The politics of the image

Today you read about and listened to people debating the ethics of publishing a "selfie" photo of the Boston Marathon Bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine. At issue is the question of glorifying, or at the least humanizing a monstrous act.  Does this image make us reflect on the fact that "the boogie man" can be among us, he does not necessarily stand apart and call attention to himslef by projecting a monstrous image.  Or, on the contrary, does it create a barrier to reflection by being so controversial that we may react with visceral outrage , not caring to explore the issue of images when so many lives have been destroyed.  Today you will reflect on what you have read and listened by exploring the issue yourself.  Take a stand and join your voice is discussing the politics of the image.

Meanwhile, take a look at some iconic Rolling Stone covers of the past.

 

Now how does Tsarvaev fit within the framework of these images?

For a look at famous covers, click here

Postcard from a new frontier

As the thermometer plummets and the days darken, I don't envy the protesters of the Occupy movement camping in  their makeshift tents, eating their watery porridge.  The thought of all of that communal living makes me want to crawl into my bed with my warmest duvet with a DO NOT DISTURB sign posted on the doorknob.  I am not a fan of tams tams and free hugs.  I own mutual funds, I hate car pooling and occasionally I throw cardboard in the regular trash.  In other words,   I am a stakeholder and beneficiary of  our capitalist system.

And yet.  I am fascinated by the Occupy movement and a supporter of the protesters.  Occupy Wall Street and its transborder cousins grew as a result of economic turmoil that is wreaking havoc on all classes, races, ages.  Although I readily admit that I participate in the system, I firmly believe in reforming it.  The economic crisis and disenfranchisement of a generation may be the key arousing us out of our apathy and empowering us to demand a redistribution of wealth and power.  We don't have to revolutionize society, we have to create a more fair and caring one.  There are  simple changes that can be implemented in order to become more inclusive, more just, and more sustainable.  The Occupy movement can be an intrument of these changes.

And so, I am enjoying the uncomfortable confrontations between the Occupiers and City Hall, between the voices of change and the condescending  pundits of the mainstream media , between the leaders of a new mentality and the gardians of the ideological status quo.  I agree to occupy this experimental space where people everywhere are joining together to map out a new territory of possibility.  Just let me bring my duvet.

The politics of images in the media

A lot has been said about the way the media construct images of beauty, of masculinity and of minorities.  For example, television and magazines consistantly present images of femininity that are either unattainable for the average woman in terms of impossible beauty standards or in terms of the superwoman who is both perfect wife/mother.

But lately I have been hearing and reading critiques of the way media choose to present images of disasters.  These types of images present a helpless victim/saviour hero dynamic which simplifies the complexity of crisis .  This simplification of disasters  results in a public that is both misinformed on important issues and perpetuates the stereotype of peoples of the developing world as victims.

For a thought-provoking discusssion of the way that the media are portraying the famine in Somalia, listen to Q  "What's wrong with this picture?" . You can also read one of my previous Decmber 2010 blog posts on a related issue, Band Aid and the famine in Ethiopia "There's a world outside your window"

Be Proactive!

Well, a new school year has begun, it's the perfect time for a fresh start.  It's a great time to spend money too and all the stores encourage us to buy: new clothes, new school material, new appliances, new electronic goods, new makeup, new apartments!

The new school year is also a time where many of us take stock of ourselves, of our appearances, of our habits and of our insecureties:  we believe in self-improvement.  Advertisers prey on this desire for perfection and even though we are more media-savvy than previous generations, we are still willing to buy a piece of fantasy in order to boost our self-esteem. 

Let's take a look at an ad for a product I'm sure you've all seen heavily marketed on tv.  What are people really buying when they order this product?

Fantasy Island

Dear Diary,

Well, it's been 3 months since the shipwreck and still no sign of rescue.  What's that blog I read so long ago?  If only I could be anywhere but here...

God I'm hungry.  If I have to eat  tuna sushi  one more time I will go crazy.  It's enough to turn me into a hunter.  That wild turkey is looking mighty mouth-watering right now.  What's that old saying?  "if you teach a man to fish..."  Damn you and your proverbs Nick Moroz!

 What I could really go for is one of those Boston Cream donuts from Tim Horton's.  I'm so desperate, I would even settle for the strawberry flavour.  Well, all I can do is fantasize.  At least my French Laundry Cookbook survived the disaster.  Let's see:  Salad of Globe Artichokes with Garden Herbs and Gazpacho, Roasted Rib Steak with Chanterelles, Pecorino Toscano with Roasted Sweet Peppers and Arugula Coulis, Chocolate Fondant with Coffee Cream, Velouté of Bittersweet Chocolate with Cinnamon-Stick Ice Cream....ah, I can only dream.

I have discovered ways to relieve the tedium of staring into the turquoise water all day long.  A useless pocket-full of soggy as-yet-to-be-used Dooly's tickets inspired me to devise a variation on pool which involves coconuts and bamboo.  And just for fun I am making up my own language .What I really miss is music.  If only could listen to The Clash (London Calling), or Tom Waits (The Early Years) or Bach's Cello suites (Anner Bylsma) or even The Scorpions, the time would pass more quickly.  Instead, the other day, a pristine copy of Super-Mega-Dance-Party Hits 2011 washed up on shore.  What the---?

Am I hallucinating?  Is that a viking ship I see on the horizon?  No, too many sails.  Now see a dude on board. He's got dreads, he's carrying a sword...it's...no, it couldn't be..yes, it's him, it's really him, it's

Jack Sparrow!  Yo ho and a barrel full of rum!  I guess someone really did receive my message in a bottle.  Jack!  Over here!  Help, get me off of  this island!  Teach me how to wield a sword, to outsmart villains and make them walk the plank, to outwit my enemies.  Oh, Jack take me on a pirate escapade!

You know, I think I'll miss my little island.

Well, Jack and the Black Pearl  beckon.  Farewell island, you've taught me so much.   Another adventure awaits.

It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine

Last month, when I opened my RRSP statement, I was quite pleased to note a 9% increase in my Global Energy Fund.  On the other hand, when I fill up my gas tank twice a week at $126.4/litre I feel a lot of pain.  And when I see images of unrest in the Middle East, I cheer for the victory of the people over the forces of oppression and cringe as pro-regime forces attempt to crush the popular movements and I am forced to admit to myself, as if I didn't already know already, that it's all interrelated. My mutual funds, my car, my CNN, my MTV, my iPhone, my grocery cart are all links in a chain that bind us from our safe -haven of  insouciance to the rest of the world.  My conscience has known this for a long long time but the recent world events that are turning me into a news junkie have made me conscious of my conscience.  I can no longer look away.  I can't go on living as if my actions have no impact on the world.

The paradigm is shifting.  I am struggling with the following question:  how can I continue to live my life as if I am not concerned when the world is in such upheaval?  Are you familiar with the old  R.E.M. lyrics?  It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine.

-
But...I. don't. feel. fine.

I watch in awe and despair as the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear crisis transform parts of Japan  into an apocolyptic ground zero.  And yet, life goes on here.  For example, the night after the earthquake, I watched the news in horror and then stayed up until midnight filled with guilty pleasure, licking the dregs of leftover chocolate fondue while watching Sex and the City: The Movie and revelling in its irreverent silliness.  I am a terrible, frivolous person!

The other day, my kids were incessantly bickering over ipods, iphones ,the  Wii and the laptop.  I couldn't take the spoiled sense of entitlement any longer so I sat them in front of CNN, made them look at the images of devastation from Japan and lectured them:  "You cannot fight over your personal entertainment choices when there is a nuclear meltdown on the other side of the world.  Banality is immoral boys!"  Its the post-apocalyptic parenting equivalent of the old standby:  "Eat all the food on your plate--don't you know there are children starving in Africa?"

I believe in resilience, in social justice, in the victory of the good over the forces of evil.  But today I feel like a helpless spectator with the uneasy knowledge that I am, in some small way, involved in the world.  And as R.E.M. plays in an endless loop at the back of my mind, a line from the prophetic William Butler Yeats (Ireland)  poem The Second Coming emerges to the forefront:  "Things fall apart, the center cannot hold."

If you are in a doom and gloom mood like me, I invite you to ponder  the entire poem, written in 1919, in the disillusioned aftermath of WWI.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer,
Things fall apart, the center cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed in the world
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned.
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming!  Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Wind shadows of the indignant birds.

The darkness drops again but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocky cradle,
And what rough beast, its now come round at last,
Slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?

There's a world outside your window

For my last blog post for this course I wanted to write about Christmas but when we started talking about hair last week I thought I might want to write about that too.  Amazingly, I have found the perfect intersection of the two subjects!

You all must know my all-time favorite Christmas song Do They Know It's Christmas? by Band Aid.  But are you familiar with the context in which it was written?

It is 1984.  Internet does not exist yet.  Although CDs are becoming popular, most teenagers still buy vinyl records of their favorite bands and those who are really fanatic about their records protect the record covers in plastic sleeves and arrange them on shelves in alphabetical order.  Sony is king and all youth walk around with Sony Walkmans and earphones stuck to their ears.  Producing and taping customized cassettes is a popular past time.  In basements everywhere, adolescents are discovering Atari and playing Pac Man, Space Invaders and Donkey Kong.

On the international front, the Berlin wall still separates East and West and Tiananmen Square is 5 years away.  The term genocide is mostly applied to WWII and Rwanda and the ethnic cleansing in Bosnia are horrors that cannot  be imagined.  No one has heard of CNN, RDS, or other 24-hour news channels.  In Ethiopia, famine threatens to decimate the population.

The images from Ethiopia were shocking and, in evolution of the role of the media in ending the Vietnam War in the 70s, the mass media had a large role to play in influencing public opinion on the fmaine issue.  In England, Bob Geldof of the Boomtown Rats decided to mobilize his musician colleagues to create a song and dedicate all proceeds to ending the famine.  In a flury of urgency, the song was written and recorded within a week and released just in time for Christmas.

I love this song and this video.  Although there are elements that merit criticism--the naive,Western-centric, imperialist view of Africa, the conflating of Ethiopia into "Africa" and the claim that it`s "where nothing ever grows, no rain nor rivers flow"--it still represents a turning point for me who was 15 at the time.  The line "there`s a world outside your window" sums it up and it represents the beginning of my awareness of international issues that continues to this day.

Watch the video at least twice.  First, savour the complicated, edgy, choppy, gel and hairspray overloaded, dyed, shaved and bobbed  80s hairstyles!  My own hair look was definitely of the times: a choppy style, long in the front, dyed blond with lots of Sun-In, hairsprayed and underneath the long hair on the right side, a shaved strip that followed the contours of my ear from front to back. Can you spot Sting, George Michael, Phil Collins, Boy George, Simon Lebon and Bono?  I love how all of the members of Band Aid look like they just got out of bed!  So far from our plastic artificial world in which we live.

Then, enjoy the video for the message, delivered by all of that extraordinary artistic talent.  I still get shivers when I hear it for the first time of the season every December.

Merry Christmas gang and all the best for 2011!



One way ticket to here

It's amazing how a seemingly insignificant action can become the catalyst for a life-changing event. 

In my case, the action was the first and only time I ever dropped out of a course.  It was my first year of my four-year undergraduate degree at the University of Western Ontario.  I was majoring in English and had registered for a French course because a second language credit was obligatory for  my program.  I went to my first class, took an instant dislike to the arrogant, condescending professor, dropped the course and signed up for course on Ancient Greece instead.

Fast forward two more years.  I was finishing my third year with one more to go and that French course was still looming in the background.  I had one more year to take the course if I wanted to graduate.  It so happened that Western is part of the Explore program and has its French Immersion School in Trois-Pistoles.  I realized that I could get the credit I needed from Western without having to set foot in the French Department and the government would pay for it too.

So one day in May I hopped on a train with 200 other students and headed east.   I got off that train expecting to earn a badly needed credit in French.  Little did I know that my life would be transformed too.

How ironic that I live at least half of my life in French now when I had stubbornly resisted that French course throughout my undergraduate years!  I graduated with a B.A from Western, went on to travel to Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia,  enrolled in a graduate program  and completed M.A. in literature at McGill .  And  here I am now at the Cegep de Rimouski, teaching English to an amazing group of language students!

 I never did have a career plan.  My plan was just to continue what I loved doing: reading and studying. But life has a way of creating opportunites that you seize because you recognize fateful moments of your destiny.  Although I have travelled on many buses, trains and planes since that fateful train ride to Trois-Pistoles, I never did use the return portion of my ticket.

This week we will examine the Maclean's annual university rankings issue.  You have already made an important decision when you decided to study Languages at Cégep de Rimouski.  In the spring you must make another life decision:  do you apply to university?  what program?  where? do you travel? when? where? with whom?  do you work? where? doing what?   We will take a close look at what Maclean's has to say about universities but at the same time, I can attest to the fact no matter what road you choose you will meet with twists and turns,  obstacles andmost importantly, uncharted surprises.

Ode to Frost

It's 7 am.   I pull on my hat, mittens,scarf, coat and rubber boots and we creep put of the house like stealthy thieves. 

The world is white with frost. The air is crisp and sharp in my lungs.  I must scrape  a thick layer of ice crystals off of my windshield in order to drive away.

We hop in the car, shivering.  The first rays of the morning  illuminate the traces of frost left on the windows, like diamonds glinting in the new sun.

I turn up the volume as Ray Lamontagne laments in his Tennessee mountain twang. We head for the sea, to the summer house on the Grève D'Amours (love shore?  seaside of love?) where the garden, now bereft of its beans, carrots and tomatoes, awaits the winter snow.

I open the car door and the dog leaps out and runs ahead of me toward the sand.  Boots crunch, the dog's hot breath condensing in white puffs in the cold air.  Aside from the duck family paddling close to shore, my dog companion and I are the only beings here.

We are the only travellers in this universe.  The dog runs crazily, delirious with joy.  I am enraptured by this moment at this place.  Every shell, pebble, grain of sand glitters with frost.  Its luminous touch traces the intricate outline of feathers, seagrass and stone in delicate lace.  The frost magnifies the intertidal life and I can only stand awestruck, the sole witness to this magical world.

We walk on.  I am stunned by the clarity of the water and sand.  The frost becomes a lense through which to view the world for the first time.  I see green and garnet seaweed like other worldy shapeshifters, waiting for the sun to warm them up before they slither back to the sea.  Here and there, pieces of worn emerald seaglass glint through the pebbles and I pocket them, my secret talismans.

We make our way to the end of the shore and we have reached the end of the world.  One of my favorite Robert  Frost poems creeps into my mind as I recall the lines:
                                                         So Eden sank to grief
                                                         So dawn goes down to day
                                                         Nothing gold can stay.
It's time to go home.

Blogfest

There are lots of inspiring blogs in the blogosphere where you can read inspiring stories about hope, survival and overcoming great obstacles. The best of these blogs use their circumstances to comment on an aspect of society.

 A subgenre of this type of blog, however, is the fabricated personal challenge blog in which bloggers impose artificial limits on themselves and then write about their trails and tribulations, their triumphs and defeats all in order to to have something interesting to write about in which ME is the star.  This subgenre reminds me of reality tv because both present a narrative arc that is entirely based on artificial challenges and fake fortuitous circumstances.  A classic example of this kind of blog is the Julie/Julia Project.

And so, because I am feeling frivolous and in the hope that one day  I too will become famous and  have a movie produced based on my blog, here are my suggestions for my ticket to fame:

Incognito:  I infiltrate the mafia and write both scathing critiques and lush praise for this deadly yet alluring secret society.

Karaokegirl:  I enter karaoke contests throughout Asia in a bid to become a karaoke star.

$%?*(*&?  -OFF:  I challenge myself to stop swearing in French or in English for an entire six months.

Choxtasy:  I eat a chocolate bar a day (not Mars or Caramilk--the good stuff!) and describe the taste sensations in exquisite detail.  Perhaps Lindt will sponser me?

Canterbury Tales:  I take a year off work in order to write about living like a woman of medieval England.  I write about food, health, education, entertainment, work and family life.  Nevermind that blogging is certainly anachronistic for the year 1310.

Well, I can go on and on but my eyes are getting blurry.  Which one do you vote in?  Do you have other suggestions for me?  How about you?  What's your challenge, real or imaginary?

The Strawman Argument

With a nod to the American midterm elections last night, let's take a look at Grammar Girl and listen to what she has to say about a debating technique dear to the politician's heart.  Her tips on this podcast are useful for a critical analysis of Maclean's articles too!

If you enjoyed this podcast, I encourage you to become a fan on Facebook.  With charm and humour, Grammar Girl has great writing tips and commentary on grammar faux pas in the media. I am not a geek (or am I ) but I do relish discussions about grammar.  Really!

Vampire

He commands respect.  He represents moral authority.  He inspires confidence and admiration.  He is a coach.  He is a priest.  He is a Colonel in the army.  He is a monster.

As Halloween approaches, we are inundated with images of ghosts, goblins, monsters, witches and vampires.  If we so desire, we may choose to wear a costume representing one of these stock Halloween characters.  In a larger context, one can't escape the omnipresence of popular culture related to vampires:  Anne Rice novels, Buffy the Vampire Slayer TV shows and of course, the Twilight series.  Indeed, we are fascinated by representation the mysterious, sometimes monstrous netherworld because of the classic two sides to being human: good and evil.  The representaion of evil in art or popular culture forces us to look at the "evil" side of the human condition while at the same time confirms to us that we are good:  we are not like them.  Vampires may act human sometimes but humans don't act like vampires.  And so we happily stand in line at the movies to be thrilled, horrifed and thoroughly entertained.

But these days, one can't escape another kind of monster who belongs neither to medieval iconography, nor to neo-gothic popular culture.  This kind of vampire walks among us.  He leads a double life.  He uses his power,status and authority as a mask to hide his real nature.  He stalks his prey and he leaves an endless trail of victims.  He has even become a media anti-star: whenever we turn on the radio or television, there he is again.  This steady media diet of horror is beginning to make me feel sick.  I feel a malaise when I think how the vampire becomes the star but the victims must repeatedly relive the horror over a 24-hour news channel.

Sadly, as much as I may wish, this is not a fairytale. There are no princes or princesses, no chivalrous knights and no happily-ever-after in this story.

Run

Ran to fix breakfast.
Sped to drive the kids to school.
Sped back home to get ready for work.
Jumped in the car.  Ahhh, I can relax, I'm not late, the sun is shining, Gloria Steinem is being interviewed on Q
 $%%#!!$! a dead moose on the back of a truck, zoom and another, zoom and another, at least six today all the way to Rimouski.

Sauntered to the office,greet colleagues, check Omnivox, Groupwise, Hotmail, telephone messages, catching up, catching up.
Ran upstairs for a meeting.
Ran downstairs for Cool-Aid center.
Strolled to office
Madly produced administrative documents due NOW and  sent them out
Quickly ate lunch with one hand while typing with the other.
Ran downtown to buy a birthday present.
Glanced at watch, holy $%#%!! I have a meeting in 7 minutes.
Sprinted from Alphabet to the third floor of the cegep in 5 minutes.
Arrived at meeting transpiring and out of breath but ON TIME.
Finished the meeting, jogged to the second floor for  other meeting.
Dashed to office, grabbed work, ran to car.

Sped back home, come on lady, you are driving too slow.
Brisked into the grocery store, purchased supper, slight twinge of guilt for not offering all four food groups.
Pulled into the garderie, picked up kids, B is there, N is there--what É isn't there?  Oh, he's at a friend's house.  Aghh!!! which friend?
Found É, drive home, fervently repeating my mantra :serenity now, serenity now (you know, from Seinfeld).
Unpacked backpacks, helped with homework, spelling words, dictation, addition, subtraction, conjugation,
Exponents--Hey, I'm an English teacher not a math teacher ummmmm, let' s see now.....

Walked dog.

Gobbled supper, get back in car, drive É to arena, tie skates.
Drove back home, read stories.
Got back in car--I said buckle up!
Picked up É at arena, come on, hurry up! hurry up.
Got back in car . Drove back home.
Made and eate snacks, read stories.

 Walked dog.

I am wiped out.  I am beat.
Bed time everybody. Sweet dreams.

I can't sleep.

Coffee break

In the spirit of solidarity with my language students, Present Progressive is taking a break this week!

Do you ever feel like this?

L'air du temps

If there is one holiday that makes me feel like a foreigner in Québec, it's Thanksgiving.  In ROC (rest of Canada), Thanksgiving is a treasured moment in the year when friends and family gather around the table to enjoy the traditional roast turkey, rosemary stuffing, assorted roasted autumn vegetables, cranberry sauce and homemade pumpkin pie.  Here in Québec on the other hand, Thanksgiving is an anonymous holiday without a heart and soul, a banal day like any other. I guess it's a good illustration of the great franco-anglo culinary divide.  On the turkey issue it seems our differences can't be breached.

And so, in the interest of anglo-franco cultural rapprochement, I encourage you to learn more about the art of the Thanksgiving feast by the epitome of holiday festivities, the domestic diva herself, Martha Stewart.  Enjoy and:


    It must be part of  the zeitgeist,of l'air du temps.  As usual, I was driving in my car this week when I tuned in to a Q debate.  The subject :  Carnivore vs. vegetarian!  The debate neatly ties in to our discussion on the ethics of  hunting and eating meat from my previous post, Bullet-proof.  Click here  for more passionate opinions on the subject.  Have a happy Thanksgiving, we have a lot to be grateful for.

Revenge of Bonhomme Carnaval

Our hero on the rampage.--from Actualité

Bonhomme Carnaval, our new anti-hero

Dear Maclean's,

Imagine my shock when I woke up on Monday morning and heard of the scandalous controversy that has shaken all of Québec:  Québec is the most corrupt province in Canada! My first thought was not without a hint of sarcasm:  Thanks for the enlightenment Maclean's , I really need you to tell me how corrupt our politicians are.  Of course  politicians are corrupt, that is the nature of politics: where there is money at stake, corruption is sure to follow.  Nevertheless, you seem to assert that there is something in the the very nature of being Québecois that leads to corruption.  Isn't that a bit like affirming that because of this negative article,  Maclean's is a racist, xenophobic magazine?

In the end, it doesn't really interest me who deserves the title of Canada's most corrupt province.  All of them can win the gold medal in this category.  What fascinates me however, is your appropriation of a beloved symbol of the heartwarming joie de vivre of our wintery province in order to shock, outrage and therefore sell more magazines.  Is your intention to inform or is it to make a profit through sensational Quebec-bashing?



Notwithstanding the simplistic analysis evident in the  two articles that  just attempt to validate the condescending perception of the the Rest of Canada in relation to Québec, your cover attacks the integrity of our national folklore:  the Bonhomme Carnaval, symbol of our bonne humeur, our warmth, our difference.  You portray our lovable mascot as a bandit, an diabolical bad guy making off with the goods.

Can this be a new chapter in the never-ending epic of the battle between the forces of good and evil?  Between the pure and the corrupted, the hero and the villain?  Alas, one  question remains, who is whom in this story?

Bullet-proof

You are walking along a road,  you hear crunch crunch crunch, you look to your right, you see antlers, you see a majestic brown beast, you see a moose, you see two of them!  You are on your bike one day and you hear the familiar crunch crunch crunch, sure enough, its the buck and his partner.   You are driving along that same road, the windows down because your air-conditioning is broken and hey wind-cooling is more environmentally-friendly than air-conditioning anyway and you hear crunch crunch crunch and there again, on the side of the road, stands that buck.  This happens to you all summer, every couple of days.  You become attached to this animal, you admire his grandeur, his quiet nobility. You reflect: gee, am I ever privileged to witness this great creature, just being.  You think to yourself, I hope I never hear bang!

Autumn arrives, it's back to school, back to work but that's ok too, you love your work, you love your 45-minute drive at this time of year.  You drink your coffee, you listen to the radio, you contemplate the surroundings, you're in your bubble.  Then one day as you turn your attention from the red yellow orange trees to the vehicle you are approaching, you realize with growing nausea in the pit of your stomach that your woodland companion has been shot, killed, and tied to the hood of a car.  You become a  voyeur in spite of yourself, you are a hostage, you can't escape any more than the moose can.  Look away too long and you will crash.  You are complicit, you are a witness to the scene.

 And you know it's hunting season again.   You reason that you live in a rural region, it's to be expected, hunting is a hobby, a way of life, a means of subsistance, part of the cycle of nature.  And who are you to criticize, you carnivore, you meat-eater, you who enjoyed all those barbecues all summer long!   But it's that shameless display of that poor sacred creature, the macho arrogance of victory that you just can't digest.

My teacher, my friend

When one of my students  asks to be my friend on Facebook should I say yes, no, or do nothing?  Has friending acquaintences on Facebook become such a banal act that I allow anyone to view my private life?  Do I really want to know what my students eat for breakfast, drink on weekends or think about their photos?What about that word friend anyway?  Now there's a word that has evolved to mean anything from someone with whom you have a deep bond to a vague superficial online entity.

I am constantly grappling with these ethical issues surrounding the nature of the role of the teacher with regards to electronic media.  Should teachers be friends with their students, thereby blurring the lines between professional and private life?  Or, on the contrary, do teachers need to keep their professional distance from their students but in so doing, sacrifice a learning opportunity for both students and themselves?

Are you friends with your teachers?  Do you enjoy glimpsing into the non-professional lives of teachers?  Is it necessary for students to be friends with their  teachers or is mutual respect all that is required? Listen in on Q  for a discussion of issues related to teachers, students and Facebook.

It's Greek to me

Sometimes while I'm writing I must pause to think of the perfectly precise word for the occasion.  Sometimes it takes me half an hour just to come up with a title.  I savour le mot juste.  I adore my well-thumbed, falling apart, 25-year-old paperback thesaurus.  And all of this word obsession is for my mother tongue! 

But what happens when I must speak or write in French?  I yearn to be able to communicate as effectivley in French as certain panelists I listen to on Radio Canada or on Bazzo.tv.  The challenge is that once you are very comfortable in a second language it takes a lot of motivation to improve your vocabulary.  It's just so much easier to rely on the tried and true formula  (did you get that idiomatic but over-used expression?) to express ourselves.  If you are highly motivated to increase your word power, however, you will be rewarded with the satisfaction of accomplishment.

How about taking a vocabulary test at http://www.englishcorner.vacau.com/vocabulary/vocabulary.html
These activities quizz you on your mastery of the Acadmic Word List, a list of more than 500 words that every university student should master.