thinking is the new black

Oxford Street Christmas lights 2009

Feeling a bit festive today as I had my first mulled wine and mince pie of the season. Here’s a little snap from my phone. Ho ho ho.

Hellooooo!

OK, so as promised (I’m sorry that this post is so v.v. overdue), but here are some reflections on finishing a PhD and my views on how to approach research in general. I honestly don’t feel it’s too useful to be prescriptive about “how to do a PhD” or how to finish a thesis as it is such a subjective journey, which depends on all sorts, such as your support network, super-supervision, institution, money and of course… your personal dynamo.

Umbrella for sun or rain by Ben

Many moons ago I wrote a post on doing a PhD and the 10 perfections. Now, I want to bring up something called the 5 faculties  which again is based on Buddhist practice. However I think this can be applied to any type of research, not just doctural.

1. Faith / confidence. You need an understanding of what you’re confident in before you begin.  This is linked to the wisdom of learning, reading and listening. You then need to reflect on what you’ve learned and this results in a new wisdom. Finally there is the wisdom of insight, when you are able to directly understand  from your experiences.  This is something you just can’t force. It is a result of practice.
2. Energy. This relates to the ‘right’ type of exertion. That which is skillful, honest and comes from the heart. Follow your nose and be true to your instinct. Don’t get drowned out by others ( but do listen to your supers) then exert yourself. A PhD is a marathon not a sprint, but you need constant spurts of effort.
3. Mindfulness. Become familiar with what’s going on in your head. Stop still and notice your thoughts. This is about being in the present with the research and avoiding thinking about where it’s taking you. Difficult if your doing a PhD I know. But try not to think of your data in terms of future chapters and papers. Stand still with it, this noticing is where authentic analysis begins.
4. Concentration. Sounds obvious dunnit.In Buddhism concentration is in part about understanding or knowing the true nature of things. Think of this in terms of epistemology. Ask yourself what is truly knowable through your research and how can you know what you know?
5. Wisdom. In Buddhism this is achived through understanding experience is characterized by  suffering, impermanence, and not self. I’m not going to get into the theory of not-self here. As an expert on identity theory, even I find it very complicated and I feel a post on identity is imminent any way. But what is useful about this view of wisdom for anyone doing research, is that you need to learn to perceive the world in a new way. Remember it’s not necessary to know everything and that your output is part of a complex system of other ideas and things.

Sunrise in Jodphur by sarah lane

In terms of top tips for people doing a PhD I’ve just 1.Do something else.

Obviously do the per her der, but until you can see the finishing post I suggest make sure you have some other things going on. If you’re lucky enough to be FT and have funding them you’re probably contract bound if not duty bound to make it your be and end all, but personally I recommend a job. Leading a seminar  is not fun-time, and don’t let it get to the stage where a conference seems like the ultimate in leisure. Nooooo!  I had no funding so I had to work and  sometimes  I worked FT  in an office with commercial peoples on businessy things and did the PhD when I got home. For me this was a blessing in disguise. Inspiration comes from the most  unexpected of sources, and in doing one, you get focus and clarity for the other. The main thing is when you do something else – you have to be super disciplined and manage your time,  because it’s precious; there just is no room for procrastination.
I’ll say it again. But this time do something fun or relaxing. Whatever floats your boat: taxidermy, pub, playstation. It’s not the same as procrastination trust me. Allow yourself and your mind ‘other time’.  Yoga and meditation worked for me.  When I was putting in 14hours at  a desk, seeing theories swimming around my head in a savant like manner,  I’d go to a 90 min yoga class, followed by a group meditation session. I forgot about: discourse , Apple Inc, participants, logic,logos, font size and 247 pages and 10 chapters and, and, and….Without wishing to sound too evangelical about mediation and mindfulness practise  - it totally rocks. It’s great for developing your concentration  when you need it and is a total anecdote to  stress. Learning to be in the present moment can really help with the anxieties of the last bit of a PhD. Trust me on this. It doesn’t just rock, it rules.  Imagine being in a nice warm room, maybe with a candle and the sounds of chanting. ahhhh..I feel relaxed even typing about it – you see – rocks.

Gluck to anyone thinking about doing, in the middle of, or finishing a PhD. I wish you the very best. I plan to do a post some-when on viva-prep btw.  Also watch out for changes to TITNB, a bit of a face-lift is planned.

Music and politics have  a long interesting relationship and it’s pretty normative to argue that there is a political element to subculture and style. When one drills down it is usually a little more complex than politics with a big P. More like music and socio-cultural, political economy, or music and hegemony.  I guess it’s because music is ideological, and genres are discourses.

This year in May I went to The Specials gig in Leeds town square, which was awesome. Not least of which was because there was a great crowd of diverse people and all age groups on a beautiful sunny warm evening, jumping up and down, dancing and singing along. (And I met Terry Hall at Leeds trains station the next day btw). The band have  amazing on stage energy and Terry Halls’ voice is still fantastic. What got me thinking recently is the relationship between the current economic climate and the music. There’s been quite a bit of press about the band reforming, but it is interesting that The Specials are being so well received by new fans and just as their music captured a political mood the first time round it is culturally, socially, so relevant at the moment.  As a Sunday Times review said

 …how fresh and joyful their music sounds — and how vital and relevant their songs’ sociopolitical sentiments, chronicling life amid the racial, economic and class divisions of late-1970s Britain, remain in 2009.Formed in Coventry during the last economic recession to drive a failed Labour government out of power, they blended ska, punk and politics, proving an instant hit with a generation fired up by the Sex Pistols and the Clash

 

Interesting, more in depth discussion here

i’ve been a fan of Ska and TwoTone pretty much since I could hear. As a kid in the late seventies and early eighties it was a sound that was played round the house by my older siblings and parents. Also I was lucky enough to spend a little bit of time in The Caribbean during the eighties so I had a context to some of the rocksteady and reggae influence. I kinda rediscovered the music in my late teens and went to a lot of gigs in pubs. Although I was very much into techno, dance music and free parties and campaigned against the criminal justice bill, I think at the time with Ska I read a lot of antiestablishment sentiment into the lyrics that had escaped 1st time and for me it tied in to my take on life as a young adult in the 90s recession. As a kid I simply loved the upbeat sound but didn’t think much about what it all meant. The sound is so happy, uplifting and energetic, it’s perfect for doing that special kiddie uncoordinated jigging about dance, where you can hear the music but to adult observers you are dancing to a completely different rhythm. Oh and just brilliant memories of moonstomping at house parties and cockney knees ups in East London and seeing some of The Specials perform at an Anti-Nazi gig in Viccy Park. But it is curious to me that the sound raises it’s head again during such times. The cultural effects of the recession are paradoxically rich.

I went to see Malcolm Gladwell “Live!” on Tuesday night and left feeling cross. I’m sure this post is going to make me unpopular as he and his ideas are incredibly successful. I think Malcolm Gladwell needs a large sprinkle of charisma dust. It’s OK to go all humble and low key , if  and only if what you’re saying in knock-out or you’re the Dali Llama say. It was not knock out. As far as I know he’s not taken over as the spiritual leader of Tibet.

Let me explain. My 1st encounter with Malcolm Gladwell’s work was via Heath and Potter’s Rebel Sell , as they quoted an article he wrote for the NY Times about coolhunting in their examination on the ideology of cool. I read the whole article and thought it was interesting, well researched and engaging writing. Based on some of his other pieces there is no doubt in my mind that he’s a talented journalist and he’s probably, or at least hopefully a nice person for all I know, so this is not a personal attack.

But, “The Tipping point”. Urrgh and double yuck. This sort of pop self helpy business manual gets my goat, and I associate it with the mind set of real life Apprentice style vague business rhetoric. There’s so much I could say here about the relationship between self improvement and the political project of New Labour and meritocracy – but that’s for an essay and this is a blog post.  For an excellent, more thoughtful critique of “The Tipping Point” read Duncan Watts.  Anybody who argues that their reader can learn thinking without thinking by reading a paperback –  is naughty.  It’s rude to do away with metaphysics and epistemology  in a byline. (Thinking is the new black, after all). Again, there’s an essay here about how one explores the nature of things at the level of unconscious and how decisions we make in a split second are grounded in  and manifest of our culture, upbringing, and how we come to know the things we think we know . I want to go into onotological security here, but too many ology words so little time.

So you see , I was already pre-deposed not to like Gladwell’s talk because I think his ideas are fluffy, furthermore, I’m jealous he makes a lot of money out of book deals and lectures. But I went out of curiosity and to be proved wrong, even secretly feeling a bit excited that I might be evangelised and touched on the forehead by the hand of knowledge. Really, I was v interested to know what sort of public speaker he is as I’ve heard great things and seeing someone do good public speaking is intoxicating. I’d hoped for multimedia and dry ice – but no, just Malcom and a lectern and a few notes.  This should be impressive right? I mean he barely looked at his notes, he just talked.  

2 mins  he employs ethos to establish credibility. “I’ve written books you know, and done tours before”.

5 mins he tells the audience out right he knows more than us about the subject of the American civil war.( This is the subject on which he costumed the real points.)

Mr, DO NOT subordinate the audience, and do not presume to know all they know. As one of the people I’d gone with said at the time “He’s basically just said we’re all C ***s”.

20 mins  I’m comfortably numb at this point. My seat is soft and spacious, venue warm, and fortunately I’d a glass of white. Thank god for alcohol when am I gonna be hit with his wows?

40 mins I’m brought to by other members of the audience laughing as Mal makes a funny. Then he says something about a Harvard academic, thus lending academic legitimacy to his sphere of reference. I notice a man 2 seats down writing “Harvard” in a note book. 

The end There’s clapping so I think some sort of conclusion has been reached and wisdom imparted. Have I missed it? Will there be a laser show at this late point  in the lecture? People start to form a big queue to get their copies of The Outliners signed, but  I think it’s to touch his hair…

Gladwell’s meader through the American civil war battle strategy drew on the ancient art of ‘argument’, which is Aristole, but perhaps dates backs to Homer. Use logos and deductive reasoning to construct a point, or basically blind the audience with minutia and detail that detracts from actual facts or useful insight. After an hour of  listening all I’d really gleamed from Gladwell was beware of the  authority awarded to expertise.

OK, OK so fare play to Mr G for having such a good grasp on the art of persuasion. It is clever to be able to do this, but the crux of the problem  as far as I’m concerned is the lack of content. I’m keen to know what others thought he actually said?

I’ve found a few blog posts. One here on Mr G & an analogy of link bait

Am I being mean?

I’ve meaning to discuss “The Rise of the Aldirati” for some time.

Alas, alak, been super busy at uni with the 3rd year dissertations, marking, and an in-house post-grad conference so no time for blogging recently. I’ve had a paper accepted for The Transforming Audiences conference in September, at Westminster, and although I was accepted into The Emerging Scholars programme at the IAMCR in July in Mexico City, (and totally stoked about it), after a long, hard think I decided enough is enough, and I’m not going to do anything this summer which deviates from sitting my viva. Even more good news, although I must remain schtum, I think an external examiner has been identified. So watch this space…

A topic which I meant to write something on about 6 weeks ago is an article which appeared in The Sunday Times Style supplement back in April called “The rise of the Aldirati”.

They’re affluent, middle class — and shop in discount stores. Meet the new breed of savvy consumers who are turning belt-tightening into a fine art

I love the word Aldirati and ’The Italian’ told me the other day to update my blog because American Apparel is no longer his favourite shop. Apparently his favourite shop is now Aldi, followed closely by the pound shop.

So taken was I with this word, that I decided to use the article in a discourse analysis workshop I ran the following Tuesday.  My own analysis is that the article is full of brand names and marketing lingo that construct a lifestyle than is quite the opposite to belt tightening and the term actually plays out through the cultural codes of fashion. I’m also fascinated by  how legitimacy is given to the notion of no frills affluence by consistent reference to marketing institutions and consumer experts.Not quite an echo chamber, more a small voice shouting into a bucket. So are the Aldirati just exercising common sense, or is there something more along the lines of ‘ironic consumption’ going on? It is something to do with what Bourdieu calls the ideology of natural taste. Why are the middle classes obtaining gratification in low end consumption habits? Ironic distance allows the Aldirati to buy cheap parma ham whilst avoiding  dirtying themselves with the cheap food = obesity = lazy citizen , helpless poor person who can only be saved by Jamie Oliver or a reality TV program that convinces them towards their better selves, whilst not killing their children sort of thing. 

In 2009 Vogue started up the more dash than cash  feature  again after a break of many years and what with the net-a-porter.com team  launching theoutnet.com (love love love!!!) there is something very interesting going on  with clothing and economics, and  I hope to be examining the relationship between the fashion industry and the more cultural manifestations of the recession soon.

I came across tweetminster a couple of days ago, an idea inspired by?tweet congress?and MP Tom Watson?and?Alberto Nardelli.

Follow and Tweet MPs and Parliamentary Candidates, and use the power of Twitter to track UK politics, make your voice heard and conversations more open. You can take a back seat… or you can tweet.

I must say I really like the concept, despite it being a little utopian. A couple of weeks ago I facilitated a 2 hour seminar with 1styear students on Habermas and the concept of the public sphere, and the media. It was very interesting to hear students views on where they feel social media sits with political engagement. The message from the students was “I don’t understand politics”. Whereas I think tweetminster is a hopeful and positive idea, I wonder who it’s audience is at the moment? I fear it may be engaging the already engaged and wonder how it will tackle the disconnect between those it should be targeting and technological adoption rates. It raises all sorts of interesting questions about digital divides, technology and social inclusion.

I also came across?politics and the city?a website that aims to make politics stylish, founded by C4 presenter June Sarpong.

The site places political issues along side more light entertainment news, fashion, lifestyle, and celebrity gossip in order to try and capture it’s audience, young women. The site looks lovely, swish and sleek – but I struggled to find spaces of actual engagement.

I’ve been reading Radical Consumption by Jo Littler, which was only published in Jan this year by O.U press.

From the time I began my own research in 2005 this is one of the most engaging titles I’ve read, perhaps since Health and Potters Rebel Sell. I’ve found it very useful in considering the responses to the consumer interviews I conducted and the practice of what I’m calling double distinction, drawing on Bourdieu’s seminal theory. I’m looking at how participants justify their consumption through individual lifestyle practices, and through passing judgement and distancing themselves from other peoples consumption. More of this one day, but lets wait for a successful viva, before I spill.

Not really to do with my research, but I found the discussion of ethical consumption, worthiness and moralizing particularly interesting and loved the case study ?of US clothing label American Apparrel in the book. I’ve been a tentative fan of American Apparel for some time, but being in my 30s I find some of the lines a little bit too nu rave /juvenile for my own taste. However my boyf who I shall refer to as The Italian here on in in this blog is 5 years older than me and he declared it his new favourite shop the other day. American Apparel use non-model models in their campaigns and the images are often sexual in a readers wives, 70 soft porn kind of way. This allows for an ironic consumptionvia the brand, and for them to move away from the stuffy connotations of worthiness and yogurt weaver fashion slow mo remit of most ethical labels. Really interesting to me as I’m often moaning to my fashion friends that most ethical fashion I’ve come across, offends my style sensibilities.

As I’m on a fashion tip today I wanted to share this beautiful print on my new Echo scarf. I was out scouring with my fashion friend The Forbes, last Saturday and we came across a load of gorgeous scarves in local boutique Sirene. Echo are a family company based in NY, and these prints are from their archives from the 1920s.

Accessories are brilliant for updating an outfit without spending very much money, so it’s no surprise given the current climate that scarves are going to be a big thing. Not everyone can afford an Hermes so a find like this ‘lovely’ from Echo makes my day.

OK, so I’m rather late in the day with this little gem. I, like a lot of other people saw it only for the first time on Saturday night thanks to C4s rudetube. How’s that for postmodernism? Yoot make music and video using domestic technologies and post the video on an online social space, it gets pickup by TV show where your researcher heroine watches the full clip on YouTube, and then blogs about it. I’m just a networked knowledge worker swimming in the interweb of streams.

onclick="javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview('a/uk.youtube.com');">watch?v=Q6pbZLiLt30

The song makes me smile, and I think there’s something really endearing about it. For all that has been said by sectors of the UK government and popular media, about young people, street crime, hoodies, knives, gangs etc etc it’s pretty spesh to see a group of young people, well, just being a bit silly really and having a laugh. They’re funny and they’re cool.

Apparently

An estimated 1,700 fried chicken joints, with their white, red and blue regalia, currently line UK high streets, tiny bones scattered over the pavements outside.

You can read all about the creators Red Hot Entertainment in an interview with them here. Thing is I know SFC. I used to go to the one on Hackney road when I lived there. It was always a bit of a treat. Fried chicken and chips is a big thing in the East end. I’m not sure why it’s so popular, but its a massive thing and especially amongst the afrocarribean community. Infact Texas chicken a rival fried chuck joint, use images of a black family and a group of teenage boys wearing hoodies in their marketing . Also according to Mintel the heaviest users of chicken bars are younger, less affluent consumers mainly from the D and C socioeconomic groups. Another comment I found from a Guardian article last year quoted Paul Ricketts a black comic who said

“All black areas have loads of fried chicken outlets. It is a socio-economic thing…”

So I suppose what I’m saying is that the junior spesh video is a representation of culture. In a sense it’s a piece of ethnographic film making. For me Junior spesh provides a neat case study for anyone interested in cultural identity, and or subculture. On the one hand Red Hot Ents are drawing on connotations of mainstream representations of urban youth and street style. Particularly with the genre of the song (grime) and the way they’re dressed -- sweats, grime t-shirts baseballs caps, which one might normally expect to be a reference gang culture. In the UK we’re more used to reading these signifiers as negative representations of youth either as the object of fear or as an under-class. But these guys have really played with signification whilst staying true to themselves, beliefs and values. The result is an uplifting reclaiming of ideology. If hegemony is always on going process and culture a site of resistance, then hurray for Red Hot Ents -- who have won a small battle here as far as I’m concerned.

And god it’s catchy

j j junior spesh junior spesh, one pound and fiddy pence

I’m very busy redrafting 3 chapters of my thesis, marking 2nd year essays and writing a proposal for IMACR 2009, but I had to take a few minutes out to report on something which IMHO is very wrong.

There have been whispers of the reintroduction of  harem pants ( also known as the drop pant) into polite society for some time. The trend is credited to French Vogue editor Carine Roitfeld but since designers such as Armani and Chloe revealed their spring collections, the fashion press are all keyed up  for S/S this year.

I’m sure they’re incredibly comfortable, much more democratic than skinny jeans,  cover a multitude of sins etc etc, but how can anyone fail to make associations with MC Hammer?

There is something very infantile about them which deeply troubles me. I can understand people wearing them to make a statement about comfort over style.  ”The cut liberates one from the confines of fashion, Yah” etc. The garment is about the rejection of the restriction of the construction of contemporary style, but today the drop-pant, tomorrow the adult nappy. Worrying if you ask me. 

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what I will do when I finally sit my viva and become Dr Peacock. What will life be like post PhD and what is next on my research agenda? 

I went to Cuba in 2007 to stay with a family in a casa particular in Verdado a nice suburb of Havana. It had been a major ambition of mine to visit the country and the trip was fantastic. But ever since I’ve been dying to get back and spend more time there, exploring the rest of the country.

Last  week I went to watch Che: Part I . Mainly because I’m a massive fan of Benicio del Toro. It’s an unusual film, not quite what I was expecting to be honest and if you have little or no prior knowledge of Che Guevara or the Cuban revolution, basically you’re f***ed. Coincidentally I heard  yesterday that one of the artists from Buena Vista Social Club, Eliades Ochoa – the one with the cowboy hat, is coming to

perform in Feb in my home town.

I’m so giddy. All roads are leading to Cuba. I see it in the dregs of my mojito – my future is in Cuba. 

I’ve recently been diagnosed with celiac disease which sounds much more dramatic and serious than it is, but one of the symptoms is an intolerance of wheat and gluten which has been making me feel very tired and nauseous.  This is an extreme blow , as one of my other passions in life is cake. I love it. Lemon drizzle, macaroons, fairy cakes, scones, you name it I can make it and eat it. Yessirree I take cake very seriously indeed. But you’ll know this already if you’re a regular to this blog and all about my future plans for a tea room called the Public Sphere after Habermas’ great work. I envisaged sparknotes on critical theorists and their key works on the menu, and a free weekly salon for debate on culture and life, in the Raymond Williams sense of the word. I suppose I could still do this and make all the cup cakes gluten free – but the wheat free flour doesn’t rise very well. No Cuba is where I’m headed in my dreams.

Since a lot of my research and growing expertise is in the field of identity formation and brands, I have been fantasizing about making an ethnographic film on such things.

One of the things which fascinated me so much during my 2007 trip to Cuba was the almost total lack of  marketing, and miniscule references in popular culture to consumer brands (Cuban or other) that we experience in The West.  Not suprising given  wages average about £15 a month and because of the embargos food and goods are rationed. Literally there isn’t anything to buy.

During my time in Cuba I recall seeing only a few billboards in Havana with government messages and political slogans, but no commercial advertising. I seem to remember there being 3 TV channels – all state owned. My land-lady made me watch universidad para todo every morning, which was on 1 of the 3 an educational channel. I saw one shop in the foyer of the hotel national selling palm olive soaps and some L’Oreal shampoo I think, and just one other store in a very smart touristy area of Havana selling trainers  There were definitely some real or fake Adidas and Nikes in amongst them, and that’s the only form of branded goods I recognized during my stay. However, I found something online which quoted

Business Week (August 6, 2001) ranked the top 100 global brands and stated that of these 64% were available in Cuba

So much of contemporary identity in the UK is signified through our relationship with consumption and engagement with the brands we choose. And yet Cubans have  a strong sense of identity that is both individual and group – national and local .To me a non cuban, this seemed to be in part constructed through music,family, baseball etc.

But Cuba is changing, and especially in light of Obamas’ hint at new policy on Cuba I feel this will alter soon. Who in Cuba will experience an increase in material culture if embargoes are lifted? Will this result in a a semiotic glut and how will this effect class relations?

So now I’m day dreaming about learning ethnographic film making techniques and looking for crash courses in Spanish…