December 09, 2005
Self-Censorship, The Lynda Barry Experience Experience, and my Descent into Listmania
As I sit down to write this blog, I find myself at a moment of fairly severe self-censure. There are so many things that I would love to write about--things that I think would find a receptive audience among my tens of thousands of blog readers--that simply wouldn't be appropriate to talk about in a blog that I write as Professor Munson. This has nothing to do with a hesitation to share my political views (news flash to those who hadn't already figured it out: my politics are fiercely and uncompromisingly left-wing. My choice not to blog about politics is based more on my feeling that there are already numerous columnists, journalists, and bloggers who do a better job than I ever could at writing.) Rather, my self-censure stems from a feeling that I don't want to compromise some other activity by blogging about it first. For example, I would love to blog about results in progress, or ideas I have about future research studies, or general gripes. That's not the most professional thing a guy could do, even though I'm sure you're all aching to know what a laugh riot faculty meeting was today. Seriously, Windsor brought some Lemon bars from Wuollet's bakery that were top rate, and there was coffee. High class, I tell you.
So, in the absence of that—what does a guy blog about? I have this idea that I'm going to start this thread on data that I will never publish. For example, I have diadochokinetic rate data and speech error data on GLB and heterosexual talkers that I suspect will never make it into a peer-reviewed journal. I think I might have a blog entry about that. I also have some data on nonword repetition from Munson, Swenson and Manthei's (2005) article that was cut from the final version that I could post. I shouldn't be too hasty, though. I might include the real-word/nonword data in an invited commentary I'm writing right now for Applied Psycholinguistics. See what I mean? This whole academic blog thing is just self-censuring.
In the meantime, Lynda Barry is always a good topic to blog about. I decided to write her a letter just to make sure that she was cool with me posting a clip from The Lynda Barry Experience on my website. I felt justified to use U of M letterhead, because I was asking her about something that was on a U of M website, and which I (supposedly) use in my teaching. Well wouldn't you know it, I got a response. Needless to say, this one goes in my safe deposit box. If you don't believe me, I scanned it and have pasted it below. That Lynda Barry is one heckuva nice lady. If my blog postings haven't inspired you to buy her collected works, then, well, I don't know what more I can say.
I have to have something besides this to fill the blog pages in the meantime. How about lists? Lists are good. From an author's standpoint, a list simplifies the writing task: no pesky transitions, plenty of flexibility with grammar, and a mandate to be punchy and brief. Readers, like myself, love lists. They invite debate (you think that Heavenly Creatures was the best movie of 1994? What about Pulp Fiction?). A good list to start with is my 10 desert island CDs. You know the scenario: you are stranded on a desert island that somehow has a mysterious never-ending supply of electricity. You have to select a finite set of something, knowing that you'll never have access to anything but that set. What is your set? What are your reasons? What does this say about you, in a deep psychological sense? Well, I'll hold off answering the third question, but I can tell you my set, and my reasons:
1. David Live by David Bowie. I love Bowie. I was torn. Every one of his CDs is worth having. Diamond Dogs is my favorite, but it's so short! As everyone knows, in the desert island CD scenario double albums count as one album, so I went with his best double album.
2. Post, by Björk. Every single track on this disk is worth listening to over and over, and there would be a delicious humor to hearing The Modern Things through a dirt-powered CD player when stranded on a desert island.
3. Cast Your Fate into the Wind by the Vince Guaraldi trio. Forget that freakin' Charlie Brown Christmas Album, this album shows Guaraldi's real genius. Plus, the rendition of Generique would be perfect to listen to when it was stormy. I always think of that song when a thunderstorm is coming in.
4. Car Wheels on a Gravel Road by Lucinda Williams. I would be lying if I said that Can't Let Go isn't my favorite song, and Jackson would remind me not to miss the things I left behind in civilization.
5. Talking Book by Stevie Wonder. This was my mother's favorite album, and I would definitely want to be able to listen it to remind me of home. Plus, every song is a sing-along. I mean, every song, from Superstition to I believe (dadadada)
6. Soundtrack to the film Short Cuts, by Annie Ross and some other people. If I ever got lonely, I could listen to Ross singing To Hell with Love. Plus, there's the whole sing-along factor. Why it is that To Hell with Love isn't a more popular song is beyond me. It's pure genius.
7. Tourandot by Puccini, as directed by Zubin Mehta and sung by Luciano Pavarotti and Joan Sutherland. A queen has to have his opera. Plus, there's the two-disc thing. 'Nuff said.
8. OK Computer by Radiohead. An eternity without being able to listen to Paranoid Android is not an eternity that I want to imagine. It would be like that one Twilight Zone where the guy's glasses broke. That just makes me want to shudder and scream.
9. Rainy Day Music by the Jayhawks. For as much as I badmouth Minnesota (at an estimated rate of 200 slams per week, or SPW, for short), they have given the world the Jayhawks, and that's something to be proud of. Maybe I could make a guitar out of desert island materials and sing along with Madman.
10. Soundtrack to the movie Nashville. Because if I ever saw a category 5 hurricane on the horizon, I would want to be singing It Don't Worry Me just like Barbara Harris at the Nashville Parthenon.
What does this list reveal about me? Not a damn thing! In fact, I don’t even know if I believe it. But I had to write something.
Coming next: something academic.
Conspicuous in my absence, redux
Man, I thought I was conspicuous in my absence when I ditched on the Tuesday of ASA. That pales to how conspicuous my absence from the November ASHA convention was! I think I'm up to about 45 "Where were you" messages. The answer: I took a year off from conferences. I didn't go to ASHA, and I didn't go to SRCLD. (I went to ASA, of course, in Vancouver and in Minneapolis. A guy can't go cold turkey, can he?)
I just want to say to all of my colleagues and friends that I hope you all had fun in San Diego, and thanks for sending me good wishes. I'll be there next year (Miami?) with bells on.