Karen Nakamura: December 2011 Archives

While we're on the topic of fictional skits, my pal Nana sent me this one. It's in Japanese only. It depicts some fathers who are having trouble communicating with their teenage daughters using their keitai cell phones.

http://www.nhk.or.jp/neo/contents/catalogue/movie/ct_mv_003.html

(Right now, I'm watching the first season of Louie, so it's particularly amusing to me).

I'm not sure how I feel about this mix of static and motion image that Jamie Beck and Kevin Burg are calling cinemagraphs. Some are quite beautiful like this one below, others are a bit more meh.

See more at: Jamie Beck e Kevin Burg – Cinemagraphs

From TheProfessorIsIn, much of the same could be said about PhDs in the social sciences...

And nine years later...

One of the graduates of our PhD program (hi Nana!) turned me on to Karen Kelsky's blog and website, TheProfessorIsIn. Kelsky used to be a tenured professor in the field of Japan Anthropology, then dropped out to become a paid academic consultant. The advice she gives on her site is cogent and insightful:

My position is, rather: go in not just with “your eyes open” (as so many Ph.D. program apologists insist) but with a strategy and a game plan. Calculate your chances from start to finish, and maximize them with strategic choices about *which* program, *how much* funding, *what* topic, *which* advisor, *how much* TA-ing, *how* to cut corners, *when* to be selfish, *where* to network, *how* to schmooze, *where* and *when* and *how often* to publish. And so on. Find the job ad for the type of position you want and make every decision based on reaching that goal. Get out quickly. Don’t count on your advisor. Don’t fixate on the dissertation. Protect yourself. Collect your own set of transferrable professional skills.

People wanting to go to graduate school as well as those in grad school should definitely check her site out. Here's the direct link to her blog: http://theprofessorisin.com/pearlsofwisdom

I somehow missed this great article about Elyn Saks' book, The Center Cannot Hold:

In 2007, after years of weighing the possible risks, Elyn R. Saks, a professor of law at the University of Southern California, published a memoir of her struggle with schizophrenia, “The Center Cannot Hold.” It became an overnight sensation in mental health circles and a best seller, and it won Dr. Saks a $500,000 MacArthur Foundation “genius” award.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/23/health/23livesside.html

Thought the 1/2000 second shutter on your camera was fast? The NY Times reports on a new generation of scientific cameras with shutter speeds in the femtoseconds -- two-trillionths of a second -- fast enough to catch light moving as a wave: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/13/science/speed-of-light-lingers-in-face-of-mit-media-lab-camera.html

I want to know if I can retrofit it to my Leica III. :-)

I'm on the cusp of sending the manuscript for A Disability of the Soul to my publisher. I was cleaning up the text and came across tips for two important tasks:

1. Are you plagued with horizontal rules in Word that won't go away? These horizontal rules are created when you type three dashes --- in a row -- and are almost impossible to get rid of. Deleting them won't work, cutting them won't work. They are immortal. Here's how to get rid of them: http://www.techsupportforum.com/forums/f57/remove-horizontal-rules-ms-word-105393.html
2. I needed to add line numbers down the left side of the page to make it easier for copyeditors to mark material. Here's how to do it: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee692905.aspx

In both cases, scroll down as the tips are at the bottom of the pages.

A student who is afraid of flying asked me how to survive the fourteen hour flight to Japan. These were my tips:

• Shorten. Take a direct flight. Connections suck.
• Reserve. Make sure to get a seat in the forward half of the cabin. Less turbulence and less claustrophobic.
• Sleep. Don't drink any caffeine on the day of the flight and try to board the plane slightly sleep deprived. If needed, pharmaceuticals can be your friend. Take a (properly prescribed) chill pill or sleeping pill (not both!) and sleep through the entire thing. Alcohol can dehydrate you and make you wake up with a headache, but if a small glass of beer or wine will send you to lala-land, go for it. (I personally can't take either drugs or alcohol, so these last two are based on the advice of seatmates and other travelers).
• Nest. Get a window seat and bring your own neck pillow and fluffy blanket.
• Shutout. Get good earplugs, noise isolating or noise cancelling headphones with a good soundtrack or audiobook on your iPhone, and an eye mask and/or wear a baseball cap (it can shade the cabin light quite well).

Any other tips or suggestions?

I've collected all the tips on successfully applying to graduate school into a single index page: http://www.photoethnography.com/blog/careers/gradapplications.html

Dear Karen,

I have been following your site for may many years now and thought I would send you a link to a project I am working on.

Although I am now working in the legal industry, my AB is in Anthropology and I have been a photographer for many years, working closely with the Silverlens Gallery in Manila until now. I have had two shows with them in the past, but this next one really brings in may background as an anthropologist much more than the previous two.

The project can be viewed here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/yophoto/sets/72157627205877902/with/6303608714/

Just wanted to share that. I have enjoyed your website, and continue to read it over and over. If ever you are in Manila, pleas let me know!

Cheers,

Johann

Fascinating! Be sure to look at the flickr feed! - Karen

Reminder – Call for Films – ETHNOCINECA 2012
Deadline: January 15 2012

Dear colleagues and friends,

ETHNOCINECA is a film festival based in Vienna focusing on ethnographic
and documentary films. We would like to invite you to send us your
contribution(s) or to forward our Call for Films to interested filmmakers,
students and scientists.

You can find more information about the submission process in our entry
form:
http://www.ethnocineca.at/fileadmin/media/submissions/CallforFilms_Ethnocineca2012_English.pdf

For further questions please feel free to contact us.

Kind regards,
Nadja Haumberger