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Might be a good book; might not

Technicity, edited by Louis Armand and Arthur Bradley. The blurb says (in part) “In this collection, a group of internationally-known figures within the fields of philosophy, linguistics and cultural studies come together to consider the meaning of “technicity” at the beginning of the 21st century.” So it might be interesting. But one of the things I think is weird is the table of contents. (pdf) It has the authors’ names in big and bold letters, and the title of their essays in harder to read and smaller italics. It’s almost as if it’s saying “pay no attention to what I’m saying; pay attention to who I am.” Hmm….

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C&W 07: My Presentation

I presented at the very last session on Sunday, May 20, at the recently completed Computers and Writing conference in Detroit. To be honest, more people showed up to this session than I thought would, mainly to support the other two presenters, I think. Still, it was a marked improvement over my “crowd” at the CCCCs.

In any event, I am making my presentation available at this web site with three basic versions:

  • the script of my talk with a few key slides pictures included (the version I’d recommend for most readers);
  • just the script with numbers where I inserted the slides; and
  • the Keynote slides saved for the web.

I’m also going to be sharing this presentation to the EMUtalk.org community since, after all, it’s about them. We’ll see what they have to say about all this.

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Computers & Writing, Days 3 & 4: Another Bulleted List

  • I was planning on attending the 9 am session on Saturday morning, but things around the house and traffic held me up. These things happen.
  • Went to a session called “Mediating Literacy: Plugging Latour into Computers and Writing.” I learned a few things about Douglas Engelbart and his invention of computer interfaces, and also about a student project involving partially cooked chicken, but I didn’t learn a whole lot about Latour. Oh well; I did work on my presentation during all this.
  • Met up with Bill HD and one of his grad students for lunch, though we cut out before the presentation to do a little roaming about and shopping. I bought a lovely T-Shirt.
  • Went to a round-table on Ong to celebrate the 25 years after the publication of Orality and Literacy that was pretty decent. Hawisher and Selfe were sitting behind me and making me feel inadvertently guilty about multi-tasking.
  • Steve B. and I took off the last panel and went over to the Detroit Institute of Art, which is getting ready to close for the next six months for the final stages of renovation. As a result, there wasn’t much of the collection open. But we did spend a fair amount of time with the Diego Rivera mural “Detroit Industry,” which was worth the minimal admission. Pictures don’t really do it justice, but we did take a few. Pictures are forthcoming, I promise.
  • We went over the the African American History museum after this, quite a bit early, but we didn’t have anything else to do. The folks setting up the dinner said we could take the tour, so we did. It’s one of these museums where you have to go through a linear/historic path: first Africa, then the slave trade, then the Civil War, etc. Pretty interesting exhibit.
  • By the time we were done, the crowd was gathering for the banquet. Excellent food for this, too.
  • The room/lobby/whatever where this was being held was a dome/rotunda sort of structure, and the acoustics in there were bizarre. Conversations taking place halfway or more across the room bounced off the ceiling and marble floors/walls so that it sounded like it was right behind me. I thought I was hearing voices. I mean more than usual.
  • Ended up sitting with a lot of BGSU folks, which was good, especially with Kris Blair winning a technical innovator of the year award. What’s interesting to me about all this is that C&W was my first presentation, back in 1994, and I remember that me and Mike/Mick Doherty, John Clark, and Bill HD road-tripped to Missouri from BGSU. We were it. This time around, I’ll be there were 10 or more current and former PhD students there. Things have changed for the better.
  • Congrats to everyone who won various awards, but once again, I have not won anything. Actually, I’m not sure who the person(s) is/are who won the ward for best blog, to be honest. But congrats to them, too.
  • The keynote speaker was Richard Doyle, and he was, um, interesting in places. I think he was anticipating having internet access; I’m not sure. Doyle was pretty entertaining and funny, but as far as saying anything that was important or interesting or whatever: I thought he vacillated between making some good points and just rambling. Maybe he was hearing voices in his head from the dome/rotunda too.
  • Thanks to the directions from Nancy A., I didn’t get lost on the way home, which was nice.
  • Up and at ’em this morning, I drove back in and moderated a panel, “Virtual and Audio Teaching: Three Instructors’ Tales: Creating Environments for Varied Student Populations,” also made up of former BGSU grad students. A small group, but a good conversation.
  • Then it was time for my spiel. Funny story about tech and about the conference: there wasn’t a projector in the room I was presenting in. This was not good. So I went down to the check-in table and very calmly said “I need a projector in the room where I am presenting.” A couple of Wayne State-types show up with a projector and a computer, feverishly pushing buttons with mixed results. They leave. I hook up my computer, push the power button on the projector, and we’re in business. A link to my presentation is coming soon, I promise.
  • Kudos to Robin Murphy (BGSU) and Kimberly Lacey (Wayne State), the PhD students I prsented with and who did great things in their talks. And congrats to Robin on defending and going on to join the ranks of the tenure-track, too.
  • And then time to go home. All and all, an okay conference. I got a lot of good book project ideas, and a lot of inspiration for getting my act together on all that very very soon. The “home game” aspect of the conference was fun, though I have to say that I’m looking forward to C&W in Athens, GA next year. Bill HD and Steve B and I are contemplating road-tripping down there and playing golf along the way there and back. But that’s next year.
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Fountain (and other home improvement activities)

I have been meaning to post this for a while now, but things have been busy busy busy. In any event, here’s a picture of the fountain that I build for Annette for Mother’s Day. Big flowerpot, hole in the bottom with weird sealant stuff, a pump kit, some rocks, some water plants, some water. That’s about it.

Other home improvement things I performed last week that you might not have guessed I was capable of include the following:

  • Replaced a spark plug in my lawn mower, and now it runs like a champ. (I’m considering going “all the way” at this point by also changing the oil and sharpening the blade).
  • Replaced a broken fluorescent light fixture in our bedroom closet without instructions. Okay, with instructions I had to download from the web, but still.
  • Cleaned garage to the point where my father and father in-law would be proud or at least reasonably happy. This involved, among other things, taking back about $30 worth of cans and bottles.
  • Managed (finally!) to get rid of the back seat from the van that was stolen from the street in front of our house a few years back. How? I put it out on the curb and a couple days later, a couple dudes in a pick-up came and got it. Indeed, I am considering an experiment in which we keep putting junk out on the curb and see how long it takes for it to be claimed by some wondering junk man/collector.
  • Much gardening, which may or may not be “manly,” depending on your POV.

So far though, I have not managed to finish the home improvements around this site, as you can see. But this will happen sooner than later, I hope.


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Computers & Writing, Days 1 & 2: The Bulleted List

  • Steve B. and I drove into Detroit City late Thursday afternoon. We arrived at the registration table at about 4:50. Some person there said “Sorry, we close registration at 5.” Um, okay….
  • Went to the St. Martin’s sponsored reception at the Detroit Beer Co., which was a nice way to kick stuff off. Good beer, good company. Showed Bob Whipple a bit about Comic Life, chatted with all kinds of folks.
  • Steve B. and I were going to go out for Greek food, but pooped out and ended up at an Ypsilanti institution and EMU hang-out, the Sidetrack. Ah, the pleasures of the familiar.
  • Friday AM, I moseyed in around 10:30 or so. Met up with a former MA student of ours who is now at the PhD program at BGSU. She interviewed me about blogging for a project she’s working on, which sounds pretty interesting.
  • Went to the lunch event, ate with my colleague Nancy Allen (who has been on sabbatical this year, so it was good to catch up a bit) and managed to be close enough to the front to actually hear it. No microphone. But some interesting talks from Metroblogging Detroit, dETROITfUNK, and DetroitYES, bloggers from three very different area blogs/communities. I talked with them a bit afterwards about contacting them later as case study sources, and they all seemed pretty okay with that.
  • Went to an excellent panel, Blogologies with Collin Brooke, Krista Kennedy, Derek Mueller, Donna Strickland, and Jeff Ward. Review forthcoming, but some useful stuff for this quasi-hypothetical book project. Oh, and there I was, right there, when Derek quoted from my “When Blogging Goes Bad” article. That’s the first time I was quoted right in front of me, which was kinda cool.
  • Talked a bit with Collin and contemplated buying a Wayne State cap. I went into the store and didn’t like the selection, though I did like the sweatshirts they had indicated the major of “Undeclared.”
  • The damn Starbucks was closed so no decent afternoon coffee.
  • For reason too convoluted to go into here, I ended up missing Geoffrey Sirc’s speech because I was eating a lovely ruben and drinking fine beer in a place called Saloon Circa 1890. About 10 minutes after Sirc’s presentation was over, the place was full of C&W folks. At least one photo forthcoming. Talked with many other folks like Nick Carbone and previously mentioned folks, and heard tales from Mike Palmquist of his elaborate motorcycle travel from Colorado State U to here.
  • Drove home without incident (which, knock on wood, has been the case so far in my travels into Detroit) and hung out with the wife and child. All in all, a good day indeed.