My hair curled over a blog entry entitled Again with the “women and blogging” meme (in response to two entries). The tone is insulting, arguing that the topic of women and blogging has been done to death. It is precisely this kind of post that reminds me of how the blogosphere solidifies misogyny and prejudice rather than acknowledging that people are trying to process. Dismissing discussions about gender inequality permits the marginalized subjects to be dismissed.

There is no doubt that blogs can be clustered by gender, class, race and age simply by clustering based on subject or style. Guess what? Most knitting blogs are written by women and women make up the majority of personal blogs are written by women. Recognizing that style and topics are dividing factors, i’d still argue that the difference has more to do with audience relationships. How are people constructing expression for their audience? How are they seeking to attract/manage an audience?

Move away from the blogosphere. How many women do you know that seek to be heard concerning their political opinion ever anyhow? Proportionally fewer. Why? That’s a damn fine question. Men do not dominate the political arena; they dominate a certain aspect of the political sphere, and that’s often the most vocal. Go to Capitol Hill and you will see many fine women engaging in change. I remember asking my mother why she didn’t run for office; she told me that she wouldn’t want to put us through the ringer, having our past dredged up.

Marginalized populations have different issues at risk when they voice their opinion. And damn do you have to be strong when you have an audience who feels the need to berate you just because. That’s hard for anyone, but imagine how it feels when you look around and feel like you’re one of few, when you feel marginalized from the get-go.

Are women more protective of their stories than men? More protective of their voice? Do they have good reason to be? Cause damn it feels shitty to be told that your concerns are written to death.

[Also on Misbehaving]

Does anyone have an MP3 voice recording device that they like? I was hoping to record into an iPod, but aside from my current pissyness with the iPod, i don’t think it can record using a standard microphone (which is essential for good quality interviews).

My needs are simple:
– good sound recording with microphone
– records at least 2.5 hours at a time, preferably much more
– straight to MP3 and easy to download onto Mac OSX
– compact and decent interface preferred

Anyone have something that they love and want to recommend?

A friend of mine wrote me, bemused that upon looking at her logs, someone had found her page with the following Google search: “what did danah boyd contribute to sociology?”

I’m not quite sure how to take this. And i’m curious who is at fault for folks thinking that i’m a sociologist. (Barry – can i blame you?) As for being at a point in my career where i’m contributing to any intellectual community in a meaningful way, please be patient. I’m trying. But for goddess’ sake, i’m a bloody PhD student who once again jumped fields; i’m still trying to fill in the holes in my knowledge!

Last week, i went to see Word Wars – a documentary on Scrabble competitions. A friend of mine helped make this fabulous movie and it is well worth seeing, whether because you love Scrabble, you appreciate documentaries, or you identify with anyone who has a compulsion towards the thing that they love. Also, if you saw Spellbound, you’ll especially appreciate Word Wars because it’s like what happens when obsessive kids grow up.

San Franciscans: it’s playing through this week at the Roxie.
New Yorkers: it’s opening mid-June.
Everyone else: ask your local art theatre to bring it.

Oh, Vegas. I went to Vegas with a bunch of girlfriends to celebrate one’s birthday. It was a complete trip. I left LA on Friday with a plane full of wannabe-celebrities including far too many models. The guy behind me in the Southwest line was rattling on and on on his phone about getting limos for this and tickets for that and making himself sound really self-important for one of the models in hearing range. She realized this and was rolling her eyes at this guy the whole time. Finally, she started talking to a perfectly normal looking guy, much to his shock. It’s Southwest. What multi-millionnaire flies Southwest to look important? Anyhow…

Got on the plane. The guy next to me shared his goal: to get as inebriated as possible without getting incarcerated. Of course, he didn’t use 5 syllable words. I was amused. I practice yoga breathing to remember that i was going to Vegas for my friends, not because i liked Vegas. Of course, framing it as an anthropological exercise *really* helped.

So, i spent a lot of time people watching and talking to folks. I watched a woman try to pick up 4 different johns of exactly the same time. One gave her a room key. I was impressed. He was nervous. I watched a pimp-daddy wedding party and a lot of midwesterners on their big vacation. The best were the kids – they were sooo in awe of the dazzle of Vegas – big eyes, lots of pointing. I was staying in the Luxor and the deck outside of my room looked down on the whole scene. Great for people watching. Another one of our party was in the same zone, finding out about teen curfews and culture growing up here. Perfect, considering the recent NYTimes article on American Dreamers: the Lure of Las Vegas. It really is a good people-watching town.

And it really is where regular America comes together in weird ways. Although i was not on a specific voting mission, i had quite a few political conversations by engaging people about the Patriot Act and the various anecdotes i heard about all Vegas visitors from the holidays being considered terrorist suspects. I used that to launch into discussions about where the country is going, what it means to have freedom. This was particularly easy given that in the land of sin, people are all about maximizing their freedoms and even the local papers/news covering Reagan’s death were talking about how much more conservative the Republican party is now. I love getting reactions equivalent to: “Huh. I hadn’t thought of it that way before…” Oh so much fun. Changing political views one person at a time.

So, i officially took an internship for the summer yesterday. I will be working for Blogger (Google). I’m still figuring out what i will be doing, but it’s a great way to build on the new blogging ethnography that i’ve been doing. And i’m *SUPER* psyched.

Over the last two months, i did a lot of thinking about my life, reflecting on the last semester. I was running on speed mode and i paid a price for it. By the time i hit Tokyo, i was having blackouts every day from the lack of muscles in my back causing my fractured neck to spasm and crush those little discs. I was taking more Aleve than vitamins. Not good. My body was a wreck.

I looked around at the people who were also on the speed-track with me. They too were a physical wreck. It was a scary scary thing to realize that i was going to kill myself if i kept this up. Furthermore, i realized that i wasn’t being nearly as productive as i used to be because i was always exhausted and caffeine/sugar-cracked-out in order to keep going. I had no focus, no sanity, etc.

When i thought about what i needed to do, i realized that the most important thing to do would be to focus on one thing, do it well, but calm the fuck down and focus on getting healthy again. I decided that i needed to stay home in San Francisco for the summer. Nothing was more appealing than a 9-5 (a.k.a. 10-8) schedule.

When Google approached me, i felt as though somewhere in the universe, someone was prepared to help me get my shit together. A research project directly in line with what i love with a team full of the coolest, kindest folks at a company with massage therapists, a fully-functional physical therapy-style gym, physical therapists, pilates, organic food, etc. and a pay that will let me survive grad school. My biggest concern was having to drive, but Google even solved that, offering a shuttle from Glen Park.

I am so beyond thankful.