a thaumaturgical compendium

Teaching a class in pornography is strange:

• I have to check the spam folder almost as often as the inbox, since student emails seem to get dropped there easily. Likewise, when I get an email reading “Here as promised the log-in to that amazing adult site,” I have to do due diligence to make sure the author isn’t really one of my students or correspondents.

• I keep the door to my office closed when writing lectures and when someone knocks, I have to make sure the screen is clear of anything offensive, despite the fact that I will be talking about this in front of a class of 400.

• It’s not hard to make some ASL translators blush.

• I never imagined being approached with questions after class like “Did you say ‘double anal’? How does that work exactly?” [The lecture was about the HIV/AIDS issues in the adult film industry a year ago.]

• Although there may be people who would find the danger of teaching such a course an addiction to porn, at this point I would be happy if I never again saw the image of a naked person. However, since I wasn’t even a serious porn enthusiast before offering the course (I was relying on the hope that what I know about media effects more generally gives me a leg up—so to speak—when it comes to porn), I find myself playing catch-up.

• It’s amazing, in a class of 400, what people can take to be a double entendre.

• It’s not just me who gets bored with porn. I have a feeling that while many students took this course because of the nature of the material, the novelty has worn off (despite what the school newspaper suggests).

Aside from the little things, there are ongoing challenges. Some segment of the students apparently signed up because they wanted to see porn. This is a bizarre idea to me. I do show porn in the class: either when there is no other way to illustrate something, or when the presentation is (IMHO) very tame, or when it is just too inconvenient to expurgate from, for example, a video clip. (I’ve been using some clips from documentaries that air on HBO that seem to include gratuitous pornography interspersed with some really interesting interviews.) But taking a course has to be the most difficult possible way to obtain pornography. At this stage, it appears clear that a not insubstantial number of the students are going to fail the course, despite some generous curves on the exams. I don’t know that some brief titillation is worth having to admit to failing your porn course.

Another challenge has been the kind of chest-thumping machismo that seems to permeate some of the members of the class. Most are interested in the material and have good comments and suggestions. Several have a depth of area-specific knowledge, and that is great. But there is a collective groan when I cut off a clip just before, for example, someone begins to get undressed.

And while I didn’t realize this until approached by a student, when clips involving gay porn are shown, some members of the class find it necessary to complain about “faggots.” I’m really not sure how to handle this, since I’m not independently aware of it. It’s clearly against the policies I put forward at the beginning of the semester: that discourse be civil and open-minded.

Aside from disappointing performance on the exams by many of the students—which I attribute to a combination of lectures that could be clearer, a different level of expectation from the students (many of our classes live up to the reputation of communication departments as the places the drop-outs from other majors end up), and the monstrosity of multiple-choice exams—I am not sure how the class is going. It’s always hard to gauge that, and I’m generally pretty bad at it. When I think a class is going OK, it usually means it’s going badly, and when I think things are going terribly, the students often think they are fine. I guess maybe I’ll put up a short anonymous survey at the mid-point.

OK, I don’t have much to say about this except that I haven’t been so excited about an animated feature in a while. Or, more consicely: Dude.

A Scanner Darkly preview

When I speak with people about blogging, I often make the distinction between blogging as a personal but transparent act (much of the blogging on Livejournal takes this form), and blogging as a kind of intentional micropublishing; that is, the creation of a public persona.

I consider my blog to be of the latter type. The vast majority of those who read my blog I have never met—either face-to-face or electronically.
There are a lot of things I don’t blog. I don’t talk much about my private life. That is to say, I do often talk about personal issues, but there is a significant part of my life that is generally unblogged. There are parts of my professional life that are equally unbloggable, from papers that are meant for blind review to (e.g.) a meeting with the president of the university last week. In both cases, there could be significant negative consequences to making private matters public. At least part of that is erring on the conservative side of considering what others might consider not for public consumption. That’s one of the reasons I like doing things with other bloggers—it’s easier to assume they don’t mind it being blogged.

What prompted this was reading the new blog of a friend: In and Out of Confidence. Tamar and I have really only had dinner a couple of times and so there is no reason I should know her well, but she writes publicly and compellingly about intimate matters. One of the things I love about blogs is the potential of communicating such intimate thoughts and feelings in a way that might be more difficult in traditional face-to-face, for those of us who are introverted or “communication apprehensive.”

Tim Bray posted a link to Udell’s Google Maps walking tour of Keene, NH, in case anyone (like me), hadn’t seen it. This is really very cool: it’s what happens when you allow others to co-design your service.

I don’t know how many of the current MI students read my blog (I suspect very few), but if you do, this should trigger some ideas if you haven’t yet settled on a capstone. A lot of creative possibilities to combine GPS and Google Maps. I know a few of you are doing things with GPS and wireless (through Paul’s class or in other courses), and this would be a natural kind of extension. Also might allow for some interesting combinations when glued together: think Google Maps + Facebook or other services. Neat stuff.

As long as we are on hosting issues, I have a new company to add to the avoid category: 1and1.com. Some of you may remember this outfit: they were offering free hosting for a while (and still do, on a trial basis), a couple years ago. They also allowed you to register a domain for about $6, which I did.

Unfortunately, unlike registrars and ISPs that actually ask you to pay for a renewal, 1&1 decided to do it for me, moving my free account to a pay account. The clickwrap agreement appears to have given them permission to change the rates, and to charge my credit card without asking. It’s not a big charge—about the same as lunch or about 4 minutes of time with an attorney—and so they get away with it. And to cancel, they make you jump through ridiculous hoops: it’s a bit like the roach hotel. It’s strange that in a business that is so much built on trust, they choose the short term bilking of people out of pocket change. All perfectly legal, but stupendously bad customer service.

Caveat emptor. Don’t even think of giving these guys a credit card number. I’m hoping I can get my credit card company to make sure they don’t make future charges to me.

Chances are you already caught this here or, um, pretty much everywhere, but some of the folks involved in the SSAW last year are now staging SSAW II: The Revenge of the Academy (OK, that last bit isn’t official yet.) Go forth and socialize.

You have no constitutional right to vibrators (Yahoo News):

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected on Tuesday a constitutional challenge to an Alabama law that makes it a crime to sell sex toys.

The high court refused to hear an appeal by a group of individuals who regularly use sexual devices and by two vendors who argued the case raised important issues about the scope of the constitutional right to sexual privacy.

The law prohibited the distribution of ``any device designed or marketed as useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs.’’ First-time violators can face a fine of up to $10,000 and as much as one year in jail.

When this law was first passed, I wondered whether thay were outlawing cucumbers, whipped cream, or latex. I guess they are outlawing anything sold for “genital stimulation.”

But does that mean I can’t go down to the corner store and say “in fact today, I think I’ll have a French Tickler”? Do I have the right to buy unexciting condoms, as long as they don’t stimulate my partner? Very strange law, and unfortunate that the Supremes didn’t find a constitutional issue. Do you see a connection between this case and the recent “Extreme Associates” ruling?

(Thanks to Matt, John, and Dr. B for pointing this out.)

[Crossposted from the Cyberporn & Society blog.]