"The Whedonverse: Ten Years After Buffy"

Call for Panel Submissions

Central States Communication Association 2013 

Popular Culture Interest Group.

"The Whedonverse: Ten Years After Buffy"

2012 has been a successful year for Joss Whedon, including The Avengers, The Cabin in the Woods, and the soon to be released Much Ado About Nothing.

CSCA13, however, corresponds with the ten-year anniversary of the cancellation of Whedon’s first successful television show, Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  This panel will explore various aspects of the Whedonverse, the fictional universe encompassing the worlds of Whedon’s television and film projects, including BtVS, Angel, Firefly, Dollhouse, Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, Serenity, as well as the associated novels and graphic novels including, BtVS Seasons 8 & 9, Angel: After the Fall, Fray, Spike: After the Fall, etc.

Submissions may include Whedonverse topics as varied as the use of language, character identity, growth and development, philosophical undercurrents, utilization and problematization of gender, narrative inquiries, various philosophical approaches, and related topics.

If you are interested in participating in this panel, please email a 100-word abstract with the title and your contact information, by Friday, September 21, to herrmanna@mail.etsu.edu.  Presenters/pieces that best form a coherent panel will be chosen from these submissions.

Sincerely,

Andrew Herrmann (East Tennessee State University)

Marissa Mayer and the Continued Idea of the False Choice

Marissa Mayer is a powerful and successful woman who worked at Google – one of the original Googleheads, in fact – and accepted the opportunity to fix and run Yahoo! and is having a child.

The media has gone crazy over this. Forbes. The Washington Post. The Sun-Times...and...et al. As is typical, it is all the same focus when they realize a woman has attained some sort of position of power. They did it with Carly Fiorena and Hillary Clinton, and even Sarah Palin. (Mind you, I wouldn’t put Sarah with these other women in any other list. There’s no contest there.) More on Fiorena, below.

Can she do the job? Is she a bad example for "our children?" Should women hate her? Why isn’t she taking a full maternity leave? If she can have it all, why can't you? Is she a bad mother-to-be? Should parents hate her? Blah, blah, blah.

I’m waiting for TMZ to start asking questions about the size of her breasts, how much she craves chocolate, and her favorite movie. 

There is really only one thing worth thinking about in regard to her maternity leave decision: Due to her economic position, she can do it all, because she has the opportunity to do it all.

It is true that the educationally and economically disadvantaged do not have the choice to go right back to work. Hell, not merely just the disadvantaged, but most of the advantaged as well: white-middle class people. In most cases, a mother has no choice but to go back to work. Someone has to work to keep the lights on and given that wages have stagnated for 20-plus years, that someone is often BOTH parents. (Not mentioned in most of the news articles, mind you.)

Mayer gets to choose to be a new parent and be Yahoo!’s new CEO. She gets both. Why? Because she gets to choose. In the terms of capability economics she has the freedom to realize her well-being, the kind of life she is effectually able to lead, who can decide what she is able to be and able to do. She gets to choose what is her “functioning.”

Don’t lose me here; this is actually quite simple.

This capability approach to economics deals directly with the situation and the reactions to the Mayer case. To quote directly from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

“Take the following functionings: (1) to hold a job, which will require me to spend many hours on working and commuting, but will generate the income needed to properly feed myself and my family; (2) to care for my children at home and give them all the attention, care and supervision they need. In a piecemeal analysis, both (1) and (2) are opportunities open to me, but they are not both together open to me. The point about the capability approach is precisely that we must take a comprehensive or holistic approach, and ask which sets of capabilities are open to me, that is: can I simultaneously provide for my family and properly care for and supervise my children? Or am I rather forced to make some hard, perhaps even tragic choices between two functionings which both reflect basic needs and basic moral duties?"

In 99% of the cases wherein people are in this situation, they are stuck. Why? Option 2 – for most people is not available. They truly do not have a choice. Not limited choice. No choice. From a holistic viewpoint, they have only one possible functioning. (Which is why when looked at separately, it appears there is a choice, even if there isn’t one.)

Ms. Mayer is not stuck in an either/or situation. She has a both/and situation. She has more ability, more freedom, more possibilities for the realization of her potentiality than the average person because of her economic status. Why does she have this advantage?

That’s called having good health insurance and health care and child care through having excellent employment and educational opportunities in her life - and taking those opportunities and making the most of them – and succeeding economically. That is the kind of opportunity making our country should provide every one. This is how a society opens up and creates and allows for its citizens to become more capable, to be more free, to have more functionings.

Whether or not others’ think she is being a bad parent and horrible mother-to-be by not taking a full maternity leave, or continuing at work - and all that other nonsense - is a sideshow to the real issue. The media is making it appear that every woman and every family has this work-maternity choice. And in this debate one simple fact is overlooked: most do NOT have this choice at all. Period. (And of course none of this would be an issue if she had a penis! Gender bias? You bet!)

She’s getting a lot of snuff for the facticity of being a woman. This media barrage very much reminds me of what happened to Carly Fiorena at Hewlett-Packard. They lambasted her in the media. It was brutal. Every move she made was under heightened scrutiny. She was heartily dissed for buying Compaq and making a number of other moves people thought were short-sighted and bad for business. Then they ousted her in 2005. In fact, they still are giving her hell, years later. 

Of course everyone discounts the historical fact that she took over just as the internet bubble was going to pop – and she got HP through that period – and the economic turmoil that followed the 9-11 attacks, as well. Turns out her moves were the right ones, but she got no credit for them. Rather, the guy who succeeded her got all the credit.

Perspective is everything and here too the media is not doing due diligence. There’s a misconception that Yahoo! is failing, but in reality it is still growing, despite all the missteps by its former management teams. It just hasn't been growing fast enough for Wall Street and much of the financial media, especially when compared to Google, Apple, Amazon, and Facebook, with whom it is always compared. Then again, compared to those, everyone looks like a laggard. Yahoo! has $2B in cash on hand, with only $130M in debt, with a profit margin of 22%. Pretty good baseline numbers for any company. 

I expect to see Mayer dump a bunch of unprofitable stuff and go on a buying spree to acquire new technologies. Most importantly, I expect to see her shake the Yahoo management tree and watch the rotten fruit fall off the limbs. I think she has the chops to change the organizational culture - not an easy task, of course - and get Yahoo! out of its doldrums.

If a man was hired the focus would be only on the finances of Yahoo! and the moves that he would make. Bias? You bet.

I wish Ms. Mayer good luck as both a CEO and a parent.

Reflections on the First Year of the Tenure Track

It’s been one hell of a year at East Tennessee State University. Lots of highs. Some interesting lows. Overall, though I have to say, I’m pretty pleased with myself. Not pleased – in that cocky “I can do no wrong, don’t I kick ass” sort of way. Pleased with the fact that I made it through the first year. Why would I say that? I’ll tell you.

I say that because in my years in academe, I’ve seen any number of people fall off the tenure track. Some brilliant, hard-working people in fact. That’s one of the dilemmas I have regarding my dissertation. I was thinking about doing a longitudinal piece and re-interviewing those people who would be now getting tenure. Trouble is – out of my small sample – half of them didn’t make tenure. A couple of them are not in academe anymore at all. So surviving the tenure-track isn’t as easy as, say, baking a cake. Not sure why I used that analogy, because I can’t bake for crap…but whatever.

I have to say straight out that there’s no way I would have survived this first year without my comrades in Communication Studies at East Tennessee State. So a shout out to Drs. B., D, O, & K.  First off, they took a chance by hiring someone who at the time was not in academe at all, but only tangentially – going to conferences, applying for jobs – trying to get back into academe while not employed. Hiring in academe is a risky business anyway, and they certainly took a risk. Second, as collegues, they made me feel welcome. 

They let me ask my “stupid” questions and answered them, without rolling their eyes at the silliness of "The Noob." While I know at times I got on their nerves with all the questions, interruptions the - “Hey what’s with the….?” –questions, they were all gracious. I cannot emphasize how important they were to my making the most out of this first year. 

On the home front, I arrived here in Johnson City, TN with nothing, and it took me a while to get set up. For the first month, I didn’t even have a bed. When that first paycheck rolled in, I spent all of it on furniture. The following month all my money went to pay off past due bills. Nice to be getting on track that way after a year of living on unemployment. Acclimating to JC wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be, given that I’d lived in Tennessee once before, down in “The Noog.” I’ve made some friends. Found some like-minded compatriots to shoot the breeze with. I haven’t done much exploring. That will come this summer.

Not everything went as smoothly as I would have liked though. In my own opinion – and later confirmed by the student evals – my Organizational Communication class in the fall was a mess. Some of that had to do with learning the students: their expectations, their readiness, their culture. Some of that had to do with teaching a class that I hadn’t taught since 2007. So I learned some things as I went along: give four tests instead of three, drop a project that didn’t work as planned, rearrange the classroom to make it more interactive, don’t assume that everyone has (or even wants) a Twitter account, kill the two extra texts. 

What I learned from the disaster of my Org class, I incorporated into my Group Communication class. That class, I feel – though I don’t yet have the student evals to check my thoughts – went a whole lot smoother. I’m looing forward to teaching Org Com again this fall, incorporating everything I learned from the first go-round. It should be much improved. Adjust, readjust, and readjust more. 

As Dr. D explained way back last year when I was on my interview, while the university will talk a great deal about service and will talk a great deal about teaching, they will not stress publishing. “But don’t let that fool you.”  So I took that to heart immediately. So in my first year I’ve published three pieces, which I think is good, but not great. I also have two things that are in press that will come out sometime next fall. Although I post a lot of my successes on Facebook, I have an overwhelming number of rejection letters as well!!! That’s the game though, right? Just keep plugging away on the writing and the submitting. My goal is to have three per year. So far I’m on track and happy about it. If you are interested, you can find my pieces here, here, and here.

One of the things I’ve learned is not to ask “Why?” so much. Why? (Yes, irony.) Because – and I should have realized this – it’s beause when you ask, you also assume responsibility. So when I asked “Why don’t we have an Honors-in-Discipline Program in Communication Studies?” the resounding answer was “Because you haven’t started it yet.” So I did! It took a year to get the program proposed, set-up, and initiated. So in autumn, we’ll have our first honors students. I’m pretty stoked about that. Shout outs to both Dr. Harker and Professor C - both from our Theatre and Dance Division - for helping me with all the intricacies of getting the program situated and walking me though all the necessary steps. (See what I mean about good colleagues!?) Adjust, readjust, and readjust more.

There are some frustrating things as well. I’ll spare you all the details, but just list some. A committee that didn’t get its job done. Students that "checked out" mid-semester. The strange way the hiring process went for our lecturer positions. The meetings as we attempt to reinvigorate our M.A. program. Oh. And the never-ending stack of paperwork. Nothing major, just frustrating. A LOT less frustrating than working in information technology, that’s for sure!!!

Despite those frustrations, there were many things that gratified my soul. Our undergrads presenting at the Boland Research Symposium. Presenting at the Spring Mixer with Andrew, aka Classic Andrew, aka Dr. Dunn. Representing ETSU and the Communication Department at NCA and CSCA, while seeing great mentors, peers, friends, bar buddies, former academic outcasts, more friends (that's you Herbig), and #commnerds (all wrapped in one, usually).

Finding out that certain colleagues - the previously mentioned Dr. Dunn and the yet as unmentioned Dr. M. - and I can collaborate on a very cool internet–based research project. Having interesting, intelligent conversations with graduate students. Watching my undergraduates present at local non-profits. The ability to proffer up two new classes: “Technology, Communication, and Culture” and “Communication and Leadership.”

And so, rather than some “dark night of the soul” as some of the participants from my dissertation research experienced, I find myself thriving, I find myself engaged, I find myself mostly in awe that a kid – who almost never made it out of RCNJ in the first place – is in the position of having finished up his first year on the tenure track. And I couldn’t have done it without the great colleagues that I do. So with all that is in my soul, I thank you my colleagues. Here's to a great year two!

Go Bucs!

Write your story. It is important.

To all you qualitative researchers out there: keep writing.

I don't generally get personal on this blog, but I've been overwhelmed lately by the good people in academe. Here at the end of my first year on the tenure-track seems a good time to say thank you.

Many of you know my story about trying to find a full-time tenure-track academic position, which started in 2007 when I was ABD and ended in 2011 when I got hired at ETSU. I offer my thanks, my gratitude, my heartfelt love for those of you you sent me good karma, happy vibes and thoughts, as well as prayers.

What I was most astounded by, however, wasn't the support from people that know me. No. Once I published the piece about my experience "I Know I'm Unlovable": Desperation, Dislocation, Despair, and Discourse on the Academic Job Hunt" in Qualitative Inquiry (an excellent journal in its own right) I was overwhelmed by the response.

Hundreds of people contacted me about it. Hundreds! I had no idea that was going to happen. After all, it's "merely" a personal narrative piece.

Total strangers started emailing me about how the piece spoke to them. People started Tweeting me about it to say "Thanks - this needed to be written." They tweeted about it to other people...and they too Tweeted me. People started FaceBook messaging me about how they are going to have all their graduate students read it. People told me it spoke to them, that I was brave to tell one of the stories that is often silenced and whispered in academia, but rarely spoken about out loud.

Brave? It wasn't brave. While I won't say that writing that piece saved my life, it did help preserve my sanity. For those of you who doubt my sanity, well, I guess it preserved my functional insanity. Brave? No. Necessary? Yes.

The point is that I was overcome by the response to the piece. So many people reached out to say how it touched them. A few said they cried when they read it, because it matched their own experience. For some it was the confusion and the anger that resonated with them. For some it provided a catharsis - by simply knowing there are other people out here suffering through the same things they are.

Here's the lesson, if a lesson can be taken from this. To all you qualitative researchers out there: keep writing. Keep on writing. See, your stories are important.  You don't know how important your stories are unless you tell them. You don't know what an impact your story can have on someone, unless you actually write it. You don't know how big your personal community is - or your particular experience is - unless you write about it. Write your story. It is important.

I had no idea that my little piece would create the stir it did. I'm glad it did.

So I just wanted to say thank you.

Andrew

Counter-Narrative: An Important, Much Needed Book

Bud Goodall starts out with this truth: 

We on the left suck at narratives. 

We do – at least compared to the right - be that right the economic libertarians, the religious conservatives, the neo-cons, or the conspiracy theorists like the Birthers.  Slowly but surely those on the right have spun their tales so well, that what they say is too often taken for granted, as given, as the way things are and the way things ought to be. All these ‘givens’ aren’t givens at all. They are stories told over and over and over until we believe them to be true. For instance:

“Free markets should be unfettered!” (Hello financial crisis.)

“Democrats are weak on defense!” (Goodbye Osama Bin Laden!)

“Jesus was not interested in justice!” (Hello? Have you read the New Testament?)

“Obama is a Kenyan born Muslim!” (Hello long-form birth certificate!)

“Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot!” (Yes, ridicule is helpful but not constructive in the long term.)

Sure, we have facts on our side.

Yes, the deficit was caused by the Bush tax cuts and the wars.

Yes, Jesus was interested in justice.

Yes, the founding fathers were human with human foibles.

Yes, Teabaggers gave themselves that name without knowing what “Teabagging” is.

Here’s the thing: facts only matter if they are embedded in a good story. To quote Reagan’s 1988 slip up: “Facts are stupid things.” Narratives drive information, not the other way around.

Have you ever wondered how Al Queda can recruit people into killing themselves? Have you ever wondered why Glenn Beck’s conspiracies were accepted by so many? Have you ever wondered why the Birther issue will not die? Have you ever wondered why people who say they follow Jesus only follow the free-market Jesus? Have you ever wondered why academics are losing the battle over who academics are and what we do? Have you ever wondered what ever happened to the concept of the common good (clean air and water, state and national forests, public education, etc.)? Here you will find the stories conservatives tell dismantled, examined, and critiqued.

Finally Goodall doesn’t let us off the hook. He delivers to us an ultimatum.  If we don’t start actively writing our narratives to counter the conservative narratives, we will no longer have the words by which to tell our narrative.

Read it. Practice it.

"Hey Andrew, How Do You Get So Much Writing Done?"

People ask me this and I tell them I write a lot. People sometimes say, "You're really smart. That's how you get so much accomplished." "Well hold your horses," I tell them. "I'm not really THAT smart. I just work hard and I write everyday." And that's the first key. So if you really want to know how I get so much published in journals - though it's probably similar if you are writing books, magazine articles, or for a newspaper - here is what I do. None of this is original. They are ideas I've snagged from other authors, colleagues, peers, friends, mentors. 


1. Always, always write. Whether you are sitting down with a vague idea (Chaos theory and academic conferencing). Write. Or have just a bare sketch (Buffy, Spike, and Foucault). Write. Or are entertaining two opposing thoughts (Abbot and Costello Meet Punk Rock). Write. Or have come up with simply a weird title (like “Kierkegaard and Human Resources in the Modern Corporation,” for example) write. Write a little each day, write a lot each day. Write. Take Anne Lamott’s advice and write that “shitty rough draft.” No one will see it but you, so don’t worry about grammar, punctuation, references, footnotes, or any of that mundane stuff. That’s not writing. That’s editing. That comes later. Just write. Get words on the page. Sometimes they come slowly – word by word. Sometimes they come in a flourish. No matter. Write.

2. Take a break. Seriously. The pressure to publish is insane in academe. So write. Write until your P.O.S. draft is done.  Then stop. Push yourself away from your desk. Close the laptop. Whatever. Just stop. Go outside. Take the Underwater Basket Weaving class that meets every Saturday. Just don’t write. Have a beer at a local water hole. Shoot a game of pool someplace. Smoke crack. Walk the dog. Buy ferrets. Paint your abode. Work on your syllabus. Read some fiction. Go see a kickin' flick. Work on a flier for your upcoming summer class. Don’t write. For three days. Don’t write. This will refresh your mind.


3. Edit. As Bud Goodall once said, “All good writing is re-writing.” This does not mean merely editing. This means giving your work a careful read. By doing so you find concepts that are unclear and need to be expanded. Hack away the passive voice. Keep to your thesis statement. This means re-examining thoughts and ideas that may be tangential to your main argument and dumping them – perhaps they are the germ of a different piece. Like Red Leader said in Star Wars, “Stay on target.” This writing can be the real muck, but don’t be deterred. Revise, refine, rewrite. Put it away again. Just leave it be. 


4. Edit again. Here’s where things get tough. We generally like all the words we write. As the Police song goes, “I'm a walking nightmare, an arsenal of doom” and be a Demolition Wo/Man. Here’s where you kill your children. Some of them are still-births and need to be eliminated. Some of them sound grand and promote a flourish you think is delightful. Kill them. Axe them. Erase them. Murder them. While you want to maintain your voice, anything that is unneeded needs to go. Be a brutal dictator.


5. Show it to peers. For academics this is the hardest part, because we don’t like anyone to think we are stupid. There’s a lot of work and pride that goes into writing. Let me give you a hint. Nothing you write is perfect. Ever. So let it “leave your hand” and go into a colleagues'. This is absolutely important. I wrote a piece for an ethnography class I had as an M.A. student at Saint Louis University. I wrote it and rewrote it and rewrote it. I sent it out for publication over and over. Well, finally I let some other people read the thing. Turns out I was trying to do too much in that one piece. Bob Krizek read it when it was a class draft. My friend Sam read it. Eric Eisenberg read it. They all gave me great advice. I still could not get it published. Finally, I took it to the Young Scholars class at CSCA. This group of scholars said, “Andrew, its almost like you have two pieces here. One on the process of organizing at a new nonprofit, and one on your own personal narrative as a punk rocker returning to the scene after a dozen years.” They were correct. I broke it into two pieces. One piece is out. The other is in press. If I had never shown it to anyone, I’d never recognized the problem.


6. Edit. Again. Word by word. Punctuation mark by punctuation mark. Line by line. Reference by reference. Work out those transitional sentences that connect paragraph to paragraph. (Confession: I hate those sentences. I stink at them. For me they are the most arduous task. Still they must be done.) Essential tedium.


7. Send it out. Pick a journal that matches what your subject is and what your method is. I’m a qualitative researcher, so as much as I’d like to get something published in Communication Monographs, that’s not going to happen. There’s no goodness of fit. Don’t mess with journals that don’t do what you do. I don’t want to waste my time and the editor’s time either. Search out journals. As a qualitative organizational communication scholar, I had to find my outlets. Like what? Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management: An International Journal. Journal of Loss & Trauma. Qualitative Inquiry. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication. Studies in Symbolic Interaction. Journal of Organizational Ethnography. International Review of Qualitative Research. Qualitative Communication Research. If it gets rejected outright – send it to the next journal on your list. Don’t waste time feeling sorry for yourself. When you get a revise and resubmit, revise and resubmit. Period.

8. Keep writing. I generally have two or three things always in progress. When something is accepted for publication, I begin a new piece, even if that possible piece is some hackneyed idea like “Adding bleach to the laundry as a speech act.” Brainstorm. Read good fiction ( I prefer Horror and Hard-Boiled Detectives) and nonfiction. Write. Keep writing. Always write. Every day. Every day. That’s the only way to progress.


Bonus step: Unplug. Kill your cable. There's nothing on there anyway. Hulu or Netflix what you really want to watch. Seriously. You'll never realize how much time you have to write until you realize how much time you have to write.

My New Course: Technology, Communication, and Culture

A new class that I've prepped for the summer. It is the first new class I've proposed and with the help of my chair, Dr. Amber Kinser (who I cannot thank enough for making sure this new faculty member knows what he's doing) this has been a pretty darn smooth process.

Now the only question will be if it 'makes.' If it makes, that would be the first step into getting into the Communication Department rotation. Here's hoping!

On Teaching Group Communication Well, Pt 2

Serendipity? Coincidence? A link into the divine? Whatever the case, I’ll take it. 

In my last post I began talking about my Group Communication class. I included some of the dilemmas all teachers face when dealing with group work and engaging students in both theory and practice. Well, then a friend and mentor of mine – Bud Goodall – posted something on Facebook. 

It is a New York Times article called “The Rise of the New Groupthink” that plainly states,

“Research strongly suggests that people are more creative when they enjoy privacy and freedom from interruption.”

I agree with some of the assessment – that group work for group work’s sake is a pointless exercise. Anyone who has been sitting in a meeting to ‘brainstorm’ some totally nonsensical idea knows what I mean. (Especially if the boss isn’t going to take those ideas seriously anyway – but that’s another story of faux participation and paradoxes in organizations.)

However, the point of my Group Communication class is to bring communication theory to life and allow students to learn experientially. The author of the Times’ piece writes:

‎"But it’s one thing to associate with a group in which each member works autonomously on his piece of the puzzle."

And this is my thought process when I teach group communication. Sure students work in groups, but each person must come to the group with something of value to put on the table. Nor are the class group projects 'useless,' but vary in degrees of length, from the short to the large, and in complexity. Which brings me to what this post was supposed to be about: The assignments from my Group Communication class.

The first is an individual project: Strengthsfinder Paper: A one page paper that explains your strength based on the Strengthsfinder assessment, including a self-reflection on where you have seen this particular strength active in your own life.

Rationale: Most students haven’t spent a lot of time with Socrates’ dictum “Know thyself.” What can they bring to the table? What do they need to know about themselves and the way they relate to other people? This is an exploration of their talent. It’s what they bring to the table.

“Quad-Group” Discussion (QGD): Each initial smaller group of approximately 4 people (hence the term “Quad”) will lead a discussion (for about 30 minutes) on some section of the Rothwell text, between Chapters 4 through 5 to be negotiated in class with other groups and me. Please note that this is NOT a presentation, but a discussion. It consists of four parts:

One week prior to your presentation you must find and send a related academic article to everyone in the class.

Lead a discussion for 25 minutes on your topic.

A one-page handout for your classmates.

An activity to go along with your discussion.

Rationale: A short project to start. Something within the safe confine of the classroom experience. Think of this as the ‘getting to know each other’ part of this group experience. This is not a presentation (no PowerPoints) but a discussion of the topic they have negotiated with the other groups and myself.

"The Edge” Assignment: Each “Quad Group” will set up a time with ETSU’s “The Edge” radio station and lend their voices for a drop, a legal, a promo, a sting, or an ad.

Rationale: Stepping out into the world, even if it still the ETSU world. The groups have to make the contacts, set up the appointments with the General Manager, and then go into the studio and create what the GM determines needs to be made. This gives them practical experience in those areas, as well as lending their voices to the Broadcast Division of the Communication Department.

Dinner and the FSNP Paper: Two “Quad-Groups” will combine to become a “Double-Quad.” This larger group will have to plan a meal from scratch, eat that meal together, and produce one co-written paper. I will be looking for evidence of your group's development and its accomplishments, and of the various contributions to the dinner and the writing process. This five-page co-constructed paper is your group response to how your “Double-Quad” worked together, concentrating on the forming, storming, norming, and performing (FSNP) aspects of group development. You will present to the class you dinner menu, and a brief discussion of the group project. 

Rationale: Leaders and other roles are generally in place within the “Quads” by the time this project rolls around. This stirs things up. Power struggles often raise their heads as groups come together. Negotiating is more difficult and the number of persons in the group makes every thing more chaotic and complex. HOWEVER, the actual project of making dinner together provides students with a pretty relaxing, fun, enjoyable atmosphere – plus they get to eat well.

The “Double-Quad” Volunteer Project & Paper: Each “Double-Quad” will volunteer with a nonprofit organization in the greater Johnson City area to complete a project of some significance both to the agency you're working for and to yourselves and your group. Group members must work together on location for at least 7 hours during the semester--some might involve much more than this, depending on how much off-site preparation is required. The objective here is, as best you can, to do something for an organization that involves your group as a group and that utilizes your group's unique abilities. Documentation is essential. The grade for this project consists of two components on which you will be graded: A professional presentation to the organization for which you volunteered, which I also attend. A co-constructed paper of 12 pages (not including references) on how the team worked while doing your volunteer project, what theoretical concepts you found informative as you worked through the process of becoming a group, the accomplishment of the necessary tasks, as well as the struggles and dilemmas you encountered.

Rationale: The big Kahuna!: serving the Johnson City community. Getting students involved with individuals they don’t necessarily run into in their daily lives. For example when I did this at USF, one group worked at the Moffett Cancer Center. At Mizzou one group worked with a home for abused children. Another for a literacy program. Another for the local animal shelter. Another for undernourished kids. A LOT of planning and collaborating and negotiating goes into, not only the project, but the co-written paper. Students found these projects not only useful, but self-fulfilling.

So that’s it. Taking theory and making it practical. Going from small groups and small projects to larger groups and larger projects. While Organizational communication is my passion, this is –by far – my favorite class to teach.

On Teaching Group Communication Well

Anyone who’s spent any time teaching eventually runs into the dilemma of making theory come alive for students. That’s why I love teaching Group Communication. It is one of my most successful courses. Students come away with a real understanding of how theory works in practice.  How? I give students the requisite liberty to form autonomous groups – and then send them out into the world. As my syllabus states:

"A significant portion of the class time will be allotted to allowing you to meet with your fellow students in your groups. We will form groups by choosing class members - and being chosen - through a process to be described later in the semester. Groups will be challenged with a goal for the semester, as well as two ongoing tasks, and also will be provided activities every week that are related to the course content and designed to further both the development of your group and your ability to link the conceptual and experiential modes of learning. But most of what goes on in the group is up to you - and to your fellow group members. The groups will meet during class every week throughout the semester, and no doubt, will meet outside of class as well. The challenge is how to make the most of this unusual opportunity.”


This makes today's student nervous. Students have been trained in the banking system version of education, where the teacher deposits information into the student’s brain and then the student withdraws that information and puts it on a test. I feed you. You vomit it up. That training is not useful in this kind of class. I give my students forewarning on this aspect of what the class is going to be like:

“Some of you may find this form of active "learning-by-doing" a disturbing experience. I can't tell you "what to accomplish" or "what we should be doing in the group." It isn't that I won't. I can't. You have to work it out, individually and together. Learning about groups comes from struggling with the process of trying to become a group. For some, working together and learning to manage those differences will be one of the most rewarding educational tasks you'll ever face. For them, the opportunity to examine one's own needs for authority and the chance to learn openly about communication and human relationships in such a relatively unstructured and safe situation is a welcome one, even though some frustration necessarily will part of this process, too.”

Similarly, in contrast to the banking system of education, I don’t lecture in this class. No lectures. No PowerPoint presentations. No monologues. Rather I frame debates or situations and then let students do in-class team projects and lead discussions about how a particular theory fits within their everyday lives. Given that this is a relatively new way of ‘doing class’ for many students I put an important warning in my syllabus as well:

“Warning!! Please note that this is not a lecture class in any sense of the word, as lecturing in front of the room is the anti-thesis of what this class designed to do. Class time is going to be used for various group-building activities. Therefore, you must keep up with the readings on your own. Please, do not remain in this course unless you are willing to commit yourself to the challenge of learning about communicative processes in groups and about your own communication in groups through the active and student-directed process described above. This warning includes anyone participating on a team sport or who has a job. If you are dedicated to this class, you must be here. If you are dedicated to your athletic endeavors or your employment more than to this class, please be considerate and drop this class. If you remain in this class you are promising yourself to your group, your classmates, and me. Be aware that as a last resort groups can fire a member for nonparticipation – and if you are that member, you will fail the class, because you cannot do an individual project to make up for a group project.”

In my next post, I’ll provide some of the assignments students do during the semester. In in the meantime, here are links to the three texts I use in the class.

In Mixed Company

Strengthsfinder 2.0

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team

Stay tuned...

10 Philosophy Books 4 Your Perusal (Pt 10): Heidegger's Being and Time

Martin Heidegger: Being and Time

M.H.

People have problems with Martin Heidegger. And with good reason. Of course he was a member of the Nazi Party, which is the culmination of his ass-headedness. Martin had proven himself to be an asshole however, long before this. 

Hanna Arendt

For example, after praising his mentor Edmund Husserl's work, he completely contradicted it and abused it, turning Husserl's phenomenological project on its head. Of course for someone so smart, Husserl wasn't too bright. He's the one who published Being and Time without realizing Heidegger was lambasting his ideas. He had a number of affairs including with Hanna Arendt, a Jew...yeah...like I said...he was a real jerk. Not for sexing it up with a Jewess, but doing so while becoming a Nazi. 

Hitler und M. H.

He was elected the Rector of the University of Freiburg and his first act as Rector was to eliminate all democratic structures, including those that had elected him Rector. (Sounds like a good Nazi, yes?) 


And yet, very few philosophers have influenced  so many branches of philosophy: existentialism, hermeneutics, deconstructionism, postmodernism, phenomenology. And there is little doubt that of the 20th century philosophical tomes, none is as deep and as rich (or as difficult) as Heidegger's Being and Time. (Sartre & Foucault not withstanding.) So lets look at some of Being and Time. 

While I am not going to explicitly examine the following, it is important to recognize that for Heidegger (1962) as he elucidated in Being and Time, Dasein (the human being) is always in the world. Dasein exists in, along with and is a natural part of it and cannot be separated from it. Dasein is always there, thrown into an existing in the world. Dasein always exists in this context of ‘worldliness.’ This is important, because Dasein therefore cannot get behind, or go beyond his temporal existence in the world and this placement in the world means that Dasein must determine how to exist in, alongside and with it. Dasein relates to the world through care (Sorge), through a defining relation, through the realization that this Being is its own Being, as therefore it has direct concern and responsibility for this Being. This is one of the major breaks between Heidegger and Husserl, the latter wanting to bracket the existence of the world (and hence care) through the epoché.


In Being and Time, there is a tension set up almost from the start between two possible, mutually exclusive modes of Being in which Dasein might exist. These modes are authenticity (eigentlich sein) and inauthenticity (uneigentlich sein). In the ontology of Being and Time, these two possible modes of existence belong to the essential constitution of Dasein. Dasein must choose these modes of existence. In choosing to be authentic, Dasein chooses itself and wins itself. In inauthenticity, Dasein chooses the public interpretations of the self, takes on the conceptions of the ‘they’ and hence loses itself. It is important to note, however, that these two modes of existence are not directly dichotomous, nor oppositional (p. 67-69). They are not an either/or. Dasein does not choose to be authentic once, and then will forever be authentic. Rather, Dasein must choose again and again whether to be authentic or inauthentic, because these possibilities belong to its essential constitution. The need to choose is constant.

Kierkegaard

{Let me clarify with an example from Christianity. Strict Calvinists believe in the doctrine of “once saved, always saved,” that is, once you have made the decision for Christ, you are sealed and cannot ever not be saved. On the other hand, the Armenians conception of salvation is that salvation is worked out through ‘fear and trembling,’ and in order to be saved, one must make the choice to ‘be’ a Christian at each instant. Of course Heidegger was not discussing salvation in Being and Time, but the allegory helps to illuminate Dasein’s need to choose the authentic or inauthentic constantly. By the way, in case you did not notice - Fear and Trembling - is the title of one of Kierkegaard's books. Heidegger stole a lot of ideas from Kierkegaard, btw.}

It is important to recognize the constant need to choose because the possibility of authenticity and inauthenticity are constitutions of Dasein, living inauthentically in no way makes Dasein less Dasein. There is no lower degree of being. However, there are distinctions between living the authentic life and living inauthentically, and like Kierkegaard, Heidegger’s conception includes the ‘they.’ What is the ‘they?’ As Heidegger notes, “The ‘they’ is an existentiale; and as a primordial phenomenon, it belongs to Dasein’s positive consititution…” (p. 167). The ‘they’ and ‘they-self’ comprise Dasein in its everydayness. Because Dasein is always in the world, this being-in necessarily signifies being-with others. This being-with is a necessary component of Dasein’s existential everydayness. While Dasein cannot escape this everydayness, it is in this being-with-others where the possibility of inauthenticity lies.

In this being-with-others, Dasein can live in fallenness (Verfallen), which connotes deterioration or a crumbling (Golumb, 1995). Rather than existing on our own terms, with our own defining relation, we accept and incorporate the meanings, which are given to us from the outside. “The Self of everyday Dasein is the they-self, which we distinguish from the authentic Self – that is from the self which has been taken hold of in its own way” (p. 167). We accept the definitions and the responsibilities of the ‘they.’ From this description of the they-self, Dasein has the possibility of laying aside its care, its defining relation and accepting conventional wisdom as its own.


To Dasein’s state of being belongs falling. Proximally and for the most part Dasein is lost in its “world.” Its understanding, as a projection of possibilities of Being, has diverted itself thither. Its absorption in the “they” signifies that it is dominated by the way things are publicly interpreted (p. 264).


Dasein comes to believe given unexamined meanings as important and significant to it, when they in actuality are not. This acceptance of the inauthenticity of the “they-self,” and the laying aside of Dasein’s care is to live in falleness.


In Being and Time, Heidegger examines communication as it relates to inauthenticity and fallenness. In particular, he examines idle talk. Futher in the same passage where he describes falleness, Heidegger continues, “That which has been uncovered and disclosed stands in a mode in which it is disguised and closed off by idle talk, curiosity, and ambiguity” (p. 264). No longer is Dasein concerned with care, its own-most being, nor its defining relation. Rather, in fallenness those are to some extent hidden, as the face of a friend at a masquerade ball – you know who it is, even if you cannot see his face.


In everydayness, Dasein is confronted with the possibility of maintaining authenticity or losing it through discourse, because,


this discoursing has lost its primary relationship-of-Being towards the entity talked about, or has never achieved such a relationship, it does not communicate in such a way as to let this entity be appropriated in a primordial manner, but communicates rather by following the route of gossiping and passing the word along. What is said-in-the-talk as such, spreads in wider circles and takes on an authoritative character (p. 212).


In everydayness the pre-conceived and uncritically accepted conventional wisdom, Dasein loses itself. Dasien, by accepting the rules and roles of society’s conventionality, is a leveling down of one’s defining relation. “Every kind of priority gets noiselessly suppressed. Overnight, everything that is primordial gets glossed over as something that has been well known” (p. 165).


The “they” however, as an existentiale, is not some amorphous third person, the herd, or the crowd. In fact, despite the term’s third-person implication, the “they” is in fact intricate to being Dasein. Rather, the “they-self” is an act, a way of being Dasein, accomplished by Dasein’s accommodation of the interpretations of the self and the world, through idle talk, curiosity, novelty and ambiguity. “If Dasein is familiar with itself as they-self, this means that at the same time the “they” itself prescribes that way of interpreting the world and Being-in-the-world which lies closest” (p. 167). Living in the “they” then, is not the fault of some third party, but is Dasein’s responsibility. If Dasein projects itself into the future based upon the internalized categories supplied by the “they,” it is by default self-limiting – Verfallen. 
The trick is for Dasein to live as an individual and in the everydayness of Verfallen (Guignon, 1984).  


Of course given all this great thinking...how was he able to join the most malevolent political party ever? Perhaps Martin had the most pronounced version of cognitive dissonance ever.  


And since this is the last of the philosophy books series, here are the links to the previous nine for your perusal.




Number 9: Ion by Aristotle
Number 8: Care of the Self by Foucault
Number 7: The Ethics of Authenticity by Charles Taylor
Number 6: I & Thou by Martin Buber
Number 5: The Communist Manifesto by Marx & Engels
Number 4: The Reasons of Love by Henry Frankfurt
Number 3: Purity of Heart Is to Will One Thing by Soren Kierkegaard
Number 2: The Rebel - Albert Camus
Number 1: The Theory of Moral Sentiments - Adam Smith

Speech Com/Com Studies Career and Job Titles

Whenever I see 'lists' of career choices for Speech/Communication Studies undergraduates, I always laugh at their ridiculousness. Speechwriter. Novelist.  DJ. Actor. Actress. That is a very idealized list and always irritates me. How many of us are going to be this guy?

Yeah. 
None of us. 


He is Bob Costas. 


I am not. 


You are not.

Or this guy?

Sorry, there's only one Letterman.


Just 
like 
there 
is
only 
one......

David Boreanaz

aka

Angel

aka

Special 

Agent

Seeley

Booth.

So let's get real. 

Sure you could become a famous actor or broadcaster or DJ or talk show host, but it is much more likely you are going to have a successful career doing something else. Like working in investor relations, or as a crisis communication specialist, or a human resources manager, or a recruiter, or any number of awesome career options. 

I worked in publishing, graphic design, advertising, and information technology. I got these jobs why? Not because I was the most brilliant, but because I could communicate. For example I did not get my technology position only because of my tech skills, but because I could make technological information understandable to non-technologists. 

I could communicate about technology.

Communication has also helped me change careers...important in this ever-changing world of globalization, where this year's job is next year's place on the unemployment line. 

Given the goofiness of "the famous people/famous careers" list that proliferates for Speech/Communication Studies, here's what I did. I went online and did a search via LinkedIn on individuals who studied Speech and/or Communication Studies as undergraduates. From the data I collected, I created this Wordle that presents the most commonly found career/job titles.

The original link to the Wordle site (and the ability to see it larger) where I created this cloud is here.

So there it is. An updated and realistic look at 

Speech Communication/Communication Studies careers and jobs. 

Talk to the professors who will be teaching 
the classes that interest you.

Look into the classes you want to take. 


For ETSU Students:

Communication in Organizations

Interpersonal

Business & Professional 

Argumentation & Debate

Gender & Communication

Persuasion

Dynamics of Group Leadership

Speech Communication

Skills for Life