handed.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-87190006503396561132009-07-23T09:17:00.001-07:002009-07-23T09:40:15.725-07:00Link Wednesday!<a href="http://sun-zoo.com/chinageeks/2009/07/09/xinjiang-riots-the-two-extremes/">Xinjiang</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.theroot.com/views/lawyers-statement-arrest-henry-louis-gates-jr">Skip</a> <a href="http://www.theroot.com/views/lawyers-statement-arrest-henry-louis-gates-jr">Gates!</a><br /><br />Oh, and <a href="http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion/454282/skip_gates_and_the_post_racial_project">this</a> is a great piece as well.<br /><br /><a href="http://allafrica.com/stories/200907110013.html">Obama in Ghana!</a> I had planned to write something on this, but I kept getting eaten by dogs... wait, that's homework. What I meant to say is, I was too lazy. But <a href="http://globalvoicesonline.org/2009/07/15/ghana-global-discussion-of-obamas-visit-to-ghana/">here</a> are some good reads on it. And in honor of my former professor, <a href="http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/features/57585">here</a> is something a little more radical on it.<br /><br />I attended <a href="http://www.wolftrap.org/Home/Find_Performances_and_Events/Performance/09Filene/0710show09.aspx">this</a>. I am not sure how to describe it, but the most accurate description would be 'recockulous'.<br /><br />Which may also be used to describe Bruno.<br /><br />I am going to write a Zunguzungu movie review in the near future. God help us all.<br /><br />Oh, and <a href="http://socialsciencelite.blogspot.com/2009/07/philadelphia-pa-or-philadelphia-ms.html">these</a> <a href="http://www.theroot.com/views/what-do-you-call-black-man-phd">were</a> straight bullcrap. More on this later.<br /><br />I just let my dad know I have a blog. I better make it good or else he will really show me pepper.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-75158620444588607362009-06-25T19:47:00.000-07:002009-06-25T19:49:12.172-07:00:(Michael Jackson died today. I was going to write a long-ass post on the deaths of some Africanists, but MJ trumps them all. Michael influenced so much of my life, and I hope he found happiness in his later years. You will always be my dude MJ.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-5729114701201203272009-06-14T10:32:00.000-07:002009-06-14T10:41:00.937-07:00E3?!?!Ahh E3. The big-ass videogame expo that used to consume my soul before it became a crappy conference trade show. Flashing lights! Techno! Booth babes (and yes, they are all women :( )! If I had a 'bucket list', attending an E3 and spending three sleepless nights having my senses bombarded would most definately be on it. Yet for some reason this year I completely did not care about what was going on. I did not download any trailers, or watch any of the conferences, or scour the internetatron for big gaming news. I do not own any of the big three consoles (I still have my gamecube and my N64, but they do not count), and my pc has not been upgraded for... four or five years. I just do not keep up with this stuff anymore. My lack of interest in the E3 either means that I am becoming less of a gamer or losing my humanity. Niether option makes me comfortable. Still, the Brainy Gamer has a great discussion on the meaning of this year's E3, which I heartily recommend you check out.<br /><br />PS the other thing I HAVE to do on my bucket list is go to a World Cup. I was set for South Africa but I have to work! Curses! It will take another decade minimum before it returns to the Continent.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-54360467536551954052009-06-13T18:17:00.000-07:002009-06-13T18:51:55.087-07:00Don't call it a comeback, I've been here for years...And howdy, sorry for never posting anything. Been busy. Some highlights before I begin some regular posting (I am aiming for one thing a day, I know I can do it!).<br /><br />First, my dad got cerebral malaria, and so the past two weeks have been... hectic. He did not die, he should be straight, he has some other complications but nothing major. Yay! Of course, considering that malaria still kills about half a billion people in the world, his health and well-being must be balanced with the knowledge that a whole lotta people are going to die of something that is preventable.<br /><br />Second, I have been playing through Baldur's Gate II. I dunno why, I got the itch, and I absolutely pulverized BG and its expansion but never got into BGII (I think the second chapter was too large and intimidating, a problem I had with, like, all of Morrowind). It is a ridiculously awesome game, but christ I cannot stop getting all grad-skooly when I play it: I look for the racial implications of having most of your potential party members as human, or whether I can court big, burly Minsc as a human monk myself (I admit it, I only play as humans!), or how come basically EVERYONE in authority is a man (and all the in-game books, which I read cover to cover because I am a dork, only reference kings and male heirs), or how are poor and rich are represented, or the way history functions in the game. I CANNOT turn it off, and I am trying desperately to do so. If you have any suggestions how to deprogram yourself from this stuff, please let me know!<br /><br />Third, I am going to purchase all the books by my favorite professors AND read them. This is not to score brownie-points, because I am already a graduate, so I do not owe them anything, but that these people were straight intellectual pimps and I want to see the stuff they wrote. And not enough people read their books, so I gotta show them some love in the ol' Amazon list.<br /><br />Fourth, I have been reading a lot of stuff I have meant to read/never heard about but found out I should read. So I got through the Bluest Eye, The Brief and Wonderous life of Oscar Wao, Shadow and Act (Ellison's badass collection of essays), etc, and I realize something: I am a horrid writer. These people can string words and sentences together like... well, its their job. Nothing makes me feel more inadequate than when I read some really good prose... which is also why I love academic history, because a lot of people are not that good at writing, so I look GREAT in comparison!<br /><br />Meh, more random thoughts to come. Thanks for tuning in!Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-91529038501139689622009-05-12T14:20:00.000-07:002009-05-12T14:22:32.903-07:00The Day the Earth Shook Like a Mutha$*&%@Cross-Posted at Postbourgie<br /><br />This is both a crass attempt to get you guys to check out my blog and also to make a larger point about life. Thanks to PB for letting me do this, and G.D. in particular.<br /><br />And apologies for the quick shift in tone. Getting the title right is hard.<br /><br />On May 12th, 2008, around 2:30 in the afternoon, a big-ass earthquake hit Sichuan province. In the resulting shock and aftershocks, tens of thousands of people died. My aunt-in-law was one of them. My then fiance, now wife, could have been a victim of the earthquake as well.<br /><br />There is a 12 hour difference between China and the east coast of the United States. I was either working on my final papers at 2:30 or I was passed out from exhaustion. Sometime before 10 AM, my best friend Daniel sent me a text message informing me of the earthquake. It woke me up, and with eyes half-open, I picked up the phone, barely comprehending the message my eyes were so blurry. An earthquake? Probably a bitch-ass one, nothing more than a 4.0, nothing worth waking me up for. Still, I decided I might as well get up and call my fiance to see what was going on. So began my May 13th, 2008.<br /><br />It was not a good day.<br /><br />I stumbled to my computer in my boxers (the standard uniform for doing anything in my room) and turned it on. After it booted up, I opened Skype, put on my headset, and tried to call Shoe (a bastardized spelling of my mispronunciation of her family name, 舒 [shu]). I could not reach her, instead the machine on the other line told me that there were some technical difficulties, so I tried calling her again, with the same response. I kept trying, and still nothing. I was starting to grow worried, so I opened up CNN.com to see what had happened, and there was no mention of it. That did not make me feel any better, because no American news outlet was going to give me the coverage I wanted. Frustrated, I opened BBC.com and found the news that I had been dreading: the earthquake in Sichuan was by no means minor. It had caused major damage. Communications were down. People were missing. <br /><br />I called Shoe again. The same response.<br /><br />I started to refresh the BBC page every five minutes, and the death toll was rising. I looked at the map to see if the earthquake had actually struck Mianyang, where she lived, or if it had just perhaps damaged the phone lines in an obscure mountain town, far from any major cities. The website could not tell me the epicenter, just that the most damage had occurred in the cities, towns, and villages to the west of Chengdu. Cities like Mianyang.<br /><br />At a loss for what to do, I tried calling my mother, but her phone line was busy. I called my father, and in as calm a tone as I could muster, I told him that there was an earthquake in Sichuan.<br /><br />Silence.<br /><br />“Oh God Winslow, is everything ok?”<br /><br />Whatever semblance of a stiff-upper lip I had was washed away by my tears, as I began to sob and moan. All I could say with any coherence was <br /><br />“I can't call Shoe... I can't call Shoe... I can't call Shoe...”<br /><br />We discussed any and all possible courses of action, and he tried to comfort me. I managed to get in contact with mom, and she told me she would try to contact State Department people in Chengdu and ask them what they knew. She tried to comfort me. The phone lines to Sichuan were still down, but I tried sending her a text message (thanks to the miracle of modern telecommunications). I would spend the next three hours in a constant state of freak-out. I nearly had a nervous breakdown. <br /><br />At precisely 2:11 PM, I received a text message that said the following<br /><br />“Im ok but i cant call people and get any calling from people.”<br /><br />Shoe was fine. I could breathe again. I saved the text message on my phone (inadvertently tying me to a lifetime of Verizon's mobile services, as I will forever keep the phone and the text message and I have to stay on contract to do so), and we began sorting out the situation through a flurry of texting. A few hours later the phone lines were up and I could call her directly from Skype. She had experienced the quake, her apartment rolled and rocked like the Ark during the flood, but she managed to evacuate quickly and nobody in her complex was hurt. She had yet to make contact with all members of her family, of our family, my family. We learned later that her aunt, our aunt, my aunt, had perished in Beichuan.<br /><br />I felt utterly helpless, as there was nothing I could do to help her and our kin, but she told me everyone was sleeping in the streets and there was a shortage of tents. This was shortage was something I could help ameliorate. I told my family and they sent all the spare tents they could get their hands on (considering the amount of outdoorsmen/women in the clan, this was no small number). I bought a tent and mailed it. What was perhaps the most touching episode, though, was that after I posted my information on Extremeskins.com (A Washington Redskin fan site), a reader managed to drop everything and deliver a tent to my parents house for no compensation. It was swiftly shipped to Sichuan. <br /><br />I wrote this to commemorate the anniversary of the Earthquake, which, while nice, is still somewhat selfish of me. Everyday around the world there are injustices and tragedies, and what makes the Sichuan Earthquake particularly noteworthy? What makes my pain on that day special? My answer is nothing, a cold and blunt assessment to be sure, but something I truly believe. What was worse on May 12th 2008? The Earthquake? Or the ongoing occupation of Iraq? Or massive global inequalities? Or the ongoing Congolese Civil War (actually I think this is the worst :) )? What made May 12th such a cathartic experience was the outpouring of support on behalf of the victims, from the stranger on Extremeskins to Lin Hao to the millions of Chinese people who rolled up their sleeves to help their countrymen (which is not a given considering just how tense some of the provincial identities can get) to the Chinese government doing its damnedest to assist in disaster relief (a government that, on occasion, helps its citizens? Sign me up!) to the international support and sympathy shown by the global community. In short, people like you and I made a difference in the lives of so many. People who should have been too busy, too unengaged, too poor, or too bureaucratic, put aside their interests in the name of common humanity. No matter how screwed up this world is, I have faith in the possibilities of the human spirit and the human community. And I know we all have stories of people who DIDN'T NEED TO but DID. I hope that one day I will hear yours.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-4997933691838592502009-05-10T18:40:00.000-07:002009-05-10T18:42:29.301-07:00Who's da master? (hint: it ain't Sho'nuff)Yes, I got my MA today, which makes me officially a MASTER... of something. This weekend was kind of hectic, expect a glorious three-part post tomorrowish.Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-66397592480194065602009-04-28T18:27:00.000-07:002009-04-28T23:05:02.076-07:00Finished!!!<iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dxHdqTi3trE0C6e10ZCDJBhaft-VLkPc1BQzINDghccWLVxnHmY9W3YhPL6sp4elhwPSUihEKfmbAXlHztu' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe><br /><br />I finally finished up my MA, now it is time for some impromptu choreographed dancing on the street!Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-27210686419583439652009-04-22T19:40:00.000-07:002009-04-28T23:07:38.834-07:00Random IshMy wife is ridiculously awesome.<br /><br />Last night, as my professor came to pick up the papers I had graded (Which involves another story about the anguish I felt as to whether to give a female student a check mark or not on her creative paper for having their female protagonist get beaten by their husband...), I insisted that he come into my humble abode and chill a little. <br /><br />Which he did. <br /><br />The Wife Woman, who had been watching her current favorite TV show (which is some sort of Chinese CSI, as near as I can tell), left her fairly comfortable lounging position and bounced to the kitchen so she could chat along with me (and not appear rude to the guest). After some idle exchanges, she launched into a speech, telling my professor that I am really lazy and I need a severe beating to get me to do anything (which is completely false, a mild beating will suffice), and then both of them starting talking about the best way to handle me. Eventually they agreed that he needed to be more strict with me, if not violent, and after some more banter, the professor left. This story is not about how the Wife Woman emasculated me in front of my boss, because A) I have no masculinity to lose and B) I could care less if my professor thinks less of me(which I doubt cause he is my dude), but rather to show how absolutely unpredictable she can be, how absolutely salty she can be, and why I love her for it. Yes, I like my women how I like my coffee; unpredictable and salty.<br /><br />Then, just today she tasked me with watching her 'bread' (more like a crepe) fry in a pan while she hurried to the toilet. "Watching" involved me standing motionless with my plate full of half-eaten snacks until she finished her business. When she came out and saw that I had done nothing, she flipped over her 'bread' and told me that I should have done the same while she was gone. I told her that I just thought I was supposed to watch it literally. After I realized how stupid my words were, her eyes grew wide, a smile spread across her face, and she gave me the ol' "ni zenme zenme ke ai! [you're so cute]" and hugged me (instead of wacking me over the head with said frying pan). Less salty, more unpredictable. <br /><br />Always awesome.<br /><br />老婆老婆我爱你Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1390405683674845575.post-20826755684240962052009-04-22T10:24:00.000-07:002009-04-22T22:15:38.515-07:00Why Nigeria Rocks #1“Nigeria is not a nation. It is a mere geographic expression. There are no ‘Nigerians’ in the sense that there are ‘English,’ ‘Welsh,’ or ‘French.’ The word ‘Nigerian is merely a distinctive appellation to distinguish those who live within the boundaries of Nigeria from those who do not.” <br /><br />Obafemi Awolowo, Path to Nigerian Freedom, (London: Faber and Faber, 1947) <br /><br />What I find fascinating about this quote is not that (Chief, not just a mere man) Awolowo was unaware of the long and arduous process by which English or French governments had to actually create an 'England' or 'France'. Indeed, I am completely guilty of this, and I remember the shock I experienced the first time I learned that the French government was terrified of sending bureaucrats to the countryside in the mid-nineteenth century (!!!) because nobody there spoke French nor wanted the government to interfere in their lives. There is nothing natural about a nation or a state. Before that, I thought there was always some sort of French common culture and language. Yet, to this day people bemoan the 'artificial borders' of colonial African states while ignoring the 'artificial borders' of European 'nation-states', and though one might make the case that the colonial powers should have inculcated a deeper sense of nationalism (a complaint I often come across in my research and in my everyday conversations), this is still problematic to me. What Awolowo said is applicable to most any government that believes in a national project, and I wish his writings (amongst others) got more respect in the political canon. <br /><br />Of course, he completely served in both the precolonial and independent Nigerian government, "geographic expression" be damned! Not only have Nigerians produced some of the most astute political observations in the past century, but they succeed in having their cake and eating it too!Winslow Robertsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08914945154359674378noreply@blogger.com2