passports…should not expire

actually i have decided that passports shouldn’t exist at all

i love it here

Me when I'm about to do a terrorism but I am stopped by a cop asking for my passport

You can scratch the surface of a lot of different ideologies and find racial/religious/cultural hatreds right beneath the surface, but I’m not sure there’s any large-scale example on earth today worse than Hindutva. Every Hindu nationalist I encounter is like 0.2 seconds away from talking about the need to purge Muslims from Indian society. Modi has built his entire career on this and he has a 75% approval rating. Obviously this comment doesn’t mean much coming from an American, but it seems like there is something extraordinarily dark that’s been emerging in Indian politics the last few years

Onko suomitumpusta 5,2% suomenruotsalaisia niinku muusta väestöstä?

Tutkimuskassaneidin selvityksiä osa 4(?)

The Classics mailing list is having another ‘how many languages should People know?’ discussion. (And it is actually a discussion this time! Not to jinx it But it has so far not descended into Oxbridge professors telling postgrad students that if they haven’t spent a year living abroad in specific European countries then they shouldn’t even be doing Classics).

And like, I’m never gonna contribute to that discussion on the mailing list because there is always the chance that you’ll set someone off and I genuinely cba to deal with that, but the discussion so far is missing actual practical solutions of any sort.

Here are some facts:

- Classics scholarship gets published in a lot of languages. It is absolutely the case that the majority of it is in a smaller group of languages.

- it would be super awesome and great if everyone was multilingual!

- Most scholars are not multilingual.

- difference circumstances make it more/less likely that someone will be fluent in a second language. This includes Country, school, class, etc.

- there is literally nothing to be gained from excluding people from the subject for not knowing more than one language.

- everyone would produce better scholarship if we could read everything written on the topic we’re researching.

- there are a not insignificant amount of instances in which something was published in a language other than English and then someone else comes along later and writes the same thing again but in English and it gets all the attention (and honestly leaves you wondering whether the author deliberately chose to ignore the non-English work bc srsly how do you write an entire fucking book and not be aware of someone else’s whole entire book on the same theme??)

- non-native English speakers are more likely to get papers rejected from English speaking journals.

- it is absolutely not reasonable to expect them to be spending so much of their time perfecting their knowledge of the foibles of English academic language.

- searching for Research is a skill. Knowing what terms to use and where to search is a skill. Knowing another language doesn’t actually mean you will be good at searching using that language.

- DeepL and even google translate are pretty good actually.

Here’s some thoughts:

Publishing: I’m currently co-editing a volume and I spent a lot of time working with one contributor bc it’s the first thing they’ve published in English. They’ve been a delight to work with. And honestly, yes, it has taken me more time to help them polish their chapter than for others, but it’s not even the chapter that’s taken the longest. Like, one of the chapters written by a native English speaker has been a way bigger headache for me.

I know everyone is overworked and underpaid and bring asked to Peer Review Journal/Book submissions for free in their spare time, but also, some of us are very much happy to help others polish journal articles/chapters for free too. I’d rather do that than peer review shit, tbh.

Sure, in an ideal world we’d get paid for all this kind of work, but we do not live in an ideal world, other scholars can’t afford to pay us to do that and frankly, like, they shouldn’t have to be literally paying more money than others to stand a chance of getting published just because they’re having to write in a second/third/etc. language. Ideally universities or other bodies could fund that cost but whatever. No one is putting me in charge of a university budget anytime soon, so I’ll just be here helping people for free if they need it.

Language learning: I don’t care about what the ideal situation is. I care about what we can actually, usefully do. Sitting around complaining that universities should make x or y language mandatory is useless. And there will always be more languages that it would be useful to know.

What’s actually useful, and far easier to implement:

- teach people how to use DeepL and google translate. Get universities to *subscribe* to DeepL. Teach this as part of standard research methods. Make it clear even from undergrad that there is valuable scholarship available in other languages and that students are expected to Not Ignore It.

- resource share. What’s actually the best place to search for academic research on Y topic in X language? And what’s the word for X person/art style/literary genre in Y language? Even if someone wants to look at lit in different languages, they still have to know what to look for before they start.

- ??? Idk what to call this, but like, it would be really fuckin’ great if we could tag stuff in multiple languages. Like, it would be better if a user could search for, say ‘Iliad animal metaphors’ and have it turn up all Language results rather than having to run 10 different searches to cover a bunch of different languages (also see above, re: knowing how to successfully search is a language-specific skill). But without knowing how to fix that problem, we should still be sharing the knowledge of how to use translation tools + the best search engines per Language / area + reminding people ‘that ‘look up that term in X language dictionary and then search for that’ is something they should be doing.

Like, there are already tools at our disposal that should make cross-language scholarship easier for everyone. Whether you know one or five languages. We’re just shit at using them/teaching them.

Re: that last point: Europeana seems to be doing something and I'm not sure what. Like if I search for an object using an English word, it brings up results that are that object but none of the metadata is in English. I don't know if the submitting institutions have just tagged their stuff in English as well (and then... those tags just don't show?) or what... But whatever it is, it's great and we need it going in every possible direction.

And I don't know too well about other countries, but the Finnish ontology Finto has all the terms in Finnish, Swedish and English, and at least some museum collections management systems tap in to Finto, so like for example when I tag an object with Finto terms those terms are automatically translated for people using the system in Swedish or English.

Basically: a global ontology that everyone taps into when tagging things in databases when?

not very funny

Cat days start on the 8th of September and end on the 8th of November. It is a time of renewed energy, starting new things (new school year, new hobbies, etc) and enjoying autumn.

Please read this. Please share this. Please remember us.

Do Not Let HR do this to you. It is not illegal to talk about wages in the work place. I did and got a 12% raise!

True info. Now let me add something: The power of documentation. (I was a long time steward in a nurses union.)

Remember: The "'E" in email stands for evidence.

That cuts both ways. Be careful what you put into an email. It never really goes away and can be used against you.

But can also be a powerful tool for workplace fairness.

Case 1: Your supervisor asks you to do something you know is either illegal or against company policy. A verbal request. If things go wrong, you can count on them denying that they ever told you to do that. You go back to your desk, or wherever and you send them an email: "I just want to make sure that I understood correctly that you want me to do xxxxx" Quite often, once they see it in writing, they will change their mind about having you do it. If not, you have documentation.

Case 2: You have a schedule you like, you've had that schedule for a while, it works for you. Your supervisor comes to you and says "We're really short-handed now and I need you to change your schedule just for a month until we can get someone else hired. It's just temporary and you can have your old schedule back after a month." A month goes by and they forget entirely that they made that promise to you. So, once again, when they make the initial request, you send them an email "I'm happy to help out temporarily, but just want to make sure I understand correctly that I will get my old schedule back after a month as you promised." Documentation.

[Image ID: Text reading: In the middle of a busy clinic at our practice, I got pulled in by my manager to speak to HR, who must have made a special trip because she lives several states away, and told I was being 'investigated' for discussing wages with my other employees. She told me it was against company policy to discuss wages.

Me; That's illegal.

Them: (start italics) three slow, long seconds of staring at me blankly (end italics) Uh...

Me: That's an illegal policy to have. The right to discuss wages is a right protected by the National Labor Relations board. I used to be in a union. I know this.

HR: Oh, this is news to me! I have been working HR for 18 years and I never knew that. Haha. Well try not do do it anyway, it makes people upset, haha.

Me: people are entitled to their opinions about what their work is worth. Bye.

I then left, and sent her several texts and emails saying I would like a copy of their company policy to see where this wage discussion policy was kept. She quickly called me back in to her office.

HR: You know what, there is no policy like that in the handbook! I double check. Sorry about the confusion, my apologies.

Me: You still haven't given me the paper saying that we had this discussion. I am going to need some protection against retaliation.

HR: Oh haha yes here you go.

I just received a paper with legal letterhead and an apology saying there was no verbal warning or write up. Don't even take their shit you guys. Keep talking about wages. Know your worth. /End ID]

At one of my old (shit) jobs my boss would continually come have these verbal discussions with me and would never put anything in writing I took to summarizing every discussion we had in email. Like “just to confirm that you asked me to do X by Y date and you understand that means I won’t be able to complete the previous task you gave me until Z date - 2 weeks later than originally scheduled - because you want me to prioritize this new project.

The woman would then storm back into my office screaming at me for putting the discussion in writing and arguing about pushing back the other project or whatever. At which point I would summarize that conversation in email as well. Which would bring her storming back in, rinse and repeat ad nauseum.

Anyway I cannot imagine how badly that job would have gone if I hadn’t put all her wildly unreasonable demands in writing. Bitch still hated me but she could never hang me for “missing deadlines” because I always had in writing that she’d pushed the project back because she wanted something else done first.

Paper your asses babes. Do not let them get away with shit. If they won’t put what they’re asking you to do in writing then write it up yourself and email it to them.

If you don't have this kind of job but someday you'd might: start practicing.

After a casual conversation with friends, write up a brief synopsis of what you discussed & agreed to. (...Do not email this to friends unless you have their agreement that this would be a fun group project.) Get practice with,

"A, B, and C had a brief meeting about food options after the big game. We decided on pizza, with A&B agreeing to contribute X dollars each, and C agreeing to contribute Y dollars and also bring soda. A will call for pizza on the day of the game and schedule it for delivery at 8:30 pm."

"A, B & C discussed movie options. A wanted something lite and fun; B wanted something scifi; C was fine with anything but horror. Nobody wanted superheroes. Decided on Lost Space Wanderers which opened last weekend; C agreed to research theatre options and report tomorrow."

...and so on. Practice describing the results of "meetings" with friends and you'll be ready to sum up "boss told me to set aside Project A to focus on Project B for the next two weeks" - because what's likely is that boss didn't say anything that clear; boss talked about how important Project B is and how the company needs parts X and Y done asap and you have the best skills for that, and when you mentioned how much time Project A was taking, boss said "eh don't worry about that right now; marketing is breathing down my neck so we really need part X by Friday, okay?"

...at no point did you get a direct instruction.

Which is why anyone who is not the screaming-drama boss mentioned above would think it was perfectly reasonable for you to say, "I want to clarify the discussion we had earlier - you told me to focus on Project B to the exclusion of Project A for the next two weeks, even if that means Project A will miss its deadline; is that correct?"

Genuine question: what do I do when the boss in question doesn’t reply to my confirmation email, then says that he never approved the project delay?

In person or over the phone you say "that doesn't match with my memory of the project but let me check my records and I'll get back to you about what happened on this project." Then go back to your desk and write the pettiest email in the world.

To: Boss

From: you

Cc: work group, team lead, project partner, direct supervisor, etc.

(Depending on severity of problem) Bcc: your personal email

"Hi Boss, I'm trying to resolve some confusion here. After our conversation about priority projects on [date] I reached out to you for confirmation of these details (see attached outlook item) and didn't receive an update to the timeline since that communication. I have been working from the agenda we discussed (summarized in attached outlook item from [date]) in absence of further direction. Do you have a copy of your response updating the changes or correcting mistakes in my summary? It's possible that I didn't see your email and I'd like to identify where a communication was missed so that we can avoid issues like this in future projects.

Best,

[Name]"

For this to work you have to be militant about sending summary emails and firm with coworkers and supervisors that you will be documenting project plans via email, but once they're used to your MO it's worth the work.

I have had the honor of working on two different comics projects with Don Hertzfeldt. But this is the story of my first interaction with the man.

I have thoughts about the whole feminist anti-interrupting thing. Like I agree, men do talk over people and it is disrespectful, but I also think there are cultures, specifically Jews, where talking over each other is actually a sign of being engaged in the conversation. It’s something I really struggle with in the south, because up in New York, even non-Jews participated in this cooperative conversation style, but down here, whenever I do it by accident, the whole convo stops and it gets called out and it’s a whole thing. Idk idk I feel like there’s different types of interruptive like there’s constructive interrupting where you add on to whatever is being said - helpful interrupting, and then there’s like interrupting where you just start saying something unrelated because you were done listening. I have ADHD so I’ve def done the latter too by accident, but I’m talking about being more accepting of the former.

I think a lot of the social mores leftists enforce around communication tend to be very white. Like Jews are not the only group of people that have distinct communication styles. Like the enforcement of turn-based communication, not raising your voice (not just in anger but also in humor or excitement), etc. it’s always interesting that the most pushback I get about how I communicate come from white people (mostly women actually, white men just give me patronizing looks because they don’t feel like they can call me out in same way). Like I’ve been teaching these workshops, and a few of them have been primarily black people, and I’ve noticed black people will also engage in cooperative interrupting (and I love it!). This isn’t a developed thought and I welcome feedback. Idk I think there should be space in leftist organizing for more diverse communication styles.

Here’s a source:

As a linguist: overlapping talk is not the same thing as an interruption!

An interruption is specifically intended to stop another person from speaking so you can take over. Other reasons that talk might overlap:

The norms around these kinds of overlaps vary -- by context (we all use more audible backchannel on the phone; an interview is not a sermon is not a casual chat), by culture, and yes, by gender, which is why it’s a feminist issue. But gender doesn’t exist in a vaccuum! Some reasons overlaps might be mis-interpreted as interruptions when they’re not intended to be:

Norms around conversation tend to be super white/Western/male/NT; even among linguists, the way we talk about analyzing talk usually presupposes discrete turns, with one person who “has the floor” and everyone else listening. It even gets coded into our technology -- I thing the account’s gone private, but someone recently tweeted, “For the sake of my wife’s family, Zoom needs to incorporate an ‘ashkenazi jewish’ checkbox” because the platform is programmed to try to identify a “main speaker” and auto-mute everyone else. Most of the progress on this front in linguistics has been pushed by Black women and Jewish women, or else we’d probably still be acting like Robert’s Rules represent the natural expression of human instincts.

And it’s very White Feminism to recognize how conversations styles have disparate impacts across gender lines without also recognizing other axes along which conversation styles vary, once that empower us as well as oppress us. Just because I feel interrupted doesn’t mean I am interrupted, and it definitely doesn’t mean I have the right to scream “EVERYBODY SHUT UP!!” until I’m the only one talking.

I don’t ... have a great way to end this? Just that it’s good to recognize competing needs in communication, and have some humility and intentionality about whose needs gets prioritized and how.

Another thing; as someone who expects overlap because of my cultural upbringing, when someone doesn't overlap me I just start looping and repeating myself because I'm waiting for them to interrupt and they're "politely" waiting for me to finish speaking.

EXTREMELY rare w from the uk media

Defamation lawsuits in UK are heavily weighted in *favor* of the plaintiff. You have to have a pretty weak case to lose over there. If there wasn't a rabbid, inescapable social media campaign against Amber Heard, he would have lost in America too.

These tags are very pertinent because they're right. It is a matter of fact in the case that Depp's abuse of her was acknowledged. The fact that the court basically said "yes, he abused you, but talking about it is defamation" when she didn't even use his name in the original piece she wrote should have us all very nervous. It's incredibly frightening legal precedent to set in a world where powerful celebrities use their status to abuse people.

Type "I am" in the tags and whatever follows is your gender today...

Who i thought would induce gender envy

VS who actually induced gender envy

Hi I love them sm

btw I totally agree w/ everything I ever post ever in it’s entirety with no further engagement, you can quote me on that and burn me at the stake for it. I am a bare husk of pseudo-existence and you alone possess complexity

Maine?? Hello?

DO IT! DO IT! DO IT!

English added by me :)

widespread archaeological evidence suggests that many North Americans of this era acknowledged the existence of three genders: "men", "women", and "employees only"