A while ago I read Sven Beckert’s The Monied Metropolis, a historical account of elite new yorkers in the Gilded Age. It’s a great book. And I recently returned to it because I’ve been thinking of the many parallels to today. In part this is because of the increasing wealth gap, particularly here in [...]
Look at the newest ASR. DiMaggio and Bonikowsi show that workers who used the internet increased their earnings faster than those who did not! So get back online. It’s a way to make more money! Reading this right now may be increasing your earnings. You owe me. You can just buy me a drink at [...]
I’ve been wondering recently about investment returns of wealthy colleges. For example, NPR’s most emailed story right now is on advice from Yale’s investment “wiz”. He earned a 28% return on Yale’s investment last year, and has averaged around 17% return. Here’s the thing: aren’t rates of return tied to risk? Am I crazy? I [...]
If I’m ever giving a talk and it’s advertised like this, I won’t be surprised if no one shows up. Perhaps I’m no longer “fun”. And maybe it’s a bad thing that I don’t think good talks should be fun. Then again, this is more capricious than fun. And that’s actually something I object to [...]
fellow blogger Stanley Fish reflects on French theory in America. I wonder if anyone could write a book called, “American Theory in France”. Or for others, do we not really have theory? Come to think about it, [insert nation here] Theory really only seems to work for France and Germany. Maybe I’m wrong on that.
From someone who is ABD. This is a very liberal paraphrase (you will note that the language is strongly shakha’s), but still accurate, I believe.
I have two committee members who don’t get along. They pull me in different directions. They’re not really interested in what the other person suggests, and sometimes even seem to pull [...]
It looks like the Justice Department was waging an all-out war against civil liberties. One of its most highly praised attorneys was apparently driven out because she is was rumored to be a lesbian. Oddly, the attorney in question is not necessarily “openly” gay - she’s described as being “private” about her sexual preference. And [...]
March 31, 2008 – 12:52 pm
The London Review of Books has an interesting article about the development of profit in science (biomedical science in particular). It’s by Steven Shapin, who studies the history of science. Shapin tracks the changes in the desire for monetary gain in Science. He begin,
Until fairly recently, you did not choose a scientific career with the [...]
March 30, 2008 – 12:05 pm
That blogger that abarian pointed out to me just got a massive book deal. What do you think our chances are? More importantly, how would we divy up the cash?
March 29, 2008 – 12:36 pm
I didn’t know about this. But apparently TODAY there is a global movement to turn off your lights for an hour (starting at 8PM). This reminds me of when I was a kid visiting my family in Pakistan. Every night for an hour electricity was shut off to parts of Lahore. There wasn’t enough of [...]
March 25, 2008 – 10:38 pm
From an esteemed colleague:
What set of issues should be discussed before two (or more) people agree to write a paper together? There are obvious contenders here - order of authorship, timeline, etc. - but what else is important?
March 25, 2008 – 10:36 pm
Yes you, fellow scatterbrain posters. I know you’re all busy. But so am I. I can’t keep this going by myself. So post, damn it. Post!
Bees might as well be dancing in the dark. Why? No one cares when they do. I feel their pain. They’re also dying off at an alarming rate. Which has me really worried. I seriously have been up at night thinking about it (apparently they are responsible for the reproduction of about 1/3 of the [...]
March 24, 2008 – 12:40 pm
The NYTimes has a pretty good article on health disparities in the US. Though I must express frustration that of the list of reasons why there are increasing health gaps between rich and poor, health care is listed as the last reason. Most interesting to me is the widening of the gap, both across race [...]
March 22, 2008 – 11:06 am
I have been cutting back on my “informed citizen” time recently in attempts to get my work done. So somehow I missed what Bush said on the 5th anniversary of the war. In a video conference to troops in Afghanistan, Bush told troops,
I must say, I’m a little envious. If I were slightly younger and [...]
Recently I have had a series of conversations with a pretty wide variety of people about what they like and dislike about scatterplot, sociology, and academia more generally. For now, let me focus on what people like. The acknowledgment that we watch TV comes up again again (here and here are examples, even if we [...]
March 19, 2008 – 11:51 am
Beer may be associated with an increase in earnings. But it also is associated with a decrease in productivity. How can this be?!? What am I to do? Drink and make more money? But then also be less productive? There is a crisis brewing here. Luckily, though, as it turns out, we’re all reasonably happy.
March 19, 2008 – 10:11 am
Here is a suggestion that emerged from olderwoman about our ask a scatterbrain series. This emerged as some had expressed that the series was anxiety producing. Ane one of the causes of this was that the advice often seemed to come from folks at the “top 20″ - where few sociologists actually are (and few [...]
March 16, 2008 – 10:57 am
Here at Columbia there was just a conference in honor of Herb Gans. Unlike most conferences, I enjoyed this one. I actually really enjoyed it**. The keynote speaker was William Julius Wilson. He spoke on the book he’s finishing up right now, which takes both structural and cultural arguments about poverty seriously. Basically, the [...]
Some questions on publishing:
What are the politics of publishing? Which journals are professional brass rings? Are there journals that might accept my articles but at the same time are so unrespected that publishing in them is tantamount to admitting I’m a lousy academic? The impact factor is one way to go about it but my [...]
