Tonight at Bryn Mawr College, Judith Butler, in her second lecture of the Flexner Lecture series, responded to Hannah Arendt’s assertion that action and speech create a political space between participants; such spaces are not constituted by individuals, but rather by the interactions between many of them. The body provides the means to see one’s own perspective but also displaces the singular perspective because bodies do not act alone; rather, action (and meaning) emerges from the “between.” We appear to others in ways that we do not know, and are politically constituted by perspectives unbeknownst to us. Butler responded by acknowledging the truth in Arendt’s conception of political space, but also that material supports are necessary for action. In the spirit of striving to be interdisciplinary, I found myself relating Arendt and Butler’s ideas about political space to Incan astronomy. As I learned upon visiting Inca ruins in Cusco, Peru during my semester abroad last spring, our tour guide taught us that the Inca looked for constellations not by imagining shapes around the stars, as the Greeks did, but rather by seeing the black space between the stars. The pinpoints of light acted as the “supports,” but the image could not be seen through just one single star. Rather, through the existence and placement of many individual stars, the Inca saw meaningful images between them.

While I thought that the workshop was great, I am worried that it will be easily forgotten. During my time at Bryn Mawr, I've heard repeated that people just don't want to talk about class on campus because it makes them feel uncomfortable, and I recognise that this is a good reason why the activities this year will fade into nothingness following their original run. I would like to know why talking about class makes people feel uncomfortable. Obviously it is because we are all raised not to speak about something so personal as finances, but why shouldn't we? Do we fear that letting someone know how much we have or don't have will make them think of us differently, ask us for money, pity us?

I come from interesting opposites: at home we never spoke about what we had, only about what we lacked. However, at my high school, students always talked about what they had and never what they lacked, perhaps because they weren't aware of it. In this way, the poor students were all but silenced and made to feel inadequate. In reality, you could never know who had money and who didn't because the poor kids weren't allowed to express themselves or they would be all but shunned. I don't know if that is the way it is in most schools.

Friday's workshop was a good start towards opening up a campus discussion about class and class issues. It was interesting to hear from some of the more established administrators in one of my discussion groups about how Bryn Mawr used to be. I knew from the other day that class used to be very apparent on campus, but hearing it about it from someone who was involved in distributing the list of students on financial aid enhanced my awareness. I am very appreciative of the changes around campus. It is possible to argue that the changes make discussions about class taboo and uncomfortable and that it does no good to sweep these topics under the rug. I am of the opinion, however, that there is a difference between openly discussing class and announcing a student's financial situation. It is possible to have the free-flowing and inclusive discourse without the extremes, and workshops such as this are how to achieve that balance. The next step is to augment the group in the workshop and to include some experiential activities, not just a few brave souls commenting and discussing with the rest of the group watching.

I noted that as I was interviewing, I felt I kind of "got in the person's life" and I could imagine what their daily life was like. Am I the only one or did anyone else feel this sort of connection to their interviewee?

I didn't post this until late because I chose to reflect on the workshop and its usage by putting the interview process in motion and seeing where I saw the insights I gained from the workshop in the interviews. A question that remained- as I culled it via interview- was "Why are people so quick to bring up examples of money as indicators of inequality?" A person can be money poor and yet be rich in love. I realize it is really corny to say this but cold piles of cash do not love you the same way a  mother or father or lover do. Why do people measure class in wealth when really the situation varies and some with less money may have more love then those who possess a lot of money. I found it to be riveting to listen to those who attended in the 80's talk about their experiences. It made me realize how valuable elderly people's stories are to society. Invent all the ipads and iphones you want, nothing replaces experience and the hands on joy of doing something for yourself. I loved moving around to places we felt comfortable, I'm a very kinesthic learner and that really connected me to the topic. As my friends know, I never stop moving and that I got to do that in a workshop was awesome!  I added an interview question- "Where do you feel most comfortable and why?" just for that activity and I loved the reasons why- they ranged from a simple "Its warm" to an intricate " I love the ambiance and vitality of it." I wrapped up my last interview 20 minutes ago and it was rather engaging to interview people and hear what they had to say.

I thought the workshop went very well.  We had a fairly good turnout of people of lots of differnt students and professions on campus.  However, participating in the workshop was very challenging for me.  It was very uncomfortalbe, but that's why we've having workshops like this in the first place!  The most difficult section was when we had to choose spaces that made us feel productive/uncomfortable/ownership.  I felt strongly that I had to be honest, but also really didn't want to.  They were such personal answers and I felt that I had the right to now have to share that with anyone if I didn't want to.  It's the same thing with talking about money/socioeconomics.  It's such a personal topic, and while we definitely need to "break the ice", we also have to respect people for wanting to remain anonymous and live their life without always thinking about inequalities.  Sometimes, innocence can be bliss for everyone. 

The forum on Friday really brought to light for me the idea that our campus is really quite separated between faculty, staff members, and students. This was especially obvious to me when we were asked to stand in the area where we felt the most uncomfortable and a majority of the faculty and staff members went to the dorm area where, later, a majority of the students said they felt that they had the most ownership. I feel that, though each party of the campus – students, faculty, and staff – are all essential to keep the campus running smoothly, and though we all interact with one another daily, there is still quite a significant divide between all of us. Whether caused by class, culture, “rank,” or age, it is still interesting to reflect that on a campus that is supposed to be so community oriented and inclusive, there should exist such a distinct line that these three groups so thoroughly avoid crossing. Of course, we do need to have our boundaries, but at what point do these boundaries become too distinct and actually inhibit us from understanding one another? Even reflecting on the forum now, I realize that we really didn’t have any housekeepers at the event and we discussed, prior to the forum, the fact that the housekeepers whom we did ask, turned us down because they felt that they would be out of place in that setting. This, I believe, is just one example of where the boundaries we have set get in the way of everyone understanding one another, and I really believe that we need to find a way to overcome these barriers.

Apparently soda is gendered now. Or at least the marketing team for Dr. Pepper thinks so. "Dr. Pepper 10" is a new diet soda for men "with just 10 manly calories." It's "not for women." They should have stuck with their old slogan, because this does not make me want to be a pepper too. 

Barad’s quantum entanglement, diffracted through Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five.

“Billy Pilgrim says that the Universe does not look like a lot of bright little dots to the creatures from Tralfamadore.  The creatures can see where each star has been and where it is going, so that the heavens are filled with rarefied, luminous spaghetti.  And Tralfamadorieans don’t see human beings as two-legged creatures, either.  The see them as great millipedes—‘with babies’ legs at one end and old people’s legs at the other,’ says Billy Pilgrim.”

            (Slaughterhouse Five, 110)

Like a lot of the other commenters, I was really happy with the turn-out of the workshop, and so glad to get to hear the perspectives of upperclassmen on class and their experiences with it. I did wish I got more of a chance to speak with staff and faculty, though. I think the space questions (where we feel most productive, ownership, etc.) were really effective for mixing us up more, which was great. I know for a lot of people, the campus center was a really popular place for doing "productive work" and I found it curious that so many staff who I spoke to (deans and counselors in particular) chose that as compared to their office as a place of work doing, because for me it's always been quite social. I wasn't surprised that in general faculty felt most uncomfortable in the dorms, but I was surprised that so many people said they felt comfortable everywhere. I think perhaps people couldn't name a space in which they felt uncomfortable was because I feel that a lot of times, places in which i find myself uncomfortable aren't always that way. The spaces are liminal and their level of exclusivity changes for me based on who occupies them.