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January 31, 2007

Argh -- Dossiers!!! And Stuff.

I'm being evaluated for my First Reappointment this semester, so I'm a little stressed right now.* I'm still drafting my "faculty evaluation narrative" for my dossier (i.e., the "justify your existence, in detail" piece in my binder), and I'm feeling a bit (ha-ha!) overwhelmed at the moment from the sheer immensity of the task (and the overall oddness of the genre).

So, today's goodies for you will all be briefly noted, and will mostly come from today's class discussion in CyberCultural Studies. (In today's class we'll be talking about iPods, mobile phones, and text messaging (or "txt mssging," if you prefer).

First, I just learned (via Boing Boing), that today is National Gorilla Suit Day! Who knew?!

What are you waiting for? It's early yet. You can still be part of this momentous occasion. Get busy!

Now that you're back from your door-to-door gorilla-suit adventuring, here's a web comic from Nitrozac & Snaggy over at The Joy of Tech that's funny and apropos:

(Click on the image to go the Joy of Tech site and see the picture biggie-sized. You can also read Nitrozac & Snaggy's web comic archive, which really should be required reading for this course. I need to work on that.)

And here's a video I just came across that picks up on many of the issues around these technologies and the cultures they spawn.

(Fair warning: if you're easily offended, this video might not be for you. It's definitely NSFW. It contains strong language, celebrities, adult situations, industrial/punk music, The Klumps-style family humor, and profane gestures.)

* - At UVM, tenure is a 3-step process (usually). Here's the normal timeline (though there are exceptions). In the second semester of your second year you are evaluated for a First Reappointment. I've been told this is just to make sure that I'm breathing and not summoning demons or eating babies in class too often. In the first semester of your fourth year you then go up for Second Reappointment, at which time the department, the dean, and the college get to decide whether they think you're going to be able to get tenure in the next 2 years. This is, obviously, a much bigger thing. Then, in the first semester of your sixth year, you're evaluated by the department, the dean, the college, the university, the president, and the provost. This is, even more obviously, a very big deal indeed. So, while First Reappointment isn't the end of the world (I've been assured), it's still big enough (and the start of something that is, in fact, quite big enough thank you very much) to have me a little freaked out.

Posted by reparent at January 31, 2007 10:38 AM