the holidays

As I sit here at a Native American museum surrounded by Native American staff, I began to reflect on what our "holiday" season really is. For a lot of people it conjures of feelings of guilt that require time to be spent with family. Others see it as a time to spend with family and celebrate around food. All of our holidays here in the United States seem to revolve around food (a point that I do not usually argue). It seems like the emphasis around the holiday season can be kind or oppressive to those that don't wish to spend time with family.

I find myself making a number of observations and critiques of the culture that participates and has manufactured our "holiday" season. As we can all agree, the period of time from Halloween through New Years seems to be one driven by consumption and economic growth. This point in and of itself puts a lot of pressure on people. The guilt of not buying gifts for "Christmas" or not having the elaborate Thanksgiving, not having a Halloween costume, or not going to a New Years celebration. All these things are driven by consumption of either consumer goods such as gifts and costumes, but also in the vast amounts of food that we consume. As our lives become busier we also move away from those whole food ingredients to many prepared items that again appeals to those groups looking for us to help their economic bottom line. Is this holiday season one that our culture has really created (meaning that it would be subject to cultural evolution over time and changes within generations) or is it a manifestation of our consumer driven culture in that the hype and support of the holiday season comes from the producers of our country and therefore drives us to participate.

Another point that really came to mind is that of family. The Western culture that we have established puts a lot of emphasis on family and even more emphasis on the nuclear family. With this being the case the holiday season forces people to connect, at least talk to, their family and participate in the celebration that is the "holiday" season. My thought is that with the foundation of our society being so deeply rooted in tradition and patriarchal capitalism, is this just another way for our culture to force us to participate in the structure that is? The guilt factor that plays into the holiday season seems to be the driving force behind what makes many people participate. It seems as if there is not always a desire to spend so much time with family, or participate at all, but the "tradition" of participation and the guilt behind it drive us to participate regardless of desire to do so.

It is an interesting concept, holidays, that will forever be a point of contention for myself and an area for reflection for years to come.

Neglect

Oh blog....I have neglected you so. I want to be a good "blogger", I really do. It just seems to still be in that category of things that get pushed to a side when I am in a pinch for time. I find that there is a certain hierarchy of resort when it comes what gets pushed to the side in what order. Mine seems to look like this:

1. Working Out
2. Blogging
3. Internet surfing
3. House work
3. non-discussed readings
4. TV
5. time with pets
6. time with wife
7. sleep
8. eating
9. non-immediate projects

I think that is a pretty good list. It could be a little more specific, but it illustrates the general idea. With the amount of work that I have due at the moment I have already made it to the bottom of this list and want to pull my hair out. I wonder if other people have this kind of hierarchy to their everyday activities.

Now...back to work.

Providing Assistance

Flustered, frustrated, overwhelmed, lose for time, down to the wire, at wits end, last minute, done for.....

yes, these are all things that describe these last four weeks that are the end of the semester. As an aside from reading, writing, analyzing, reading, writing, analyzing, etc. I thought that I could share two pieces of software that are fascinating.



On one hand there is the reference database site that is amazing it helping to organize all your pdf references including journal articles, papers, summaries, video, audio, and websites. You can add notes or annotations and it produces citations for you. The software is Zotero and it is a LIFE SAVER.

http://www.zotero.org/

The other is yet another social site. This time it is a social site for those of us that have committed ourselves to being professional students and will forever be stuck in academia. Think of it as Facebook for Academics.

http://academia.edu

Tales of the lab

As you may or may not know, I work in a local museum as my G.A. position. This includes having to give guided tours from time to time and always having to lead people through the archaeology lab that we have. When there were excavations on the site, this was the pace dedicated to analysis and collections management. Since then, this is the space we use as our office (a.k.a. our table next to an outlet where we all plug in our computers). We have set up the remainder of the space as a hands on archaeology lab geared at children. The exhibit is completely hands on and provides basic level information in conjunction real artifacts. This ends up being where people spend a lot of time and we have to stay with them to ensure that there is no theft.

Ok, so I knew that with the material we had that there would be a lot of questions and actions that I would not expect, but thought that I would learn from them. Like learning more about patience when they mix all the small pieces that were separated into type, into one large pile. I knew those kinds things would happen. Today brought out some new experiences and comments, just as every day does, and they deserve to be shared.

Where to start? Ok, I had some preschool students in here the other day and while the material presented is very dense, we are pretty successful on engaging a wide range of students. We have an ethnobotany portion of the exhibit that has river cane, pumpkin seeds, kidney beans, red corn, and some died cane strips. Well usually people just feel their way through it and move on. For some reason these pre-schoolers decided that tasting them was the only way to figure out if they were real. Pick up a seed, lick it, and stick it back in the pile for the person behind you to lick. And not just the seeds, these kids were licking the cane too. We have a science scale(grams) used to show how much of different types of materials that you need to do carbon dating. Well little did I know that this was going to be the place to test the weight of everything including shoes, gum, hands, belts, wallets, keys, and you get the point. We also have a piece of wood with a spear head attached to one end showing how you attached a projectile point to a shaft. Well, today that became the "Shank." And granted, I guess that the term could be given to that object, however I am just not used to the term shank or would have ever came to term. This same group also wanted conformation that Native Americans smoked pot. It was here that we got frustrated because people don't realize that pot is not indigenous to TN and therefore would not have been around to smoke unless they got it through trade. It is more likely that they smoked natural herbs and later tobacco, not POT. And what was the one constant comment that I heard today, it was about my phone, not even an artifact. This is on top of people testing whether a projectile point is sharp or not by trying to cut themselves, trying to hear noises through the conch shell, trying to get a skeleton to stand up on its own, and many, many more.

It is at these points that I realize how many cultural and education things I take for credit. I find myself intrigued, frustrated, and hysterically laughing all at the same time. I find myself challenged everyday when it comes to dealing with children and when it comes to dealing with the public in general. And as my wife will like to know, I am really enjoying having interaction with children. The challenge of appealing to all ages on a whim has been a challenge, but finding that connection with a kid and them becoming enthusiastic and excited about archaeology and anthropology really makes me happy. Looks like I will keep kids and teaching as possibilities in my future.

Election Day

I am so geared up about today it is crazy. This is definitely the election that I have invested a lot of time in. Still, I think this election has more implications and potential than the past two elections did and I am so excited to see the outcome.

I will be following the election via my laptop for the entire day do the amount of school shit that I have to get done. I promise you though, I will be watching live video during my lectures and study sessions regardless of what that says about me as a student.

Now, my rant, if you are a republican you may want to skip the rest of this post.




I am so surprised that people can vote republican in this election. I just don't understand the rational behind it. (and yes I realize that they probably think the same thing about my decision) Yet what it comes down to for me with the whole republican party is Palin. Really??? Palin???? There are more people at college football games than she has had experience governing. Yet we are going to allow her to attempt and be the back up president for our country. I think Tina Faye would make a better VP than this wacko. I just don't get it. And I really thought that McCain was a good guy and had some good insight until he pulled this publicity stunt of choosing a candidate that doesn't even know how to get around Washington by car, yet alone able to rule over them.

Wow, this is going to be an interesting day and I LOVE hearing peoples comments and opinions.....it really makes this whole thing much more interesting and deep.

As it flies b y

Where does the time go? Where do the days go? It seems like yesterday I was keeping up with my blogging and all of a sudden, I forgot that I even had a blog and am now having to catch up. A lot has happened in the past week or so since I wrote.....lets see.

I did talk to my boss and we had a very constructive conversation regarding my place within the museum and are going to work on tailoring my position so that I will be doing tasks that benefit the museum and benefit me in terms of appealing to my skills and interests. It was an intense conversation to say the least, but I have come the following realization: I am only in this program for two years and I need to get as much out of this as I can and don't need to be wasting time doing something that isn't' benefiting my career. Also, I am not "sugar coating it" to say the least. I am not going to try and skate around or sugar coat my feelings (if they are logically founded) in regards to my education and career. It isn't going to benefit me to skate around the real issue, and I need to get what I want out of this.

OK, what else. Oh, Halloween....I was a YOUNG REPUBLICAN. And I thought it was awesome. Parted my hair to one side, khaki pants, white button-up, blue blazer, and red tie with elephants on it. I thought it was amazing and only offended a couple of people, but it was worth it. I went to a party of all anthropologists which is always an adventure and then took two of my new fiends (and colleagues) to RAIFORD's for the first time....and they loved it. We had a great time, and late night, but it was good to blow off some steam.

Saturday brought more Anthropology time with the wife and I attending the annual picnic. It was a good time in a very calming and secluded little meadow out around the museum complete with a all brick open grill with a tall chimney. It was picturesque. After that we headed down to Riverfest for a while. Let me just say....I was very impressed. In their second year they have gathered all the vendors and artists that they could possibly cram into the south main area....and it was quality. We didn't buy any art but did pick up some cards of artists whose work we will likely purchase in the future. It was a great experience and very impressive. After that great experience we came home to watch some football which translated to me going in and out of consciousness for the remainder of the night. I attempted to watch Saturday Night live, and even that was a failure. Sunday proved much better (tiredness wise) as I had slept on and off for the majority of Saturday night.

I have now recouped, recovered, and re-rested and am ready for the final month of school grind stone. I will probably be rather sporadic in my posts as I have failed to schedule in sleep let alone blogging.

Have a good week everyone!