More Public Discussion: and some of my complaints

Suzanne, as you know there has been a lot of private discussion about these matters. So I will discuss it with you privately.
   -Peter Kirk

I've been away from the blog for a few days.  Do you know whether there have been private discussions?  Of course you don't.  Now that I'm back, I see that Peter Kirk has announced at his own blog that he's on vacation, that he won't be back until September.  This, to me, is important for several reasons.

First, if there's a public discussion here at this blog, I don't want to leave Peter out of a more public conversation that he may have started (even if he announces in public at my blog how he prefers for some things "private discussion").  Second, if there's discussion mentioning him, he should be able to speak for himself.  Third, Peter asked a question of me, which I haven't taken the time to answer as if I've had the time; but I think he deserves an answer before September.  Fourth, related to Peter's question, there's really a larger discussion going on at BBB, that's been stopped now.  Fifth, what happened at BBB is indicative of a larger problem we've already observed with bible-blogging in general, the fact that men and not women continue to dominate the bible "studies" blogger carnivals and the Top 50 listings, where Peter now finds himself comfortably and increasingly near the top.  Sixth, the general bible-blogging problem seems related to male privilege and to sexism and to mysogyny and to gynophobia.

Seventh, several have already noted particular issues for them, very likely because they are women.  For example, Suzanne notes:

"Naturally my comment will stand out as marked, because I am one woman among a large group of male bloggers."

 And Paula remarks:

"Right now, based on this conversation alone, all I can see is that Sue has a legitimate grievance of clear bias against only her discussing gender. If the BBB wants us to believe this isn't so, they can't hide their argument from public view."

And Kristen says:

"I made a couple of suggestions over there. But I'm leaving tomorrow on a trip and will be gone for about a week, so I won't see the results. Catch you when I get back! "

And Judith reads and then comments "over there":

"A nice carnival. Any real reason that all the women bloggers are down at the bottom in a group called ‘Miscellaneous’? As one of that pack, I’m curious…."

She gets an answer and then replies:

"Believe me, I know how much time it takes to put together a good carnival. So thanks very much for your work on this one. As I said, I was just curious how we all landed up in the same category of ‘Oddities’ "

Please observe
the oddities that Judith observes,
the extra work that Kristen must do,
the call for more public discussion that Paula has to make,
and the public markedness.
The markedness is what Suzanne
can't help but experience.

This is the experience of females, not males,
of women, not men,
in bible blogging.

So Peter, as one justifiably hypocritical man to another, asks me:

"Kurk, isn't it the pot calling the kettle black when on this all-male blog you complain about BBB being all-male? The only reason BBB is all-male is that, despite looking, we can't find a woman who wants to join it. But surely what matters in this case is not what body parts we possess but what we have to say.

I have written quite a lot about the phrase sometimes translated "husband of one wife". Last year I busted the myth that it was used of women. Five years ago I wrote a whole series about this phrase.

But there are other interesting topics in Bible translation, so at BBB we don't want every thread diverted into a discussion of gender."

Now, I reply:

"Peter, I am glad you worked to 'bust the myth' that the Greek phrases μιᾶς γυναικὸς ἄνδρα, mias gunaikos andra AND ἑνὸς ἀνδρὸς γυνή, henos andros gune were used exclusively for one sex but not the other.  You did that by blogging individually; and not in a team of bloggers as you're a member of at BBB.  Probably I should have pointed out that I don't blog with anybody else at my blog just as you don't at your Gentle Wisdom blog.  But I do value the comments of women as well as men.  I censor neither and try to allow the voices of all people of all genders to be expressed as the individuals commenting here would like.

Is my observation about the BBB team being all-male a complaint?  If so,

•  then my complaint is that you haven't looked hard enough to include women in your team of BBB bloggers.  
• My complaint is that you want the default and unmarked body parts to be male so then you can say, by male logic, that "surely what matters in this case is not what body parts we possess but what we have to say."  
• My complaint is that you all-male BBB bloggers censor a woman differently than you do a man.  
• My complaint is that you have rules for commenters that you apply rather unevenly and pretend that gender is not in view.  
• My complaint is that you all-men BBB bloggers say, 'Comments are closed, but you can leave a trackback' but then you allow trackbacks, if seems, only if we don't use the g-word in our posts.  
• My complaint is not that all-you-males-and-only-males 'don't want every thread diverted into a discussion of gender.'  Rather, my complaint is that you use your maleness as if it's not gender to control who gets to say what and how.  
• My complaint is that you say you only want to 'discuss' such things in private while making rather public statements nonetheless here also at my blog."

When Distinctions Damage (and when they do some good)

It is impossible, then, that 'being a man' should mean precisely 'not being a man', if 'man' not only signifies something about one subject but also has one significance. ....

In the context of Aristotle's traditional logic, this is a remarkably precise statement of the law of excluded middle, P ∨ ¬P.
      --an excerpt from the wikipedia entry on the Law of the Excluded Middle

In these statements [that Aristotle has written in his various treatises,] the superior valuation of man over woman is explicitly stated. However, it is also present in the theory of contraries and in other aspects of Aristotle’s thought about sex identity. Aristotle stands out from his predecessors in that he gave a complete rationale for his theory of sex polarity. He developed reasons and arguments for the philosophically significant differentiation of the sexes and for the superiority of man over woman. Therefore, he is correctly identified as the founder of the sex polarity position. . . . [H]e also laid the groundwork for another theory of sex identity in his philosophy of definition.
      --an excerpt from Sister Prudence Allen's book, The Concept of Woman: The Aristotelian Revolution 750 Bc-Ad 1250

This is a tough post for me to write, for some personal reasons.  It may be a difficult post for you to read, because I may not be very clear.  It's about language, and the ways we use it.  I'm trying to represent fairly what we bloggers say and how we come across when saying what we say.  How that may damage, or how it may do some good.  (If I've misrepresented anything you've said, then I'm sorry.  Readers should find links back to the contexts from which I've lifted a few quotes of fellow bloggers.)

Well, here goes.

Aristotle is alive around the blogosphere. At least the sort of logic he used to denigrate women and others is alive and well. It's almost as if bloggers making distinctions the way Aristotle did are afraid.  It seems they're afraid that if they don't differentiate sharply then they will not be able to have any sort of discernment or judgment at all.

But the real distinction, the good one we'd do well to make, is this one:

the differentiation between 

(1) our own human language that is often good and sloppy and imprecise and sometimes playful and is embodied and yet still allows us to see difference and even to celebrate all kinds of differences

and 

(2) Aristotle's logic that would separate the Other from oneself, logic that invariably and inherently puts oneself above that Other in some sort of hierarchical Nature, logic that would damage the Other or must view her already as naturally damaged.

Here are 3 examples:

example 1 

In his post "Spoken style correction: the iPeeve™," Mark Liberman does some good by allowing himself to be "inspired by Erin Gloria Ryan" in her confessions of using the filler like in her speech.  But Mark also really does some good by actually distinguishing Erin's more limited conclusions from his own.  He can, for example, question what she only presumes:  "whether vernacular like is genuinely female-associated," and then he can ask "the broader question of whether there's a female speech style characterized by features that weaken assertions."

However, then Mark sets himself above Erin by differentiating in a way that could damage his blog readers' perceptions of the way she speaks.  He suggests that her "incessant repetition of a low-information-content filler is annoying to listeners and should be avoided."  Yes, I know he goes on to generalize beyond Erin's own confession to say - like a logical prescriptivist would - that absolutely all of the following "should be avoided":  "like" or "literally" or "you know" or just plain "uh."  See how this prescription differentiates?  How it sets one sort of English speaker above the others.  Mark starts to sound like the logical prescriptivist Aristotle, who insisted that ambiguities "should be avoided" or else they'll make a lousy speaker.  What's really not so good is that Mark can't even follow his own prescription for the language that not good speakers "should" avoid.  In the very blogpost where he says fillers should be avoided, Mark himself fails to avoid using a filler.  He writes the filler "well"; he writes it and doesn't avoid it.  He writes the filler "well" as if he's talking:  "What am I talking about?," he asks in writing.  Then he says, pausing with his filler:  "Well, ..."  In kind reply to my comment pointing this out, Mark further differentiates the Nature of things; he says in red font:  "Sentence-initial well is what's generally called a "discourse marker" — it wouldn't become a "verbal tic" unless it was over-used."  Notice, it's NOT a "filler" or "verbal tic" when four differentiations can be made:  (a) "well" is "sentence-initial"; (b) someone writes a wikipedia article and calls "well" a "discourse marker"; and (c) until and unless "well" is "over-used" like "Ms. Ryan's" like is so overused; and (d) until and unless the speaker or writer like "Ms. Ryan" confesses to having "her (self-)conscious reaction" to using "well," a reaction, by the way, "[that] is ... quite negative."  And so notice, differentiate, how differently Mark uses his language from how Erin uses hers.

In summary, Mark makes some good distinctions after being inspired by Erin's blogpost.  Then he continues on to do some damage by differentiating the various differences between proper speech, in the way he uses it, and NOT proper speech that "should be avoided," in the way that she uses it.

example 2

In her post, "Sunday Superlatives: 6/26/2011," Rachel Held Evans does some good by differentiating some of the best blogposts she's read, on the one hand, from some bad blogposts, on the otherhand.  For example, Rachel sees how "spot-on" Jamie the Very Worst Missionary is with her post, “Human, Like Jesus,” (in which Jamie differentiates between people who tend to run down being human, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, people who tend more to go with the Jesus kind of humanity, i.e., "our humanity that compels us to treat others with kindness and respect").  Likewise, Rachel sees the "best argument" in Daniel Kirk's post, “Gay Marriage in New York” (in which Daniel differentiates between the state being in the marriage business, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the church NOT being in this business).  Furthermore, Rachel sees as "most provocative" Caryn Rivadeneira's post, “What Christians Can Respect About Slutwalks” (in which Caryn differentiates, on the one hand, the "horrific" thing that a male police officer in Toronto said from the more honorable protests by slutwalkers, on the other hand).  And then Rachel even does good by differentiating the bad:  Rachel calls "Most Un-Cool (...and not in a good way)" Karen Swallow's post “An Open Letter to Donald Miller” (since Karen differentiates how Donald Miller and how she Karen would make a list of qualities in a fianc(é)e in some Christianly way, on the one hand, and how Donald's actual fiancée has so differently made her list, on the other hand, in a not so Christianly way, i.e., in a way that "doesn’t leave a whole lot of room for God to bring a partner who can meet needs we don’t even know we have, needs God knows more intimately than we or our spouses can ever know").

However, then Rachel seems to talk about Karen by differentiating in a way that could damage Karen's blog readers' perceptions of the way she speaks.  Rachel says of Karen's blogpost:  "Unsolicited marriage advice from a complete strange in the form of 'open letter' = not cool."  And we all wonder if we can easily differentiate Rachel's unsolicited statement here about Karen's unsolicited one.  Who is above the other?  Who can call somebody's blogpost "cool" or "not cool" if the one is differentiating herself from the other but does the very same sort of differentiating as the other?  It's sort of confusing.  But the subtleties here are what can damage the Other.

And so let's look at what the ostensibly "cooler" (as if in a "good" way) bloggers do as "Christians" differentiated from the Others.  Daniel, for example, writes:  "It’s difficult for Christians to imagine a world where we are truly in the minority and subject to the power of people with alternative religious convictions."  And he adds, "As Christians, we need to learn how to hold our own religious views while seeking liberty and justice for all–not just those who happen to believe as we do."  And his clear differentiations are between "Christians we" vs. Others "truly in the minority" who cannot "believe as we do" because they're NOT Christians maybe gays - as if these are mutually exclusive categories with the middle excluded.  Isn't it damaging to find yourself without a real category, if you are Christian and gay or are Christian and some other minority or are Christian and yet still not necessarily sharing all the beliefs like Daniel's Christians do?  Similarly, Caryn says:  "While we can debate the method of SlutWalks, Christians should agree on their purpose. Christians should be leading the marches against violence toward women."  Can one not be a Christian and a feminist and also a SlutWalker?  Or is the only thing "Christians" can share with "their" debatable feminist method "their [SlutWalk] purpose"?  Can we all see how this sort of us NOT them differentiation doesn't allow people to be who they are or who they're becoming, as if one category of religious person is above the Others they're trying to "love" or at least somehow to agree with?  Doesn't the absolute differentiation damage?

example 3

Now let me point the finger at me.   I'll keep it short, but you'll have links if you want it long.   At this blogpost, I commented about two of my fellow bloggers in disagreement:  "I’m thinking that there are already two clear disagreements to note and that our seeing these differences clearly shouldn’t hurt anybody."  I was really hoping to do some good in differentiating, at least not to do damage.

However, it's clear there's been damage done late in a related conversation at a related blogpost here.  One of the conversants quotes me and says:  "Well, I don’t know about the 'not hurting' part. Of course it hurts. But ... "  Oops!  Suddenly I find myself perhaps doing not good but damage by using logic that separates instead of human language that appreciates difference.

Do you see the difference?  Can we appreciate differences in Others as we all talk, and change, and grow up a bit?  These are some of my questions this week as I listen in on and participate in blog talk and differentiations.

2 Bible Blog Announcements

1. The saddest thing about the April 2011 Top 10 Biblioblogs is that not a single woman blogger was voted tops this month. 

The other sad thing is that I completely forgot to vote in March for April. When I voted in February for March (which was the US Women's History Month), then my 10 votes for the bibliobloggers top 10 were as follows:

1. Suzanne McCarthy http://powerscourt.blogspot.com/

2. Jane Stranz http://stranzblog.blogspot.com/

3. Rachel Held Evans http://rachelheldevans.com/

4. Rachel Barenblat http://velveteenrabbi.blogs.com/

5. Maggi Dawn http://maggidawn.com/

6. Rachel http://hrht-revisingreform.blogspot.com/

7. Shawna Atteberry http://www.shawnaatteberry.com/

8. Jamie http://www.theveryworstmissionary.com/

9. Bitsy Griffin http://bgjackofalltrades.wordpress.com/

10. April DeConick http://forbiddengospels.blogspot.com/

And the following happened in March:

2. April DeConick, Forbidden Gospels

3. Suzanne McCarthy, Suzanne’s Bookshelf

But I hadn't voted ever before for this Top 10 list.  Notice what happened for February:

5. Suzanne McCarthy’s Suzanne’s Bookshelf

6. April DeConick, The Forbidden Gospels

And earlier for January:

9. The Forbidden Gospels (April DeConick)

And when it all began in 2010, for December:

No women at all.

 
Now, the funniest thing to have happened for the April 2011 Top 10 Biblioblogs was this:

8. Kurk Gayle, Aristotle’s Feminist Subject

2. There's a new Bible blog to announce today:

The Better Better Bibles Blog (BBBB) at http://betterbetterbibles.wordpress.com/ 

Don't worry.  At the BBBB, they haven't kicked Aristotle's Feminist Subject off of their blogroll.  This blog of mine just hasn't been rolled there yet.  And they've promised they'll blogroll yours if you ask 'em.  (Yes, I know, the BBB bloggers have decided to censor all my comments automatically.  And they've removed my blog from their blogroll.  Sigh.  Maybe some of us will feel a little more welcomed at the BBBB.)

Men Around the Top of the Hill

[update:  somehow I thought I'd linked to this post asking "what are we going to do?"; now I have.]

I'm a man. But I don't know whether to be amused or disgusted every month when men who identify themselves as Bible bloggers play King of the Hill. And women are not included in their game, at least not in equal numbers. This is a small thing, I know. It's just blogging and just only about "the Bible." And yet, to me, anyways, it's indicative of some very big things.

Thanks again to Kristen for coming over here to this blog, for reading, and for writing these sorts of questions:

Why are there ... no classes for men on how to recognize attitudes and trends within themselves, their friends, and society in general, which leave a back door open for rape to happen?

I'm a man, and as I blog and blog with men and women too, I'm wondering how we were trained. Blogging about the Bible hasn't seemed to help the sexism for many. There's no need to name names. There's really no time for that. My wife just gave me Mary Pipher's Surviving Ophelia, and I just finished reading it. Read very closely the chapter, "Fathers." Now want to quote a few paragraphs or sentences or words from her final chapter, "A Fence at the Top of the Hill." Let this be a kindergarten class for us men, who blog, and who spout out stuff about the bible, so we can rise, at the expense of, or at the very most, to the neglect of, women around us.

In Pipher's final chapter, she opens up with a real-life scene of her being in a room at a YWCA with teenage girls watching a film on date rate. "This film doesn't hold my attention," the author confesses. And she explains: "I'm gray-haired, I have been married for twenty years and unlikely to go on another date." But she stays and watches and listens and talks. This blogpost may not hold your attention. But, for one reason or another, why not stay just a little while longer? Pipher says:

There is something eerie about teaching our daughters how to fight off rapists and kidnappers. We need classes that teach men not to rape and hurt women. We need workshops that teach men what some of them don't learn: how to be gentle and loving.

Now she's saying many things more to women, about adolescent girls, for parents of young and older children who are females. But here in this chapter, she does mention us men, a bit more:

Schools could offer clear sexual and physical harassment policies that protect students and establish norms for conduct toward the opposite sex. They could offer guidelines for appropriate sexual behavior and teach how to say no. This work with young teens might help prevent the "gang bangs" and the date rapes of the high school years.

"Manhood" needs to be redefined in a way that allows women equality and men pride. Our culture desperately needs new ways to teach boys to be men. Via the media and advertising, we are teaching our sons all the wrong lessons. Boys need a model of manhood that is caring and bold, adventurous and gentle. They need ways to be men that don't involve violence, misogyny, and the objectification of women. Instead of promoting violence as a means of solving human problems, we must strengthen our taboos against violence. Some Native American cultures have no words in their language for hurting other humans. What do those cultures think of us?

As she begins to end her chapter, Pipher credits a man for bringing a poem to her attention, the poem that is the parable forming her title for the closing chapter of her book. And here also she has an additional allusion to the title of the book itself. But there are things for us men to hear, to hear for change, change of ourselves. She says:

My grandfather liked a poem about a town that had people falling off its cliffs. The city elders met to debate whether to build a fence at the top of the cliffs or put an ambulance down in the valley. The poem summarizes the essential differences between treatment and prevention of social problems. My work as a therapist is ambulance work, and after years of ambulance driving, I'm aware of the limits of the treatment approach to major social problems. In addition to treating the casualities of our cultural messages, we need to work for cultural change.

I believe, as Miller, Mead and de Beauvoir believed, that pathology comes from failure to realize one's possibilities. Ophelia died because she could not grow. She became the object of others' lives and lost her true subjective self. Many of the girls I describe in this book suffer from a thwarting of their development, a truncating of their potential. As my client said--they are perfectly good carrots being cut into roses.

....Let's work for a culture in which there is a place for every human gift, in which children are safe and protected, women are respected and men and women can love each other as whole human beings. Let's work for a culture in which the incisive intellect, the willing hand and the happy heart are beloved. Then our daughters will have a place where all their talents will be appreciated, and they can flourish like green trees under the sun and the stars.

Men around the top of the hill may actually be ones who have caused others to plumet to the bottom. Yep. Let me say it again, I know, it's just blogging, and it's only blogging around the Bible. We don't need to change a thing, really, because that's all it is and needs to be. Get serious, have a sense of humor, and get a life or another bible blog, but don't rock the boat because it's all fun, all games, all well intentioned, and so forth, and so on. It's not real life. Blogging and bible don't really hold my attention anyway. And it's hurting no body. Or is it?

There is something eerie about teaching women (bloggers) how to slough off the way men Bible bloggers treat them. We need classes that teach men not to disparage or ignore the many contributions of women. We need workshops that teach men what some of them don't learn: how to be gentle and loving.

100 Best Blogs for the Literati

OnlineCourses.org is a resource for individuals pursuing higher education degrees online.  The reasonable claim?  "We are the ultimate source for facts on college courses online to get you one step ahead."  For example, there are several top 100 lists (such as 100 Useful Links for eBook Lovers).

And recently, the site owners have compiled the 100 Best Blogs for the Literati.  If "literati" doesn't sound like you, then take a look anyway.  And if you are a thinker wanting to engage with others in various ways about different topics, then you'll find some very interesting blogs organized around the following categories:

Art, Politics and Law, History (where some of my favorite blogs are listed), Society and Culture, Languages, Literature, Philosophy, Writing, Film, and Music and Performance.

You'll see that the organizer of the site goes on to say:

If you feel that you’re destined to be an intellectual long after you graduate from college, you’re going to have to work a little harder to keep up with high brow culture and scholarly debates on your own. These 100 blogs will help you jump in on the discussions influencing the art, literature, political and culture worlds, even without the support of your professors and fellow classmates.

And as you look through the "philosophy blogs" for "comment on literature, political theory, culture and more," you might find something else.  You might find yourself coming back over here.  Blog number 76 is

"Aristotle’s Feminist Subject: Read this blog if you’d like to discover how Aristotle was actually a chauvinist."

So we don't disappoint, let's just say Aristotle, the logical objective father of science and philosophy, more than "discovered" that females, because of Nature, have fewer teeth than males.
 

 

Pheminist Phooh

If the Christian bible writer Paul can dump his Star of David like far-flung doggy doo doo, then a "good" biblioblogger ought at least to be able to go beyond the concerns of gender and race and class. Right? "Amen and aMen," so say the really Big BiblioBloggers.

(But more on all that in a moment. First this:

>Never mind that this Humble Little guy named שָׁאוּל and also called Παῦλος never ever ever divorces his Joshua aka "Jesus" from his Jewishness.

>Never mind that this blogger is ever concerned with how this ever Jewish rabbi is always concerned with gender, race, and class.

>Never mind that Paul is writing "Christian politically incorrect" words like σκύβαλα - which another Joshua aka "Jesus" uses first to translate some politically incorrect Hebrew, all of which gets dumped from the bible as the unwise "Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach" especially Chapter 27, Verse 4, in which puppy pooh remains for humans even after the canonical siftings.

>Never mind that this blogger's blog has a "Christian politically incorrect" middle name, "feminist" - which one must accurately point out is purposefully left out of all the Bible texts, especially those few "respectable" texts that "include" so-called "non-feminist alterity.")

Now, back to the point. The point is that there is a problem with "feminist" blogging in the biblioblogosphere. (And let's not mark the biblioblogosphere with maleness -- can't we all just get beyond, like God is?)

The problem was a serious problem of conviviality back in 2007 at SBL.

It is a problem now. One big problem we can all sympathize with - given our common desire for a post-sexist, post-racial, post-classist society - is that messengers (such as the word feminism) tend to get shot in church on a Sunday morning. In other words, we all tend to forget that sexism runs deep in the dark places, our own dark places, our own blogosphere, where you can't even see your compass or your mirror as if you're willing there to look at a compass or in a mirror at all.

The Biggest problem now, however, seems to be that the sure fact that little bloggers like me just really might "contribute to creating an environment in which Bible readers who do not share [my so-called] passionately chosen brand of feminism will [therefore,] feel free to ignore and even disrespect [my] particular alterity."

Alas! I myself have other concerns. Alas!

Alas! My associations with Jane Stranz and her "living, laughing, liturgical" brand of feminism have become public. Hence, I'm getting all these Pheminist Phoohy blogger awards lately. And, after reading each of Aristotle's terribly numerous works on Animals, I thought I was only working to rid the world of sexism among hippos. (Careful Suzanne, Jane just might also bring down your now-very-well-read Bookshelf.)


Alas! I haven't even come close to earning enough cash for my very own "Lingamish franchise." (I think I only get paid when David the Hippo Ker visits my blog, and there's only $6.66 in the bank now.)


Alas! John F. Hobbins keeps picking on me at James R. Getz Jr.'s Carnival. And James won't let Julia M. O'Brien sit between us. The only help he offers is "good grammar" and the imperative "don't panic!"


Alas! The Month of May made me put on my thinking cap for #1 Top Biblioblogger Dr. Jim "why does gender matter?" West, who deserves congratulations for being crowned Mr. March and Mr. April and Mr. May.

---

Coda

Lest my babbling above is not clear, I'm looking for the smile on your face. I count you all as my friends. What you say here in comments and in posts at your own blogs constantly challenges and amazes and encourages me. I'm okay when people like Polycarp pick on me for my Ph.D., a harassment which he rationalized in vain by claiming, once upon a time, [quote], "Since J.K. Gayle has stopped blogging, I have been trying to find a balance to my acknowledged masculine viewpoint which would challenge me to look through another’s eyes." I am quite alright with people like Tonya and Daniel at their Hebrew and Greek Reader looking for things that shouldn't be there, and when people like N.T. Wrong, who never really was, aren't there any more but still come around for conversation as if critical theory and the Enlightenment weren't dead. I love it when people like Jared Calaway at his Antiquitopia can advise us: "be creative, stick your head out and see what people are doing in other fields."

My sadness is that the "feminist" label in some contexts works as the "Bible" label works in others. My affinity with feminists is more profound perhaps than mine with bible bloggers because feminists tend more generally to be much more inclusive (both personally and methodologically). The awards above tend, nonetheless, to cause us blogging against sexism to be suspicious of the power afforded the many male-dominant voices. We see how many are silenced by phallogocentric interpretations and translations and bloggings of "the Bible."

My hope is that we all can listen rhetorically, translatively, feministically, biblically, playfully. Not just listening to refute but rather listening to render what the Other is saying - and thereby finding ourselves, our bodies, repositioned however differently. Otherwise, it just sounds like more Phe-men-ist Phooh and biblical Boo!

(ps:
My post title comes from the effort of one of my friends to translate Winnie the Pooh books by A. A. Milne from English into another of her languages. She rightly noted that other translators had neglected the play in the feminine name Winnie for the male bear - even though everyone knows that the author only intended originally to name his character after Winnipeg, a real bear in the London zoo. Winnie, of course, as the feminine diminutive of Winifred also plays on Whinny [as in the Whinny womanly Fred]. And now not a few writers have taken Pooh to mean what it sounds like. Thus, Frederick Crews authors The Pooh Perplex, which we all say aloud and laugh. [Didn't even chuckle? Well, say The Pooper Plex for an academic work.] This authorizes Benjamin Hoff, as if aspiring to the crap of the Ivory Tow-er, to write The Tao of Pooh. And not to be outdone, Crews goes beyond that stuff with Postmodern Pooh. The last book mentioned includes several women writers, and many feminists, not the least of which is one Ms Sisera Cathetera, whose contribution is the punny chapter, "Just Lack A Woman." I think we get the point. If we're smiling we do. Please feel free to smile, to ignore, or even to disrespect.)

Why I Blog: in Others' Words

Publication of any sort is an intrinsically social act, "I" having no reason to speak aloud unless I posit "you" there listening; but your presence is especially vital if I am seeking not to disclose the economic benefits of fish farming in Zäire, or to recount the imaginary tribulations of an adulterous doctor's wife in nineteenth-century France, but to reconnect myself—now so utterly transformed by events unlike any I've experienced before as to seem a stranger even to myself—to the human community....lending materiality to my readerly ideal, transform monologue into intercourse.
--Nancy Mairs, Voice Lessons: On Becoming a (Woman) Writer

We read to know we're not alone.
--C. S. Lewis, as in the screenplay "Shadowlands"

τὰ δὲ ἀντίγραφα τῶν ἐπιστολῶν ἐξετίθετο κατὰ χώραν, καὶ προσετάγη πᾶσι τοῖς ἔθνεσιν ἑτοίμους εἶναι εἰς τὴν ἡμέραν ταύτην. . . . καὶ εἰσῆλθον αἱ ἅβραι καὶ οἱ εὐνοῦχοι τῆς βασιλίσσης καὶ ἀνήγγειλαν αὐτῇ, καὶ ἐταράχθη ἀκούσασα τὸ γεγονὸς. . . . καὶ τὸ ἀντίγραφον τὸ ἐν Σούσοις ἐκτεθὲν ὑπὲρ τοῦ ἀπολέσθαι αὐτοὺς ἔδωκεν αὐτῷ δεῖξαι τῇ Εσθηρ
--Jews back in Egypt, translating from אֶסְתֵּר (Esther 3:14, 4:4, 4:8)

Falling off a blogroll

I hope you keep track of who blogrolls your blog.  For me, it's always an honor to see this blog rolled on yours.  Yes, an honor!  Conversely, to be dropped from your blog roll is quite a drag.  So, I've got a couple of questions for you that may take some brave candor to answer:

1.  Whose blogroll has your blog fallen off of?

2.  Whose blogroll would you like to see your blog added to?

My answers?  Well,...

1.  With no explanation (but with tons of speculation on my part), Aristotle's Feminist Subject has fallen off of the blogrolls at:

• Jevlir Caravansary
  
• Christian Feminist
  
• Tyrant Queen of Midgets
  
• Iyov (although my blog was rolled there once only as one of "those who link here")
• Complegalitarian
  
• probably others I haven't noticed but should've.

2.  I would love to see my blog added to these rolls:

• the five linked above (won't they have this blog back or at least explain the reason for the fall off the blogroll?)
• b l o g o s (but I guess I should roll blogos first right?)
  
• Suzanne's Bookshelf (even though she announced it's no longer going)
  
• The Rosewater Chronicles (some pretty clever stuff with a very picky blogroll)
  
• Velveteen Rabbi (but I may have to "convert" to something)
  

your (possible) addiction, and mine

The academics have proven, once again, that you (and I) may be addicts. Here's yesterday's news (hinting that you're wasting your time and your sanity reading my blog):

September 9, 2008

It's Ba-ack: Internet Addiction Is the New New Affliction

The University of Montreal says one of its researchers is looking into a “new addiction” — Internet addiction.

. . . now people seem more or less inured to the notion of spending countless, pointless hours checking their e-mail, playing games, and watching videos of shark attacks and newscaster flubs on YouTube.

. . . the press release from the University of Montreal has an arresting passage: “We know of serious cases in which teenagers don’t leave the house, don’t have interpersonal relationships, and have been isolated in front of their computer screens for the past two or three years, and only speak in the language of the characters they play with in network video games,” says Louise Nadeau, a professor in the university’s psychology department. . . .

Hey, you, in there. What are you doing? Go outside. Get some sun. —Scott Carlson

--

Go here to read more (and to comment) there. Comments here are welcome at your own risk. (And why do I feel like a bibbing bar tender talking with a friendly customer?)

Laughing at Your Blog? A Truth or Dare Meme

1. What gets the biggest laugh about how you blog?
2. What gets the biggest laugh about what you blog?

Your readers won't tell you to your face, so you may just have to drag your imagination out of denial. This is an open meme, if you can play. Would you dare post, honestly, on 1. and 2.?

(Don't wait for your friends or the researchers to tease this out of you!)

One of my friends on campus who's doing Ph.D. research on blogging, met with me in my office yesterday.

Involuntarily, he laughed (talking about my blog):

"What I find most interesting is your readers' comments to you! It's fascinating that there is anyone on the planet who can talk feminism and rhetoric and translation all at once."

He was laughing at my blog's what. Was he also laughing at me and you too? Are we also The Who?

But by far his biggest "LOL" literally to my face, right in my ears, was on my blog's how. Here's what he tried to tell me:

"Some of your posts are two (chuckle) . . . are two thousand (snicker) . . . are two thousand words long (guffaw). Are you trying to be blogger counter cultural? Do long posts (just smiling now, but a repressed smile) really win you readers? Do you think the world audience is really that patient? That understanding?"

(Which sent me into a bit of slump trying to answer.
I kept wondering about Aristotle's comments on audience,
and what it would have been like if he'd been able to blog his long treatise called the Rhetoric.
And whether university professors of "rhetoric" could assign their graduate students to read his blog.
And about the women, whom Aristotle's blog leaves out, reading his many posts.
And whether anyone who didn't read his Greek would use google translator tools online or alta vista's babelfish.

Now I'm just humming Larry Norman again:

nothing really changes
everything remains the same
we are what we are, till the day that we die

would aristotle be an acid head?)

Who's reading now, and will you play along? Dare you.?