Solitude and “co-being”: connecting Russian and Rilke in becoming a scholar

In the fourth year of doing a PhD, different people come up into, and against, different feelings. Some become more invigorated, generating an ever-so-slight fullness of smile, a growing sense of purpose, of voice. Others seem bogged down, sagging under the weight of hours staring at one's silly words, uncertain that anything will ever come …

The intellectual’s desperate need for self-parody as a Professional Smarty Pants

After the inspiring first class of Introduction to Dialectics with Stanley Aronowitz this weekend among many seasoned thinkers and established intellectuals, I felt the need to reflect on the experience of being a Professional Smarty Pants and my socialization, for better or worse, into this motley group. I'm increasingly convinced that self-awareness is in desperate …

Immigrants can be funny

Weird post title, right? I'll explain. It's not typical to think of immigrants as funny, indeed, it's rare to think of immigrants as individuals in general. They are a group of (usually) poorer, (usually) browner, (usually) slightly strange people who come to this country to live. They are people we see in the news being deported, …

Mobile learning

It is the time for us to educate ourselves, to read and connect ourselves to stories of triumph against ignorance and oppression. Seeing the Queens Library bus parked on my walk to the subway reminded me that we are all ALWAYS learning and can demand that the government support our education.   When we stop …

Captain America: belonging and fear in Prospect Park

I was walking through Prospect Park near where I'm staying this month in Brooklyn. As I turned a corner, I spotted several small tents with American flag patterns: I thought to myself, oh god, it's a Trump rally. I'd just volunteered for Hilary Clinton the night before...would that show on my face? With the news about …

Interdisciplinarity

Since I’ve started taking classes at the Graduate Center in 2014, I’ve consistently gone outside my department to swim — awkwardly — in new fields. I’ve taken classes in the areas of philosophy, sociology, and Hispanic-Luso Brazilian studies and am pulling from these fields as well as linguistics, social and critical theory, and others to construct the interdisciplinary theoretical …

The 38-year-old brain

More writing today, and my apologies for the self-indulgent posts. Too much of life in one day, somehow, and so my 38-year-old brain shut off mid-afternoon. Couldn't try to study at the cafe where I was sitting -- I've learned I can't study in public with hipsters singing Eddie Money and making chai lattes -- …

Day of thanks-action

A silly title for what I hope will be a simple post. It's Thanksgiving, though in Spain (and perhaps other hispanoparlante parts of the world) the holiday is called "Día de Acción de Gracias." As in, getting your thanks on. Since this is an education blog (see About), I am taking a moment to be thankful to …

Intelligence, emotional or otherwise

In common discourse we separate the emotional from the intellectual, as in, “He’s brilliant, but he can’t have a regular conversation (the “lonely genius” syndrome, so to speak). A dichotomy was introduced with “Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More than IQ” written by Daniel Goleman, in which the term “EQ” was coined, reassuring millions …

Halloween: To Ebola or not to Ebola

A friend of mine posted some pictures of himself from Halloween on Facebook this morning. This person tends to be larger than life, good-looking and full of swagger, which works for him as his full-time job is in the arts. This friend’s posts sometimes cross a line, pushing boundaries and unapologetically sharing his brash, funny, …