Muddling through Moodle

Seems like the blog was one of the things that slipped away from me this past semester--where did the time go?! But it's time for a reboot...and look for an exciting announcement this week on a spinoff project that is a long time in coming... I mean besides the gingerbread...

One of the real frustrations of this past semester was the "upgrade" to Blackboard 8--I liked to think I was pretty adept at our previous platform, but the new version wreaked havoc with my ability to provide live and accurate grade information for students. Further, it appears that sending students email from Bb from my Mac is a non-starter (of course, that could be a 10.6 glitch too, I suppose). In short, several key aspects of my online platform have fallen, and they can't seem to get up.

So this might be the tipping point to move me to Moodle, I thought to myself. I even went onto the Moodle site and set up an a/c for myself last night, starting to poke around and see if I was getting myself into deeper doo-doo by trying to learn a new platform in a few weeks rather than the summer (I might just pilot one class this spring)...

Thing is, I opened my BSC email this morning, only to be confronted with no less than three dozen spam emails for Viagra, penis enlargement, and what have you. Aha--the downside of open-source software! So if I go the route of Moodle, is this something that my students and I have to look forward to every morning?! Yeesh.

I love the idea of open-source software for online media studies classes (ready-made self-reflexive opportunities and all that), but is spam the price we have to pay? If our IT wants us to migrate, we need way better filtering.

My question to You The Reader: What experience do you have with open-source software and/or institutional spam protection? Also, if any of you have Moodle experience (good or bad) I'd love to hear about it!

"O Lithuania, My Homeland..."

This week in COMM 199 we're seeing a pair of films from perhaps THE most prolific and important director in Polish film, and a celebrated auteur in the realm of what we lovingly refer to as "global cinema": Andrzej Wajda. This weekend, we'll screen his canonic Ashes and Diamonds (1958), his third film, and the completion of his "WWII war trilogy." First, though, we're starting with a more recent film set nearly two centuries ago, Pan Tadeusz (1999). Though they're made over four decades apart, with wildly different geo-political and industrial contexts for their productions, both films are dealing with Polish statehood and national identity.

Perhaps not surprisingly, though, things can start to get complicated once you get underneath the surface a little. Consider the opening line of Adam Mickiewicz's epic poem upon which the film is adapted:

O Lithuania, my country, thou

Art like good health; I never knew till now

How precious, till I lost thee. Now I see

Thy beauty whole, because I yearn for thee.

For some, this couplet points to the Polish-Lithuanian union which existed in what we commonly call the Middle Ages, until the partitions of Poland that forced this part of the world to become a part of Czarist Russia from 1795-1918. It's remembering a state of the nation that no longer exists (note that both Tadeusz and Ashes chronicle nobly doomed attempts to reassert independent Polish statehood). But as is alluded to in the end of Pan Tadeusz (with a discussion about serf emancipation), the reassertion of Poland and Polish rule over the land puts the Poles back as colonial rulers in their own right. Lithuanians might hear this opening couplet from Mickevičius (as he's know in Lithuanian) and have their own sense of this country that they lost time and again...

Remembering 9/11

Driving down the Cape this morning on an errand, I came across coverage of the 9/11 anniversary ceremony in New York on WCBS (880 AM). Listening to the names being read, I was reminded that, unlike most of America, I experienced much of that day mediated via radio rather than television. We'd just moved back to the US from LT a few weeks earlier, and didn't have cable in our apartment yet. Workers on our bathroom told me that something big was going on in New York, and I should check the radio--it never turned off that day. I remember playing an intramural tennis match that day (?!) and also teaching my 16mm film class. Walking here and there, I was listening on my Walkman radio. Only in the middle of the afternoon, at the country library, did I start to see the video images...

2006 was (to my knowledge) the first time that you could relive the TV coverage on 9/11, as CNN streamed their coverage from five years previous in real time. That was my first semester at Bridgewater, and was quite an "in" to discussions in both Intro to Mass Comm and Mass Comm Theory & Research courses. Today, I found out (from WEEI-AM, who declined to name the specific network!) that CNBC is replaying NBC coverage from eight years ago today. I can't spend more than an hour with it--it's too hard. And I'm tuning in now, after the towers have fallen, and I am so ok with that. If you have time, reviewing the coverage is well worth the effort....

And for a palate cleaner (I need a lot of those this year, it seems), I offer the trailer for last year's documentary Man On Wire. Really nice film--and it's available to stream on Netflix. Worth a look.

And then tell your important folks that you love them.

Farewell, Amanda

This is an odd way to start the semester, but I just wanted to publicly wish my former colleague in the Department of Communication Studies, Prof. Amanda Brozana, all the best as she leaves Bridgewater State. Those of you who have worked with Amanda know about her passion for all things journalism--we will miss her as she pursues other projects.

By the miracle of facebook, you might even read this yourself, Amanda. Take care, and be in touch.

Nothing cleans the palate like a good KISS lip-sync video

COMM 229 goes in a slightly different direction today, as we talk about fan-created videos--discussions surrounding doglover199709 and her Katy Perry video point to other preadolescent hijinx.  Which leads me to my next skeleton in the closet--my KISS fandom.

I will just say that as an enthusiastic 4th grade fan of KISS, I did not understand what they meant when they sang "You pulled the trigger of my... love gun!"  That is too blatant to even call it a double-entente.  That is what you gotta call a single-entente--hilarious in its crude artlessness, which is I guess why I still like KISS, despite it all.  

There is another Bjorn Ingvoldstad (well, Björn Ingvoldstad) I have met over the web (yes we're related--a 3rd or 4th cousin in Sweden), and he's sent me video his son has made of his son & buddies IN FULL KISS MAKEUP doing a lip-sync video for "Detroit Rock City."  This is SWEDEN in 2009 for God's sake.  I attach it here--the best stuff is actually the curtain call in the last minute.  Amazing.

And if I had the technology back in 1979, I would have done the same thing.  I hope!  To mix my 70s rock references, for those about to rock, we salute you....

Gates' arrest: "...a local issue..."?

My COMM 229 summer web class is discussing race and media representation this week, and the arrest Dr. Gates in Cambridge has certainly enlivened discussion.  Here's the latest snippet I posted to our discussion board, complete with ongoing tie to local sports-talk radio station WEEI (which does great local sports coverage, but way too often veers off into right-wing political diatribes--listen to their 6-10am morning show on the web in the next few days to get a taste of how they're discussing the issue).... 

Did you all catch the Obama press conference last night?  If not, here's the Yahoo article from this morning w/ relevant quotes, plus the rebuttal from the Cambridge officer.... as quoted on WEEI!  Unreal....  

In view of our discussion on the phrase "playing the race card" this week (it's not about race until Gates says it is), I want to highlight something the officer said that again shows the lack of understanding of the context of this issue:

"I support the president to a point, yes, I think it's disappointing that he waded into what should be a local issue and something that plays out here," Crowley told WEEI. "As he himself said ... he doesn't know all the facts."

So not only would this not be about race (if Gates would have JUST SHUT UP), but it would also not be of national attention (if The [national / liberal (ha!)] Media and/or Obama would JUST SHUT UP).

There is the event itself, and there is the perception of the event.  And there is the discourse surrounding the event, which is part of a larger discourse on race in the USA.  The pattern I see emerging from the Right is the attempt to not only refute any perception of racial injustice but as well any possible linkage from this to any wider social context.

Nothing to see here, folks--drive on by.  Wow. 

Every picture tells a story...

One of the interesting threads on the COMM 229 discussion board this week has to do with our textbook's use of photography to unpack notions of both  semiotics and narrative.   This dovetails nicely with a recent find from the Sandwich Public Library: a book of color photographs from the late depression years, part of the FSA/OWI (Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information) archives, now housed at the Library of Congress (click here to access their online holdings and search engine).

The attached photo is part of the collection--a color shot of the office of the Brockton Enterprise which still publishes some 15 minutes north of BSC.  Note the two-colored, hand-printed headline thumbnails in the corner window--the poor man's scrolling LED display!

The book, nicely titled Bound for Glory (hip points for COMM 229 students that can identify the allusion), is striking in its ability to bring color to an era that, for those of us who didn't live it, is mostly frozen in black and white.  It's eye-opening to see pre-WWII farmsteads in Pie Town, NM or street scenes in Lowell, MA in living color.  Do yourself a favor and see if you can find it in your town library--it's a trip. 

Fish, Céline, Audrey, and (yes) Michael

The word from Wing-Kai in Shanghai is that blogs are still being blocked in China, making Fish's blog on his BSC study-tour a moot point.  However, you just have to think that this could be the seed for a new media / int'l media policy senior-sem kind of paper, right?  In the meantime, if anyone reading this knows Eric Fischer, and is looking for China blogs, you might be best served to check his facebook a/c instead for updates.  We might get a deluge of stuff on the blog once he's back...

In the ever-growing "Things We Like About Toronto" file, let us now praise the 33 1/3 night bringing together readings and discussion on the series' books on Céline Dion and Elliot Smith.  Those who took COMM 399 ("Popular Music, Communication & Culture") with me last fall are nodding knowingly--the rest of you need to check out Carl Wilson's book (subtitled A Journey to the End of Taste) now.  If anyone has read Matt Lemay's book on XO, I'd love to hear what you thought...

Caught a charming little film called How to Steal a Million (1966) last night--Hepburn & O'Toole are solid together, and seeing Hepburn into any number of chic '60s outfits (the dresses!  the hats!  the sunglasses!--seriously!) and one hell of a red subcompact (see above) is worth a look...

And what would this week's blog entries be without yet another MJ reference?  Mowing the lawn and listening to podcasts yesterday, I noted yet another King of Pop moment from left field.  This time it was This American Life, which organized their show in four acts, each named by a Jackson song, topped by the "Man in the Mirror" outro.  I believe the show was sent out on Saturday, so this must have been something of a last-second choice (unless they recycled this particular old show on the basis of the MJ organizational principle).  It was understated, and more poignant for it...

Michael is everywhere!

A postscript of sorts to yesterday's post... Finally sat down this morning to watch (& send off) the Netflix DVD that's been languishing on our kitchen table for at least two weeks, a 2000 Oscar-nominated Belgian film called Everybody's Famous.  I won't give too much away by saying that our protagonist kidnaps a national star in a bid to break out of an increasingly desperate mid-life turn of events--he himself is a frustrated songwriter hoping to jump-start the career of his daughter, who is floundering on the Flemish star-tribute circuit...

Anyhow, the father shows up to negotiate his demands wearing a Michael Jackson mask (which I unfortunately cannot manage to find a picture of on the web--someday I'll sort out how to do screen-shots).  A jarring yet oddly moving moment--and another nod to MJ's global reach...

Remembering: Michael

Time will tell if folks will truly remember when / where they first heard of Michael Jackson's passing (why this particular fascination?  do people need to feel "a part of" the story?  trace it back through not only 9/11, but also Diana, Lennon, Elvis...), but for me, I was folding clothes and listening to NPR.  At that point, it was an unconfirmed report, but I hopped over to CNN while finishing the laundry.  Turns out I watched a lot of TV on MJ this weekend, and heard not a few songs on the radio to boot--collective, mediated mourning...

I was pretty much in Michael's marketing sweet-spot circa Thriller--an 8th grade music (video) enthusiast.  Granted, my copy of this album was in fact one side of a Maxell D90 cassette recorded from Tony Wilson (the other side had a Pat Benetar live set, if I'm not mistaken), and I was never a "fan" the way I was about new wave artists like Mr Numan (or even Prince, for that matter)... But Michael Jackson was someone who really transcended culture cliques--or perhaps better to say, race-based entertainment boundaries of the 1980s...

Favorite musical moments from Jackson's songs returned in force this weekend: the squeal of delight as "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough" kicks, the bubblegum fizz of "ABC," afro-beat echos in "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'"... Video moments I'd forgotten, like the nod to Do the Right Thing as MJ goes postal at the end of "Black or White," Steve Stevens giving it the ol' college try in "Dirty Diana," Cher trying her best to keep up with a choreographed Jackson 5 (good luck with that)...

Back in the day, I taught a class at BSC called "Mass Communication Theory & Research," and one year we read a solid book by Jason Mittell called Television and Genre, which had a chapter on Michael Jackson and music videos.  MJ is so intertwined with '80s-era MTV that it's hard to imagine one without the other.  So it was eye-opening read for the whole class (myself included) to find that in fact MTV had refused to air Jackson's first single off Thriller.  It took the entire corporate weight of Columbia/Sony to get MTV to ease up on it's lillywhite playlist policy.  (For media studies folks who might be reading this, seek out this chapter--it's an enlightening window into race and pop culture in Reagan's first term.)  This helps to explain why even now I am still sorting out all the solid music made by African American artists in the 1980s that I never really sorted out at the time--to say nothing of whole histories of blues and jazz...

The 24/7 news cycle lumbers on that Friday, with Larry King interviewing Céline Dion & Cher.The most surreal moment of the evening comes with Randy Jackson ("No relation!" King dutifully notes)  on the line.   We see a decontextualized image of a helicopter--King, only mildly flummoxed, learns through his ear that the copter appears to be carrying (Michael) Jackson's body, prompting him to ask (Randy) Jackson if maybe he knows where the flight is headed?  Randy does not...

I've read some pretty nasty stuff on facebook and elsewhere on MJ's passing--and I guess I can understand it, if you believe he was guilty as charged in the various molestation charges.  But it seemed oddly dissonant to me--something even now I'm not terribly excited to engage.  I think of Jackson's struggles these days (or my mediated understanding of them, of course) in terms of Herman Gray's book Watching Race, which is about television, race, and cultural politics in the era of Reaganism (coming this fall to a COMM 300 virtual classroom near you).  MJ's too-overt wrestling with his own racial identity is starting to become a means for to talk about race in the USA in the 1980s (and beyond)...

We flip to MSNBC, where the helicopter has landed--Jackson's body has been moved from UCLA Medical Center to a helipad at USC, which is close to the LAPD Coroner's Office (where by now two autopsies have been carried out and reported upon) and Keith Olbermann narrates the transfer of the body into a waiting van.  Ambulance chasers, all of us--we watch (and watch again) as the nearly-formless, sheet-covered body is slipped into the van, which drives uneventfully to the Coroner.

He is gone.

I turn to my wife and say something inane about the universality of death.  However wrongfully, I can't just not say anything...

I get interviewed, or 10 litas wasted!

A month or so back, I was asked to do an interview for Lithuania's largest daily, Lietuvos rytas.  After teaching on media for several years now, and writing about Lithuanian media in particular, it's an odd experience to become a "participant" again in the process.  I managed to piss a lot of people off for writing off Sasha Son (who did, in fact, get to the second round of Eurovision).  I still owe him 10 litas.  Here's the interview: 1. How many years and under what circumstances have you lived in Lithuania?  Add it all up, and I've lived over two years in LT... 1997-98 I was an English teacher at Seduva Secondary School.  2000-2001 I was doing dissertation research and interning at Radio Vilnius.  Summer 2002 I did some follow-up research in Seduva.  But really that was the last serious chunk of time I've lived in the country.  By the time I finished my dissertation, I was already writing about history--the period right before EU & NATO accession.  I've been back each of the past two summers, and have a conference in Kaunas this summer--but it's not the same as living there.  I miss it. 2. From http://www.bridgew.edu: “His particular focus continues to be in Lithuania, with a wider contextual base in post-socialist Eurasia.” Is it accurate to say you sort of built a career out of  interest in Lithuanian pop culture? How much of your research material, gathered in Lithuania (or about Lithuania), do you use in your classes? Do you students seem to be interested in it? My dissertation on Lithuania allowed me to work through a range of interests: not just television and film, but also popular music and new media as well.  My work on Lithuania certainly helped build my career.  My hope is that it's not a one-way situation--for instance, I'm working on a study-tour to bring a class of students to Lithuania this next summer, introducing them to another culture--one I fell in love with myself some dozen years ago... My work in Lithuania comes up in my research methods course (field work takes time!), though I try to not make it about ME.  I have a new class next year called "Cinema of Small Nations" that will include a unit on Baltic film--we're going to use a special issue of the Estonian journal Via Transversa that focused on the "lost cinema of the former Eastern Bloc." My students are curious about the world, but a lot of them haven't had the chance to be exposed to a lot of stuff.  I had a student travel to NYC for the first time in his life (only a four-hour drive) only because of the festival success of a film he acted in.  Students take my classes on Global Cinema, Central European Film, or (most recently) Central Asian Cinema and are really learning about that part of the world along with trying to sort out the films.  Even sorting out watching films with subtitles is a challenge, because it's a learned skill they have yet to develop.... They're open to learning, and that's all I can ask for!  3. You met and interviewed Andrius Mamontovas, other Lithuanian pop/rock stars. What impression they made to you? Any stories/reminiscences connected to them? Did they conduct themselves as stars, or they were casual with you?  AM was incredibly gracious with his time--I interviewed him twice, and once my cassette recorder even worked!  He strikes me as both wise and self-aware--seeing as all I could muster is kind of smart and self-conscious, I wasn't exactly in a position to negotiate a profound interview, I'm afraid.  I still have a tape of our interview in Old Town: AM's talking interrupted by a song by....yep!  No escape. I still regret not getting to the last Foje show in '97--I made up for it by seeing AM several times in 2000-01, including a blisteringly loud show in Palanga...  Olegas from Lemon Joy opened several doors for me, for which I'll always be grateful.  My wife and I even celebrated Int'l Women's Day w/ him & his family, which was fine. I got to interview Skamp in 2001 after Eurovision--I wrote extensively about the LT contest that year in my dissertation, and so it was helpful for me to hear from them what they thought about the whole "real Lithuanians" discourse. I got a few autographs for friends / family but never for me... except for running into A. Kaušpedas in the airport w/ my 4-CD Antis reissue, and sheepishly asking for a signature.... If you're asking whether the LT stars acted arrogantly, I would say absolutely not.  It was an artificial situation--they don't know me, I'm recording their conversation, I'm from the state radio (press) but also a student from abroad (?!).... So the fact that they sat down with me at all was gracious. I realized, though, that my interest ultimately was more towards these stars' AUDIENCES and that my time was probably better spent sitting around in Seduva talking about what Antis meant to them... instead of trying to interview Antis themselves. 4. How they perceived themselves being musicians in a small country, relatively far away from the European music scene? Did they express any frustrations? I think AM and Skamp both were looking to break out, or cross over, or what have you.  Neither really succeeded in that sense, but both really continue to be successful domestically.  In the diss, I discuss AM's double-bind in particular--he was looked at with a fair amount of disdain for trying to "rebrand" himself internationally.... And when he would go abroad, it still ended up mostly being Lithuanians looking to hear "Laužo Šviesa" and relive the '80s....That's got to be hard--but it's also opened so many doors for him... 5. What did you know about Lithuanian pop music/pop culture before coming to Seduva/Vilnius? Did reality contradict any of your preconceptions about the state of Lithuanian pop music? about consumption of foreign pop music? I knew absolutely nothing about Lithuanian pop music before setting foot in the country.  Well, I read about Antis from a dogeared copy of LET'S GO USSR!  We saw Lemon Joy play at a club in Feb. '97--they were pretty heavily influenced by The Smiths at that point.  That was my first exposure to the local scene. Really, my students were my teachers.  We would talk in and out of class about media, and I would encourage them to bring tapes to class to play.  Students took me to see SEL that spring, and introduced me to Mamontovas and Foje.   I came to LT thinking I was going to write a dissertation about postsocialist film industries that was going to cover 27 countries--totally ridiculous.  Once I actually was living in Lithuania, I realized there was WAY more going on right there than I could account for.  And I needed to not just talk about film, but about a wide spectrum of media practices.  I'm lucky my students were willing to teach me so patiently. 6. In your article “Lithuanian Contests and European Dreams” you focus a lot on European Song Contest—Eurovision. Why Eurovision was interesting to you? How you, as American, not just as media researcher, perceive it? Is it comparable in any way to “American Idol”? Why yes/no? I'd read about Eurovision in Melody Maker & the NME (all bad stuff, of course), but never seen it until 1998--"Viva Victoria," right?  It was just great television for a night.  Israeli transvestite boom-chick?  I'm in! Working at the state radio in 2000/01, I saw the gear-up for the ESC first-hand, which got me to talking with folks on both sides of the TV screen.  This was a period when everyone saw that LT needed to get into the EU & NATO, but a) it wasn't 100% clear it was going to happen [remember how LT = NATO, EE = EU, LV=?], and b) it wasn't clear what was going to be gained, but c) there was a sense of loss--a decade after getting out of one multinational state only to enter another, right? I couldn't really walk up to folks and say HOW DO YOU FEEL ABOUT EU ACCESSION, THEN? and expect anything worthwhile.  But I could get to that through the back door--LT & Eurovision (vis-a-vis success by both EE & LV) became something of a referendum of whether or not LT "belonged." I don't think it necessarily plays out that way now, but I defer to those "on the ground" to make a more informed argument on that... 7. What drive people to think of Eurovision as “a gateway to Europe”? Do you find these hopes naïve, or they do have any substance after all? The precedent is there: ABBA, Celine Dion...even Lordi!  Heck, Ruslana made the rounds after her win, right?  The problem when it comes to LT artists is that the political economy of the industry works against them in a huge way.  Ironically, after trying to break out by playing it straight, the boys of LT United made a blip on the European radar with tongue firmly in cheek.  I have to admit I didn't get it at first--but now I look back and see that as probably THE defining LT/ESC moment.  At least until 2010--I have 10 litu that says Sasha Song doesn't make it out of the semifinals. 8. Let’s say one day Lithuanian wins Eurovision. Will that help the country’s image? Will substantial amount of Europeans pay attention to it? What about Americans? Australians? I think Europop travels--wait, is Lordi Europop?  I think so.  If the act has that "something" that puts them over at Eurovision, they can potentially take that "something" on the road.  But while my students that are into metal know Lordi, nobody has anything to say about the Russian winner this past year.     9. Maybe having internationally successful band would help Lithuania’s image more? I’m thinking about something like Lithuanian ABBA… What are the biggest obstacles for Lithuanian musicians to make any larger footprint in the world pop scene (I am not talking only about ESC)? Robert Burnett wrote a great piece about the success of Sweden internationally, and he identified four key things Sweden had going on: musical competence of its citizenry (especially seen in extensive music education), industrial / infrastructural presence, a history and existing network of voluntary organizations, and audience sophistication vis-a-vis global music trends.  What kind of marks might we give LT on the "Sweden test"? 10. Do you find it strange that Lithuanian national television (LTV) is at the center of selection who is going to represent Lithuania in Eurovision? LTV is all about being non-pop and elitist… Some of the “expert judges” are experts in folk singing… Does it have anything to do with the poor Lithuania’s performances in ESC? If you look at the ESC from an industrial POV, whom else would be in the center of national organization if not LTV?  This is part of how public-service broadcasting is being branded, right?  Pan-European populist broadcasting.  This tension you identify is something that public-service broadcasters globally are wrestling with--but having folk singing experts decide who goes to Eurovision helps explain to me why we have another LT singer with questionable taste in hats ready to be bounced in the semifinals.  I think the hat just bugs me because it reminds me of "I, Assassin"-era Gary Numan! But fair is fair--I remember seeing a broadcast in '98 of Rebel Heart playing for all the kids in Vilnius for Dainu svente--headbanging kids in traditional outfits, while the band (in full pancake makeup) spit out I'M YOUR ENEMY--DON'T YOU F**K WITH ME!  Classic. 11. If you approached an average Joe in Massachusetts and asked him what Eurovision was, what, in your opinion, he would say?  Why most Americans are not interested in European music; or are they? How would you define a term of Europop to an average Jonas in Seduva? Why Americans do not like Europop in particular? An average person in Massachusetts has no idea what Eurovision is.  Students in my "Popular Music, Communication & Culture" course now know what it is, but I think they wish they didn't.  Their loss. I think what matters here in the US is the song... or the (sub)genre....more so than where the song is from.  People don't care that Peter, Bjorn & John are from Sweden--they just like that whistling song, right? I think part of how Europop works is that it's designed for folks whose first language ISN'T English--English is pretty much THE second language of Europe at this point, and it serves as common currency.  But if you're looking for something deeper in terms of lyrics, that's not where to look.   12. At a time you were living in Lithuania, debate about Skamp’s Lithuanian-ness and necessity of purely Lithuanian pop music versus singing in English peaked. Do you think the debate is still relevant in nowadays Lithuania? In other words, do you think Lithuanians are more open in 2009 than they were in 2001? I'd like to think that this debate is over.  But it's not.  Actually, I think it's transforming in ways that will make this even MORE pressing in coming years.  This latest wave of folks who have left the country to make their lives outside of Lithuania--there's so many folks like this.  And they're EVERYWHERE, right?  I think folks from LT are more open, but I think the discussion re: Lithuanian-ness will continue...just like European-ness and global citizenry.  Those questions never are fully resolved--they keep coming back in new and interesting ways.   13. In your article “Lithuanian Contests and European Dreams” you wrote: “To a native English speaker, Europop lyrics can always seem simplistic, if not downright nonsensical”. What do you make of this piece of lyrics:         A little girl is crying alone                     A little boy searching for his home                     Giving up to a sin                     For a heart-craving dream                     Is that a sin?                     If you really love                     The love you say you love (really love)                     Then surely that love would love...                     Then surely that love would love to love you back FYI, this is a song by Sasha Son, official Lithuanian entry to Eurovision’09. I saw the video.... His heart is in the right place (vs child abuse) but the whole thing seems packaged in a way that is ultimately disappointing to me.  Like I said, I have 10 lt that says LT is done in the semifinals, but I'd love to be proved wrong.  As soon as someone like me opens their big mouth, that's almost a guarantee that Fate will find a way to serve me Humble Pie... 14. A very straightforward question: Why Lithuanian acts always were miserable to lukewarm in Eurovision? We might best answer that on a case by case basis.... 15. What Lithuanian music is on your iPod (if any)? Why?  Mamontovas--Laisve tavyje...Superb b-side w/ a beautiful chorus Empti--Diskoteka...They should have been MASSIVE--what a loss Jurga--Instrukcija...Saw her in Boston--great new hope for me for LT pop Lukas--Ėch ta laime...Did a presentation on this song at MIT two years ago! Mango--Raskila...Musu kiemo raskila, nu va.

It was 20 years ago today...

June 4, 1989: concurrent with major changes in Eastern Europe, China too was on the verge of major change...or so it seemed.  For weeks before, hundreds of thousands of people had converged on Tiananmen Square, looking for change.

Instead, they got tanks.  And the counter-revolution was televised.

I had a conversation with a student yesterday who is (rightfully) psyched to be going to China later this summer on a school trip--it's going to be an experience of a lifetime for him, no doubt (at least until his next trip, when he stays there even longer!).  When I brought up the June 4 anniversary, though, and the government tactics (reported by NPR) to cordon off social networking internet sites in an attempt to nip any reprise in the bud, I didn't get much of a response.

In some ways, it's natural--he was one year old when that happened, while I was going into my junior year of college.  Still, that past informs the present, and is important in helping to contextualize China (and the world) in 2009...

I haven't seen this yet myself, but a little Google action turned up this link to an episode of PBS' Frontline on China & 1989.  Check it out, and maybe even let me know what you think?

Reboot

Time to get serious about blogging again--summer vacation (give or take that section of COMM 130), like baseball's Opening Day, is a time when we're allowed to think that anything is possible.

Like, for instance, getting (back) into the habit of regular blogging.  Is 3x/wk really too much to ask?!  Don't answer that one--at least not for another couple of months.  Let's see where it goes...

Two weeks from now I have a conference presentation on post-accession-era Baltic film industries in Kaunas, so along with the class and the home-front (weeds!  boxes!  filing!), I'm looking to craft something presentable at the Baltic Studies conference....

I named my talk "From Despair to Where?" making a nod to the Manic Street Preachers (who I first got into while teaching in LT in the 1990s) while trying to put my finger on this transitional moment immediately after EU accession.  When I came up this title last fall, I thought I was placing the present moment in the "where," locating "despair" as the period of re-independence / reemergent capitalism (1990-2004) that had been less than completely kind for the local film industries.  However, with the global recession in full swing, I realize that the real moment of despair (industrial or otherwise) is in fact right now.  So the question is how Baltic film has managed to reposition itself within EU structures, and how it's positioned to weather this recession...

In the meantime, I'm trying to watch all the Lithuanian films we're managed to stockpile before making another run.  This weekend, for instance, I screened Paskutiniai Brėmeno muzikantai (Bremenas' Greatest Musicians, 2005), which for anything reminded me most of the hip-hop parody Fear of a Black Hat.  Here, for instance, is the band having a go at what I'm 99% sure is a Boney M parody:

Several of the actors were involved with the LT staging of Jesus Christ Superstar back in the 1980s, and offer up a loving look at chasing Soviet-era musical fame (click here for a Wikipedia overview of Lithuanian rock).  An overwrought love hexagon drags things down a bit, but there are enough good bits to recommend interested parties to seek it out--available, among other places, at BalticShop. 

NCUR Week!

Some two dozen BSC students are taking off this week for the National Conference for Undergraduate Research, held this year on the campus of UW-La Crosse.  Four students from the Department of Communication Studies will be presenting--when you see them, ask them what they think about cheese curds!

Here's the rundown:  Shawn McGeoghegan is presenting twice, on the rhetoric of marriage and on the persistence of classic rock as a genre... Alex Mello discusses the straightedge Boston scene, including the ways it broke from the punk crowd... Shawn Mullins investigates why folks might pay for music when free downloads are so readily available... and Tim Haber extrapolates his study-abroad experience by looking at New Zealand radio regulation through the lens of cultural imperialism and globalization.

NCUR 2010: You could be there!

Opening day: radio on!

Despite my utter failure to research my fantasy baseball team adequately this spring, I've still been fizzy all week in preparation for the start of the baseball season.  Heck, I even watched the first half-inning of the first game of the year: the defending champs from Philly gave up a two-run homer in that first frame, and lost 4-1 to Atlanta.  I'm not even an NL guy, but it was BASEBALL, darn it!

Truth is, though, it's really hard for me to sit and watch a game, at least on TV.  For me, baseball is much better experienced on the radio--I enjoy picturing it in my head even more than seeing it with my eyes.  What that says about me I do not know.  After some AM searching, I found the Philadelphia station (1210 on the dial, for those of you keeping score at home), and listened to a few middle innings while doing dishes.  I even caught a little more via the web after I was done....

Radio on the web--great idea.  Major League Baseball continues to have a subscription deal where for $15 you can access home and away radio broadcasts of all games (including archived games) for the year.  You can stream TV too, but for me that's $15 very well spent.  It's all good.  I can follow the Twins, keep up with the Indians, even see if something funny is going to happen with the Cubbies.  Talk about multitasking enablement.

So if the Red Sox manage to get their game started this afternoon, I'll probably follow the same pattern: the opening inning on TV, but then slip over to the radio as I work on something else.  Maybe even... taxes?

COMM 430: Five more books on Central Asia

This semester, a small but hearty set of souls has gone on a journey with me--a filmic / literary journey (but a journey nonetheless) to Central Asia.  Thanks to the Soros Foundation & the Open Media Fund, BSC scored a box-set of ten DVDs from the region.  COMM 430 this semester has been watching these films, as well as reading Christopher Robbins' excellent and highly recommended book Apples are From Kazakhstan (2008).  The subtitle of the book is telling: The Land That Disappeared.  I think I can speak for the class when I say what an eye-opener it's been this semester becoming better acquainted with a region of the world so rich in tradition and culture (to say nothing of geo-political importance) that heretofore has been so absent from our collective radar screens.

For my 430 folks, and anyone else who might be interested, here's a short list of some additional books (and a CD) I have on the region.  They may be of help for those final papers, right?(Let me know if you're interested, and I can bring them in to loan.)   Otherwise, it might be something to check out for summer reading... No, really!  

Everyday Life in Central Asia: Past and Present (2007) is an academic anthology rooted in sociology and anthropology, with a distinct ethnographic methodological tilt.  Sections of the book include works on gender, religion, and the nation/state.  A great way to get more in depth in the daily lives of folks from the region.

The Palgrave Concise Historical Atlas of Central Asia (2008) offers a number of interesting maps, with a single page of text accompanying.  Sections include sets of maps on the Mongols, the era of Russian/Soviet colonialism, and the post-Soviet era.  The green and grey maps might be off-putting, but I find the accompanying text to be concise and quite helpful.

The Lost Heart of Asia: An Intimate Portrait of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, and Kirghizstan, the Five Central Asian Republics (1994) has a subtitle only an Amazon.com search engine could love.  I found this in the "travel" section of a big-box bookstore.  Could end up being a nice follow-up to Robbins--in fact, I'd be shocked if Robbins hadn't read this in the midst of writing Apples.

Central Asia: 130 Years of Russian Dominance, A Historical Overview, 3rd ed. (2002) is an example of truth in advertising--the book's focus is indeed the complicated relationship the region has had with its neighbor to the north.  Relatively light on more recent decades, the book's strength is in presenting the systematic colonization of Central Asia by Czarist, and later Soviet, forces.

The Empire of the Steppes: A History of Central Asia (1970) is apparently a classic in the field, but there's a reason I managed to stumble across this only at the Harvard Co-op.  Meticulous and dense, this is the place to go to get the goods on Jenghiz Khan of Mongol (2007) fame.  The first of three sections of this tome only gets us to the 13th Century, and the book on the whole doesn't broach the 19th Century.  This would seem to complement the previous book nicely, in that regard.

Oh, and I'd be remiss if I did not mention a CD on the region: The Rough Guide to the Music of Central Asia (2005).  I came across this series as a world music DJ in graduate school, and it's consistently solid.  You get a mix of traditional instrumentals, vocal tracks, and even some decidedly 21st Century-sounding material.  I'm not sure what this says about where I'm at in my musical tastes, but I find myself going back to this disc more often than the new U2.

A Sunday morning in the life of a prof....

I'm not sure if this is a cautionary tale or what, but here I'm posting a proposal for a Baltic Studies conference in Lithuania....that I whipped together this morning before taking off to Boston with L for cepelinai.  Fingers crossed!

"From despair to where?  The post-accession era Baltic film industries"

Bjorn Ingvoldstad, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Communication Studies

Bridgewater State College (USA)

Abstract submission for the 2009 Baltic Studies Conference

Vytautas Magnus University--Kaunas, Lithuania

Cinema Studies offers a particularly revealing lens through which to investigate the intersections between Baltic cultures and Baltic identities.  In addition to work on texts and audiences, work on film industries reveal the economic spine of "the most important art."  Building on recent work on "cinema of small nations" generally (Hjort & Petrie [eds.], 2007) and on Baltic cinema in particular (Naripea & Trossek [eds.] 2008), I propose to discuss the most recent, post accession era (2004- ) in Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia.

In particular, my focus will be on the film industries in the Baltic and their adaptation to the economic and geopolitical opportunities and constraints coupled with accession to the European Union and NATO.  My presentation uses Baltic cinema circa 2004 as its initial reference point, and works its way out both chronologically and geographically.

While accession to the EU and NATO was an endgame envisioned and worked towards for over a dozen years, it certainly was not "the end of history" (Fukuyama, 1992).  Rather, it opened a new chapter in the political, economic, and social transformations taking place in the Baltic States (the post-postsocialist era?).  Half a decade is a blink of an eye compared to the millennium of Lithuanian history we celebrate in 2009, yet it still offers us a vantage point to trace the continuities and discontinuities in the film industries of the region upon greater European integration.

Rather than strictly focusing on one particular country, the analysis will center on the national cinemas of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia.  My presentation will consider the level of interaction and integration with one another (is there such a thing we can meaningfully refer to as Baltic Cinema?), as well as interplay with other regions' cinemas (Scandinavia, Central Europe, Western Europe, and the CIS) and the global film marketplace.  In this regard, I will explore EU-based funding networks for production and distribution (in particular, co-production and cross-medium strategies), the evolution of exhibition and ancillary markets, and the relative position of Baltic cinema within both the EU and the global marketplace.

Seeing film as a cultural crossroads of culture not only allows us to look at the ways in which cinema industrially links texts with audiences, but also offers a connection between people of different localities, nationalities, and regions.  Baltic cinemas, in this sense, can rightly be viewed as an intersection of civilizational identities.

Your 7th Grade Hit Parade (part one)!

This Christmas, my wife got me a boombox so that I could listen to my old cassette tapes again.  We have boxes and boxes of tapes in our garage, but haven't had a working tape deck since my Sony Walkman gave up the ghost.

Rather than unpacking everything all at once, I opened one box, and dug for mix tapes.  One particularly scary find is simply labeled Rock Vol. II, a Memorex D-60 compilation of 7" singles circa 1981-2.  Why did I feel I had to assert that this was "rock"?  What's with the Roman numerals?  Where did Rock Vol. I go, and is there a Rock Vol. III somewhere?  Washing dishes tonight, I was pleasantly surprised to find that several b-sides had made their way onto the mix--they tend to age better than the a-sides, I kid you not.

Play along at home: here are the big pop hits from Vail Junior High in 7th grade, or at least for this post-Kiss / pre-Numan 7th grader.  We'll count them down, from least to most embarassing....

10.  "Rapture" b/w "Walk Like Me," Blondie--My only real regret about "Rapture" is that it's the single mix--it's so short compared to the ten-minute 12" mix I found a few years back.  After an ill-fated "Blondie Awareness Party" in college where all we had to play was the ten-track Best of Blondie over and over, I started working on completing my Blondie back-catalogue on vinyl in the mid-1990s.  Now watching the video, I find myself gasping, "Wait--is that Fab 5 Freddy?!"  "Walk Like Me" is kind of B-52's-ish in a good way.  I realized tonight that Missing Persons was basically a (noble but failed) West Coast attempt at filling the void that Blondie left after this album....

9.  "Start Me Up," Rolling Stones--The video has so many funny takes of Charlie Watts' bemusement, while the other guys elbow each other for lens time.  I think this was their last good single, save "Undercover."  I came to really resent classic rock for a number years starting in 8th grade, but you see this was 7th grade.....

8. "I Love Rock-n-Roll," Joan Jett & the Blackhearts--This was a favorite at dances well into early high school--the rockers loved it, the pop kids loved it, and it still sounds good.  Dig a bit to hear her do "Bad Reputation" live on the Urgh! A Music War soundtrack--now that is good eating.  You can hear the end of the studio version at the beginning of the video--can't say I remember that at all....Indicative of 1981 that her lyrics kept her four-square in the closet, so that is a little wince-worthy....

7. "Freeze-Frame" b/w "Flamethrower,"  The J. Geils Band--The first of two J. Geils singles on the tape; add the b-sides and four of the 14 songs on here are from them.  At this point in my life, the hits are time-encased novelties, while (at least in my own mind) the flipsides are still worthy of a listen.  If you've never heard it, check out the b--tasty solos.

6.  "Shake it Up" b/w "Cruiser," The Cars--By the time I got into the Cars, they were on a slow but steady decline.  At least, that's what I think now.  Then, I found this great band, starting with this single, then the full album, then the three before the Shake it Up LP.  By the time I saw them in Phoenix supporting Heartbeat City, they were one of my favorite bands.  Come to think of it, though, I believe I was asserting at the time that the opening act, Wang Chung, was now my favorite band of the moment--but 9th/10th grade is a whole other list.

Next time, we'll hit the mother-lode of embarrassment.  I'll give you a taste: Olivia Newton-John doesn't even make it to #1.  

We are the agents of change that we have been waiting for

As I made breakfast this morning, hundreds of miles from DC, preliminary NPR coverage of folks gathering for inauguration festivities this afternoon started to make me a little fizzy.  In fact, I popped upstairs to turn on CNN to see live images of people collected near the Capitol, on the Mall, and along the parade route.  The sea of humanity was impressive--like what we experienced at the Thanksgiving parade off Times Square in November, but with that extra....fizz?  This triggered a recurring conversation my wife and I have had about our hopes (or lack thereof) for change with the Obama administration.

My wife L identifies herself variously as an optimistic pessimist, a pessimistic optimist, and a realist--I'm pretty much a manic optimist, but prone to crashing into sullen pessimism on occasion.  We were both excited to move to an ostensibly liberal Massachusetts in 2006, only to find ourselves in a pretty conservative pocket of the state (libraries?!  we don't need no stinking libraries!).  Further, Obama's yes we can echoes our Gov. Patrick's together we can--yet we still can't manage to keep professors from working without a contract this year, with no end in sight (and scant hope any retroactive COLA increases).

After my verbalized, coffee-induced daydream about driving to DC this morning, L noted that she wished she was more excited, but after the rise and fall of hopes under Patrick, she's just not on fire like folks you hear interviewed on the Mall.  I understand her--today is symbolic, but it's not merely symbolic.  (In fact, as my semiotic-grappling COMM 229 students will attest, nothing is merely symbolic.)  Symbols matter, and the swearing-in ceremony for our nation's first first black president is an important symbol for our country.  Hearing an NPR report from Montgomery, AL, where a convention center blocks away from where water cannons were used on civil rights protesters in the 1960s is set to host thousands of people for the inauguration, brought that home again this morning.

Another way in which this symbolism matters is in terms of the peaceful transferral of power from one party to another.  This is something that as Americans we might take for granted--but we shouldn't.  Consider the recent Russian elections, where Medvedev is now president, but it's pretty clearly understood that Putin is running the show.  (Of ourse, we had Cheney behind Bush, which only underscores the importance of today's symbolic moment all the more, right?)

Further, for the last decade, internal opposition in Russia, much less any attempt at providing an objective (journalistic) voice within the country, has been literally shot dead in its tracks.

The latest proof: today's New York Times article about another political assassination in Russia.  This time it was a human rights lawyer and a journalist.  The lawyer, Stanislav Markelov (34), described by the Times as having "spent the better part of a decade pursuing contentious human rights and social justice cases," had been fighting the early release of a Russian tank commander accused of murdering a young Georgian woman.  The journalist, Anastasia Baburova (25), wrote for the government-critical Novaya Gazeta newspaper, and is the fourth journalist from the paper to have been killed since 2000.  The most notable of those four, of course, was Anna Politkovskaya (murdered on Putin's birthday in 2006), whose last book Putin's Russia is a heartbreaking and alarming must-read.

So let us give thanks.  Today is an important day.  We should rejoice for any number of reasons.  But we should also be ready to roll up our sleeves tomorrow.  In reading Sarah Susanka's The Not So Big Life, L came across a quote from Ghandi this weekend that was particularly poignant to us, and that I leave you with:

We must be the change we wish to see in the world.

Don't call it a comeback!

(With all apologies to LL Cool J, who you can hear at the end of the blog entry, if you are so inclined...)

New calendar year + new semester w/ 60 students blogging for those elusive points = new resolve to regularly blog myself. Stop me if you think that you've heard this one before....

But really: where there's a will there's a way. (And of course, when you're in Stratford-upon-Avon, where there's a Will there's a play.)

What can I say, my friends, it was either post-syllabus induced punning, or YouTube clips of Scandinavian death metal. The latter, for those of you keeping score with the Sons of Norway, will have to wait for another entry...hold me to that, yeah?

Enjoy inauguration day, and stay tuned!