UW is no longer in my Top 8

...but I think MySpace is a joke anyway, so that's a moot point. And now for my annoyed rant:

What the hell!?

This could easily be an opportunity for another school (I think Wisconsin was the first? Could be wrong) to tell the RIAA to "[four letter word or any other favored explicative] off" and go start picking on people who actually profit from such alleged theft. But no, what does the UW and its overpaid administration do? (WARNING: INVOCATION OF GODWIN'S LAW AHEAD... sorta)

Yeah, full cooperation. Appeasement and FULL COOPERATION. Vichy France, meet your 21st-century equivalent.

This is ridiculous, and I, a lowly "blogger" with a T20 getting ready to suffer from Sudden T20 Death Syndrome, should not be the only one saying so. But what really pisses me off is that the article is in _THE NEWS TRIBUNE_. Not MyUW, The Seattle Times, or any other easily-accessible news source. The F'ing News Tribune.

Of course, I'm also annoyed by the high-minded assholes (who aren't getting served or sued, of course) that seem to believe that the RIAA is justified in this - "You broke the law, and now you're just paying for it, so stop yer whining" - without noting that a) the fees ($3K ~ $5K settlements) are ludicrously overpriced given that the songs aren't (and can't be) identified in any realistic way (the fees don't go to the actual singers and writers, who, in theory, are the ones most hurt by illegal downloading as it, in theory, leads to lower album sales and royalties) and b) the methods used by the RIAA to sniff out evildoers are pathetic, enough so that the government probably wouldn't use them as evidence in terrorist trials for fear of the case being thrown out over it.

Luckily for anyone who has the sense to not download and yet still got prosecuted for it, someone had the guts and balls to go after them. "...negligent and illegal investigation and prosecution" doesn't cover it all - there ought to be a "malicious" or two tossed in there as well. I'm not sure how the laws are different in Washington, but given that they're invoking the RICO Act (federal law) I don't see why it can't be done here. I'm also surprised it isn't class-action, either, as I can recall a few other cases along these lines.

Yes, there is illegal file-sharing on the UW campus - no doubt about that. If any UW students are reading this, I suggest that you stop and browse Amazon.com more, or rent movies - for free! - from Odegaard. And yes, the UW would be aiding the illegals (I'm going to start using this word to apply to any lawbreaker in the US, as it seems strange to simply use it in reference to illegal immigrants) but we're not talking about a political or national security issue here - this is simply an industry trying to make a few extra bucks off of people who are culturally not likely to be able to afford it. Of course, if the targeted students/staff happen to be the most well-off on campus... the UW would ignore it, the news media would ignore it, and it might come up in a footnote to the above suit or a leaked memo from the RIAA main office.

So in summary: I'm very disappointed in you, UW. Very disappointed. And you still haven't sent me my diploma!

Favorite Mac Hall strip

Here it is. Now that it's back up again, I popped by to see if I could find it. And there it was.

...It's even funnier if you can imagine X-Men II's Wolverine saying that as he jumps down from a balcony onto some soldiers.

CLASS: "Final Essay" - The Remixing of Language

Here's my final paper for ENGL 349-A. Came out about as well as I expected.

The Remixing of Language

Language is an important part of human culture – this line has greeted many a reader to a high-school-level exam essay – but the fact is, culture cannot survive without a language of some sort, and in this way it might be simplest to say that language is culture, making for disappointing moments when a popular work of science fiction does not remember and exploit this to its fullest. It goes without saying, then, that language is an especially important thing to have in mind when discussing or writing an Afrofuturism sort of text, and that, in theory, everything should follow from it. To use Kodwo Eshun's words, cut for space:

“Afrofuturism may be characterized as a program for recovering the histories of counter-futures created in a

century hostile to Afrodiasporic projection and as a space within which the critical work of manufacturing

tools capable of intervention within the current political dispensation may be undertaken.” (Eshun 301)

Of course, “tools” here can only be quickly explained as “things by which to manipulate ideas and their distribution” – with “manipulate” being in the very literal sense and encompassing both the complimentary and pejorative usages, and “ideas” being just about anything that can arguably fall under the phrase “intellectual property”. In short, the “tools” he refers to can be just about anything that can be said, sung, written, composed, copied/appropriated, and in certain cases thought, among other things – Eshun's “tools” are a means by which communication of ideas with a constructive purpose¹ can occur. Language obviously falls under these categories, but as my convoluted way of coming to this point has hopefully made clear, to simply ask how language works inside of Afrofuturism on its own would be (somewhat) selfishly limited in scope, as the movement, or “program” as he refers to it, may be thought of as² essentially being an Afrocentric offshoot of futurism, itself an offshoot of Science Fiction – in the sense that futurism tends to work best in the realm of Sci-fi and the possible. Thus, it is better to ask questions of Afrofuturism (a topic-system relatively small in scale) as it relates to language (a mind-bogglingly vast topic for a non-linguist), rather than the other way around. Switching gears slightly, the most important question one can ask with all this in mind, of course, is a reply to Audre Lorde's comment, that massa's tools will never dismantle massa's house (Hopkinson 7).

Before going any further, the idea of a “hybrid language” must be either struck down or further explained. Under one way of thinking, “hybrid language” is obviously a good way to describe a language that has evolved from the contact between, let's say, two “parent” languages – and under another way, it is an oxymoron. The idea basically is, to have a hybrid of something, the original parents must be clearly defined, and while this works on paper for a number of things that can be clearly defined, it does not work as cleanly for something as nebulous as a language. To keep things more or less simple, English will be the example³ here, and the thought experiment here will be research-paper simple – that is, very simple in scope, to the point that we will ignore the effects of race for the time being. Let us say that, Parents (A) and (B) both speak a particular dialect⁴ and that their Child (ab) grows up learning to speak a hybrid of that language. Given the way the public school system works in America, (ab) will probably be taught in American English – but will hear around her whatever regional dialect/accent is prevalent in the area. As she grows up, she will, unless she takes specific steps to speak otherwise, speak and write in a “peculiar” way – let us say that she uses her verbs in a particular way that would, to some outsiders, seem a bit odd – but will otherwise stay within the certain boundaries of American English. Assuming that she has the good sense not to go into linguistics in college, she goes about her life not really noticing the difference, and then has two children with a guy named (cd). These children cannot possibly both be (abcd), for two reasons. First, they would have to grow up in the exact same environments, under the exact same conditions, and come out to be exactly the same as far as their minds are concerned – anyone with more than one child knows that this, for all intents and purposes, simply never happens, although if it did it would make gift-giving much easier. Second – and this comes from the first – they would both have to speak the exact same language, the exact same dialect and accent of American English. This would require not only the exact same life experiences – friends, preferences in TV, music, lifestyles, literature, games, courseload when it becomes relevant, and so on, but mostly the sorts of things that both the child and the parents do not have complete control over under reasonable circumstances – but the same awareness of their language and how they use it. As the first is impossible, the second is as well – there will always be a minute difference somewhere in their lives, and so there will always be some minute difference somewhere in their language. Now take the second half of this situation, multiply it by the current number of families in America alone, keeping in mind the restrictions of a “local language”, and suddenly the word “hybrid” does not quite account for the fact that there are many hybrids coming out from all walks of life. Now toss the concept of race back into the experiment like a pin-less grenade – we didn't consider it, remember? – and attempt to come to the conclusion that a cacophony can be tuned. Finally, and for more entertainment, apply it to all English-speaking families on Earth, or write a book about it that confuses Samuel Delany. As this simplified and possibly flawed thought experiment should show – considering that English isn't even the most widely-spoken language, for example – everyone has a different set of Eshun's “tools” that are only similar in broad terms, that they are all “tools”.

But back to the “real” topic: Audre Lorde, who once stated that “massa's tools will never dismantle massa's house” (Hopkinson 7). There are a few ways to answer it, and for the most part, Nalo Hopkinson sums up the question by noting two answers: the tools themselves are in the public domain and now anyone with the skill can build a house, or they have been re-appropriated for other uses and so the size and style of the houses that pop up in the neighborhood no longer matters (Hopkinson 8). They are not mutual exclusive overall, but there is a small error here: note that neither actually solves the main problem of a house that, in the opinion of some, needs dismantling. This is actually a very silly question to ask at all – if “massa's tools” happen to be the best for the job, or are considered to be the best for the job, from a house-dismantling perspective this question wouldn't come up in the first place. But it has. This means that “massa's tools” cannot be the best for the job of taking the house and reducing it to not-house status – if it isn't “true”, it has to be “false” and not “maybe”, the latter of which isn't an option in a True-or-False question. As anything that can make can also be used to unmake – a hammer can drive in a nail, or break apart the two-by-four around it with some work – the question is really more of how one might go about it. In terms of construction, time and effort is spent to make something well, but most demolition jobs do not even reuse the same tools and are more likely to involve large tractor-driven hunks of metal with pistons or some explosive materials designed to very efficiently break things apart⁵, more so than the hammer. However – and the two answers Hopkinson gives are only possible with an awareness of this – there is little point in tearing something apart if it still has productive use, and as unpleasant as the phrasing of the metaphor is, “massa's house” and “massa's tools” are not without use. If the house is read to be the body of work produced by the language of the “massa”, then there is no problem at all with reusing the house in some way, as the “tools” here cannot be discussed in any fashion without an understanding of them – the problem lies in the understanding. While a description along the lines of “hammer goes whack” would be the simple, quick-and-dirty understanding of how the one particular tool is to be used, in the wrong context it might invite accusations of insensitivity – but it is an accurate foundation on which to build an understanding of how it can be used, and how other tools can work in conjunction with it. Gradually creating from scratch an understanding of how everything in the toolbox works and interacts with the building materials – which would be along the lines of experiences, dialogue, and other things the reader actually sees on a book page – the newly-minted builder finds that he or she is inside the house, figuring out how it all comes together. From there, it is a simple action of dropping “massa's tools”, running to the empty lot next door where the new builder's “tools” are, and building a new house – maybe not getting it right the first time, but eventually.

Aside from the poor-but-accurate choice of metaphor, there is something else wrong with the metaphor of dismantling a house with tools, or rather, it implies something that is more disturbing than the idea of “massa's house” by itself. The exact wording of the first answer Hopkinson gave⁶ was:

“He looked over at me and said (I'm paraphrasing), “We've been taught all out lives how superior European

literature is. In our schools, it's what we're instructed to read, to analyze, to understand, how we're taught to

think. They gave us those tools. I think that now, they're our tools, too.” (Hopkinson 8)

This ought to bring many things to mind, anywhere from the idea of forcing one culture to assimilate by disallowing education in the native or local language – basically, the not-the-colonizers' language – to a conservative school board with an irritatingly low budget for new books and no tolerance for controversial ones. In any case, it hints at censorship. Censorship in itself is not always a bad thing, in the same way that a five-year-old should probably not have access to an actual hammer and breakable things. But after it has been allowed to creep up past a certain point, it becomes a problem, and intellectuals everywhere bear arms of ink. There is a moment in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode “Far Beyond The Stars” where Comdr. Benjamin Sisko faces it – for most of the episode, he finds himself as a black writer, ending with his story of a Black spaceship captain rejected even after changes – and refuses to give up his idea nonetheless. But a better, perhaps even frightening example would be the “authenticity rules” in Evie Shockley's “Separation Anxiety”, which are exactly as they sound – rules designed to keep protagonist [P]eaches' preferred form of art, dance, “authentic” and “black”. In her words: “all these authenticity rules! gotta have eighty percent historical content in each program. can't change not a step in performing some nineteenth or twentieth century dance. it's like we're fossils, walking around.” (Shockley 60) Specifically, if dance – a somewhat minor “tool” in the toolbox, all things considered – can only be performed in a specific way, what's to say that other, more widely used “tools”, are not under similar controls? Nothing – it isn't confirmed or denied, and the only hint of this possibility is in her pluralization of “authenticity rules”, which could quite easily be referring to something else. There is some irony here, in that they have absolutely nothing to do with “massa's house” and “massa's tools” in the “ghetto” and are using their own “tools” – but aren't allowed to change the “house” too much, or else something happens. That [P]eaches is the only one to really complain about it is also bothering, but there is only so much that can be read into.

If censorship is one way to keep certain “tools” from ever getting anything new done, what would be another way? Assuming the materials and the tools cannot be destroyed or intercepted⁷, the only other option would be to remove the builder – and that is where Derrick Bell's “The Space Traders” comes in. Since simply publicly killing all users of a particular “tool” would usually be fairly illegal under most America laws, the solution would be to accept a trade for them all, from aliens who speak in the “familiar comforting tones of former President Reagan” (Bell 327) – for some reason, this never sets off alarm bells in anyone. (Why Reagan? The simplest answer, from a writer's perspective, is that he was the most recent President at the time of writing.) It should have been cause of great worry from the American perspective in the story, as it would mean that the Space Traders knew a great deal about them without explaining why - “sinister” is not strong enough a word – and, in a more ironic sense, likely have better-established “tools”. Regardless, in the end – and despite all sorts of effort to prevent it – virtually all Black citizens of America are forced to leave with the Space Traders. Various “tools” are employed, but the right ones evidentially were not – Golightly, the current President's “unofficial black cabinet member” (Bell 330) attempts to suggest that they all pull a “trickster” on the rest of the population, but it does not go through the wall of prideful integrity at the “Anti-Trade Coalition” (Bell 342). There is no conformation that careful and judicious use of language would have turned the tide, but Golightly gets the last laugh, sort of:

“ “I wonder,” he murmured, half to himself, half to his wife, as they rode in a luxury limousine sent, in some

irony, by the Secretary of the Interior to convey them to the nearest roundup point, “how my high-minded

brothers at the conference feel now about their decision to fail with integrity rather than stoop to the bit of

trickery that might have saved them.” ” (Bell 354)⁸

If there is something to be learned from this, it is that it is probably better to carefully compare “houses” before committing to one – pay less attention to the craftsmanship and builder than the location and safety of it.

As mentioned before, “hybrid” is not the best word to use when referring to languages, and a “tools and houses” metaphor for expression in one is not foolproof – most of the preceding two paragraphs is an excellent example of this. Despite its simplicity, it actually is a difficult question to answer, as it is possible to both agree and disagree with it depending on what context it is placed in. The best to answer it, as hopefully shown, is to not assume that the answers are limited to a simple yes or no, but to remember that there are two components to it: the end and the means, the actual expression and the roads that actually lead to it. There are really three answers, in this case, wherein one or the other is more important, or they are both of equal importance. In other words, “massa's house” (the body of literature) can be kept while the “tools” are destroyed and a new “house” is built across the street, or “massa's tools” (the methods which can be used to create it) can be kept and used to dismantle the “house” while another is built across the street, or both can be kept while another “house” is built across the street. It almost does not matter, as another house is eventually going to get built anyway – the only difference is whether there will even be a neighbor, an annoyed neighbor, or a neighbor who comes by twice a week to the new house to study and criticize it for years until it is accepted.

At any rate, “hybrid” is not the proper word to attach to “tools”, but in keeping with Eshun's attention to the sonic medium, perhaps “remixed” might make more sense when the “tools” are language. It certainly seems to fit within the boundaries of Afrofuturism.

Works Cited:

Bell, Derrick. “The Space Traders.” Dark Matter. Ed. Sheree R. Thomas. Aspect, 2001. 326-355.

Eshun, Kodwo. “Further Considerations on Afrofuturism.” CR: The New Centennial Review 3.2

2003. 287-302. University of Washington, Seattle, WA. 27 Mar. 2007

<http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/new_centennial_review/v003/3.2eshun.html>

“Far Beyond The Stars.” Writ. Ira Steven Behr and Hans Beimler. Perf. Avery Brooks. Star Trek: Deep Space

Nine. 2 Feb. 1998

Hopkinson, Nalo. “Introduction.” So Long Been Dreaming: Post-Colonial Science Fiction. Ed. Nalo Hopkinson,

Uppinder Mehan. Arsenal Pulp Press, 2004. 7-9.

Shockley, Evie. “Separation Anxiety.” Dark Matter. Ed. Sheree R. Thomas. Aspect, 2001. 51-68.

1A debatable way of putting it: simply imagining a world in which everyone is Black will not do it along

2This is a highly limited reading, of course, but to keep a longish paper under control, it will do.

3English, lacking a governing body as a language, is notoriously unreliable in cases.

4Dialect refers to a particular syntax and vocab, often with its own accent (pronunciations) in practice.

5Related and fun, but ultimately pointless, example: in the original Transformers, the six “Constructicons” are each good at a particular construction job and transform from/into a related heavy vehicle – they build things. They can also combine into Devastator , who does exactly what his name implies, not uncommonly to things recently built by the Constructicons. It's like this, in a way.

6This person is described as a friend of Zainab Amadahy, and a recent recipient of a PhD. (Hopkinson 7).

7I'm sure they could, and that perfectly good books and movies have been written about forced memory loss...

8There is no question mark or tone – he likely expected it.

CLASS: HIST 290 Essay #4

I'm posting it here so that, just in case WebPine fails me again, I can prove that I finished it on time... Huh. I guess the footnotes weren't that big a problem...

The Face of Evil and Modern Eugenics

When a layperson is asked “what is eugenics?”, the immediate answer will be anywhere between one of confusion (“is that some kind of cologne?”¹) or something along the lines of controls on birth for the sake of the future (“...yeah, that”) – ultimately, it tends to mean exactly what the user wants it to mean, neither more nor less. As Diane Paul puts it in “Eugenic Anxieties, Social Realities, Political Choices”, it “is a word with nasty connotations but an indeterminate meaning” (Paul 99), and is generally understood to be so. She also notes that:

“Eugenics has been variously described as an ideal, as a doctrine, as a science (applied human genetics), as a set of practices (ranging from birth control to euthanasia), and as a social movement. The word has been applied to intentions and to wholly unintended effects. It has been defined expansively, to incorporate medical genetics, and narrowly, to wholly exclude it.” (Paul 95)

What she fails to mention² is that eugenics has a life outside of the scholarly analysis she gives the word, especially in science fiction, a genre notorious for running on ideas more than careful characterization³, and what better media form than television to showcase it? Of course, once the conversation switches to TV and Sci-fi, there are only a few logical examples, chief among them the ever-popular “Doctor Who”, designed to be a show enjoyable by both adults and children yet also equipped with a built-in depth to the stories⁴ that not only allowed it to stand up to the test of time, but also justifies picking them apart as with fine literature. It even had a few turns with eugenics – for example, the Daleks religiously believe in any brand of “negative eugenics” that involves EX-TER-MI-NATing. Of the 26 original seasons, the Fourth Doctor serial “The Face of Evil”⁵ stands out for a few reasons, not the least of which being the portrayal of a mildly “successful” eugenics experiment. More than anything else, the word “successful” is extremely important, as eugenics as a whole has always been virtually impossible to implement on a wide scale, owing to human nature.

To summarize the story, the Doctor finds himself alone on an unnamed planet, where two tribes – the “savage” Sevateem and the “refined” Tesh – survive with the ultimate goal of freeing Xoanon, who each tribe believes to be their own god, all the while surrounded by technology neither can use to their full advantage. As it turns out, Xoanon is a sentient computer, formerly a colonization ship's main computer, gone “insane” (Dicks 101), described as having “acute schizophrenia”⁶ (Dicks 88) – the cause of which was a small error in assistance rendered by the Doctor years ago. As a result of its insanity, Xoanon began an experiment in eugenics, and split the colonizers into two tribes: the Survey Team became the Sevateem and grew a culture of strength and courage, while the Techs became the Tesh, adhering to a code of denying the flesh and gaining “paraphysical” powers⁷. It goaded the tribes, which had apparently never seen the other – the “invisible other” – into conflict in order to speed up the process, with bloody results. Had the Doctor not come back, it would have proceeded to somehow unite the two into a perfect race⁸ – but because he did, it set the colonization ship to self-destruct to kill him. When this is stopped in the nick of time, and the two tribes realize what has happened, a truce is finally set up and testy “peace talks” begin, with the ultimate goal of uniting.

The story, badly summarized above, is actually a canny satire of religious extremism – and beyond that, appears to draw on the Israel-Palestine debacle⁹ – more than it is a story of eugenics, but it does not ignore the issue. And it is eugenics – the Doctor suddenly realizes it as such at one point in the show, with a look of horror¹⁰, and later, a sane Xoanon confirms it. While it does not add anything scholarly to the debate – at least, nothing Diane Paul et al. would be able to use in all seriousness - it does give one method of bringing about a “successful” eugenic “end”. The biggest point The Face of Evil drives home, however, is that, given human nature, it really would take the daily presence of an omniscient god – albeit one who only speaks to a specified person in a specific setting¹¹ – existing somewhere beyond a group of colonists to really get an eugenic society going, rather than a government attempting to do so in a large population, and even then cultural control would be required. Culturally, both tribes are based around Xoanon, which would allow for greater population control – the nature of their beliefs is not gone into, but the Sevateem can be thought of as more “promiscuous” than the Tesh for the simple reason that the latter's culture specifically revolves around physical denial¹². So in the end, it is probably not a question of voluntary or coercive genetic control so much as it is a question of who or what is doing the controlling. Similarly, there is no objective standard for what counts as “successful eugenics” or not: the Sevateem and Tesh can survive as races of people, and they are successful in that respect only, but their past and origins have become a sort of religious story, even a myth – they are not the race, perhaps not even the species, they once were, and do not know it.

Bibliography

Paul, Diane. “The Politics of Heredity.” Eugenic Anxieties, Social Realities, Political Choices. Ed. Diane Paul. State University of New York Press, 1998. 95~115.

Dicks, Terrance. Doctor Who and The Face of Evil. London: Target Book(s), 1978

“The Face of Evil.” Doctor Who. BBC, UK. 1 January ~ 22 January 1977. (End-of-credits copyright is MCMLXXVI, apparently owing to a airing delay.)

Sullivan, Shannon Patrick. “The Face of Evil”. Online. <http://shannonsullivan.com/drwho/serials/4q.html> Accessed 4 June 2007.

1“Eau de Genics for Men and Women”: guaranteed to attract the best possible mate for the best possible offspring. $24.95 at Wal-Mart.

2“A host of television programs, trade books, and scholarly and popular articles express their authors' alarm at the prospect of a eugenics revival.” (Paul 97) – this is as close as she comes.

3Not an inaccurate description of eugenics, actually.

4Helped by the serial format – 4 episodes to a story seemed to be the average, with some far longer and more epic than that.

5All references will be to the televised version, available on video as well as YouTube: search for “face of evil part” (including quotes), and look for the ones posted by “ange728” - active as of 6/4/07.

6While the insane part is obvious – Xoanon believes itself to be the Doctor, having gotten a copy of his personality within it, and refers to him as “us” or “we” – both the show and the novelization describe it as “schizophrenia” and have in encompass both the delusions and the split/multiple personality disorder.

7This is the word used in the show; the book changes this to “mind control” and “telepathy” (Dicks 121). And in addition to all this, the Sevateem are portrayed as tan and muscular, while the Tesh are pale (from living inside the colonization ship?) and on the slender side – the somewhere-in-the-middle Tom Baker thus sticks out, but is amusingly identified as “The Evil One” by the former and “The Lord of Time” by the other.

8Physical appearances aside, they are never described as biologically incompatible, but how it would have done so is unknown.

9That Leela, the Sevateem woman who joins the Doctor after this story, is named for a Palestinian hijacker famous at the time, is one hint... (Web: Sullivan)

10The weight of this realization is not in the book – it would be on page 82 – even though he likely realizes just how mad Xoanon is at this point, and his actions become more frantic afterwards in the show. Additionally, in the book, the Doctor also refers to it as “selective breeding” before the realization – this is likely because the book was specifically written for a young audience, and paraphrases in general besides.

11Because of this, not everyone believes in Xoanon or the power the shaman Neeva wields over the Sevateem, as Xoanon only talks to him when he is in his Inner Sanctum – that Xoanon really does talk to him isn't obvious at the beginning, where it appears Neeva is doing whatever he wants under the guise of religion.

12The Tesh live on the colonization ship, and would be more likely to face issues with overpopulation – their self-denial beliefs would a) help to keep it from happening and b) make it more bearable if it did.