Author: rosewhite

Here’s a chapter from Anthony Bourdain’s book, Kitchen Confidential.

It’s a fun and colorful look at what sort of people end up in restaurant kitchens – I think you’ll enjoy reading it. When you’re reading, think about his descriptions of people interacting in a kitchen — what similar situations does your workplace have?

Here’s a 15-minute video from the TED conference, of Iqbal Quadir talking about mobile phones and poverty.

I know you’re all working on your midterms, so I don’t want to give you a huge assignment — so here’s a 15-minute video on a topic we’ve already discussed. See you in class!

[Edited to add: Ai yi yi! I found out that the topics were not showing up because I pasted the text from Word — it’s fixed now!]

As I mentioned before, I’m *really* sorry that this is late – I’ve had horrible trouble with internet connectivity! I don’t want you to lose time on the midterm, though, so i’m giving everyone a two-day extension.

Instructions: Pick three of the following five topics, and write one-page responses to the topic question. Let me know if you have any questions!

1: Pick any two (or more!) of the readings (or the videos) and relate them to each other, drawing on not just the readings themselves but also the class discussions. Write one page about how they relate.

2: Write one page about something you’ve learned at Baruch this semester (from a class besides this one) that relates to our class topics.

3: One part of the “sociological imagination” is being able to imagine the world through someone else’s eyes. Race, gender, and class are important parts of that. Using anything we have discussed in class or any of our readings, tell me about new insights you’ve gained. (Example: You aren’t immigrant workers in London, or field hands in Florida, but I think many of you saw the world a little differently by reading those articles – now I’d like to hear more about that. Pick any article or class discussion that works for you.

4: We’ve talked a lot in class about food – how it’s picked and grown, how food culture can unite us within our families and ethnic groups, how ecological concerns are intertwined with both those things. I’d like to hear about your food culture. Write a page about the foods you grew up eating, or that you eat now. Also write about how you’d be affected by trying to eat more locally, and whether you think that would be a reasonable goal for you.

5: We’ve also talked about new technologies, and how they are changing the ways we interact not only with our friends and family, but also with strangers. I’d like to hear about your interactions with technology, particularly how you use it to interact socially with others. How do you use cellphones, email, text messages, social networks (LiveJournal, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Skype, etc.) and other forms of communicating through technology to keep in touch with friends? How has that changed for you in the last three years? How do you think it will continue to change?

Hi everyone! I’ve had outrageous trouble getting online at all, and getting enough bandwidth to watch videos to make sure I had the ones I wanted you all to watch, but that’s straightened out now.

Later in the semester I’ll try again to have us do a day of all videos; but for Tuesday’s class on the 17th, I’ve got a couple of short videos with short readings that will help us get the context for the videos.

I’m really sorry that these posts are late!

First:

First Lady Michelle Obama gives a tour of the White House kitchen before a State Dinner: There is a short text article and then a 9-minute video of the First Lady giving a tour to “the top six students from L’Academie de Cuisine in Gaithersburg, MD.” Here’s another short article about the same event. It looks like food policy really IS going to change in the White House!

Second:

Bill Cunningham is a fashion reporter for the New York Times. He has been taking candid photographs for them for decades. His photos used to just run as a half-page in the Style section of the paper; now that the Times has been experimenting with adding so much online content, his photos also appear as a slideshow, with audio commentary from him.

Please read Bill Cunningham’s short autobiographical article in the Times. Here’s an audio slideshow on winter coats (about 3 minutes long). And here’s another one on the use of bright colors in clothing.

Here’s the reading for Thursday night’s class — the first chapter from Barbara Kingsolver’s book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, in which she tells how she and her family grew their own food for a year (or bought it locally), and everything they learned as a result.

http://manifestneoteny.net/kingsolver.pdf

To download that, right-click on the filename and save it to your computer. Of course, you can also read it online — you’ll want to rotate the file, though!

It’s a little longer than our readings have been, but much easier than the Goffman reading. Please read it before class and come in ready to talk about it — think about what it would be like to grow your own food, for instance, and to make the choices Kingsolver and her family have made.