Anne Dalke's blog

"Muddy-ing the Waters": Doing Justice To Race, Class,
Gender and Environment (Jody Cohen and Anne Dalke)
Session I @ the 2014 Tri-Co Environmental Studies Workshop

Sara, Hayley and Sasha--
please write a self-evaluation of your prison work this semester.
General guidelines can be found in the self-evaluation that you did for
WWC 1 1/2 years ago: /exchange/courses/360/silence/f12/portfolio
--but here's the current version we'd like you to respond to:

This process invites you to "diffract" on all the work you have done in
our prison group and to contribute to and assist us with the evaluation of your work.  

In order to do this, be specific and descriptive, but also evaluative:
Review your participation in our group work before, during and after the sessions
we spend inside.  How present-and-contributing have you been during our preparation,
in our discussions inside, and during our debriefing sessions?

* Describe how you prepared for, and reflected on, the prison environment
and classroom experience outside of class.  In what ways did you push yourself
outside your comfort zone?

* Describe your critical, active engagement during our sessions in RCF:
How did you actively engage women in conversation and relationship?
Did you initiate or wait for someone to talk to you? To what degree
did you push yourself outside your comfort zone?

* Reflect, too, on your engagement with the reading and writing we assigned.

as we finish out the year, i find myself wanting an archive of the lesson plans

and homework we assigned. so: find attached.

as promised: attached find the script; the links to the BMC performance are @
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOFbIjXfBx0&list=PLURlCoT5iFbeubSDMRn3fSUd-bEmg9vfG

as the manual explains, this script differs from The Vagina Monologues,
which give voice to a mostly private aspect of women's lives: The Hijabi
Monologues take something public, which everyone seems to have an opinion about,
and give it a personal voice. The characters of each monologue wear the hijab,
but the hijab is not the focus of any story.

An interactive installation by Ava Blitz, Mellon Creative Resident for the 'Eco-Literacy' 360.
Enjoy and interact with the piece, but please respect it and do not remove anything from the site.
Thank you.

The very first Bundt Cake was made back in the 90's on Bryn Mawr's campus, outside of Arnecliffe Studio. Ave dug a hole in the ground, filled it with concrete- dug the piece out, carved it, and set it back into the depression- to be reclaimed by nature. This form has evolved over time. Carved and cast in various sizes and materials, it has occupied various environments, in the earth, on the earth, suspended in the air, and floating on water. Its interpretation is ambiguous-- nature made--human made--natural--unnatural?

The community of Bundt Cakes here is meant to be an interactive piece for the Bryn Mawr community to explore these questions.

since this features my and sophia's sister's "duck-rabbit,"
i can't resist sharing it w/ you all,
along w/ the question of what, since this 360, can you "not unsee"?
Things You Cannot Unsee (and What That Says About Your Brain)

resonant words from Jane Addams, Twenty Years at Hull House:

“In the unceasing ebb and flow of justice and oppression we must all dig channels as best we may,
that at the propitious moment somewhat of the swelling tide may be conducted to the barren places
of life.”

[can you tell that i'm still talking w/ you all....? from my couch....?]

still mulling over much of what we said during our shared evaluation this afternoon,
including the report that the dynamic among the three disciplines was a source of tension,
with econ not working very well in concert w/ the other courses (in part because there
were non-360 students in it, and/but/also....?)

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/29/science/what-does-today-owe-tomorrow.html
an economic analysis ending with the claim that this is actually not an economic question,
but rather a question of how much we believe we owe those living in the future...

So I'm continuing to mull over the implications of our story slam--whether telling individual stories invites investment in difference, or bridging towards sameness, whether it encourages investment in the stories we know, or an invitation to revise those stories....?