The Interim

It has been very difficult recently to break away enough quality time to constuct a post that merits posting, so I figured that a small update and then a chronicle of impending posts would be sufficient. It can be hard sometimes to maintain the motivation to visit this blog, because whenever I am on the computer at work, I am usually very methodical and I try to be very precise so as not to waste any paper in the machine or space on the page; this blog is antithetical to those constraints, and to add to that, I am sometimes so exhausted after a day at the Seminar that casual writing does not quite seem to fit into my plans. Sleeping wins out, or at least the idea that I should sleep. Alright, then. Here it goes: a quick update, and then an unorganized list of the longer posts I'm currently developing, most of which have a philosophical bent because they were almost categorically inspired by conversations or plenary sessions that took place last week.

First, I have received some exciting news, regarding a special project for next month. Unfortunately, IHJR, which I was looking forward to tremendously, has lost funding sufficient to support an intern; thus, that opportunity has been lost, but as sometimes happens in life, it has been supplanted by another one. David has put to me the idea of organizing and, in some capacity, running the blog for the Salzburg Global Seminar. It is my impression that most of the writing that is currently contained on that blog is conceived of by higher administration, including our president Steven Salyer; because of their status, their presence at the actual sessions in Salzburg is necessarily infrequent, and while the prominent sessions--ones run in partnership with the UN or high government, for example--certainly warrant their presence, they simply cannot record their thoughts about every session that we run. Thus, the job for which I had been highered initially has disappeared, and a job for which I am more appropriately equipped has materialized. Tangentially, it is likely that I will inherit some responsibility to run a social network for ISP alums, with particular emphasis on student outreach. This will very likely mean a facebook account: I am excited about this prospect in an entirely different way. While both of these opportunities will afford me the chance to develop my skills at writing and analysis, and will be supported in purpose by the academic sector of the Seminar, I will also get the chance to practice my research and communication skills, and to exercise a bit of creativity both intellectually and socially.

Last week was extraordinarily busy, requiring a totally different work schematic than I am used to. Instead of last nights and quick bursts of action, the intern office--now a bit lonelier for the absence of Daniel, who has returned to university--ground out some long hours and saw some early mornings. I feel a bit like a man playing a marionette, who works intricately behind the scenes but does not participate with his audience. I am learning a great deal about the manner of office business, about planning and organization for large conferences, and about the way in which university pedagogy really tends to burden the faculty who are the most interested in making a positive change in a holistic fashion. Obviously, there are tremendous financial constraints to be considered, especially these days, and doubly so for small schools, so the breakout group sessions are a great forum for discussing in great detail the creative ways in which the university higher administration must be provoked to part with its funds. It is important to remember, as Jochen wisely interjected, that when we say resources, we should caution not to think of solely financial prospects. Instead, we should remember to consider less material supplies, like effort, energy, time, support, and so on.

There are, as in most university proceedings, frequent mentions of certain ubiquitous key words, which seem to be terms that the faculty use as tools, and yet which have become terms that create some obfuscation to any acute discussion of theory. For example, I heard the words "stakeholder," and "inclusion" many times, but each of these seemed to be references to "those persons which must be involved so that our project is not shut down by those same people"; "broadening horizons" and "matriculation" seemed to be code for "make sure that we have a study abroad program"; "heritage" sometimes as a replacement for "non-white culture" or "non-rich experience". I do not see the way in which this sort of flowery language is helpful: if you mean disenfranchised, just say it. If you mean unacceptable, don't say "challenging" or "unaddressed". To suggest that something is "a new focus for us" is not the same as admitting the truth that is has been, until now, "at least a moderate failure". I know that ego is necessarily involved in this sort of terminology, and I am equally aware that my abrasive criticism of these terms are examples of my own stain of psychological egoism. So, in order to return my focus to addressing a problem instead of simple ranting, let us re-examine the purpose of having these sorts of seminars in the first place: creating a new and better system.

Large amounts of university politics seem to be a game concerning who to please and who to excise, which to attend and which to ignore, when to praise and when to correct. I think that each of these activities is necessary, obviously, but I'm not sure that the best way to reach definite decisions or to execute orders is to link that process to the best way to please the people who control the funds or who run your department; what if, for instance, that those administrators have aims that are otherwise concerned, and are not truly and ardently fixed on producing well-rounded, quality students? Moreover, if an institution endeavors to instill in its students some particular outlook or persuasion--social justice, for example--then how can it be said that this goal is realized and is in fact achieved, if the wording of the message is itself unclear? How is the inclusion of buzzwords in a plan or a slogan or a project sufficient evidence that what you have created is good, or useful?

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Another one of these words which seemed to obscure the conversation around global citizenship is the term itself. I think that it may be that we have considered the nature of the issue incorrectly, in the first place. Instead, I suggest that there should be two terms, each of which will subdivide the term which is now used, and will then occupy its respective field of academia and of social programming. For more speculation on this, see my post entitled "Global Citizenship as a Misnomer".

I have begun to give consideration to the role that historical accounts play in our intercultural narrative. Over the past week, many esteemed professors and scholars who visited the Seminar referenced events from the past that somehow created a schism, or animosity, or otherwise disrupted the fabric of social communication. But something began to twitch in my mind about the import of retelling stories of a traumatic shared past. I have come up with a nascent version of what I believe to be a dissonance between the intent of education about legacy, and the actual outcome of that sort of conversation; I have labored to construct an idea of historicism which I have outlned in the entry "A New Approach to History".

A project which I have been pouring myself into since early summer is a thought experiment about the way in which prayer and worry are connected. There is a passage in Philippians which commends the power of Jesus to relieve a believer of his anxiety, by simply investing oneself in a practice of prayer and ritual. This advice is antithetical to me, so I started to sketch a draft of a playful essay that would outline the link between the existence of prayer and the existence of worry, which I have, without much inspiration, called "On the Interrelatedness of Prayer and Worry".

Finally, during a plenary session held last week, I started to toss around the issue of how ethical theory can be gracefully applied trans-communitively, that is, between different "sovereign" groups of people in the United States. While this too will be a bit of a playful submission, I am genuinely interested in the decline of deontological morality except in very politically conservative constructs, such as fundamentalist churches. There seems to be some link between anti-intellectualism and anti-relativism, but there also seems to be a growing persuasion among the very liberal to condemn an idea of objectivism. That is, it seems as if neither the very conservative nor the very liberal are willing to accept that normative ethics can be categorically perscriptive, and yet moderate and easy to accept and apply. I have titled this entry "Regarding Morality in the Modern Communitarian Archetype".

Thanks for reading, now and in the future.