Last week, Rich Rice, Janie Santoy, Lennie Irvin and I presented a panel at the SITE conference in San Antonio. Prior to driving down to San Antonio in Rich's truck (there was a problem with the lights--old trucks, bad design--you know the drill) I got to hang out in the MULL with Rich. I wound up seeing Leanne Schroer-Motz, Christiana Christofides, Locke Carter, Becky Rickly, Kirk St. Amant, and Sam Dragga. So when combined with hanging out with my online classmates Lennie and Janie, and spending loads of times with Rich Rice, I had a real windfall. The conversations, both casual and professional, were outstanding. My juices got flowing and I started having all those intellectual inspirations one is supposed to have when studying for a doctorate.
So what's the upshot? Well, I was thinking we should organize a yearly conference for all the online and onsite students. It would be a conference with no theme, a writer's retreat. . .a Chatauqua, if you will, of TCR phd students. For those who couldn't make it, an online component would be easily added using the MOO and some IM chat sessions. Folks both at home and on location could drop in and out, making conversation and contributing and sharing ideas. Faculty would of course be invited (again--both online and in-person contributions would be welcome) so we could pick brains and make connections.
Anyhow, just an idea. The planning is the hard part--times, places, facilities, participants, etc. And selling the idea might not be too easy. Most of us have conference plans year-round, anyhow. But this one would be difference. We wouldn't have a theme that constrains what you do or talk about--we'd have a No-Theme Theme. Dirt cheap, too, if we can get the right facilities and rough it just a touch.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Very interesting idea regarding the retreat. I hope others think about this carefully. Basically, what online PhDers need in addition to motivation to keep moving forward, is time, I should think. This is an idea to create time. Of course, time costs in terms of other resources. But the Chatauqua idea seems to be a good one. The May Seminar for those taking classes is time for coursework; this might be an opportunity for individual writing with meaningful peer review exchanges. TTU has excellent retreat facilities all over Texas, but those in South Texas are the best.
Thoughts on the diss...
Pete,
Interesting conversation here.
One can equate technology to communication, and communication/rhetoric is perhaps everything. Technology, in my view, is any tool or technique used to accomplish any task. Now, as we discussed, that broad definition can quickly become an issue of epistemology. Anything that helps one do anything, including knowing, including propagating the chain of being, could be construed as a technology. I agree with Johnson. If language is a technology, and if we “know” through language or even through “feltsense” (which arguably is also only approximated through language), then all knowing is technology. It’s not until you find self-caused entities that have always already existed, and that are unknown (because to know in a human sense is to use a technology), that we find things which exist outside technology. Sure, theoretical, and ultimately not practical for a dissertation in TCR.
But then there is a practical answer; that is, just as I’m teaching an undergraduate essay right now on defining “text” in individualized contexts, it seems to me that a definition of technology should be defined within a specific context. Otherwise we’re spinning wheels in the mud. If the context is NOT epistemology, then technology can be defined in more specific, rhetorical ways. This is what Johnson is doing with the system-centered view. The context is a system of actions, complete with goals, which means it’s a rhetorical system. While I’d stay away from technological determinism, as all pathways there lead to solipsism in my view, using the purpose of technology is a way to narrow the definition of technology. Technology in a context. One definition is practical/purposeful, one is theoretical. Really, it’s the difference between Aristotle and Plato.
Seems to me that starting broad but quickly narrowing as you relate the purpose of meaning-making with a dissertation, would be useful. But, I bow to Fred’s wisdom here.
Rich
Post a Comment