Hat-tip to Christa Hibbard for taking these photos while also taking notes.

Labels: development, teaching

"Good Copy, Bad Copy" is an excellent film about the struggle to redefine intellectual copyright in a manner that fosters creativity rather than stifling it. It is clear from this video that there is a need to develop new business models that account for the ways in which people are using, synthesizing, and creating new media. The current legal regime surrounding copyright is excessively tilted toward corporations and rent seeking behavior instead of supporting artists, fans, and a dynamic economy.

Labels: globalization, open source, technology, web technology

In my last South Asian politics class a student asked about the meaning of civil disobedience in the Indian context. We discussed the origins of civil disobedience in the work of H.D. Thoreau, M.K. Gandhi, and M.L. King. In particular, I tried to convey the idea that the phrase "passive resistance" is highly deceptive, since civil disobedience is very active.

Labels: south asia

My globalization students are reading Kevin Bales' Disposable People. We will be discussing this video in class tomorrow.

Labels: globalization

This is the image which is discretely cropped on the cover of William Easterly's book, The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done so much Ill and so Little Good. My development students will be talking about this 1930's travel poster today.



Note that all of the Africans which appear in the travel poster have been airbrushed out for the book cover. The question for my students is: Why airbrush out all of the Africans in a book with the title White Man's Burden?

Labels: development

I asked my Globalization students to make their first blog or You Tube video. Mainly, I just wanted them to get over the hump and see how easy it is to use web technology. So, here is the list of student blogs and videos (I'll update as more come in):

Blogs

1. P.A. backincontext

2. E.K. speedlimit40

3. N.D. hotspotsintheworld

4. B.W. bradleyweinberg

5. R.D. reebs10

6. M.B. michellebadagnani

7. C.T. internalcon

8. D.D. narodnacollective

9. K.S. globalization-ktsliger

10. K.C. kc5299

You Tube Videos

1. E.P. & A.L.


2. J.S.


3. I.B.


4. M.A.


5. M.M.

Labels: globalization, web technology

Labels: random, teaching, technology, web technology, wiki

In my Globalization class today I decided to give my students two rather random assignments to try to get them to connect with the technologies and collaborative techniques they were reading about.

First, I asked them to write down a place as far from Geneva, NY as they could imagine where they did not know anyone. After they wrote it down, I told them that their assignment is to find someone in that place and ask them to take a photo documenting that they are in the town chosen. (I did ask that they not select a war zone.)

Second, I told the students to start a blog or website or to upload a video. The items can be created under a pseudonym to guard their privacy. The content can be on anything they want. The aim is just to get started using technologies that they many are hesitant to touch.

Both assignments are worth precisely zero points. Well, I did say I would tell them they were "really cool" if they succeeded. The aim is to get students to overcome their inertia, self-doubt, apathy, paranoia, etc. and see what they can do in the global arena. I don't see these assignments as academic so much as just basic life lessons.

I hadn't planned to do these assignments when I woke up this morning, but I guess was just shocked that so many of my students are so cut off from these modes of self-expression and interaction. Yes, they all use Facebook, but that is a relatively cloistered community; it functions to prevent creativity, channel activity, and celebrate being in a bubble. In any case, it is not much use talking about blogs, wikis, global supply chains, outsourcing, insourcing, social marketing, bottom of the pyramid marketing, etc. if the students have no interaction with these technologies and techniques that allow them to have a global reach.

One of my students said that they had not done these things because they didn't have time. He added that if he devoted time to such diversions, he feared he would end up dropping out and then his parents would kill him. The students said not everyone could be like Bob Dylan or Bill Gates. It was kind of funny, but kind of sad to hear.

I think there is a pervasive sense among college students I've met that they cannot do things or that it is difficult to collaborate with people outside of their culture and demographic. I think that it is actually not as difficult as some imagine, particularly for these students who already have ample access to all of the necessary hardware and software.

It was amazing that several students said they had no idea where to even begin to go to get a blog started. Of course, the assignment is precisely to figure out where to get started and how to do it. I don't think it is always a good idea to give precise instructions on how to do something, students need to learn how to learn.

Labels: globalization, technology, web technology

DACOR Bacon House Foundation
Fellowship Program 2008-09
Graduate School Awards – up to $12,500/year!
HWS Application Deadline: February 11th at 12 noon

On-campus Screening Interviews: February 12th & 13th - Up to THREE HWS students will be recommended Selection Interviews in Washington, D.C.: March 10th – Students will be flown, all expenses paid, to D.C. for the interview process. ONE qualified HWS student may be selected by the Foundation

DACOR Bacon House Foundation Fellowships are awarded to encourage and assist American students in advanced study of international affairs at recognized American institutions of higher learning in the United States. The awards are made primarily on the basis of academic excellence. Fellowships are exclusively for tuition costs and will carry a stipend up to $12,500 ($6,250 per semester), depending on the actual tuition charge.

Application requirements:
1. Curriculum vitae (resume), which includes date of birth, citizenship, and marital status;
2. A transcript of his or her academic record at Hobart and William Smith Colleges and that of any other institution of higher learning that he or she may have attended; and
3. An essay of approximately 600 words prepared by each nominee, expanding on the information provided in the resume, as appropriate, and covering such matters as special academic or other accomplishments, work experience, experience related to international affairs (e.g. foreign travel, foreign study, competence in foreign languages), career objectives and any other matters pertinent to the nominee’s qualifications.
4. All materials MUST be submitted to Career Services by 12 noon on February 11th
5. Students will be notified by the end of the day on February 11th if they have been selected to come in for an interview with the HWS nominating committee on February 12th or 13th.

Questions? Please contact Bob Murphy or Brandi Ferrara in Career Services at x3514 or Murphy@hws.edu /bferrara@hws.edu

Labels: development, globalization, political economy, south asia

Labels: development, globalization, south asia, web technology

News of a cut in one of the fiber optic cables that links India and the Middle East with Europe and America got me interested in the old telegraph cable lines that linked India with Great Britain during the first age of globalization.

I came across this excellent website with maps of the old trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific cable routes.

I remember a story about the first age of globalization when the telegraph cable connecting Britain to Europe was severed, a British paper supposedly led with the headline: "Channel Telegraph Cable Cut in Storm: Europe Completely Cut Off!" I wonder if Indians working in call centers had a similarly glib sentiment this time around...

Labels: globalization, south asia

This week my Globalization students and I have been discussing Kwame Anthony Appiah's argument about cultural patrimony and the repatriation of cultural artifacts. My students generally concurred with Appiah's Cosmopolitan argument that repatriation is highly problemmatic. They agreed that cultural artifacts foster greater interest and respect for different cultures if people living in other parts of the world can have access to them.

I disagree; I generally support the repatriation of (illicitly obtained) cultural artifacts where a state makes a reasonable claim and provisions to preserve the item. (Of course, I would hope that states would be willing to share and loan as many artifacts as possible to museums, but the assertion of ownership is a different matter.) I see the issue in terms of speaking truth to power and attempting to correct historical injustices. I also see cultural artifacts through the lens of Walter Benjamin: these items have an aura and people should be willing to travel to see them in their own context if possible.

Nevertheless, I think we all agreed that these issues should be handled on a case by case basis.

Along these lines, I think Oxford University has articulated a reasonable approach to dealing with cultural repatriation. Oxford just decided to return Maori and Moriori remains to a museum in New Zealand. Now... about that mummy in the HWS library...

Labels: globalization