A Little Bit of Magic

I've been working working and writing writing all weekend. Shuffling between the library and the cafe and my little apartment, the past few days have been productive and tiring.

Then, last night at about 2AM I pulled my weary gaze from the glare of my laptop and glanced over my shoulder and out the window. Where I found a bit of inspiration. A blustery snowfall. An intense kind of quiet. A sparkly nighttime cityscape.

I spend my days mired in words, but for such moments, a girl needs a picture. This is not the view from my window, but it is certainly a little bit of magic. Enjoy.

Grounded

After 3 continuous weekends of enjoying the great city of Chicago (and it's various late night beverage establishments) this weekend I'm laying down the law, as it were. For the next several days: no pub-crawling, bar-hopping, drive-throughing or any other activity that lays bare my sometimes questionable judgement. In other words -- no fun, just philosophy.

I think it's only fair. After all, too much fun makes for a very bad thesis. Plus, next weekend is the Super Bowl, in which the Bears are playing, and who am I to stay in when the whole dang city is partying?

Call it forethought, call it self-discipline. Call it good for my liver.

Detox. Let's call it detox.

Whatever you call it, you must admit, when a girl does nothing for all of her teenage or college years (nothing worth mentioning, anyway) to merit a grounding, the fact that she becomes debaucherous and delinquent in her old age is really pretty commendable.

So now I'm commended for not losing my edge while I simultaneously misplace my glasses and complain about inexplicable aches and pains (I did both these things in the past 12 hours, btw).

Commended and grounded.

For Choice, Yes But Also for Justice

Today is Blog For Choice Day sponsored by NARAL as a means for commemorating the 34th anniversary of Roe v. Wade. The aim is to get people to write why they are pro-choice, so here I blog.

Most of you know why I am pro-reproductive justice, but it's nice to think it again and remember the commitment.

-- Bodily integtity is crucial to self-determination. Having a say in what happens to your body is perhaps THE most fundamental human right.

-- Choice implies the ability to choose - the ability to decide. When a society lets people decide what happens in their lives, they implicity show how much those members of society are valued and trusted. I value and trust people with female bodies to make any and all choices about their reproductive lives. And people of all kinds of bodies, too, for that matter.

-- How much money a person has, or what race they are, or where they live, or any other such thing, should not limit a person's human potential. Pre-Roe economic status, race, and gender were limiting characteristics for many people. This one goes beyond reproductive concerns and launches us into the realm of human rights and global justice in general.

I think that covers the basics, but if you have anything at all to add, please do.

Here's to justice.

In the Eye of the Beholder

The New York Times ran a story this weekend about changing conceptions of beauty in Brazil. Anorexia is a growing epidemic in a country that didn't traditionally conform to modern Western beauty standards. Ahhh, globalization. It's not just for Coca Cola anymore.

To wit:

"Though such globalized standards of beauty originated in rich, mostly white neighborhoods, they are gradually being spread to the rest of Brazil and across racial lines by the actresses and models who live here and perform in popular telenovelas. Exercise academies can be found in slum areas, and newspapers noted that the most recent anorexia victim was a dark-skinned teenager from a working-class suburb of Rio who dreamed of becoming a model."

And as a true testament to the global market and the comodification of the aesthetic (forgive me, I'm an academic these days), since 2000, Brazil also maintains the highest per capita plastic surgery rate.

Here's another interesting bit from the NYT article:

"This abrupt shift is a feminine decision that reflects changing roles” as women move out of the home and into the workplace, she said. Men are still resisting and clearly prefer the rounder, fleshier type. But women want to be free and powerful, and one way to reject submission is to adopt these international standards that have nothing to do with Brazilian society."

This kind of claim is really interesting because it shows a couple of important things. First, that even when challenging tradition and patriarchy in their own nations, women have to be aware of the patriarchy they adopt via modernization. This is so clear to me in the case of India as well, watch a Bollywood movie from 1956 and one from 2006 and you'll see that the outfits have changed dramatically, but the types of characters that women play, or the options available to them in these movies has changed little.

Second, there's something interesting here about standardizing beauty at all. We live in a world that is set up on a skewed geopolitical power spectrum. Big money means big influence over the world market and therefore over the commodification of culture itself. But is our concept of beauty something that can be so easily influenced by market forces and billboards? It seems to be the case. I always knew that ideals of art and beauty were products of their times. I mean, who would put Botticelli's angels on a billboard today without airbrushing them first? If this is true, and our art changes with our politics, then what will it take to change these harmful standards of human attractiveness? Feminism? Counterculture?

Thoughts?

2007

It's official.

I'm totally thrilled about 2007.

A few reasons why:

- I've found some inspiration for the thesis. You'll probably hear more about this than you care to over the next few months so I'll spare details for now.

- My courses for this quarter are great. They are, in no particular order: Politics, Art and Aesthetics; Critical Race Theory; and Ethics and Political Philosophy. Can't. Wait.

- I get to see some Western Mass buddies soon. Yay.

- 2006 was alternately awful and awesome. I have a really good feeling about '07 though. I'm tougher now.

- I turn 26. And I'm going dancing. This is one birthday I'm looking forward to - it has a mystical air about it. I'm going to run with that. I think I just might get my shit together at the age of 26.

Happy New Year to you all!

May you revel in possibility and find all hopes and dreams realized this year.