[Xmca-l] Re: Our Broken Economy, in One Simple Chart - The New York Times

Fri Aug 11 01:33:11 PDT 2017

Greg - Theoretically impossible; happens all the time,  however. 

Helena Worthen
helenaworthen@gmail.com
Vietnam blog: helenaworthen.wordpress.com

On Aug 11, 2017, at 12:29 PM, Greg Thompson wrote:

> Helena,
> Do you think that it would be possible to do both? Or is that a Faustian
> bargain?
> -greg
> 
> On Thu, Aug 10, 2017 at 5:22 PM, Helena Worthen <helenaworthen@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> 
>> Hello --
>> 
>> This message from Alfredo struck me as especially vivid and typical of
>> teaching in higher education today. It's that moment of getting back to
>> work in the morning and facing afresh the question, "How can I make my
>> research useful to the human cause?" in the face of the crowd of interests,
>> powers and constraints that condition the response to the question - that
>> moment is familiar to so many people! Including the need to find new jobs,
>> over and over.
>> 
>> Joe and I are now in Viet Nam at Ton Duc Thang University. This is the
>> second time we've come, to teach in the Faculty of Trade Unions and Labor
>> Relations. Like a lot of universities all over the world, it is tooling up
>> to teach in English and become "ranked." One aspect of this is publishing.
>> Faculty are being encouraged (you might say pressured very hard) to publish
>> in journals on certain ranking lists. Success will be rewarded with cash
>> (value of a couple of thousand dollars per article). This is not support
>> for research -- it's pay for research. Joe and I are going to convene and
>> mentor a "research group" and talk about how to get published. The
>> enthusiasm for getting in on this bandwagon is palpable. I'm not kidding.
>> They are highly motivated to do it. But they are not asking "How can I make
>> my research useful to the human cause?"
>> 
>> Joe and I are going to have to tool our mentoring to put Alfredo's
>> question into the picture.
>> 
>> Alfredo's snapshot of him sitting at the start of a work day is like a
>> message from the future. I too would like to hear what the ISCAR community
>> has to say.
>> 
>> Thanks -- Helena
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Helena Worthen
>> helenaworthen@gmail.com
>> Vietnam blog: helenaworthen.wordpress.com
>> 
>> On Aug 9, 2017, at 8:56 PM, Alfredo Jornet Gil wrote:
>> 
>>> Capitalism is incapable to carry over humanity. The other way around is
>> another story, I guess. I do wish we could attain a true democratic
>> (communist) society though.
>>> 
>>> In any case, I often wonder what WE, each one of us, can do. The first
>> thing I come up with, and not surprisingly because that's the field in
>> which I work, is pedagogy. On the one hand, it is a contradiction, because
>> the whole of pedagogy, as institutionalised field (I mean, as faculties, as
>> my temporary salary, as the pursuing and achievement of publishing
>> incentives, etc...), it wholly belongs to Capitalism.
>>> 
>>> Yet, judging by the level of involvement and engagement that education
>> faculties show, it seems to me that the notion of pedagogy that most
>> faculty members hold is that our field is about learning, when in fact I
>> think it is about generating culture. I sit every day with my freshly
>> collected data at a small independent school and wonder, having briefly
>> checked the discouraging world news, and I wonder:  'how can I make my
>> research useful to the human cause?' But then I need to address journal
>> audiences, the motives that got me the funding for my research, my
>> temporary contract and the need to find a new job soon... and one feels
>> pretty hopeless. I don't give up, though. It feels good having you all out
>> there, xmca'ers,
>>> 
>>> How does, e.g., the ISCAR community stands for these matters? How does
>> your respective faculties/institutions stand for this?
>>> 
>>> Alfredo
>>> 
>>> ________________________________________
>>> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu <xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu>
>> on behalf of Ulvi İçil <ulvi.icil@gmail.com>
>>> Sent: 09 August 2017 14:38
>>> To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
>>> Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Our Broken Economy,       in One Simple Chart -
>> The New York Times
>>> 
>>> Capitalism should be destroyed urgently.
>>> Primarily in US and China.
>>> Otherwise, it will destroy humanity even without wars.
>>> 
>>> I wonder if anyone is able to claim that human species can be saved by
>>> mechanisms belonging to capitalism which is itself the very owner of the
>>> current destructive mechanisms.
>>> 
>>> Like it or not, communist society is the unique exit. Capitalism is
>>> incapable to carry over humanity.
>>> 
>>> I do not believe communism is inevitable but I think that communism is a
>>> necessity to save human species. This is a scientific truth.
>>> 
>>> Otherwise, we are the final generations of our species and humanity will
>>> not survive after 21st century.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 9 Ağu 2017 15:03 tarihinde "Larry Purss" <lpscholar2@gmail.com> yazdı:
>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> THIS IS DRAMATIC:
>>>> 
>>>> This graph captures the depth of the crisis.
>>>> 
>>>> The 8 richest people in the world have more wealth than the bottom half
>> of
>>>> the planet’s population.
>>>> 
>>>> Also...
>>>> Canada’s latest census also documents that for the first time single
>>>> occupancy residency is now the dominant form of living arrangement.
>> Only a
>>>> single person in each apartment or townhouse is now the most prominent
>>>> living arrangement
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Our Broken Economy, in One Simple Chart
>>>> This chart captures the rise in inequality better than any other chart
>>>> that I’ve seen.
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/08/07/
>> opinion/leonhardt-income-
>>>> inequality.html?emc=edit_mbe_20170809&nl=morning-briefing-
>>>> europe&nlid=69072237&te=1
>>>> Sent from Mail for Windows 10
>>>> 
>>>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Gregory A. Thompson, Ph.D.
> Assistant Professor
> Department of Anthropology
> 880 Spencer W. Kimball Tower
> Brigham Young University
> Provo, UT 84602
> WEBSITE: greg.a.thompson.byu.edu
> http://byu.academia.edu/GregoryThompson