May 2

found on a telephone pole, good friday 2010:

because
i need to express myself to stay sane i'm shy this is where i live i don't see my history written on the body of this city sometimes i am so sad sometimes i am so lonely seeing something i've made, outside, in my neighborhood helps and so this is where i am making my home i have responsibility for this place this city needs more color this city needs more vibrancy this city needs more creativity this city needs more spontaneity, this city needs less bureaucracy i sometimes can't sleep at night my heart hurts i can't just leave the past behind i can never finish things but i create all the time and can't throw them out i have lots of doodles around my house i taught myself to draw and think i mostly suck but some people like it i have things to say that i don't want my name attached to i love seeing other people's creations i am inspired by other people's creations i am inspired by art galleries art galleries too often only show Art art galleries make me sad this city is too gray this city needs histories written on its walls this city is a place this place has histories these histories are neither simple nor just i don't know them well enough i want people to tell me theirs i want to learn this place is not easy i don't want to be sad i don't want this city to be so cold it will be fun to...are all artists people say "we are all artists" but don't often enough ask what that means there is a lot of amazing stuff being created by you and me all of the time i want to experience it there doesn't have to be a "middle man" i have staples i have tape i have thumb tacks i have flour and water i have ideas i have dreams i have a future i find inspiration in so many things i would probably find inspiration in you lots of people would probably find inspiration in you if you wanted to let everyone else know what this place, this life is like for you. if you wanted to share.

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Rant: do-gooder do-nothings

i don't know what it is about professors -- "my people" -- but they just love to hate their jobs. nothing gets us more exercised than bitching about how much we work, under what terrible conditions, for inadequate pay, under such stupid administrators. nothing, that is, except how bad someone else's job is.

i'm on this list, a cultural studies list, where everybody is up in arms over a tenure case at the university of michigan. seems a progressive activist has been denied tenure. sweet jesus above, keep your eyes peeled for horsemen, for the apocalypse must be upon us.

actually, it appears on closer inspection that the tenure decision has not yet been finalized, nor has it been made public. nor has anyone on the cacs list been privy to the full set of documents involved in this case. nonetheless, professors, postdocs and graduate students are all dutifully writing to the provost at michigan to express their outrage at this miscarriage of academic justice. i guess they've never heard the old peter cook and dudley moore sketch on the second world war. "i was against the war," says dud, self-righteously, "i wrote a letter!" i can just see it now, the u-michigan provost calling a special meeting of the tenure and promotion committee: "i know this group has reviewed the materials in the tenure file and has read carefully the letters of experts in the field, and has put this candidate's qualifications against those of other recently tenured professors. but i'd like to draw your attention to a letter i received this morning from an assistant professor at brock university which clearly states -- what? oh, brock university: that's in canada."

people on the cacs list must get less email than i do.

while i'm no pollyanna (yeah, sure i'd like to make more money, work fewer hours, have a bigger office and a faster computer, handpick my students, teach only when inspired, write for fame and glory), and while i don't for a second believe that universities are perfect, i'm normally so busy with issues in my own school and city that i don't have time to involve myself in the obscure, private matters at another. and, yes, they are obscure -- the full facts are not known, and probably never will be, given the confidential nature of tenure cases -- and they are private, for the same reasons of confidentiality.

here's an idea. if you want a better system of tenure, promotion, reward, activism, community service, or collegiality, why not take up an administrative position in your own university? say "yes" the next time someone asks you to serve as an external reviewer. nominate leonard pelletier (or, for that matter, andrea smith) for an honorary doctorate. or help organize the next local/provincial/national election. or tutor a student at an inner-city high school.

you'll have less time to fret on the multi-national listservs, but you might actually make a difference.