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I am a graduate student at a mid-tier research university. In the seven years (don’t even go there!) that I have been enrolled in the program only four African-American students were admitted to the PhD program. Out of the 35 faculty (when I started grad school), only two are African American professors. I think this pattern speaks to the attitudes of our faculty and students while recruiting and hiring new students and faculty. Something, somewhere is not right.
The election of our student government representatives is far from democratic. It is held towards the end of the academic year, normally on a Friday afternoon when most students are busy with end of the term papers, grading etc. Only the votes of the students who are physically present are counted; even though there is a provision for absentee ballots, no arrangements are made for the process. The elected officials are often the elite few who are funded by the department so they get to hang out together on the same two floors at all times, share offices and form friendships. Minority students (especially the ones being funded by other departments or institutes located at a different end of the campus) and quite a few female students with young children are rarely able to make it to Friday afternoon meetings due to more important and pressing commitments and so are often left out of the process. Students who are no longer taking classes but are in the dissertation writing stages are also ignored. They are supposed to be impervious to changing departmental policies and budget cuts because they are no longer taking classes. I don’t get the logic here. Even if students are no longer takings classes, they still are teaching classes to undergraduates. Whether they are conducting field research or not, budget cuts are going to affect students even in dissertation stages. My theory is the reason most of the students in the dissertation stages are ignored is also because they tend to be minorities.
It is very difficult for minority students to find mentors in our departments. Many are stereotyped as the students who will only study racial politics. So if you are interested in racial politics, you will be marginalized. If you are interesting in studying “mainstream” political science, then god forbid you bring in issues of race, gender, sexual identity into your analysis; you will be unpopular and often times told that these issues belong in their own sub-field and not as part of the critical analysis of “mainstream” political science. The lack of mentoring at the graduate school level severely affects your performance and output. With no one to mentor you and thus help your professional development, you stumble through conferences, get passed over for funding in the department, rarely have opportunities to co-author with professors and end up taking more than the average time to finish your dissertation.
I think it is important to point out that the members of the student government are not openly discriminating or alienating women and minorities. From their position of privilege, they simply are not consciously considering all the members of the student body and how they may have different concerns based on their gender, race and even nationality (i.e. whether you are an international student or not). However, if you point out to them how they may not be equipped to handle certain concerns due to lack of diversity in representation and lack of strong relationships with minority students, they get belligerent and defensive. Most of these students don’t deny that gender and race are major issues in American society, just not in our department.
None of this is really shocking. Whenever minorities point out the privilege and unsuitability of the people in power, they always get defensive. It just is very frustrating to deal with these issues and to gain notoriety as the unpopular member of the student body who constantly brings up gender and race. Not every member of the elite student body is like this, but even those who agree with minorities in private rarely are willing back them up in public.
I set my alarm for 5 a.m hoping to do some yoga and go for a run around 6. Winter is setting in so it is really dark outside until about 7:30, so as the quintessentially lazy person I got easily discouraged and decided to go back to sleep for another hour or two.
My alarm, though, was so loud that I think it woke up my neighbours next door. They woke up feeling the sexy times and instead of being able to go back to sleep I’ve been listening to them having loud passionate sex for the past hour. A million disjointed thoughts seem to be zooming through my brain, my body exhausted and unable to catch up. I guess early mornings might be the ideal time to start updating my often neglected blog.
So here are my disjointed thoughts for the day:
As much as I love public radio and strongly believe in supporting it, I hate pledge drives early in the morning because they cut into my news time. Yes, I know I am being selfish but I’ve already sent in my $5.00. I don’t know if it is a function of being this close to thirty but lately I constantly feel like I am running out of time, unable to do enough in a day.
I think my brain and my body have a disconnect. In the mornings my brain is alert but my body feels exhausted but by the end of the day my body is raring to go but my brain is shutting down. Ideally this should mean that I spend early mornings writing and working and the evenings exercising to tire my body but it never quite works out that way.
I’ve become so disconnected from my country. I hardly follow the political news and when I do I am constantly shocked at the similarities between Indian attitudes and conservative/republican attitudes in the US of A. Xenophobia towards the Pakistanis, Chinese and even the minority groups in the north-east of the country seems rampant. There seems to be tremendous support for the use of force for every dispute. Also, every other Indian state seems to be demanding greater autonomy from the central government with nationalist sentiments segregating along state lines.
On that note, I think I might actually read a few articles popping up on my news feed.
I absolutely hate packing. But I love moving. The first night at a new apartment can be so romantic. The empty rooms, the boxes full of books, settling down for the night with takeout food and a bottle of wine – the possibilities of a new way of life. Even when you move in the same city, without changing jobs or schools, the new apartment is a great opportunity for all the changes you want to make in your life.
I’ve finally somewhat settled into my new apartment which is absolutely beautiful but completely bereft of any furniture. I am living in a area that used to be part of the cotton mill community in the south. The “village” where I live was built to house the cotton mill workers; I am guessing primarily white. I doubt if black slaves would be given any comfortable housing in those times. The apartments, mostly one bedroom-one bathroom, are big enough for couples to live in today, but from what I understand in the 1800s, huge families were living here. Walking through my empty apartment by myself, I often feel like I am in a black & white movie about miners.
I made my first cup of coffee in my new place today. My kitchen smells of freshly brewed coffee. I sit here, at my desk, listening to NPR, browsing my RSS reader for anything new, interesting or controversial. As the coffee warms my throat and coaxes my brain cells to full alert, I pen a quick post about my current state of being, make my list of things to do for the rest of the day and hoping that every day will be perfect in its beginning as it is today.
No ripped bodices, or heaving bosoms!
The Heroine: Sophie Dempsey, the forever responsible older sister dragged to Temptation by her flighty younger sister to film a soft porn film about an aging actress.
The Hero: Phineas Tucker, the mayor of Temptation, single father and the upholder of the town’s moral values. Yes, they fall in love too! But the fun is in watching them negotiate their relationship through murders with multiple confessors, porn kings, an ex-boyfriend-slash-therapist, a con-artist younger brother, and a puritanical mother. And of course, Sophie ends up running as Mayor of Temptation – try topping that!
Min is zaftig, except her mother’s constant nagging to ‘put down the bread’ has cemented her feeling that she is a whale. Cal is a handsome, and charming heartbreaker who leaves unsuspecting women just after they started picking out the bridal magazines. There is bet somewhere in there where Cal is supposed to get Min in bed within a month or lose $10,000. Min is determined to not let Cal get to her but he keeps feeding her chicken marsala and unimaginably orgasmic Krispy Kreme donuts. Shoe fetishes, crazy parents, loyal friends, and lots of Elvis eventually do lead to a happily ever after.
Agnes, who writes a newspaper food column under the moniker “Cranky Agnes,” is trying to not split open someone’s skull with her frying pan, all while throwing a wedding for her BFF’s daughter, not to lose her house to the devious former owner, and not getting her dog kidnapped. All she wanted was to have a family of her own to feed but teenagers and mobsters keep showing up out of the woodwork challenging her anger issues. Shane is the hitman sent by his uncle to take care of “little Agnes” from dognappers and mobsters. Of course, they fall in love!
If you love the romance genres, enjoy witty repartee, and can’t stand heroines too dumb to live, then Jennifer Crusie is a god send. Apart from the fact the I just LURVE the dialogues in pretty much every book by her that I have read, she also satisfied my feminist quotient. There are no damsels in distress, and the heroes aren’t obnoxious misogynists. Not all of her couples want kids – which is refreshing to read in a romance novel. Her heroines are mostly in their thirties and no(!), love or passion or sex does NOT die out as people leave their twenties. She even made me (the lefter than a hippie) like a Republican yuppie hero in Strange Bedpersons, really. Crusie’s Bet Me is now on my pile of security-blanket-books, along with my much cherished copy of Pride and Prejudice. I read Crusie because of her heroines – I see myself reflected back in my favourite books, struggling with weight issues, and being the responsible one in a dysfunctional family. It is heartwarming to read about their journeys, the cherished relationships with other women, dealings with neurotic mothers whom we love yet dislike, delinquent younger siblings we fear for but learn to let go – there is so much life and love in her stories. And yes, while they do go on to find love in a very heteronormative fashion, there is something very satisfying about reading a good healthy sexual relationship, rather than one fueled by unnecessary passive aggressive behaviour and sexual assaults.
I stuck with Dollhouse, primarily because of Joss Whedon’s promise that the core vision of the show is really manifests around episode 6 & 7. For once, I wasn’t disappointed by an episode of this show – Man on the Street.
So what happened in this episode? Things I was hoping for. Throughout the show, brief interviews with people on the street about the Dollhouse were incorporated. It was a bit heavy handed at times, but it needed to be said. It didn’t just highlight the issues of slavery and human trafficking, but also depicted the shameful underbelly of human fantasies.
I liked the twisted plot lines. FBI agent follows the money to find a Dollhouse client who is essentially a millionaire coping with the loss of his wife. Millionaire, played by incredibly cute Patton Oswald, basically uses a Doll programmed to be his late wife to play out the happy alternative scenario had she not met with her untimely death. FBI agent sees Echo/Caroline, unrealistic but great fight scene ensues, Echo gets away and the idealistic agent gets a ‘gray-areas-of-morality’ lecture from supposedly morally bankrupt rich guy.
Then there is the story of Sierra – the Doll being sexually abused by her own handler who is both her pimp and the father figure for her. It was disturbing and terribly sad. Abusive handler gets his due when he is killed by another Doll who is none other than FBI agent’s girlfriend. Oh my, is everyone a Doll?
In the middle of all this, FBI agent manages to meet Echo/Caroline in the empty kitchen of the local Chinese restaurant. She frames him for murder and delivers a secret message about the Dollhouse being real and needing him. Can I say twisted again?
Best line of the episode: “I played a very bad hand very well” by Dollhouse head honcho Adelle whose combination of maternal concern and pure disregard for human beings makes for a great villian. Now if only they would stop excusing her badness away!
I felt that this particular episode of Dollhouse really began to get into who the Dolls really were and why there was even a need for a Dollhouse. On one hand it dealt with why plain old prostitution and human trafficking exists; 0n the other, it really lays down the foundation for why and how the Dollhouse is different from your run-of-the-mill human trafficking- it goes beyond sex-for-hire. People pay millions of dollars to be able to use fellow human being for far more dark and disturbing reasons. The Dolls may not be the only ones being manipulated, the clients are too. Moral of the story: “If this technology really exists, then we as species are over”.
I still wonder if the show will continue in the vein of this episode or if it will simply revert back to catering to (read: heteronormative, male) audience fantasies of Eliza Dushku, because really, all this episode did was HIGHLIGHT the issues through a twisted plot-line. The show is yet to delve into the real issues that the Dollhouse creates, rather the effects get glossed over because the Dolls/Actives get mind-wiped eventually. I am not sure why I am hoping the Joss Whedon would do right by women when the rest of the stuff on the idiot box is full of shit.
If only…
If only I had a job and my own apartment. I would come back from work, throw off my painful heels carelessly next to the door and pop open a bottle of sweet wine. I would put my crusty baguette in the broiler for about five minutes, pour out warm olive oil and mix it with thyme, sage, oregano, salt and pepper. I would arrange a few cheese cubes with some juicy kalamata olives in a platter next to the bread and the warm olive oil.
I’d wash up and change into something looser than my restrictive business suit. Mail would get sorted, wine would be sipped, my fingers popping olives and cheese cubes alternatively into my mouth. My eyes would close because of the pure comfort of biting into a toasty baguette dipped in warm herby olive oil. As the wine melts my tensions away, I’d get started on making some comforting dinner.
A can of crushed tomatoes would be opened and pureed. In my heavy bottom Le Creuset soup pot, I’d pour some olive oil and tear some basil leaves into it. As the oil warms up half a red onion would get chopped and some garlic minced. Into the pot they’d go, sautéed until soft and some thyme, sage and oregano would be added for good company. Salt, pepper and a little bit sugar to enhance the sweetness of the heirloom tomatoes. As the rooms becomes fragrant, it would be time for the pureed tomatoes to join everybody. A can of diced tomatoes also added to keep the soup chunky and rustic looking. Maybe I’ll also add a tablespoon of tomato paste I always store in my refrigerator and a teensy bit of cream . As the soup bubbles and simmers, I would butter two slices of my home made whole wheat soda bread. I would flip the bread and spread some Dijon mustard on the other side, put a couple of Swiss cheese slices on top of it, a couple of slices of heirloom tomatoes and some cooked bacon. The sandwich would then go in my panini press.
I would put away my wine glass, bring out the hot tomato soup with the grilled cheese sandwich to the dining table. I’d open the romance novel I had started last night during dinner, settle in my cushiony chair and forget that the world outside existed.
** This is my attempt at writing a sarcastic post based on events that occurred in real life**
I met a friend of a friend this weekend and received some valuable lessons in American immigrant history, race relations and third wave feminism.
According to her, there really is no difference between German immigration in the 18th and 19th century into the United States and Turkish immigration taking place in Germany now. The reason that Turkish immigrants in Europe and Mexican immigrants in the US of A face hostility and problems with employment opportunities, health care and education is because they don’t try hard enough to assimilate. I mean look at how well things worked out for the British, French, and German immigrants who came to the US 200-something years ago and integrated themselves into the existing American culture without any complaints. So any guesses as to who we should blame in the immigration debate?
And really who notices race these days. The best way to go through life is to never notice the race of person and how it disadvantages them or acknowledge the systemic and institutional racism millions of people face on a daily basis. We live in a post-race America and people are just being oversensitive these days. They’ve gotten used to playing the race card, so they can’t let go of that habit. It is best to simply tell these people to chill out and relax. Women of colour are not invisible at all, it was probably something I was wearing or my height that continually make white men bump into my bright red Ann Taylor Loft suit wearing self. Really nothing to do with the colour of our skin. After all, she managed to completely take away ethncity and race from my identity. According to her, she didn’t notice my race even once during the evening, instead just treated me like a white sister who grew up watching Sesame Street in Long Island, went to Brown and now lives in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Now isn’t that nice?
Clearly, her focus is more on gender issues than race issues. Granted, sensitivity to gender issues does not mean that the naked female torsos onstage* are at all examples of mindless objectification of the female body. Especially since her favourite band was playing, they weren’t capable of such misogynist acts. I guess headless naked female bodies really make a poignant statement about how your girlfriend crushed your heart. Besides, they were perfectly proportioned, nice looking torsos. There is nothing wrong when men showcase the parts of our body that appeal to men/society.
Anyway, there are more important issues to worry about, like this whole debate between stay-at-home feminists and career feminists. She really made me realise how divise I was being by recognizing the differences in the women’s experiences world over especially the women of colour, immigrant women, women in developing countries, women who wear veils etc. etc. The more differences I recognize the more I move away from the the spirit of feminism and hurt the cause that women like her have so gratefully spearheaded.
After all, what you don’t see doesn’t really exist, right?
* Here is the picture:
I’d totally forgotten that last night was Oscars. I was all set to be emo in a corner in barnes and noble listening to tears for fear and reading my the new werewolf novel but the mall closes at 6:00 pm on Sunday. I sulked home to see my parents glued to the TV set waiting to watch Anil Kapoor’s antics. He really disappointed us. I was hoping he would twirl Ryan Seacrest à la Regis. That would shut Seacrest up for while from saying, ‘Ooooh look at these Indians speak English!’
Moving on to pleasanter things!
An australian, playing an australian in australia!
Hugh Jackman = Awesomeness!
Why?
He sang.
He danced.
He acknowledge the snub The Dark Knight got from the Oscars.
He gave a shout-out to Wolverine.
He spent time with Ricky Gervais for Oscar jokes. *Shows good taste*
Moving on to cuter things!
Resul Pookutty = Mallu world domination!
Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto = best Oscar acceptance speech evah!
A.R. Rehman and John Legend together singing = wet pink chaddis!
Did anyone else keep thinking Battlestar Galactica and Final Cylons when the previous winners came to announce the nominees in the various acting categories?
Also talk about being self-serving! The movie montages especially were terrible and I think the Oscars didn’t show Eartha Kitt in the In Memorium section but I may have simply missed her. Also, why wasn’t Loveleen Tandon mentioned along with Danny Boyle? Wasn’t she a co-director? On IMDB, it says Loveleen Tandon (co-director:India). What does that even mean? The whole movie was shot in India and has a majority Indian ensemble. So she directed almost everything because the movie was shot in India? Or she directed only the Indians, which was practically everyone in the movie? Why Oh Why was she not even thanked in Danny Boyle’s speech?
My brother was boycotting the Oscars just for the Dark Knight/Christopher Nolan snub although considering that he’s never watched a single Oscar show in his whole life, I am bit confused about the effectiveness of his statement.
I am also a strong supporter for Nolan/Batman for best everything but I would rather Slumdog Millionaire won than the godawful Benjamin Button movie.
Anyway, I am going to hop onto Jezebel to see who they categorized as the best and worst of all the outfits.
A bit unfeminist, I know!
I just finished watching the second episode of Dollhouse, and I must say that so far I am disappointed. I have been a Joss Whedon fan since Buffy. While I don’t claim to know his real motivation for creating the blonde, seemingly shallow heroine who doesn’t die right at the beginning of the movie; instead kicks ass splendidly. In creating Buffy, Joss Whedon gave the teenagers of the 90s a distinctly feminist show. I identified with Buffy (and on more than one occasion with Willow) despite the fact that I grew up in the opposite hemisphere. Buffy’s struggles with doing her duty while managing her crushes and heartbreaks, the cost she endured for being a powerful woman, the loneliness she felt as a result of having huge responsibilities – really, these themes created a complex, likable and strong character that young girls can still learn from.
I enjoyed Angel, despite the drastic changes in Cordelia’s character. I have a huge soft spot for Firefly, even though there were a lot of appropriations and race issues that surfaced as a result of the amalgamation of Chinese and English cultures. I have re-read Buffy: the eight season a number of times, in spite of being a bit discomfited by the fact that Whedon seems to only turn his female characters gay (granted they tend to be well rounded gay characters rather than the stereotypes we see elsewhere on television).
Anyway, to get to the point about Dollhouse – as it stands now, the show seems extremely exploitive. The Dolls/Actives seem nothing but slaves lacking in consent and agency; put in dangerous situations where they can be raped, and murdered. The two episodes so far, seem to gloss over the consent, and human trafficking issues and focus Elisha Dushku’s ability to wear numerous skimpy outfits and be as sexually titillating as possible.
I really hope the eventual story is about the Dollhouse as a human trafficking business brought to light by the victims and the incredibly handsome, and brooding FBI agent. I wonder though, is FOX going to allow Whedon to make his audience feel uncomfortable for enjoying Eliza Dushku having a romp in the backseat since it is actually rape being depicted.
I don’t expect Joss Whedon or any other artist to be continually making statements against the patriarchy, but still, I hope he does!
This weekend, my father and I had to drive to Ann Arbor, Michigan and back. We were dreading 20+ hours of driving through ice and snow. Luckily for us, we found a great pastime deconstructing old bollywood romantic songs. The subject of my snappiness was Legends – The Prodigy of Kishore Kumar which has about six CDs, each with an average of 10 songs.
One caveat; my english tends to become wonky once I start translating hindi songs. My brain does not compute the switch between the two languages too well.
One of the worst songs was also one of the catchiest one:
Zaroorat hai, zaroot hai, ek Shrimati ki, kalavati ki, seva kare jo pati ki.
This man desperately needs a wife; one who is there just to serve him. He goes on to list all the qualities she should possess, excessively focussing on her extraordinary beauty. She should have beautiful hair, eyes, cheeks, sprightly gait etc. He wants his wife to be beautiful. Shallow, but I can get behind it. But then he has to add, she should do all the work with love, and salute/greet him a smile. If there ever needed to be an catch-phrase-song about how being an Indian wife means being an unpaid slave to the husband who doesn’t even get to have ownership over her own emotions – this song would be perfect.
You want a song that takes away personal responsibility, blames a man turning into a monster solely on the fact that a woman broke his heart?
Listen to: Dil Aesa Kisine Mera Toda from the movie Amanush.
You want a song that blames the woman for simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Listen to: Ek Ladki Bheegi Bhagi Si from the movie Chalti Ka Naam Gadi. The movie is an old, black & white with all the three Kumar brothers and is hilarious. But if you listen carefully to this song it is a disturbing mixture of victim blaming and harassment. He is essentially shaming the woman for getting caught in rain and then running into an unknown man while trying to find a dry place. How is it possibly the woman’s fault?
A song about wallowing in self pity: Ghunghroo ki tarah, bajata hi raha hoon main. There is a stanza in the song when the man is singing: Main karta raha auron hi kahi, Meri baat mere mann me rahi. He is saying, I always did what others asked me to, what I wanted to do stayed in my mind. Well whose fault is that, you idiot? This is very similar to pity parties thrown by my mom or grandma where they go on and on about how they’ve always done what pleases others and still they never get appreciated. This song reminds me of them: whine, whine, whine!
We had ten hours to kill each way, so you can imagine what followed. My father was very amused and on occasion would defend some of the songs well enough to change my mind. It was hilarious to take all these well known, well loved songs and to really listen, I mean, really listen to the lyrics.
I mean no disrespect to the lyricist, singers, actors, directors, writers and anybody who is involved in the making of the songs. This was simply a fun exercise we engaged in to pass our time. I like practically every song in these CDs regardless of what I think some of the lyrics may imply and neither do I think there aren’t some magical, beautifully poetic and absolutely perfect songs in the collection. Case in point: Khwab ho tum ya koi hakeekat from the movie Teen Devian – were you to ever serenade me with this song, my cold heart will melt in a second and follow you to the bedroom.
