Hello #soctwitter & etc, if you're planning a first-day-of-class (or etc) introductions, and you want to be inclusive of trans/non-binary folks, can I suggest (as a trans professor with a lot of trans & non-binary students) including pronouns as *optional* rather than required?
+
Pronouns in go-rounds & on name-tags & etc are great in many ways, bc they signal "we don't assume anyone's gender identity/pronouns here" and also "we're trying to be inclusive of trans & non-binary people."
BUT they're also deeply uncomfortable for anyone not ready to share.
Jul 29, 2022 • 9 tweets • 5 min read
#soctwitter & #poliscitwitter - if you're teaching something of mine this fall, I will very happily Zoom into your class (or come in person if possible). I try to make most things I write, and all my speaking, accessible to & engaging for undergrads & everyone else. Some ideas:
I would LOVE it if folks teaching American Politics, Campaigns & Elections, Political Sociology & etc use some or all of Producing Politics. It's got:
- an accessible overview of what we know about campaign effects (ch 1)
- discussion inequalities in pol participation (all thru)+
Jul 25, 2022 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
Hello students on the job market: many of your advisors don't think liberal arts colleges are good jobs for people who care about research. I'm here to tell you they can be GREAT for research, plus they also reward you for caring about teaching and your students.
As with so many things, there's at least as much variation within types (R1, R2, SLAC, whatever else) as between them. I've only worked at one SLAC but I have a pretty good sense of at least one other where I got an offer. I've never been a prof ar an R1 but went to one.
Jun 21, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
I will write something longer & better argued later, but here's the thing: the only way to fight the ... it's not really even "creeping" fascism, I think it's "surging" fascism that we're seeing, is by drawing LOTS of people together to oppose it, from direct action to voting.
and the way you draw people together & get them to do stuff is not by yelling at them that the stuff they're doing already is wrong. This cartoon roughly encapsulates my political philosophy/theory of change
Apr 7, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
this is a good encapsulation of a problem I think about a lot with Twitter - the multiple audiences problem.
Applies also to political analyses - so much
"OMG can you believe how BAD [pundit/candidate/politician/law/policy] is" when often that [...] is only very slightly to the left or right [or another directions] of the person critiquing it. Which doesn't mean they shouldn't critique
Apr 6, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Oof the overt unvarnished homophobia coming from the right these days... I had imagined we were somehow past that but I guess the lessons in @louise_seamster & @victorerikray's "Against Teleology" apply to gender & sexuality along with race. doi.org/10.1177/073527…
Note 1: homophobia & transphobia (and misogyny too); on top of their increasingly overt racism etc.
Mar 29, 2022 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
Wow this makes me not like this guy. Good closing thought: "a person could fight so long to move ideas out of the margins that he could lose sight of the moment when they had finally made it close to the center." newyorker.com/culture/person…
I'm so glad I'm part of disciplines he doesn't consider sufficiently stylish. While I also appreciate a number of books & authors he's published.
Dec 21, 2021 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
Around this time 9 yrs ago I had reached the conclusion that I would probably never get an academic job. It was the fall of my 9th year of grad school, I'd sent out what felt like hundreds (probably 40-50?) of applications to tenure track jobs and post-docs, and had nothing. 🧵
No interviews at all. Some hints I'd made a few "long short lists" or "short long lists" or whatever, maybe. A call from a post-doc I'd applied for to tell me I'd made it to the final round but then the whole program had been shut down.
Nov 8, 2020 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
Related to this, I'd like it if people could separate advocating for their preferred policy/humanity position from claims about whether that position is good for electoral success.
Because 1. You should support e.g. BLM whether or not it's good for winning seats & 2. It's not clear that any given policy position in isolation from its association with a party, candidate, and/or social group makes a big difference to electoral outcomes.
Nov 8, 2020 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
A few quick thoughts on interpreting elections/votes on the day after Biden wins:
- most people understand their votes (or non-votes) differently than you do.
- the characteristics of the most visible members of a group are not necessarily the characteristics of all that group.
- the winner or holder of the presidency doesn't tell you hardly anything about the mood or character of the country.
Nov 7, 2020 • 15 tweets • 4 min read
Thread of scenes from me finally getting out in the city with people:
On the other hand, "poor and working class" is heard as meaning "urban" aka "Black & maybe Brown."
Nov 6, 2020 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
For a long time as a kid and into my 30s maybe, I thought if I/we could just nail a thing the right way, it would be done. From my Marxist mom's belief in the coming revolution to my sense that finding the right planner would allow me to finally feel totally efficient. But, no.
That's not how the world works, really ever. However well a (literal or allegorical) house is built, it will at some point need repairs. However big or hard-fought a political victory, it will need defending. Roads always have to be repaved...
Apr 30, 2019 • 17 tweets • 3 min read
Here is a common kind of trouble students (and others, including still me, sometimes) have: getting behind on a thing->feeling bad that you're behind->avoiding the thing & the people involved in the thing->getting even more behind on the thing-> feeling bad etc.
I say that 1. because if you can recognize it, and know that you're not the only one who does it, it's easier to get out of and 2. because I have some suggestions for how to deal with it. Here they are:
Oct 4, 2018 • 21 tweets • 6 min read
Today I told my class that working class/poor students are less likely to know rules can be bent, and less likely to ask to bend them, or for other kinds of help, and I got an email from a sophomore saying that helped her make sense of why her first year was so hard.
I told them explicitly that they can ask for extensions on their papers, and how to do it, and that they can come to talk to me about their papers. Same student admitted they'd been overwhelmed about the paper, asked for an extension, and set up an office hours appointment. Win!
