Already...but not yet.

Inspiration...

2007-10-01T23:56:00.000-05:00

Dan, my sister Ellie's finance, recently asked her why I had not been blogging for so long. There are many answers to that question, the simplest of which is that I have been rather unconnected as of late and thus did not feel inspired to write. However, the idea that Dan was thinking about me has called me forward again (not unlike so many people's stories of being called to ministry; it is often not until others recognize and name our gifts that we are able to see what we have to give in ourselves).

A more complex reason for my lack of writing has to do with intersecting identities. About 12 weeks ago, I began the less-than-straightforward journey of living into the identity of being pregnant, a journey that, God willing, will end in me taking on the identity of mother somewhere around February 10th of next year. Although I have not been writing, I have been doing a lot of thinking about what it will mean to become a mother and how my identities as a mother and as a scholar and teacher of religion and theology will intersect. How will I do both? I struggle with a lack of imagination in answering this question. My own mother was employed outside the home until I was born, and then she made the decision to work inside the home from then on. I do not know a lot of women in the academy who have had children while at the beginning stages of their academic careers. Let me put that a different way; I know women who have had children while writing their dissertation, but I do not know their stories. Once again I am reminded of the importance of women having models who can help them imagine futures that may be different than what they have previously known.

My Celebrity Look-alikes

2007-07-10T20:11:00.001-05:00

I got the link to this site from Paul Teusner's blog. He is a colleague in the Melbourne area who studies religion in cyberspace. Should I be at all concerned that JT made it into my list of celebrity look alikes?

My cool celebrity look-alike collage from MyHeritage.com. Get one for yourself.

Foundational Beliefs

2007-07-04T04:04:00.000-05:00

Recently, a mentor of mine has been dealing with a professional dilemma. One of her books will receive a somewhat negative review in our guild's main peer-reviewed U.S. journal, and the journal is giving her a chance to respond to the review. While the reviewer had a few positive things to say about her book, he disagreed with two of the foundational assumptions on which she bases the book: one pedagogical and one theological. This is how she describes these two foundational assumptions in her blog:

First, that learning is a collaborative process that must involve student
engagement; and second, that media culture might be a context in which God is
revealing Godself.

The reviewer believes that learning is more of an instrumental process that centers on the transfer of content and that media culture is not a context in which God might reveal Godself.

The issue this situation raises for me is how we can have constructive dialogue with those who do not share our most important foundational assumptions or beliefs about the world. For instance, through the reading, teaching, and research I have done, as well as through my personal experiences as a student, I have come to agree wholeheartedly with my mentor that learning is a collaborative process that must involve student engagement. But I also recognize that someone else, who has also done reading, teaching, and research, and who has his or her own wealth of experiences, may just as wholeheartedly disagree with me. How can I talk with this person who disagrees with me about pedagogy, education, and epistemology when our foundational beliefs differ so markedly? I use "beliefs" here intentionally, because after all of the reading, and teaching, and research has been done, at bottom, aren't we called to stake a claim, a belief, about the truth of the matter, knowing full well we do not have all of the facts and never will?

Maybe another way of putting the dilemma is as a question between being committed to beliefs while remaining open to change. I have strong opinions about education and I care deeply about doing education well, and so I have made commitments to particular ways of teaching that I believe are in the best interests of students. Yet, I know that by virtue of seeing only from my position I necessarily have blind spots and biases. What sort of conversational stance does it take to both try to convince my conversation partner of my own wisdom and to remain open to what that partner can teach me?

Virtual Life

2007-07-03T02:25:00.000-05:00

As of about two weeks ago, I had never given any thought to virtual life. Then, in the series of a few days, I heard about virtual life games a handful of times, thus it caught my attention. There was a report on the local news about how virtual life games were going to be the next big thing on the Internet, an msn.com piece about the first person to make a fortune selling virtual real estate, and a passing reference to it in a blog I read regularly. I still can't quite wrap my head around this phenomenon, but as far as I understand it, people create avatars who then live in a virtual world doing similar things to what we do in the "real" world, such as going to parties, buying homes, buying and selling stock, etc. According to one source, there are about 20 million people actively participating in virtual life, which is roughly equivalent to the population of Australia.

The phenomenon interests me on a number of levels. First, what needs and desires are people meeting through the creation and manipulation of their avatar alter-egos and how are to understand identity in a world that includes both reality and virtual reality? Second, how will the existence of virtual life challenge what we think of as "real life"? Third, what are the theological implications of virtual life?

Girls groups

2007-07-02T03:57:00.000-05:00

Thanks to Mary Hess for introducing me, through her blog, to TVbyGirls, a nonprofit organization in Minnesota through which young women have the opportunity to create their own media products. I'm adding learning about this organization as one more reason I cannot wait to get back to Minnesota this coming fall. I'd love to think more about how faith communities could partner with already established organizations like this one to the benefit of the young women in their congregations.

Another organization that recently came to my attention is GOAL, an organization in Georgia that conducts experiential learning workshops that promote self-esteem and self-awareness among young women. They are currently looking for a full time program director and two interns for fall 2007.

Exploring TVbyGirls and GOAL also reminded me about New Moon, an award winning, advertising free magazine geared at girls ages 8-14 (also published in Duluth, MN). The goal of the magazine is to take girls' voices seriously, and it is an excellent alternative to the range of junior fashion mags.

U.S. Social Forum

2007-07-01T01:26:00.000-05:00

This past weekend the first ever U.S. Social Forum was held in Atlanta, GA. It's tagline was: "Another world is possible; another U.S. is necessary." I really do not know much about it, but it is exciting to think about thousands of people getting together to dialogue about how "we the people" would like to change social policies in the U.S. and sketching roadmaps of how to reach this future vision. Also impressive was the dedication of the planning team to have a dedicated youth tent, so that young people would have their own space to be heard, and also to promote an intergenerational feel throughout the forum.

Young Women and Catholicism

2007-06-27T05:13:00.000-05:00

In November 2005, My Red Couch and Other Stories on Seeking a Feminist Faith was published, a collection of first person narratives by people trying to reconcile their faith and their feminist commitments for which I was a co-editor and contributor.

Now, Kate Dugan and Jen Owens, two graduate students at Harvard Divinity, are putting together a similar anthology, Young Women and Catholicism. They invited young women to tell stories about the role of Catholicism in their lives for consideration in the anthology, and they received over 100 submissions. The large response to their call for papers seems to speak to the importance people place on telling their stories.

If a tree falls in a forest...

2007-06-20T05:08:00.000-05:00

One of the major topics I study is identity, and one of the major debates in the literature is about whether identity is something individually constructed/achieved or whether it is based in social relations. (I do not think identity is either individual or social/relational; it seems like more of a both/and situation to me. Incidentally, Terence Tilley claims that a commitment to both/and thinking is a particular trait of the Roman Catholic intellectual tradition.) Lately, I have come to understand in a new way the relational component of identity. Living in Australia, I am relatively isolated. Sure, I can talk to friends and family from home through e-mail or skype phoning, but there are many days when the only human interaction I have in person is with my husband and with the check out people at the grocery store or library. Thus, I have temporarily relinquished a lot of the identities that formerly populated my life: here I am not a daughter, sister, best friend, teacher, student, colleague, writer, expect in the most provisionary sense. Without these identities mirrored back to me by people in my life, sometimes I feel as if I have become one-dimensional, both in the physical and the metaphorical sense. The only role I am expected to play here is wife, and there are days when I feel as if my personhood is flat, nearly non-existent. And I think it is because I am not engaged in the relationships that normally give my identity its familiar heft.

There is an age old question: if a tree falls in a forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a noise? This is a question about the relationality of knowledge. My current question is: if a girl is living in Australia, and there is no one there to know her, does she have an identity?

Footprints we leave behind

2007-06-19T05:57:00.000-05:00

People concerned about how human beings are affecting our environment and climate talk about lessening the footprint we leave on the earth. Intellectually, I have understood this notion, but I don't think I really felt it until two weeks ago on vacation in the red center of Australia, true outback country. We stood in the middle of the desert, with a near 360 degree view and watched the sun go down on two amazing rock formations, Uluru and Kat Tjuta. As we spent the next few days in the area, and then were able to view it one last time as our plane departed, it occurred to me that I had never seen a place where the human footprint has been so light.

And this is not because there have not been people there. Coincidentally, when I returned home I ended up watching a documentary on the red center while running on the treadmill. Aboriginal people have been living in the red center for about 40,000 years as a best guess. And unless you saw the cave paintings they do to teach their children their stories, you would not know they live here, probably because they have learned to live more with the land than against it or off of it.

I was truly drawn to this place. The emptiness intrigued me, and the sheer natural beauty of it awed me. It caused me to reflect on how human cultures shape the land and the values that undergird our decisions to shape it as we do.

Buying locally

2007-06-18T03:47:00.000-05:00

My sister Ellie just visited us in Melbourne. She is currently working on a book about her experience of spending a year abroad as a volunteer in the tiny town of Lascano, Uruguay. She and I worked on her book proposal while she was here, which led to many interesting discussions about her time in Uruguay. One thing she noticed about her time in Uruguay was how little she consumed and how when she did spend money, she almost always knew who the money was going to.

Granted, it may be easier to know where our money goes when living in a small town in Uruguay than when living in a mass capitalist society like the U.S. But reading my sister's writing has inspired me to think about how to be more creative as a consumer so that I am shopping more locally and how to be attuned to businesses that are being creative as well. One small thing Ethan and I have tried to do in Australia is to shop for produce at the local farmers' markets, although there are times when our desire to sleep overrides our desire to get up early to get to the market.

I also wanted to mention two companies that have caught my attention because they are owned by friends or friends of friends. The first is 3 Crowns Design, which is owned by people who went to Gustavus Adolphus college with my sister. 3 Crowns sells limited edition t-shirts designed by up and coming artists as a way for artists to gain recognition, and they also donate part of the proceeds from the t-shirts to charity.

The second is Twin Six, co-founded Ethan's friend from high school, Ryan Carlson. Ryan and his business partner, both avid cyclists and talented graphic designers, decided it was high time to bring "a graphic revolution" to cycling apparel. And they have succeeded...beyond all expectations. We just got an e-mail from Ryan saying he quit his "day job" to focus completely on Twin Six. Seriously, if you need new t-shirts, check out these two sites.

Away for vacation...

2007-05-26T00:36:00.000-05:00

My parents are coming to visit us in Australia tomorrow, so I won't be posting for the next two weeks while we explore Melbourne, Uluru, and the Great Barrier Reef.

For fun, http://dna.imagini.net/friends. Click on one picture for each question and the site will tell you all about yourself.

No more periods?

2007-05-22T20:59:00.000-05:00

According to an AP report, the FDA has just approved a new form of the birth control pill called Lybrel that is meant to end menstruating altogether. My first reaction: "Really? Can that be healthy?" I agree with the concern raised by sociologist Jean Elson, who is quoted in the AP article ,that approval of this drug makes menstruation seem more like "a medical condition" than a normal life event. While Lybrel may be a welcome relief to women who suffer through really painful menstruation, I am concerned about the message this sends to young women, who already get the message that menstruation is gross, dirty, etc.

When I did a retreat with seventh and eighth grade girls about a year ago, I was surprised at how little they knew about menstruation. Some of the questions they asked me anonymously through our question box were, "How long does an average cycle last?" "Is it true that you can't get pregnant while you have your period?" and "Will it hurt a lot when I finally get my period?" On msn.com's coverage of the Lybrel story, there is a link to an interactive depiction of the menstrual cycle. I wish I had had something like it when I ran the retreat.

Cracks of Resistance

2007-05-21T20:11:00.000-05:00

My doctoral research focuses on how young women in the United States construct their gendered and religious identities and how (religious) educators can best support their identity work. Thus, I am always on the look-out for resources that can better help me understand the lives and struggles and joys and stories of young women and support for my claim that one of the best things we can do for young women is to create safe spaces where they can tell their identities stories and be heard into being.

One such resource is Alive Magazine. It started in 2004 as the senior thesis project of Heather Scheiwe, one of the contributors to My Red Couch. Now it is just one component of Alive Arts Media, a non-profit organization based in Minneapolis dedicated to creating media by and for young women. All of the staff people and contributors to their website and e-zine (which you can sign up to receive via e-mail) are between the ages of 13-25.

Judith Okely, an anthropologist, coins the wonderful term "cracks of resistance" to describe where she looks to find examples of agency in conditions of subordination.* Alive Magazine is an example of a flower growing from a crack of resistance, as this grassroots group has worked together to create more fulsome alternatives to mass media products that all too often portray young women without agency.

*Judith Okely, "Defiant Moments: Gender, Resistance and Individuals," Man 26: 3-22.

Campaign for Real Beauty

2007-05-21T04:35:00.000-05:00

My friend Jael told me about a short film called "Evolution" on the Dove website that shows how a normal looking woman can go from looking simply average to having her face on a billboard through the magic of hair and make-up artists and computer brushing up. The short clip is worth sharing with the young women--actually, with any man or woman--in your life. Even once we know about the way images are manipulated before we see them in post-production, with the ever-present stream of unattainable figures presented to us, it can be easy to forget that our standards of beauty have become seriously skewed.

For fun...

2007-05-17T04:18:00.000-05:00

For fun, take the Grey's Anatomy character quiz. I turned out to be Meredith, which makes sense given how dark and twisty I am.

Or if you are more daring, check the InterPlay website to see if there are any InterPlay groups operating near you (there are regular groups in St. Paul/Minneapolis and also in Port Melbourne, which is the next suburb over from where I live in Australia). InterPlay is all about fun and embodiment, as participants move through incremental "forms" that allow them to move, think, and be in new ways. InterPlay proudly proclaims it is for those who want to become "recovering serious people." I have learned about InterPlay from my colleague Courtney Goto at Emory University, who is studying InterPlay as part of her dissertation. Regardless of whether I ever become a regular InterPlayer or not, their work does remind me of the importance of considering the role of the body in education and the fact that there are multiple ways of knowing--and embodied knowing often gets short shrift in the world of academics.

The OT

2007-05-16T07:27:00.000-05:00

I must be on a theater kick because last night I went to see The OT: Chronicles of the Old Testament. (No, I did not go to see it just because The OT sounds like The O.C., although that is why it attracted my attention in the first place.) According to its promotional materials, "The Old Testament has been the guiding light for many into the fundamental values of our world. Love it or revile it, the Old Testament is embedded in our thoughts, our language and how we see ourselves. But how many of us have looked more deeply into the old book to see the things your Sunday School teacher didn’t tell you? What kind of universe ultimately emerges?"

Admittedly, the universe that emerges in this imaginative (picture stuffed animals acting out the story of Lot and his daughters or the actors dressed as telle-tubbies to proclaim the psalms) production is a largely dark and violent world. I appreciated the play's reminder about the overwhelming number of difficult stories in the Bible, stories with which we must contend, like Jacob wrestling the angel, if we are to continue to make Christianity relevant in the twenty-first century. I also appreciated the way the play itself rendered the Old Testament not only entertaining but also relevant. I left wanting to read the stories more for myself and to think deeply about how religious educators can make biblical education more relevant to the concerns of today.

Interestingly, (and also theologically appropriately) the character of God did not speak throughout most of the play, although he (played by a man) was present and involved to a greater or lesser extent throughout. Most of the time, the human characters spoke for him ("Thus says the Lord...") and God only spoke in the final scene to affect creation.

Operation

2007-05-13T20:05:00.000-05:00

This past week I went to see an amazing "play" entitled "Operation" at the Black Box Theatre in Melbourne. I put play in quotation marks because puppetry arts more accurately describes the show. According to a flier for the show, "This searing performance gives a rare insight into a very secret and personal war. Using the techniques of autopsy and crime scene investigation, you will bear witness to the hidden truth of a soldier's existence and an interrogator's determination to extract meaning in a silent battle for information." Read more about it here.

For the full hour of the show, no words were spoken. A human man operated on a human-looking doll, extracting a smaller puppet who became the main character in the drama. This smaller puppet grew up in the Middle East, moved to Australia, apparently was recruited for terroristic activities, and left behind a wife and child in Australia when we went on his mission. The whole thing was surprisingly moving, given that the only live human character served in the role of the interrogator/surgeon.

I appreciated two things most about the production. First, it invited the audience into the story of the main puppet in a way that did not shy away from the horror of terrorism/war but that also helped us to realize that even those on the other side of a conflict have a family and life story and to understand the lure of extreme organizations (be they political, religious, or otherwise).

Second, the play was staged in a way that I have never seen before. At any one time, the audience could take at least two views on the action. We could watch the play as it unfolded before us on the stage, or we could watch a screen behind the stage that broadcasted the play from the point of view of one of the characters. For instance, at the beginning when the puppet was being operated upon, you could see the puppet's view of the doctor doing the operation on the screen behind the stage. One of my favorite educators, Maxine Greene, frequently writes about the importance of multiple perspective taking, and here is a play that invites the audience to take multiple perspectives through its unique staging.

New Year's Resolutions

2006-01-15T09:52:00.000-05:00

I made two new year's resolutions this year... and today is the beginning of both. The first was to start taking dance classes--which I will do at 1pm this afternoon at Dance 101 in the Hip Hop Flow class. This is my attempt at doing something each week for myself simply for the enjoyment I get out of it. I'm hoping I can keep up enough that enjoyment will outweigh utter embarrassment.

The second resolution was to start a blog. I have been meaning to start a blog since I first learned about them two years ago, but I could never think of an appropriate title. How to sum up who I am and what I stand for in a pithy phrase? Ah, the power of paradox. "Already... but not yet" is a nod to one of my favorite Christian theological tenets: the belief that in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, the kingdom of God is already manifest, and yet not yet complete. For those of the Christian persuasion, we live in the between times of already... but not yet. And I love this paradoxical space!

I also find "already... but not yet" an apt description of identity, a topic around which much of my work as a graduate student revolves. I am already who I am, but I am not yet who I am becoming. And I pray this journey toward myself continues for a lifetime.

So it is with a modicum of fear and trembling that I publish this first post, with the fervernt resolution that it will be the first of many.