Public holiday blues

Posted on | April 22, 2005 |

Yes, I’ve been quiet. But I’ve booked more trips to Sydney and Hobart this week, and Glen and I have finished the revisions to the paper I like to call “The UC.” Glen has been an absolute machine in the past two weeks. He has been a delight and inspiration to work with. Anyway, you’ll have to wait til September for the end result. Can you bear it? And it’s coming out in a cultural studies journal, which apparently rules out a rather large chunk of the potential readership in the Australian ‘political’ blogosphere. Lucky my blog isn’t about politics. After all, I do believe in the importance of changing language, even in texts addressed only to other academics (who sometimes have lives outside universities, and teach lots of students who do too). I might not be changing the entire world, but it helps me feel a bit more comfortable in the very privileged surroundings that are the basis of my every day.

It occurs to me that with two long weekends in a row, I have no friends to go crazy with. Damn this so-called emancipated life of singledom. Who can amuse me with their ANZAC Day festivities? I’m going to need company for a little while.

Category: Events, Research, Travel

Comments

12 Responses to “Public holiday blues”

  1. danny
    April 23rd, 2005 @ 2:42 am

    Nothing more lonely than unshared memorials :(. One thing about the new regime of public holidays (compared to the less commodified days) is that the shops are open. I once had a memorable afternoon’s shopping with an acquaintance I ran into while in a similar mood to yours. So leaving the house could be a good idea even if none of your adoring fans come up with anything, you never know what will happen! Looking fwd to the Gregg and Fuller (that has a nice ring to it actually) combo too.

  2. Marki Bahnisch
    April 23rd, 2005 @ 2:54 pm

    Since this post links to a thread of mine, I’d like to clarify that my criticism of Cultural Studies relates mostly to what I see as being its political effects, and it’s a position I’ve held for some time and articulated in debates on postmodernism and literary theory on Troppo. I’ve always been careful to qualify my criticism by noting that it doesn’t apply to all work in Cultural Studies by any means. If others aren’t as nuanced, there’s not a lot I can do about it.

    I’m also critical of some of the appropriation of French theory - again a position I was arguing in published academic work in 2000, and of the dissonance between the claims to trandisciplinarity, and the increasing institutionalisation of the field, a problem discussed (if I remember rightly) in an issue of Cultural Studies last year - a journal I do look at from time to time.

    I’m certainly not anti-theory, again something demonstrable from my publications. I’m also aware that I’ve imbibed something of a respect for rigour in methodology from my Honours and Doctoral study, and no doubt that colours what I write.

    I could be equally critical of my own discipline of Sociology - which also originated as a largely political project and was fairly quickly normalised - and I have been in some of what I’ve written. I doubt, however, that a post on this would be of great interest!

    My intent is certainly not to cast stones or make aspersions at people, but a concern at a time when any sort of critical scholarship is under great attack (see the Negri affair and much of what emanates from Nelson) to clarify the lines of distinction.

    I hope you have a nice weekend, Mel.

  3. Mark Bahnisch
    April 23rd, 2005 @ 2:55 pm

    Sorry, apparently channelling Marky Mark above in the thingie to be filled in above the comments box!

  4. melgregg
    April 23rd, 2005 @ 6:49 pm

    Aww, I kinda liked the Marki touch.

  5. Mark Bahnisch
    April 23rd, 2005 @ 7:58 pm

    Better than Bayno at any rate!

  6. jean
    April 24th, 2005 @ 11:31 am

    unfortunately my weekend involves mountains of marking :( I would have gone to the booksale with you though! Last year I bought Paul Willis’ Learning to Labour, several very cool “build your own” synthesiser/electronic organ manuals, a guide to “new music” from about 1982 and maybe the 2nd ever Continuum…and other things I never got around to reading, like Madame Bovary and Future Shock…kewl.

  7. melgregg
    April 24th, 2005 @ 11:40 am

    There are still plenty of copies of Future Shock! Ah, the perils of futurism…

  8. Christian McCrea
    April 24th, 2005 @ 3:45 pm

    It almost feels dysfunctional, doesn’t it?; long weekends by ourselves, slaving over obscure texts to harvest meanings for a impossible few. If only I was into sport!

    *reads CS arguments* - *brain melts*

    I stop reading those arguments around about the point where someone mentions they think that scholarship needs to be clearly written. The functional difference between that page and a forum on computer games or heavy metal is nanoscopic.

    Glen! Get out of there, buddy! Nuke the site from orbit; its the only way to be sure!

  9. Andrew Bartlett
    April 25th, 2005 @ 12:10 am

    It’s ANZAC Day - it’s not meant to be festive. At least if you’re depressed you can feel good about it by telling yourself that it’s the way you *should* feel on a day that marks the futility, heartbreak and mindsnapping suffering that war generates - unlike the rest of society who show such poor taste by trying to enjoy themselves.

    Plus the great Sir Joh has died, so sombreness is even more in order - a good opportunity for a night of teeth-gritting reflection as you think back and slowly realise how huge a number of appalling things he managed to get away with.

  10. Andrew Bartlett
    April 25th, 2005 @ 12:15 am

    By the way, your website makes it look like I’m a sad bastard who sits up after midnight posting comments when really I just sit up until 11.10pm

  11. Glen
    April 25th, 2005 @ 12:44 am

    Mel,

    Yes, we fuckin ROCK!!!! Totally!

    I am a MACHINE!?! Thanks. That shall serve as a part consumation of my phuturist fantasies.

    [So it is accepted with revisions or what? Or is that automatic? They couldn't possibly not accept it... Is there an email or something? waaaaAAHHHH!]

    I cleaned my flat yesterday. How about that? haha… needed cleaning…

    (Ricki Lake hat)
    But, damn girl, I am jealous!
    (/Ricki Lake Hat)

    Yep. Sounds like you got some pretty sick books for pretty much bugger all… I have spent half my bloody scholarship on books!!!

    AND i am just making toasted sandwiches with diced tomato and blue castello (or however it is spelt) and the bloody thing let fly with an explosion of tomato juice and liquified cheese as I went to open it. It was under pressure. Crazy. There goes another pair of shorts… if I was a Yank I would be on to my lawyer, public holiday or not… so cheezey…

    AND Christian! It is unproductive and fun, dude! Some people call that ‘play’! lol! We all need our sport…

  12. Glen
    April 25th, 2005 @ 12:48 am

    err, that comment about books was about your next post… whoops!!

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