The Bat Blog

Lesson 1: What is the Internet?

2011-04-04T20:51:00.001-07:00

A vast computer network linking smaller computer networks worldwide (usually preceded by the ).

The Internet includes commercial, educational, governmental, and other networks, all of which use

the same set of communications protocols.

The first paragraph of the Wikipedia Page for the "Internet" expands on this a bit more:

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP) to serve billions of users worldwide. It is a network of networks that consists of millions of private, public, academic, business, and government networks, of local to global scope, that are linked by a broad array of electronic, wireless and optical networking technologies. The Internet carries a vast range of information resources and services, such as the inter-linked hypertext documents of the World Wide Web (WWW) and the infrastructure to support electronic mail.

Now maybe you're like me, and were caught up on a particular reference in the last paragraph, perhaps, it was TCP/IP?. I'm going to look up this acronym now.

TCP/IP-Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and the Internet Protocol (IP):

After reading several articles on these acronyms, I decided on this explanation from pcmag.com's encyclopedia:

The TCP/IP suite provides two transport methods. TCP ensures that data arrive intact and complete, while UDP just transmits packets. TCP is used for data that must arrive in perfect form, and UDP is used for real-time applications such as voice over IP (VoIP) and videoconferencing, where there is no time to retransmit erroneous or dropped packets.

TCP/IP is a routable protocol, and the IP network layer in TCP/IP provides this capability. The header prefixed to an IP packet contains not only source and destination addresses of the host computers, but source and destination addresses of the networks they reside in. Data transmitted using TCP/IP can be sent to multiple networks within an organization or around the globe via the Internet, the world's largest TCP/IP network.

I also really liked this "non-techie-person" explanation from A.P. Lawrence:

Think about the early telegraphs and Morse code. Press the telegraph key in the right pattern and that means the letter "A" to the person at the other end of the line. Morse code is just patterns of "on" and "off"...The Internet uses patterns of "on" and "off" too. In Morse code, it's "dahs" and "dits"; on the Internet we call it 0's and 1's. Same idea, different words. "Dah" and "0" are "off", "dit" and "1" are "on". There is one important difference. Morse code is variable length. An "A" is "dit-dah" and a "B" is "dah-dit-dit-dit". Internet code (TCP/IP) is always eight units long. An "A" is "01000001" and a "B" is "01000010"...It gets just a teeny bit more complicated. There are a lot of computers out there: yours, mine, a few at Google, IBM, Yahoo.. if I want to send "ABABAB" to Google (think how happy they will be to see that!), how do I get it there?

I wrap it in a packet. Some people like to explain this as an "envelope" and they talk about writing the address on the envelope, but it's just more 0's and 1's and it's always eight at a time. Those eight zero's and ones are a "byte" and some of the bytes in the packet say where it's going and some say where it is coming from...Inside the packet, if we're looking at the part that has the address of the computer the packet came from, the bytes always mean just that: where it came from.

But the data, the "010000010100001001000001010000100100000101000010" part, might not mean "ABABAB". It might mean 65, 66, 65, 66, 65, 66. Or it might mean a color or a sound - it depends on how the other end interprets it. Paul Revere said "one if by land, two if by sea". You can't really know what "ABABAB" means unless you know what it is supposed to mean.

Here's a visual from pcmag.com:

Now if you're not thoroughly confused by the explanation of the linking protocol of the internet, we can move on to internet coding, also known as the language of the internet, or HTML.

Here is what a great little tutorial website called Page Tutor says about HTML coding:

The basic idea is this... A web page is nothing more than a file, an HTML file to be exact. It's called HTML because web page documents have the file extension .html or .htm. HTML stands for Hyper Text Mark-up Language.

Here's an elaboration on HTML from Wikipedia:

HTML is written in the form of HTML elements consisting of tags, enclosed in angle brackets (like ), within the web page content. HTML tags normally come in pairs. The first tag in a pair is the start tag, the second tag is the end tag (they are also called opening tags and closing tags). In between these tags programmers can add text, tables, images, etc.

The purpose of a web browser is to read HTML documents and compose them into visual or audible web pages. The browser does not display the HTML tags, but uses the tags to interpret the content of the page.

HTML elements form the building blocks of all websites. HTML allows images and objects to be embedded and can be used to create interactive forms. It provides a means to create structured documents by denoting structural semantics for text such as headings, paragraphs, lists, links, quotes and other items. It can embed scriptsin languages such as JavaScript which affect the behavior of HTML webpages.

An analogy that I came up with is thinking of viewing the internet as watching an extremely well-dubbed foreign film. Your web browser is taking a different language that you don't speak and seamlessly translating it into a language that you do understand, although, the origin of the web content is still based in the foreign language. This leaves you with a choice, you can carry on simply viewing what is translated to you, or you can choose to learn the code, which gives you the power to not only read the content in it original form, but eventually enables you to start creating the content yourself. The latter is what I intend to do, and you can join me here, as I publish my step-by-step process to learning the language of the internet and how communication inside the network conducts itself. Stay tuned.

Goals, Commitment, and Other Grown-Up Crap...

2011-04-04T18:59:00.000-07:00

It's hard to have a blog when you don't have a clearly defined goal. That's because it's difficult, as least for me anyway, to write about an infinite number of potential things, not to mention it's hard to attract faithful readers without a stable product. My imagination goes all over the place...at a pace too fast to settle on any one thing for a substantial amount of time. I know everybody these days thinks that have ADD, but I seriously don't think my brain can focus on one thing for more than 5 seconds after 2 o'clock in the afternoon. It's a reality I have to deal with.

Anywho, my deficiency in attentiveness has led me to the conclusion (ironically) that I desperately need to find a subject, a schitck, a niche, on which to base this blog, in order to cling to my own sanity, and maybe a few followers. I've toyed with making this a news blog, a life log, and a cheese bog, (wait that last one isn't a real thing), but none has really intrigued me to the point of developing a disciplined blogging habit thus far.

This leads me to the question: why is it that it's necessary to blog? Is it because I like my inner monologue so much that I find it important to share it with others? Is it because I'm so smart I think I have an obligation to plaster my profound thoughts across a public forum for all to see as some kind of noble duty to my fellow man? Those last two make me sound kind of vain, but they're perhaps not too far from the truth.

So, if I am blogging to satisfy a selfish desire to hear myself talk--digitally-- then it seems the least I could do is find some way to make the blog equally beneficial for whomever happens upon my writings and is entertained enough by my self-centered and cynical style to read beyond the first paragraph. I'll think about that idea and get back to you.

...about twenty minutes go by...

Based on the last twenty minutes or so of thorough contemplation, I have decided that at least for now, I will make this blog about my new pursuit of knowledge surrounding the internet. What is this weird world of translated code that is "surfable," and who ever thought of such a thing? Surfing a code...surfing anything other than channels...or waves, well whatever, it's weird.

To start, I may sound unavoidably naive or unsavvy, but hell, that's because I'm just learning as I go. So if you're particualarly internet savvy, you might be bored for the first few months of my journey, or you might be entertained by my failures, you might even comment on this blog with your pointers (yes, please) for my future success. Any feedback is appreciated, as that means your are reading my blog, and perpetuating my drive to continue this ego-infusing project.

Since at this point this post is mostly rambling, I'll start with the actual internet exploring (no stupid microsoft browser reference intended) in the next post.

Thanks for reading this far.

Rediscovering an Artful Past

2010-04-05T13:58:00.000-07:00

When life gets ya down I've found that it's important to remember that it might not be life's fault. Sometimes the stress, fatigue, worry, and general 'ick' feeling is all in your head. Heck, you might be the number one cause of your own life's downiness. So perk that chin up put on your comfy travel shoes, cause we're going back in time.

I'm finding that one of the best ways to rediscover happiness is to travel (in your mind of course) back to a time when you remember a greater level of contentment. What were you doing? Wearing? Eating? Who were you hanging out with? What kind of music were you listening to? It all seems too simple you say? You'd be suprised how much people struggle with simplicity in the 21st century. In fact, in my own exprience lately, the more I try to simplify, the more I've been causing a greater degree of chaos and confusion.

Example? When trying to simply mail in a credit card payment (the old fashioned way), I ended up with a considerable amount of money getting lost in the mail and countless added trips to several different bank locations in order to solve the mystery (well...trips have been made, but the mystery is still not solved). It seems that my own desire for simplicity led to my own temporary financial demise.

This, however, is only a small and very specific example of a larger direction my life has been taking over the past few years. When I started school, I didn't know how my career was going to work out, but I knew that I wanted to be an artist. It was what I did. It was what I was good at. But wanting to be an artist, a seemingly simple idea for me, caused a great deal of confusion and chaos from my family. How was I going to make any money? How would I establish any security for my future? In this case, my family thought their concerns were quite simple too, as well as practical.

So in the interest of clearing up their doubts about my ability to survive on my own, I began to devise what I thought to be more simple goals. Practical goals. I switched my major from theater to communications. I directed my career goals from the stage to mass media. Then eventually my hobbies began to change. I went from painting and sewing to watching the news. I went from going to movies and shows to cooking meals at home. I thought I was being practicle and simple, but the truth is that it was just causing me more grief. The greif came from not being able to let go of either set of aspirations. Now I always find myself trying to follow both paths, have it all, do everything; and it is starting to break me.

But the moment I picked up a paint brush and starting painting for the first time in about four years there was instant joy. It was as if content was spewing from the brush's tip. I was ecstatic, like one of my fingers had miraculously returned from a several-year absence. Then a few weeks later I attended an audition for the first time in nearly two years. Though I don't think that I performed my best, I was instantly reunited with that old sense of pre-performance nervousness that brings me ultimate rejuvination.

Slowly, I'm starting to feel like my old singing, painting, crazy-clothes wearing self again. It is comforting to know, that the version of me that I used to love is not totally gone, but has only supressed for a short while. I am no longer worried about my future. I figure, if my family is so adamate about worrying, then they can carry that responsibility for me. I need to do what makes me happy, or I'll never be able to handle all the other stresses that "life" throws at me.

So please, my friends, love ones, and even strangers that might happen upon this blog, as best you can...be true to yourselves. Don't lose sight of what makes you you. Even when it hurts to be misunderstood, I have found that trying to change who you are (even when done subconciously) is not a better alternative. This message has probably been repeated twenty or thirty million times by now, but perhaps that's because the goal of being true to yourself is so easy to lose sight of. So write it down this time...on a sticky note or something. Much Love ;-)

And here's a couple quotes to keep in mind:

"Gnothi Seauton"

-Socrates

"Sometimes the hardest thing to be in this world is just yourself,"

-Brother Ali

"Do you want to play a lead role in your own life? Or a supporting role in someone else's life?"

-Hillary Clinton

"Let go of what you think this is"

-Anne Bogart

"Real World" Update

2010-02-26T09:39:00.000-08:00

What a piece of work is man, how noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving, how express and admirable, in action how like an angle, in apprehension how like a god!

-Hamlet Act II, scene 2, 303-312

I still remember reading this quote for the first time in Ms. Judge's 12th grade English class. Though I did realize at that moment that my understanding of the profundity of that line was incomplete, there is no way I could have anticipated to what degree. I seem to wake up each morning asking myself, "is this really my life?" and "what am I supposed to be doing here?" What else besides human existence presents such infinite possibility devoid of a pure or clear pedagogy by which to achieve it? Furthermore, why do humans long for such a guide? I am irked by the irrationality of that conundrum, which is itself, ironic.

So where do I go from here? Each day I try not to dwell on the fact that I am beaconless and underdeveloped. I try not be overwhelmed by how my fellow humans confuse me so. I feign comfort in situations of uncertainty (which is always). I wonder. How long will this state continue? When will the confusion fade? When do I start to fit in my own skin?

As a child I looked ahead to each new graduation of maturity with anxious anticipation. I knew what was next: driver's tests, proms, college application essays. But my life right now is at a stage that no one bothered to explain, or perhaps it is undefinable. The stage is now determined by me and the order in which I place those stages in turn determines many seminal aspects of my future. But regardless of whether or not I act, I am making a choice. My fate is being determined for me while I sit hesistantly trying to make up my mind. I find myself, now more than ever before, longing for a pause button.

Before I can move on, I want to become more aquainted with this stranger I call me. I don't want to glaze over my own passions, aversions, and abilities. But amid my current civil arrangement, how can I hope to have any time for personal discovery? Working to feed and house myself consumes most of my days.

Did Huxley have it right in his dystopian classic? Is man (whether voluntarily or pharmacologically induced) doomed to fall into some exploitive order? And another mystery remains, how is this fate possible when the scheming despots are nothing but human themselves? How do I tap into the autonomous nature that they possess? Oh what a remarkably confusing piece of work is man.

New Fan Page on Facebook!

2009-11-20T14:59:00.001-08:00

Michelle Alimoradi is a fan of

Michelle's Hennepin Theater District Examiner Page

Create your Fan Badge

Movin' on up

2009-11-09T08:36:00.000-08:00

Hey there fellow bloggers,

My journey to actually getting paid to write about my thoughts has progressed!

I am now the Hennepin Theatre District Examiner for Examiner.com.

Please check out my first article on Hennepin Theatre Trust historical theater tours at my new Examiner home page.

If you like what you see, I encourage you to subscribe to my posts at the top of the page.

Thanks!

Health Care Reform, What Twin Cities residents have to say

2009-09-21T12:50:00.000-07:00

Audio link to my coverage of Keith Ellison's health care forum last month in North Minneapolis.

https://www.kfai.org/node/22253

Needlework Knowhow

2009-08-29T11:21:00.000-07:00

Lately the only thing that has helped me pass the part time job blues is needlework. My amazing grandmother taught me how to crochet when I was very young and I've been going in and out of crochet phases since then. It wasn't ever something I would consider myself an expert in, but it is great for someone like me who has a phobia of being idle.

About four years ago, my dear dear friend Ellie O taught me how to knit. I loved it at first, but after realizing that knitting is a much slower process than crocheting (and therefore far less gratifying for me), I rediscovered my love for crochet. I'm not sure if it's the process itself, or the fact that crocheting reminds of and makes me feel closer to my grandmother. Perhaps it's both. But lately during my long periods of time off I've been crocheting anything and everything I can.

I used to be against using patterns because I believed (and still do in a way) that 'art' does not come with instructions. Many people might not consider needle work a true art, but I'm a proud supporter of the applied arts. I believe that everything in you use in life can be beautiful. Why just hang paintings on blank walls, when the building itself can be a work of art?

But now I'm older and supposedly wiser and can recognize that patterns (and instructions for that matter) teach the tools you need to go off on your own and make more unique works of art. By crocheting with patterns (and often deviating from them) I have learned many new techniques and I've come to appreciate the importance of using a quality yarn product as well. Though, you can't beat the color selection of good 'ol $2.50 a scene Red Heart yarn (http://www.redheart.com/).

Another thing I've come to realize is that it is ok to sell your art. I used to be very against selling any of my art or craft projects because I thought that one you added money into the mix, it would stiffled creativity or cause you to resent your art as an obligation rather than a hobby to enjoy, but I'm finding that I'm crocheting more than I could possibly keep for myself or give away to friends and in order to afford to continue at this rate, I will have to resort to selling and taking orders. A realization that I'm not so sad about anymore. I'm excited that even though I may never get a job that uses the degree I've gone into all this debt for, at least people might enjoy my crocheting enough to support my ability to continue. So feel free to commission a project from me. Right now I'm really into making purses, but I'm begining to make shawls and skirts as well. My rates are low and my quality is high. Thanks and good night.

View my ads on Craigslist!

http://minneapolis.craigslist.org/hnp/clo/1351998517.html

http://minneapolis.craigslist.org/hnp/bab/1351967624.html

Juneteenth, A Forgotten Holiday?

2009-06-18T09:55:00.000-07:00

People in the Twin Cities celebrated the annual Juneteenth festival yesterday at Theodore Wirth park in Minneapolis, but event organizers still have their work cut out for them as far as educating people about the historical significance of the celebration. KFAI's Michelle Alimoradi reports.

http://www.kfai.org/node/20648

2009-06-04T13:55:00.000-07:00

In times like these I'm reminded of the lyrics from one my favorite musicals, Avenue Q.

What do you do with at B.A. in English?
What is my life going to be?

Four years of college,
And plenty of knowledge,
Have earned me this useless degree.

And so it is there that I stand, right in the middle of internship eligibility and two years professional experience. How does that type of system even make logical sense? Why are there not more entry-level positions? Why do more people not have paid assistants instead of unpaid 'interns?' I would gladly sit alongside a seasoned professional in my field for barely above minimum wage if it meant that I would be gaining the type of experience necessary to actually advance in my field later.

In light of this apparent catch 22, I've decided to return to the basics. Learning to rediscover my love for writing may be the only way to maintain my current level of sanity. My reserve supply of patience has long since been consumed, my virtues, exhausted.

I even find myself at a loss for topics to write about. I won't pretend that people will remain interested in my log of personal antics and happenings for long. It's nice to break up the news with personal check ins now and then, but I know, in the long run, I have to find my areas of conviction.

Recently the issues that have been weighing on me pertain mostly to the job market, obviously. Many layoffs that have occured lately were ill-advised and exponentially harmful to the terminated workers. My own cousin was just recently laid off from his job at a television station in Flint, Michigan where he had been employed for many years. His position was eliminated due to a station merger and now he has been leadless in his job search for months. I am convinced that new legislation should be developed to prevent companies from approving drastic job eliminations without first exhausting all other options.

How have the powerful few in this country gotten away with isolating the fruits of their success from the hands of their labor-class counterparts? How has this exploitative mindset survived for so long in the land of the American dream? I am not a socialist, but I don't believe that the rich few can lay claim to the vast wealth earned by the manual labor of a less fortunate army. We must shrink the opportunity gap in this country, now more so than ever.

Perhaps the American dream has become antiquated with rapid population growth. How can this country sustain delusions of equality when there are too many people to track? Sometimes I feel as if our system has been out-manned.

My current dilemma is that I have no tangible solution. I am literally and figuratively stuck. I am also not sure if I have wandered outside the realm of my intellectual capacity or if my frustration has become temporarily debilitating. Where to turn from here?

For now, I am at a loss for other topics to explore. Feel free to offer any suggestions you'd like to hear more about.

Alimoradi out.

A Few Audio Links

2009-05-25T21:56:00.000-07:00

In case you missed their original broadcasts, here are some links to a few of my KFAI news stories.

Here ya go.

A story I did recently on Experimental College, the twin cities chapter.

http://www.kfai.org/node/20078

This story in on the progress of the Saint Paul Saint's request for a new baseball stadium in Saint Paul.

http://www.kfai.org/node/19677

More to come soon.

Life After Graduation

2009-05-25T21:28:00.000-07:00

Tonight I was watching CNN and noticed an ad for their upcoming special on life after graduation. Interested, I decided to google “life after graduation” and see what advice the tangled world web could offer to a confused post-graduation twenty-something like myself. What key advice did google retrieve?

A blog on the first 30 days after college graduation said this: “You have a lot on your plate, from searching for a job to figuring out your living arrangements to plotting your finances. With all of these variables, this can be an incredibly confusing time.” Thank you for fishing out the most obvious response master google. But could google offer me any advice on how to sacrifice my sanity amid this thirty-day crisis? Google’s response was this: “Remember, however, that you’ve achieved a lot and reached the point where you can finally live life on your own terms.” Well at least I still have my keen ability to bullshit, a skill I honed successfully throughout my pursuit of an undergraduate degree in useless theories on real life. With that I can at least feign sanity until the whole situation blows over.

I did return to the job search again this morning, not much else to do on a cloudy memorial day. But my search was quickly interrupted by Internet disconnect when my roommate decided to use the house phone to make a call. For the past few months, none of us have bothered to call the phone company to fix the fact that our Internet and phone line can’t be used at the same time. Today, I was just glad it gave me a good excuse to find some other way to occupy my time.

I headed down to the kitchen to put together meal numero uno for the day. I first thought of making spaghetti, but then decided to get a little more ambitious. I make this black bean stew that everybody really loves and today I noticed that I had all the fresh ingredients to make it from scratch. Giddy at the thought of spending the next hour or so cleaning, dicing, peeling and spicing, I dove into the project whole-heartedly. I roasted corn, peeled carrots, and chopped onions all morning to my heart’s content. I’m still amazed at how sharply my attitude towards cooking has shifted in the past few years. I used to despise it. Maybe I saw cooking as a fulfillment of some debilitating female stereotype. But now, politics aside, I find it so relaxing. It’s a fun little project to create something really tasty and original. Plus, I find most prepared food I buy either too bland, or shamelessly flavored with too much salt. Finding my own savory blend of spices has turned cooking into a fun little adventure.

After finishing up with my bean stew prep work and getting the mixture on the oven to simmer, I decided to tend to my new vegetable garden on the balcony. I just planted spinach and cucumber seeds and bought tomato and jalapeño plants from the nursery yesterday. I’ve got quite the little botanical oasis started on my perch. I’m pretty excited about the garden, because as soon as the fun of gardening has paid off, I’ll be able to cook with the crop. I love how the two hobbies complement each other.

Life after graduation is still in the beginning stage of course, but I believe I’m in the midst of the hardest part of the transition. My drive to accomplish tasks each day has lost the majority of its momentum. I’m staggering to complete anything and dragging along from one day to the next. I woke up at one in the afternoon today thinking it was still nine in the morning. I unknowingly slept half the day away when only a month ago I was never able to sleep past eight in the morning.

The hardest part of all of it is the vast amount of options that lay before me. I realize now that I never considered life without the structure that school provides. The concept totally blindsided me. I’m looking out at a vast gray area of competing options. If I think too much about the future, I’ll never get anywhere in the interim, if focus too much on the now, I may lose sight of my long-term goals. I feel the heavy weight of adulthood responsibility lowering down on top of me. My childhood vigor and curiosity have escaped my recollection.

I don’t really expect anyone to read about my struggle and see it as unique or intriguing. I suppose it’s more just to spell out my struggle in a more tangible way. I think getting over the hump involves a great deal of self-exploration and re-connecting with one’s old hobbies. But also I think one can find serenity by connecting with others in the same stage of life, reaching out to each other even if only to help occupy the time on the more fruitless days; when you find someone else to join in your struggle, at least you can distribute some of the weight.

Old Memories of the New Moon

2009-05-05T21:09:00.000-07:00

It has been thirty years since Teatro de la Jeune Lune (Theater of the New Moon in French) began its journey in 1979। In that year, Co-founder Barbara Berlovitz and three of her fellow classmates of the Ecole Jacques Lecoq School of movement-based theater in Paris, France were burning with fresh inspiration. The company spent the first several years switching back and forth between Paris and Minneapolis, but after the first five years, the company finally settled in Minneapolis.

“Paris is like New York City, it’s difficult to find space…any little hole in the wall is a goldmine। “In Minneapolis we were supported,” said Berlovitz, “we [knew] Minneapolis somewhat…so if we [wanted] to rent a theater or if we [wanted] to see if we could get funding we [knew] some of the people.”

The Echo asked Berlovitz when she and her co-founders knew it was the right time to pursue the creation of Jeune Lune। “The four of us decided in our own different ways that the theater that we were seeing …was not what we wanted to be doing,” said Berlovitz, “it basically came out of discontent. We wanted to open a new path.”

Berlovitz quoted her teacher and mentor Jacques Lacoq as saying, “I’ve given you the tools to create a theater that doesn’t exist, now go out and do it।” Lacoq was experimenting with the idea of theater that originated from moving the body. Movement theater, Berlovitz explains “is an approach to acting with the idea that everything starts with movement and the voice comes after.”

This physical element became the signature trait for all Jeune Lune productions। Exaggerated and grotesque characters have adorned their stage, telling their personalities without words.

Like many smaller, experimental theater companies, Jeune Lune was not immune to financial instability। The Echo asked Berlovitz what got the company through the rough patches they experienced before the ultimate closing last summer.

“I would say it was a total commitment to our vision,” said Berlovitz, “anything that we did, we knew that we had this goal in supporting this vision that we would eventually reach।” Berlovitz mentioned that when times were rough financially, all the company members lived together or with family to save on housing costs.

The vision Berlovitz mentions was of a “theater that was for an audience of today; we were never interested in doing plays just because they were good play,” said Berlovitz. “If [they] had to change some of the text or [the setting],” that was acceptable as long as they were sharing a new experience with their audience. “Most of our shows were visually beautiful,” said Berlovitz, “I wanted [the audience] to see something they had never seen before.”
Juene Lune was nationally recognized for their regional theater efforts with a Tony in 2005 and the company has toured their work on the west coast for years in addition to their productions in Minneapolis।

Unfortunately for Berlovitz and the many loyal fans, Juene Lune had to close its doors early this summer due to surmounting debt and declining theater attendance.
“In the theater, we certainly walk the line,” Berlovitz noted, “we were never able to have a safety net of cash।”

This past weekend the company held a rummage sale at their old theater building to liquidate their assets. Tables of posters listed for $5 a piece were the only tangible remnants of the body of work that was realized in the old warehouse building. Their chandeliers still hung above boxes of old hats and dusty plywood. Buyers carried out chairs, dresses and other set pieces that they purchased for bargain prices while still carrying a look of disappointment on their faces.
The Echo asked for a comment from the workers that day, but with a stern reply were told “There is no story here…if you’re not here to buy, you should leave।”

Berlovitz looked on the verge of tears at the mention of the sale, but we quickly moved on to what this new chapter of her life has in store। Berlovitz is now working with the Augsburg theater department; she directed her first Augsburg production, Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, in 2007. She is currently directing Samuel Beckett’s Eleutheria, set to open in late January in the Tjornhom-Nelson Theater.

“It’s a great place to come to try ideas and to give experiences to the students that come out of a conceit that is very specific to a specific group of people,” Berlovitz explains, “What I can do is I can bring my understanding of the theater experience to the students here।”

Berlovitz has many projects aligned post-Eleutheria, including an all female production of King Lear at the University of Minnesota। She also mentioned that she will be working on her own original show with the help of a grant she received from the Fox Foundation.

“The thing I think about Jeune Lune, something I’ve thought about in the last few years…I think that we did things that said to people that certain things were possible, that it was possible to make a change, it’s possible to take a risk and it’s possible to believe in your own self and what you have to say. It doesn’t have to be earthshaking, as long as it’s what you have to say.”

Guest Director Liberates Augsburg Theater Department

2009-05-05T21:07:00.000-07:00

The Augsburg Theater Department will be presenting Samuel Beckett’s Eleutheria for this year’s winter main stage production. The production will feature guest director, Barbara Berlovitz, of the Tony-Award winning Theater de la Jeune Lune. Berlovitz and the rest of the creative team have worked to create a grotesque interpretation reminiscent of the Jeune Lune theatrical auteur. Fat-suits, white exaggerated faces and gender-bending extreme characterizations breathe a bold new life into the Beckett piece.

Eleutheria was originally written in French in 1947 and was the first dramatic play that Samuel Beckett ever completed. However, because Beckett completed his existential masterpiece Waiting for Godot very shortly after, Eleutheria received little notice or mention. The play was finally published in English in the mid 1990s was first staged in 2005 at the City Theater of Tehran in Tehran, Iran.

The plot is centered on the action, or inaction rather, of Victor Krap (Brandon Ewald). At the start of the play, Victor has been in a state of self-inflicted exile for about two years. Throughout the play, Victor’s parents (Melissa Warner, Alex Hapka), his fiancé (Ali Fitzpatrick) and several other eccentric characters attempt to bring him out of his alternative state of being. This production makes some rather sharp statements, facilitated by an energetic cast, about what it takes to be “normal” and “happy.” Eleutheria (Greek for a state of liberation) questions the meaning and purpose of societal values, relationships and personal fulfillment.

The preview did not feature costumes, but the set is a clever embodiment of the plot themes. Constructed mostly of windows with opaque glass and doors that do not open, the set (design by Michael Burden), forms a symbolic representation of Victor’s state of mind.

This production is being called a “workshop” production, for which Berlovitz and Jeune Lune have been famous. A workshop in this sense means that the final product comes together through the collaborative and creative ability of the whole cast throughout the rehearsal process. The characters are studded with creative facial work, over-the-top physical expression and clever use of props.

The play will open Friday, January 30 in the Tjornhom-Nelson Theater located in Foss Center. The show will run through Sunday, February 9. Admission is free with a donation of a non-perishable food item. For information on how to get tickets for Eleutheria visit www.augsburg.edu/theater or call 612-330-1257.

Women’s Resource Center Presents Sacred Choices

2009-05-05T21:06:00.002-07:00

The Augsburg College Women’s Resource Center recently teamed up with the Minnesota Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (MN-RCRC) to host a screening of the film Sacred Choices: Ten new things to consider. This screening took place last Friday, February 20 in the Women’s Resource Center.

The MN-RCRC promotes that “every woman should be free to make decisions about having children according to her own conscience and religious beliefs” and that “people’s reproductive choices are broader when they understand how their bodies function and when they have opportunities to practice decision-making in a safe environment with adults who care about their well-being.”

The documentary Sacred Choices reveals ten new issues for people to consider if they believe abortion goes against their religion. Images of women at pro-life rallies flood the introduction of the film. “Not the Church, not the state, women must decide our fate,” is one of the many slogans chanted by seas of pro-life protesters. Among the notable demonstrators in the film, is Whoopi Goldberg, an avid supporter of the Roe vs. Wade decision.

The topics of consideration range from general religious freedom to the obscure case of a 9-year-old rape victim in Nicaragua whose life is threatened by her country’s religious opposition to abortion.

The film offers a plethora of reluctant testimony from Islamic spiritual leaders, rabbis, Catholic and protestant priests, and nuns. Islamic scholars site verses in the Quran that suggest that a fetus does not have a sole until it is 120 days old, which is significant considering the film also states that 91 percent of all abortions take place in the first trimester. Christian Scholars also defend similar verses in the Bible, but do not site them specifically.

These pro-choice supporting clergy men and women assert that women should be able to choose how they want to participate in their own religion. They also stress that women should be able to make reproductive choices without fear that their church will cast them out. They encourage viewers to think beyond the parameters of pro-choice and pro-life and really examine why they believe what they do about reproductive freedoms.

The film juxtaposes mothers happily holding their babies at morning mass with voice-overs of the Rabbi saying that there are in fact “physical and psychological reasons to justify abortions.” The images encompass the dissonance that many feel when attempting to prioritize religious teachings, parental duty and women’s rights reproductive autonomy.

The audience was all female and many stayed afterwards to discuss personal concerns about the issues mentioned in the film. One point that was stressed in the discussion but not in the film was to education women as a form of prevention. The women felt that if more young girls were taught earlier (like they are in Europe) about sexual responsibility and reproductive responsibility that the number of women seeking abortions would significantly decrease. More literature on this topic can be found in the Women’s Resource Center located in Sverdrup Hall or at www.mnrcrc.org.

CCHP Body Week Features Park Nicollet Dietician

2009-05-05T21:06:00.001-07:00

This week Augsburg’s Center for Counseling and Health Promotion presented a series of body image related programs for Body Peace week including a special night devoted to rediscovering healthy eating habits. A group of about 20 students met in the Marshall Room where Special guest Sarah Johnson of the Park Nicollet Eating Disorders Institute led the discussion on how Americans can develop a more healthy relationship with food.

Johnson mentioned a 2008 study suggesting that almost 75 percent of women in America report distorted eating, which is not synonymous with eating disorders, but is a habit that can lead to their development. In addition to bad habits, Johnson says 67 percent of women say they are trying to lose weight. She purported that men’s statistics were similar to women’s, but noted that men’s cases are often under-reported.

The nature of the dietary advice was mostly preventative. Johnson warned that ignoring physical and psychological signs of hunger (such as stomach growling, fatigue and mood change) can lead to obesity, but that developing conscious moderate eating habits will allow you to eat whatever you like with little to no impact on your weight. This is because the human body has an innate eating schedule that everyday culture systems teach us to ignore, says Johnson. She suggests that as babies we know when we are hungry or full, but as we enter daily schedules at school and work, we teach our bodies to ignore those natural cues.

The answer to solving this dilemma, Johnson suggests, is to eat consciously every time. Habits such as eating while doing homework can interfere with our ability to notice our stomach is full. If we keep track of what, when and how much we eat, Johnson says we can re-program our natural hunger cues and steer our body in a more healthy direction. She mentioned that jumpstarting this process may involve making yourself eat in the morning if you normally skip breakfast.

The major culprit for these rising eating disorder statistics, Johnson says, is the commercial media that creates mixed messages about proper eating habits. Growing serving sizes at restaurants were also blamed for over-eating trends. The Eating Disorders Institute advice is to ignore “left-over guilt” and quit eating when your body tells you it’s full.

Lastly, Johnson concluded that, contrary to popular media headlines, “There’s no food that is always bad.” She emphasized the importance of a well-rounded diet because the body needs a variety of nutrients to function, including fats and sugars. She presented statistics showing that when people restrict their diet to limit “bad” foods, it increases anxiety and preoccupation with those specific foods. By telling yourself not to eat certain foods, you can increase your chances of binge eating when you finally do eat them.

Park Nicollet’s number one principle of intuitive eating is to reject the diet mentality. They suggest that you throw out the diet books and eat whenever you want in moderation in order to achieve your body’s natural weight. They also suggest that you “make peace with food” by stopping the dissonance between what you want to eat and what you think you should eat. And of course, supplementing your food habits with exercise is also recommended.

Other Body Peace programs included a Monday night screening of the documentary “Killing Us Softly,” which deals with the portrayal of women in commercial media. Also, showing today, Mar. 6, from noon to 1 p.m. in the Century Room, is the documentary “Starved”, which shows the journey of 5 women in recovery from their eating disorders.

Making peace with your body can take longer than a week. The Center for Counseling and Health promotions offers counseling on these and other issues throughout the year. For more information about CCHP or to make an appointment with a counselor visit their website at www.augsburg.edu/cchp.

Another Echo Sample

2009-05-05T21:04:00.000-07:00

Because Augsburg prides itself on its community engagement, leadership and vocation, it is gratifying to see Auggies who have long since graduated doing their part to spread Augsburg’s mission in their professional careers around the country and the globe.

Recently the Echo received a message from a retired Augsburg Professor, Lyla Anderegg, telling us about one Augsburg Alum in particular who is faithfully representing Augsburg’s mission in much warmer part of the country. His name is John Ennen and he is running a small chain of coffee shops in McKinney, Texas. In an interview with the Echo, Ennen tells about his experience at Augsburg, what brought him to Texas and his hopes for the future of his family business.

Ennen is a Minnesota native who grew up in Minneapolis. His family owned and operated the Ennen Supermarket formerly located where the Target Center now stands in downtown Minneapolis. Ennen attended what is now Totino Grace High School and started his college career at the University of Minnesota.

Turned off by the extremely large class sizes at the University, Ennen transferred to Augsburg in 1981 where his younger brother Bill Ennen was also studying. He mentioned that he and his brother often engaged in friendly competitions to see who could earn the highest grades. Ennen specifically recalled a course they both took at Hamline through the ACTC program in which they each strived to score the higher grade. “We both got A’s,” Ennen said.

Ennen studied business at Augsburg at a time when the business program was just starting out. In 1981, the business degree was possible largely in part to the consortium program (ACTC) which allowed him to take many of his business courses at other schools while still getting the Liberal Arts Foundation at Augsburg. Ennen also received minors in Psychology and Economics. Ennen attributes his psychology interests to his respect for Professor Anderegg, with whom he took five courses to receive his minor.

“[Anderegg was] one of my favorite professors and the reason I hung around and got my minor in psychology…she had a great perspective on involvement in social causes,” Ennen said. “A lot of what she taught became a part of me.” Ennen mentioned that he and Anderegg still keep in touch and that she recently attended a surprise party of his in Minnesota.

Ennen finished his degree at Augsburg in 1984 and took a job in Canon Falls for almost two years. He then sought an MBA in Texas which eventually brought him to the Historic town of McKinney. After receiving his Master’s degree Ennen entered the corporate world working for several Fortune 100 companies. He met his wife Mary while they were both working for the Four Seasons Hotel Corporation.

With the help of Mary’s background in Architecture, the Ennens developed and launched their first coffee shop in McKinney called Coffee N Cream. This coffee shop features high end coffee served fresh or in take-home bags as well as Blue Bell ^tmbrand ice cream, a flagship brand of Texas. Coffee N Cream is also a friendly place to sit and enjoy free Wi-Fi internet access.

Ennen says this whole coffee shop idea started because “ [he] could never get sweets in the afternoons” at his job downtown. “The concept grew and took hold [from there],” he said.

The Ennen’s now have two Coffee N Cream locations, one in McKinney and one in Allen, TX. They are also in the process of opening a second shop in Allen.

“We want to prove the concept with this new [Allen] store,” says Ennen, “in the hopes of breaking out of corporate America.” Ennen’s concept for Coffee N Cream is to create an environment “where neighbors and friends meet,” this is also their store motto.

The Echo asked Ennen if Augsburg has influenced him in his business career and his mission for Coffee N Cream.

“Undoubtedly,” Ennen said. “Augsburg’s always been important to me.” Ennen says that Augsburg has really stuck with him over the past twenty years. He and his wife are dedicated to serving their community through their faith and their involvement in charities. They see Coffee N Cream as a way to give back to the community while becoming an important part of the community.

Ennen looks to his father and grandfather’s example when running his business and wants to really bring the “family into [his] family owned business.” The Ennen’s have been married for nineteen years now and have four sons, Zachary, Jacob and twins Tanner and Garrett. Ennen’s Brother Bill, is now in the commercial real-estate development business in Naples, Florida.

Coffee N Cream features the work of local artists and musicians in their shops and also started a Beans for Troops program last holiday season where customers could purchase one-pound bags of their premium coffee to be shipped to the troops in Iraq.

The Echo asked Ennen if he had any advice for Augsburg’s graduating class this year.

Ennen replied, “[Don’t] be afraid to really pursue something that inspires you…[don’t] listen to nay-sayers,” and “step out and take that risk for reasons only you understand.”

Augsburg Professors at the Forefront of Space Physics

2009-05-05T21:01:00.001-07:00

Professors Mark Engebretson and David Murr are continuing to put the Augsburg Science Department on the map through their extensive research on space physics. Engebretson and Murr are being sponsored by the National Science Foundation and NASA to research the patterns and impacts of weather in space. Their studies have been recognized internationally at world conferences, as well as locally in a recent Star Tribune feature. Engebretson has also had a peak named after him in Antarctica for the research he has contributed in that region and in his field (you can look it up on Wikipedia!).

Engebretson has been interested in space physics since graduate school and had the opportunity to continue his studies when he became a staff member at Augsburg. He met up with Murr while Murr was still in high school as a part of a science-related mentorship program. Murr then came to Augsburg and studied space physics with Engebretson for four additional years until he graduated in 1992. Murr was student body president in his Augsburg years and also a writer for the Echo. After he graduated, he joined the Peace Corps, received his PhD in space physics and after working for the State Department, ended up back at Augsburg to return to his space research with Engebretson.

The field of space physics sounds a bit intimidating, but what Engebretson and Murr really focus on is space weather, that is, patterns of waves of electrons, protons and magnetism from the sun that shoot through space. You can almost think of it as magnetic fronts that originate from the sun and depending on the size, can travel through our solar system and affect the planets.

So why do they study space weather and how does it affect you? The answer is mainly through satellite technology. These surges of radiation from the sun can blow out GPS data for pilots and drivers, it can knock out your satellite TV and radio signals, but most importantly it can affect the power grids of cities in vulnerable locations.

An example of this happened in 1989 when a giant wave of radiation left 130 million people in Quebec without power. The surges can knock out large networks of transformers, if power grids are not strategically networked to try can contain the damage. The surges also pose a significant threat to the navigation systems in planes flying over the poles.

“One of the biggest threats of space weather,” says Engebretson, “is that it’s just going to knock out one of our satellites.” In a society that is becoming increasingly reliant on satellite technology, it is important to know how to protect our investments in space from radiation surges. The study of space weather actually began initially in order to engineer better space instruments.

“If you’re going to send people to the moon, you have to know something about the environment you’re going to be exposed to,” says Murr.

Because the surges are so powerful and so far impossible to harness, Engebretson and Murr are working to develop more sophisticated ways to predict when and where the surges coming, thus enabling countries to better prepare for imminent danger. They likened their research to hurricane research. “The gulfstream occasionally has hurricanes…and you like to know when the hurricane is coming,” says Engebretson. “Satellite operators like to know when severe weather is coming from the sun [so] they can turn down the voltages and make it less likely that the satellite is going to be damaged.”

The ways that space physics can affect you have to do with the magnetosphere around the Earth. “Basically the magnetosphere is invisible,” says Engebretson, “so we have to figure out how to study invisible things.” But fortunately for them, there is one way you can observe the magnetic waves: auroras. Auroras are ever-present rings of electrons coming down from outer space and crashing into the earth’s atmosphere. When the electrons collide with the atmosphere they create the ambient colorful light show that most people associate with them.

Engebretson and Murr have received a million dollar grant just to monitor the activity of these auroras through instruments that they have placed in the arctic areas of Northern Canada. Murr and Engebretson actually have the second largest collection of instruments, second to a Japanese researcher, to collect data about these auroras. They also collect data from satellites in space.

Through the culmination of this and other data, Murr and Engebretson have come to the conclusion that space weather, like earth weather, has a cycle. Earth’s weather cycle lasts one year, but the sun’s weather cycle lasts about 11 years to repeat.

“At some rough level,” says Murr, “there’s the seasons of space weather…one’s more active and one’s quieter, but just like [Earth] weather… you’re more likely to have storms during one season than another, but every once and a while you get a freak snow storm in May.”

The two have also been involved with research that looks at sunspots as an indicator of particular kinds of weather. “Sun spots are kind of rough indicator of solar weather. They’re not what drives it,” says Engebretson, but they are the only thing you can see from the ground.

There isn’t as much variation in types of weather in space like there is here with different types of precipitation. The main variations of solar weather pertain to the size of the radiation storm and the location where the storm will affect Earth. Their main goal is to be able to predict with greater precision the magnitude and location of a radiation threat.

Murr noted the technological irony that tends to stifle their progress. “I think one of the interesting things is that you have this 11 year cycle of activity and at the same time you have this increase in technology that’s continuously going on…the fact that it’s eleven years, it’s just long enough that people can forget about it. Each time we get surprised.”

What Murr is saying is that as technology advances and becomes more complex it becomes harder to cover all the areas of vulnerability within our technological world. Every time the most turbulent part of the solar weather cycle peaks, there is new technology that we don’t know how to protect. Murr used the example of how the surge in GPS usage in the past few years that could cause a potential problem during another major radiation surge because the technology was not as wide spread during the last solar cycle.

Engebretson and Murr are on the forefront of their field, but they say that overall, their area of study, given its global nature, is very interactive. They look forward to future international conferences where they share their findings with other countries. But in the long run, Augsburg has served as a nurturing home for their studies. As Engebretson said at the start of our interview, they are not just teachers, they get to be ‘real scientists’ as well.

Michele Bachmann says Latin on money is anti-American

2009-05-05T20:59:00.001-07:00

This is not a real news article, this was for the 2009 Joke Edition of the Augsburg Echo.

In addition to Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann’s recent support of an amendment that would ban the U.S. from ever replacing the U.S. dollar for foreign currency, the well-revered Republican Congresswoman is also authoring a bill that would ban the use of Latin on the current United States currency. Bachmann defends her proposed bill, which has yet to receive any approval from introductory committees, saying that she is tired of U.S. citizens being taken advantage of by the illegal Latino community in this country and is calling the use of Latin on U.S. Currency “anti-American.”

The bill would seek to ban the line “E Pluribus Unum” from the U.S. quarter dollar, meaning “out of many, one.” This phrase, added to U.S. currency in 1795, was first coined by the Virgil (famous for the Aeneid) in his poem, Moretum. Other phrases that would be omitted by the bill would be “Annuit Coeptis” and “Novus Ordo Seclorum,” meaning “he approves our undertakings” and “new order of the ages,” respectively. Both phrases were also coined by Virgil and are included on the one dollar bill inside the Great Seal of the United States. Details on how to reconcile the inclusion of Latin in the Seal, but not on the dollar, have yet to be released.

Bachmann declined to comment on this discrepancy, but instead stated, “If the illegals won’t pay our taxes, we won’t be paying homage to their ancestors. Our forefathers wrote the Constitution in English for a reason,” says, Bachmann. Also, in the bill is a clause that would change the official pronunciation of ‘tortilla’ to include the phonated ‘L’ sound.

Bachmann, who claimed earlier this year that the United States is running out of rich people, is certainly appealing to her staunch constituency of the dying affluent nature. Certainly the liberals can identify with protecting an endangered species.

Bachmann first received wide-spread press coverage when she questioned the patriotism of the now President Barack Obama on Hardball with Chris Matthews. More recently Bachmann channeled her efforts towards stopping other anti-American legislation such as universal health care for children, which is obviously just a ploy to cheat hard-working Americans out of their tax dollars so illegal immigrants can have free health care, claims Bachmann.

With regard to her most recent bill on anti-Latin currency, Bachmann is gearing up for harsh opposition. “This will be a tough battle, but we have to show those Latin-loving liberals that we Patriots have will not stand for this system abuse,” said Bachmann earlier this week. Afterwards she was seen posting a “Vote Democrat, it’s easier than working” bumper sticker on the back of her limited edition Lincoln Navigator.

What’s next from the Minnesota Congresswoman? Besides touting to the New York Times that global warming is nature’s fault, our capitol correspondents say there is talk of a birth certificate verification process for imported vehicle purchases, international money wiring and employment in the restaurant industry. Will any illegal immigrants be able to free-load off the United States tax dollars in this country? Not under Rep. Bachmann’s watch.

Jungle Sheds Sinister Light on Hitchcock

2009-05-05T20:58:00.001-07:00

Coming from a theater student who knows little about the history of film, Hitchcock Blonde (written by Terry Johnson, Directed by Joel Sass) at the Jungle Theater was an enlightening glimpse at the contributions Alfred Hitchcock made to the movies we see today.

This play about film employs a unique integration of film into theater that goes beyond moving pictures projected on a screen. The set (design by Joel Sass) transports the audience to three different places at three notable points in time. Scenes in 1919 show Hitchcock when he is just starting out. The scenes in 1959 show Hitchcock after his recognition as a pioneer of the film genre. Finally, scenes from 2003 show how film buffs of today are still fascinated and influenced by the work of Hitchcock in both the artistic and personal realms.

Warning, plot details are revealed in this review, but we don’t spoil the ending.

The show begins in 2003 with the story of Nicola (Heidi Bakke) and her Professor, Alex (J.C. Cutler). Alex takes young Nicola as his apprentice to restore his most recent discovery: never released Hitchcock films from Hitchcock’s personal library. He coaxes Nicola, despite her initial reluctance, to come with him for a summer in Greece to restore the films.

Though the two do discover some of Hitchcock’s previously undocumented film breakthroughs in the process, the disturbing motivations behind Hitchcock’s signature blonde ingénues begin to transcend into the mind of Alex. As Nicola and Alex dissect the lost archives, they catch a glimpse into the psyche of Hitchcock where an allusion can often be more desirable than the real thing.

Playwright Terry Johnson emphasizes the autobiographical nature of Hitchcock’s works and sheds lights on a man who preferred to remain behind the scenes. The play also pays tribute to Hitchcock’s technical breakthroughs in the film genre. For those who know more about film, perhaps less of the technical jargon will fly over your heads. But understanding the film vernacular is not necessary to comprehend the motives of the playwright or the director.

The lighting (design by Barry Browning) in the 1959 segments portrays the dramatic tones of this film era. The shadows and contrasts are sharp and dramatic, highlighting specific elements on the stage much like frames of film distinguish one shot from another. There is also a distinct sinister tone in the lighting that is emphasized by the chilling performance of Hitchcock himself (Tom Sherohman).

Heidi Bakke’s portrayal of Nicola makes the character extremely easy to fall in love with, as the script demands. The script is a pleasant mix of education and entertainment that is likely to engage a wide variety of audiences.

The show runs through March 8 at the Jungle Theater. More information on this play and ticket availability can be found at jungletheater.com.

Online Journalists Fight for Equal Status in House

2009-05-05T20:56:00.000-07:00

This article was originally featured in the Augsburg Echo

A battle over access to the Minnesota House of Representatives has been waged by the Online Media community in the Twin Cities after finding that on Feb। 9 of this year, Huffington Post reporter Sam Stein was called on by President Obama at a White House press conference। This display angered many Minnesota online journalists who currently do not have the same privileges in the Minnesota House of Representatives that Stein was awarded in the White हाउसCurrent House policy in Minnesota prohibits online-only media from obtaining the same press credentials as their colleagues who work in television, print, or radio।

The current House Majority Leader, Rep। Tony Sertich, DFL, told the Minnesota Independent last week that the House doesn’t have a “fully defined policy of what online media is. If it’s somebody who designs their own Web site and comes down to the Capitol… we could be deluged with www.anybody.com walking through the door saying, ‘I’m the online media, let me have floor access.’ You think the House chamber is a ruckus … now, wait till all the bloggers get here and show up en masse.”

Despite opposition from House leaders, the Minnesota Society of Professional Journalists released a formal statement in support of Online-only media equity, saying that “If the Legislature is concerned about the conduct of individual reporters, existing rules and procedures can be utilized। If the problem is one of space, then the criteria for distributing media passes should be equitable for all journalists, not arbitrarily discriminatory based on an outlet’s medium.”

Independent online journalist and producer of MyFreeRadioNation।com, Martin Ownings, shared his experience at the Minnesota House with KFAI Radio news this week. On two separate occasions, Rep. Sertich’s staff asked Owings leave events which did not require any press credentials for admittance. Owings says there are no current rules restricting cameras at these types of public meetings, but that the discomfort with the presence of his camera was palpable. When Owings resisted their request he said he was told,” if you don’t come with me, I’ll have you physically escorted out.”

“A representative from the Sergeant at Arms office approached me and said ‘You’re gonna have to come with me’,” said Owings। When asked if Owings thought the reason for his dismissal had to do with his well-known online video blog (or vlog), he replied with a resounding “yes.”

Last week, several members of the online media community gathered to lobby the Minnesota House of Representatives for equal access to press credentials for the House press conferences। Owings, who attended the hearing, said that the sponsor of H.R.A 007 (the rule amendment that would include online media in the House) was temporarily dismissed because the chief sponsor, Rep. Steve Smith, Rep., could not attend the proceedings that day. Owings has received no personal responses to his calls to Rep Sertich, but his legislative aide, Lisa Radick, told Owings “that they are trying to do everything they can to come up with some rules that would pertain to online journalists.”

Owings maintains that this issue “transcends political ideology and speaks to our first amendment rights to freedom of the press.” He added that “these are public institutions that, for better or worse, need to be transparent in their dealings,” and that the House members’ current policy is an “injustice to the people of Minnesota.”

Dr. Dale Taylor Talks Music and the Brain

2009-05-05T20:53:00.000-07:00

Dr। Dale Taylor, the Interim Music Therapy Director at Augsburg College, will be holding a seminar on Music and the Brain on March 25 at 3pm on the Augsburg campus. While concrete location and format of the seminar are still being decided, the seminar will focus on explaining the biomedical theory behind music therapy. In addition to Dr. Taylor’s extensive research background in the area of music and the brain, he also ran his own practice for many years and taught music therapy at the University of Minnesota. In preparation for this event, Dr. Taylor spoke with The Echo about the fundamental components of why music therapy has proved successful.

Dr। Taylor first noted the advantages of using music, rather than simple speech commands, to engage the brain during speech therapy. He went on to explain how using music therapy for speech development works by using a complex stimulus (music) to activate more areas of the brain than only talking. “Any use of language symbols will activate certain specific parts of the brain such as the visual memory centers, the primary auditory cortex, and then the main language centers,” says Taylor, “but when you add music…it uses any and all of those structures plus a lot of [association and cognitive area] that is not activated when music is not there.” This fact, Dr. Taylor says, has been confirmed through the use of brain scanning technology.

Dr। Taylor also added that research shows a positive correlation between the total amount of brain activation during an exercise and the success of completing the goals of that particular therapeutic exercise effectively.

But how and why is music so effective at activating brain functions? Dr। Taylor says research shows that “when music is played, even if [the person is] just listening to music, but certainly when the person is actively involved in the music production, the auditory cortex in a sense broadcasts that information to the rest of the brain and the different parts of the brain respond according to their normal jobs.” In this way, Taylor explains, “music changes the neuro-impulse pattern of the brain,” like generating an external heartbeat for the body.

Dr। Taylor refers to the common foot-tapping reaction people have when music is played. He points out that many people respond this way without even being aware of it and without trying to consciously control it. This foot-tapping is an example of how the auditory cortex, which is responsible for creating the concept of sound in our minds, can activate other parts of the brain which then respond through their respective functions. In this case, the foot-tapping would be attributed to a response from a signal sent to the motor cortex.

Essentially, the richness of most musical stimuli (as opposed to more common simple stimuli) causes a chain reaction initiated from the auditory cortex in the brain that increases total brain activity। The effects of this increased brain activity allow easier access to important brain functions, like critical cognition, and in turn help patients access their brain’s full operating potential. In this case, one can see why the brain/muscle metaphor is so appropriate in explaining brain functioning; the more you work out your brain, the stronger it gets.

There are a wide range of treatment areas where music is utilized for therapy and rehabilitation including cognitive therapy is the case of memory loss, speech therapy, physical therapy and chemical dependency treatment।

Dr। Taylor explained that “in working with people who have cognitive disabilities or learning disabilities, or neurological disorders…without music they may be calling upon certain parts of the brain that may be damaged or may be decreased in function…but when we involve them in music, the brain can re-learn those tasks using much more brain tissue than it would normally be using without the music.”

He also mentioned the issue of functional neuro-plasticity, which basically translates to your brain’s degree of flexibility in handling tasks। Some therapeutic methods are designed to increase this flexibility of the brain among the different cognitive structures. By increasing this flexibility, Dr. Taylor says we can “transfer jobs that are normally done in damaged parts of [the brain] to undamaged parts…[shifting] jobs to parts of the brain that are functioning normally, even though those parts would not normally be involved in that task.”

Chemical dependency treatment differs slightly from other music therapy treatments in that the activities are directed more towards distracting the brain from damaging thoughts and redirecting the source through which the brain receives gratification for certain cravings।

“With chemical dependency, our goals and objectives primarily are to get the person to realize that they can function well without the reliance on the chemical dependency without needing to escape to the altered state that chemical dependency give them,” says Taylor।

Another technique Dr। Taylor mentions is used by some music therapists is encouraging patients to use “music to enhance the brain’s own production neurotransmitters which stimulate parts of the brain that generate feelings of pleasure…and those neurotransmitters such as dopamine and serotonin will do somewhat the same thing as the illegal drugs or pharmaceuticals that people take.”

Another tactical variation a music therapy involves the type of music a therapists uses to achieve a particular result। Dr. Taylor says, “For instance if we’re working with someone with a gate disorder, all we need is [a click] to help organize the rhythm and tempo of the patient’s responses. However, when we hear and entire symphony or an entire orchestra playing symphonic progressions of chords, that will not only involve the parts of the brain that have to do with music, but it will also activate long and short term memory and the limbic system of the brain.”

The limbic system controls the brain’s conscious and unconscious emotional responses to outward stimuli through changes in chemical production। In this way, music directly affects an individual’s emotions because these chemicals change when music stimulates a change in our outward neuro-impulse cues.

In addition to an apple a day, Dr. Taylor advises the use of music as a preventative measure to control stress and to promote good emotional health. For more information on this music therapy research, visit musictherapy.org or other resources are available in the Lindell Library.

Private Review, Silenced Protest

2009-05-05T20:39:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, October 4, the Board of Regents held a private meeting in which they voted ‘yes’ to extend President Paul Pribbenow’s contract for another six years। This decision took place after the faculty had voiced concerns about the Board’s lack of consideration for faculty input in the decision-making process.

In an interview with President Pribbenow just after the decision was made, Pribbenow was asked to comment on the review process which led to his contract renewal and his thoughts about the faculty and students’ roles in such decisions।

“It’s not my process,” Pribbenow said “[The Board’s] contract with me is not a public deal…we have to draw some lines of governance, it’s about how we deal with authority।” Pribbenow’s understanding is that the board’s job is to act in Augsburg’s best interest and that they must review “all aspects of the college, not just faculty concerns.”

He also mentioned that faculty had more input in his review than other presidential review proceedings in the past। This was the first year that the Faculty Senate Chair was asked to give input for the review and two other faculty members, Robert Groven and Matthew Rumpza were also consulted.

In past reviews, Pribbenow said the review was conducted solely by the Board of Regents using a rubric-style evaluation where the President would be rated on specific areas of performance on a scale of 1-5।

When asked if Pribbenow thought there should be further consultation of the faculty and student body in the review process he responded that he agreed their opinions should be heard, but that was why they included the Faculty Senate Chair as a representative of those opinions। Faculty Senate Chair Vicki Olson confirmed that she was never explicitly asked to consult her fellow senators for their input.

“Opening up [the process] more generally is turning the review of the President into a public opinion poll,” said Pribbenow।

Faculty member, Kathy Swanson, in an earlier interview with Echo said “[she wished] there had been opportunities for extensive conversation among representatives of many constituencies…[Faculty] Senators did not seem to know of the evaluation by the Senate President until [Olson’s] response to the Board had been written and the process was nearly completed।” The President responded that this was “not something that gets announced.”

There was, however, and e-mail sent out by Board Member Mike Good on October 1, three days before the vote to renew Pribbenow’s contract। Good stated that “Although the Board understands that some may differ about who should participate in the process, it has no reason at this time to consider any changes in this year’s process.”

According to Article IX of the Augsburg Faculty Handbook which states that “The Faculty will consult with the Board of Regents, at the discretion of the Board of Regents,” there has been no apparent violation of Augsburg’s officially observed policies। Despite this careful observance of the verbiage, Good still prefaced his e-mail by saying there had been “some apparent confusion among some faculty members about the recent performance review process.”

Though several members of the faculty told the Echo that they had concerns about the amount of say they were given in the review, they asked that their concerns remain anonymous.
In an e-mail from Faculty Senator, Christina Erickson, Erickson noted that the faculty had two ways by which they could express their comments and concerns about the review of the President to the Board। They could either send their comments to their division chairs who would then forward them on to Chief of Staff, Christine Szaj, or they could send their comments to Szaj directly. Szaj would then report these concerns to the Board.

Faculty Senator, Mark Engebretson, when asked what the faculty’s specific concerns and comments were, replied, “We haven’t seen those letters [or] a summary of them.”
According to Engebretson, the channels that were set up through Szaj for reporting faculty concerns during the review process were not linked to the Faculty Senate। “No one came up and volunteered to me any of their concerns,” said Engebretson, and “I didn’t go knock on doors asking ‘are you concerned?’”

Engebretson express his confusion when asked whether he thought Augsburg faculty felt comfortable expressing their opinions on these presidential matters Engebretson replied, “That puzzles me, something is causing some fear। Augsburg speaks out much more than other places and that’s our strength. We want to be the kind of place where people can express their frustrations.”

But Engebretson offered his best guess concerning the current stifled discourse on campus। “Whenever there’s a president change, there’s a change in the comfort zone… the perception is that things are broken, but the structure hasn’t changed a bit.” Engebretson also added, however, that “the perception matters, [we] can’t just say there’s no problem…but how are we going to find out things if you don’t talk to [the Senators]?”

In an e-mail response to this same issue Professor Kathryn Swanson responded, “While it is true that there have been many colleagues who have disappeared from campus in the past few years, responses of "I prefer not to" and "I dare not" (respond) remind me of Bartleby in Melville's story and the compact majority in Ibsen's, Enemy of the People. These responses are worrisome because they indicate a chilly climate rather than an open environment, inviting to varying and differing responses. Indeed, this questioning of process and assumptions underlies the very model of critical thinking we work to inspire in our classrooms. Instead, we are reminded of Senator Bachman's recent (and regrettable) call to "make a list" of colleagues who seem out of sync. I argue that, in fact, these colleagues who do dare to ask questions and request authentic transparency represent the spirit of free inquiry that is at the heart of all academic work.”
The concerns that were reported to the Echo anonymously were from tenured and non-tenured faculty and addressed the President’s managing style, ability to raise funds for the college, a $400,000 renovation of the President’s house and a budget deficit between six and seven hundred thousand dollars for the 2007-2008 fiscal year।

Financial Services Director, Tom Haglund, commented that “[Augsburg] is basically a break-even institution” and that President Pribbenow was hired specifically for his fund-raising abilities। When asked about the budget deficit for 2007-2008, Haglund responded that under President Frame there was a perceived surplus. Haglund was hired in October 2006, three months after President Pribbenow. Haglund said that over time the new accounting team under Pribbenow “chipped away” at the perceived million dollar surplus which “evaporated under different scrutiny.”

The funds allocated for the $400,000 renovation of the President’s mansion were approved in early 2006 when the million-dollar surplus was still perceived to be real.
Engebretson does not directly blame Pribbenow for the current financial concerns. “Whenever the messenger delivers bad news, he [has] to beg not to be beheaded…Pribbenow has been the bearer of bad financial news.”

Back to the Basics

2009-04-02T12:03:00.000-07:00

Hello all, again it has been far too long.

I think that my return to blogging will consist of the traditional online-diary-vent-about-my-emotions-like-everyone-else-cares type entries. I am going in this direction because I'm getting a little burnt out on politics and I could use a visit back to the time when I thought that everyone else agreed with my sensible ideals (let me dream, ok?).

So I've taken a long break from blogging because I've been diligently showing up to my internship 3 and sometimes 4 times a week at KFAI Radio (you can listen to us at kfai.org). I absolutely love working in radio. It's the first time I've felt like I'm learning any immediately applicable skills, like how to use ProTools, how to write scripts for radio, etc. You know, stuff you can actually put on a resume. I enjoy the diverse group of people that volunteer here at the station. It's a great way to meet non-Augsburgians of all ages and demographics (however liberal they may be). Plus, I've always been one for behind-the-scenes type community service and this internship is about as far in that direction as I can get. I have been approached by a few people who recognize my name from the radio, but I'm just another anonymous voice to most listeners.

As of today, I have exactly one month until graduation. This has been a very formative year for me, or at least I hope the crap I went through this year is going to benefit me in the long run. The biggest academic news I got this year was that I was eligible to apply for Summa Cum Laude, which for those of you who don't know is some high-brow Latin honors label that goes on your final transcript. There are a few other formal ceremonies they make you sit through as well. Initially, I was ecstatic to hear this news, but now it's become just one more thing to stress me out in my final days of undergraduate studies. Now I'm back to stressing about my GPA and worrying what my family will say if I fail. This was something I assure you I did not miss for the past year or so when I let my academic over-achieving mind loose for a while. I'm thinking I'll probably still receive the honor, I'm not thinking that it is well-deserved. I realize now that making good grades has more to do with work ethic than intelligence, and that really unnerves me. I just want to be done with school. I'm tired of the constant knowledge checks. I just want to get out there and see what I'm capable of in the real world. That's the only proof that brings me real satisfaction anymore.

But thinking that way just bring about more stress. I read in the Star Tribune this morning that the job gap in Minnesota is 10 to 1. Meaning for every 10 people looking for work, there is one job available. This is not a good time to be graduating. Lucky for me though, if I go to grad school I can get my loans deferred, but I haven't even started looking at schools and who knows if there will be any financial aid left by the time I do. I'm hoping to keep my sales job at the Ordway for a while, but they are cutting hours and positions, so my hopes of working there full time are withering.

There is always the option of leaving Minneapolis and chasing the jobs wherever they go, but I feel that picking up and moving now would only end up costing me more money in the long run; and one thing I don't have a lot of right now, is money. Though the thought of leaving the Minneapolis climate is enticing. I've always wanted to go to New York City (who doesn't right?) and that idea is starting to creep back into my head. We'll see how that develops.

In my personal life, I'm headed towards some closure with Adam. He recently informed me that he was de-friending me on facebook, I guess I can take that as progress. I have mixed feelings about it. He couldn't seem to accept that I needed a break from talking to him for a while, his only options were to be friends right now or break off all communication forever I guess. I'm sad that someone I've invested so many emotions and so much of my time over the past few years can't give me a little time to heal, but I'm not willing to let myself get thrown back into the relationship again. Which was what I feared would happen if I started speaking to him again so soon after the break up. It took me a very long time to realize that I too, would fall victim to stupid young love. I thought I knew everything and that we would end up together forever, blah blah blah. But hey, at least I won't have to do that twice. The sad thing is that in another life, if Adam and I had met under different circumstances, I think we would have made great business partners. I have a tremendous amount of respect for his intelligence and work ethic, but emotionally we are polar opposites.

I'm now trying to move on in that aspect of my personal life, but I fear that I might have dug myself into a small hole for the time being. I'm not sure what to do about it. There's that part of me that doesn't want to be too cynical, because that brought me no satisfaction in the past. But on the other hand what good has blind optimism ever done me? I'm trying to stay away from the fact that I'm doomed either way. The biggest problem I face is that I don't trust myself to make good decisions right now. That is the worst feeling I've had in a really long time, particularly in this situation. I suppose I will have to deal with that situation as it develops.

Another new addition in my life is my yet to be named baby kitten that I recently picked up from an Elvis impersonator in front of Rainbow Foods. The little kitty is small enough to fit in one hand and therefore, I do not know yet if it is male or female, but I'll keep you posted. Last night it slept curled up under my chin for most of the night (though I kept waking up to tiny little claws on my eyelids every now and then...) It gets separation anxiety pretty badly because I think it was taken away from its mommy a little too early, but it's eating soggy cat food and drinking milk regularly, so it's probably ok. Next big obstacle of course is the litter box training. The little stinker has already pooped on me and my roommate and seems to think that the litter box is just a big food dish. I keep finding chewed up pieces of litter in its water dish. What fun little baby animals are.

Well that's a long enough update for now I suppose. Hope you enjoyed a more light-hearted entry this time. Hasta Leugo.

Being a woman in the 21st Century

2009-01-27T09:52:00.000-08:00

Because I'm the one that started that whole blogging group and have since taken a two or three month sabbatical from blogging, I feel the need to come out of my recess. Especially after the news headlines I read today.

Last Thursday, the 36th anniversary or the Roe vs. Wade decision a pro-life activist drove his SUV into the side of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Saint Paul, Minnesota. The man told authorities that "Jesus told him to do it." I am aware that this particular location is known simply as the "abortion clinic" because it is a designated PP clinic that actually performs abortions procedures.

I find this utterly heartbreaking. Planned Parenthood of Minnesota has a reputation of promoting awareness about Minnesota Family Planning Health Care Services, a state-funded program that helps women with low incomes afford family planning services such as access to yearly exams, birth control, HIV/AIDS testing, HPV vaccines and yes, abortions for little to no cost. Planned Parenthood has often been a sanctuary for young women who need confidential, low cost services and consultations about their bodies and their sexual and reproductive health.

Aside from the fact that I am very much a pro-choice advocate, the rest of these services are needed in the community and for someone to lose sight of that and take their self-perceived justice into their own hands in this manner is disgraceful to others who are supporting their cause in a peaceful, legal manner. So to that man, I hope you consider yourself subject to the same judgment you inflict upon others.

We should not strive for a government that protects our personal morals and ideals, that it not what this country is about. This country was founded upon the value that our government should promote tolerance and freedom of thought.

Women have fought for many things including the right to initiate actions for divorce, to press charges for rape, to vote, to have careers and one battle that we THOUGHT we had already won, was the right to choose whether or not to have a child.

There is a prevailing idea in our society that women who get pregnant unexpectedly are irresponsible. Though I take offense to that opinion, I would also say that it doesn't matter. People who smoke cigarettes all their life and get lung cancer as a result are irresponsible, but we still allow them seek a way to return to the life they once had. People who become addicted to drugs or alcohol can escape guilt for circumstantial reasons and they still receive treatment to recapture the life they once had. But when a woman becomes pregnant, even in the case of rape or incest or by perhaps by being "irresponsible," they should not be allowed the same opportunity? It is anatomical discrimination towards women to deny them that opportunity simply because they have the potential to become pregnant. They should be allowed to seek to regain the life they once had after they engage in "irresponsible" acts.

The fact is, there are too many situations out there that are a lot more complex than we could possibly begin to describe that cause women to seek abortions, and it is no one else's business to interfere with that decision. Especially when most of the time, when a mother does give birth to a child that they were not prepared for, the one that often suffers most, is the child. We should strive to bring children into the world under the best possible circumstances, not to say that any child that is born under any circumstance is a bad thing, but IDEALLY we would want them to have a stable, secure upbringing.

Bear in mind that I am not saying that abortion is ideal. It is not. Babies are not a disease or a problem. We need them and most people want them. But for those who don't, for whatever reason, making abortions illegal will certainly not stop them from seeking an abortion. Those in favor of anti-abortion laws are naive to think that such legislation would protect babies. If anything, it will harm mothers who will continue to seek abortions anyway. If you really want to save babies, it doesn't come from capitol hill, it's comes from social interaction, education and promotion of responsible behaviors. If you believe that God dictates these decisions and that humans should not interfere, save it for the pulpit, because our constitution allows for people to legally disagree with you.

WE DON'T NEED TO MAKE LAWS AGAINST EVERYTHING WE DON'T MORALLY AGREE WITH, that is not what democracy is about and it is certainly not effective. If you want change of the social nature, you address the people. You council young women about sexual responsibility. You educate them on the alternatives. You truly do what Jesus says to do in the gospels. You approach them with compassion and understanding (you could follow Planned Parenthood's example on that one). And most of all, you accept that sex does happen. It will continue to happen and you have to deal with that. Avoiding that fact and promoting intolerance will only make you a bitter person.

So please don't' drive your SUVs into clinics. Instead, tell a scared pregnant woman that you care and want to help them, perhaps then, they will be more perceptive and perhaps then we will all begin to understand each other. Also bear in mind, that they have the legal right to disagree with you, but the moment you convince once woman non-coercively to have her baby instead of aborting it, it is my belief that you will receive satisfaction that is far greater than passing a law.

Reponse to Father Johnson

2008-10-27T10:08:00.000-07:00

The following is my response to Father Johnson's Fox News post found at:
http://foxforum.blogs.foxnews.com/2008/10/27/frj_1027/#respond

Excuse me Father,

I thought it was a common conservative belief that truth is black and white. There are no SIDES to truth, Father Johnson. If you and your platform Fox News actually believed that I think that real journalism would still exist. Just to introduce you to some new lingo, Liberals refer to these alleged ’sides of truth’ as ‘personal perspectives’ and we generally expect everyone to have their own.

The TRUTH that conservatives seem to be avoiding is that what is most consistent is not always the best choice. There is no one way to cure all of our problems at all times. We are in the middle of an economic crisis. Continuing to wait for the current system to correct itself has proved ineffective and now the problem is too grave to ignore. I’m not saying that I like what Obama wants to do, I’m saying that it’s the only plan that is any different than what is already going on. I’m willing to give it a shot. Living in a democracy requires a degree of flexibility that you sir seem to lack. If we have to drift towards what you call ’socialism’ for a few years where we rely more heavily on the government (as we did during the Great Depression) in order to survive the failings of our current president, then so be it. We’ll let the rich have their money back when the rest of the country can afford to put gas in their cars to get to work.

I keep hearing the argument from conservatives that rich people work hard for their money. So do poor people! And I would argue that poor people probably work even harder. Fiscal conservatives seem to think that everyone starts off on the same level of opportunity for success. The TRUTH is that we don’t. Some people are born on welfare and have to work twice as hard and twice as long to ever be presented with the same opportunities that the rich receive. Some of those people will NEVER get those opportunities for the same reason that some people will never vote for a candidate who is black or muslim. You may not believe me, but based on the upward numbers for Senator Obama in the polls right now, it seems to me that you and others who agree with you are becoming the minority in the this country. Though I may never be able to change your mind, Father Johnson, I hope someday that the voice of the hard working poor people out there will ring much louder than yours.

I hope that your ideals bring you peace of mind as mine do,
Love,
Michelle

Metro Transit Raises Fares

2008-10-06T10:12:00.000-07:00

If the high prices of gas or the threats of global warming drive you to take the bus, you may find yourself paying more than you remember to “go green.” The Metro Transit Council officially instated a fare increase of 25 cents per ride that went into effect on October 1. This brings the regular local adult fare up to $1.75, rush-hour fares to $2.25 and express fares to three dollars.
College students taking advantage of discount rate bus passes will also see a fare increase. U-pass holders at the University of Minnesota saw a twenty-dollar price increase for fall bus passes bringing the grand total up to eighty-four dollars for one semester.
There are several factors that caused this increase. The first one being the rise in fuel costs. “The rising cost of fuel affects transit in a couple of ways,” said Metro Transit Council Chair Peter Bell in an interview with Minnesota Daily in late June of this year. “It increases the cost of doing business. And it increases ridership, which is good for transit, but also increases our operating costs. We need to be able to respond in the shorter term as well as have the flexibility to adjust fares again next year in the event our costs continue to escalate.”
Another reason for the increase is a $15 million dollar Metro Transit budget deficit Associated Press reports. The Council hopes the increase will help offset the deficit caused by rising health care and labor costs.
The Associated Press also reports that there may be an additional 50 cent increase in fares early next year. Augsburg students can still take advantage of college-student discount passes and stored-value passes available in the Enrollment Center.

Addition to Previous Post

2008-09-15T13:54:00.000-07:00

Looking back at the previous post, I now think it looks a bit inconclusive. This is, in a way, appropriate for my arguement, but there is still a point on which I would like to expand. The point of bringing up my concerns with Bush aftermath and two-party failure is this: Politics is not about policy anymore.

Yes I know that most people are skeptical on whether politics has ever been about policy, but now more than ever even the ordinary voters are slinging mud.

I was browsing my Facebook hompage today and I noticed a link to an article by Ann Coulter posted. Granted, Coulter is not known for hiding her biases, but biases are one thing, rage is something else entirely. Here is an excerpt:

"If Bush's only concern were about his approval ratings, like a certain impeached president I could name, he would not have fought for the Patriot Act and the war in Iraq. He would not have resisted the howling ninnies demanding that we withdraw from Iraq, year after year. By liberals' own standard, Bush's war on terrorism has been a smashing, unimaginable success."

(The rest of this article can be found at http://anncoulter.com/)

If you examine this closely, you will see the rage that I'm referring too. Coulter's blog is clearly a response to a claim that Bush should be concerned about his approval rating being low and that the Patriot Act and the War in Iraq are factors in his low approval rating. Coulter is off to a policy-driven start...but just when you think she's on her way to discussing policy, she instead moves straight to petty jabs at the Democrats. THIS IS NOT POLITICS! This is name-calling! And just so I don't come off as bias, let me assure you that I have seen these same tactics on the "howling ninny" end as well (Keith Olbermann, you're the figurehead for that one).

The only "journalists" I've observed who have the pull and the desire to drill the candidates for straight answers on policy are Chis Matthews and Bill O'Rielly. But both have some over-bearing traits that hurt their credibility despite their seemingly good intentions. If you haven't watched their shows, watch them. You'll see what I mean.

We have an economy that is falling apart. We have a war that is costing billions of dollars and an enemy of the U.S. who has been hiding in a cave somewhere for the past seven years. Why aren't the journalists asking SPECIFIC questions about that? We should be asking these kinds of questions CONSTANTLY until the president realizes that he IS suppose to answer to the American people (Ann Coulter).

Coulter, I'd like to know by which "liberal standard" you are judging this success. I'd like you list the major issues the American people disagree with Bush on that is causing such a low approval rating and explain why Bush does not need to be concerned with those issues. When you can make a valid argument on those opinions of yours, then I will listen. I'm just a lowly college blogger, but your influence, whether deserved or not is vast. Please use it to inform the people on the numbers, the events, the facts, the quotes on policy and not just some random words from Michael Moore taken out of context. I expect you to let the facts tell the story, not your name-calling.

Thanks.

In high school I got into competitive speech and debate for a while and one of the things that I really enjoyed about competitive debate is that I was forced to argue both sides. So even though I was entitled to my opinion, I was required to be well-informed on all sides of an issue. Furthermore, the more I debated an issue, the more I knew about it. If pundits, serrogates, journalists, and even candidates today were furthering my technical knowledge on a particular topic as we listened to their reporting and arguing, I think the American people would feel a lot more connected to their politics.

I hope you find a link to this note on your Facebook homepage today. I hope you read this all the way through. I hope you read the Ann Coulter article. Don't worry, I don't need you to agree with me. I don't need you to comment (though I do welcome them friendly or not) Just reading
my perspective and being aware of it when you make your next political decision is enough.

Thoughts on the final day of the RNC

2008-09-05T10:10:00.001-07:00

The scene:

John McCain has just been officially nominated by the Republican Party for the 2008 presidential election. Sarah Palin, Governor of Alaska, has been officially nominated as his running mate. Riots are breaking out in the streets. Protesters sneak incognito into the Excel Energy Center and are quickly removed by secret service. Republican deligates are shouting U-S-A over and over again. I'm sitting in my bedroom with my roommates shaking my head at it all.

My thoughts:

I believe that for the past eight years, George W. Bush has silently pushed America over the edge on the most seminal element of being American, freedom of choice. More than the money he stole, more than the soldiers and homes that were lost, George Bush desicrated the foundation of our nation. In a society that had been gradually polarizing for almost two and a half centuries George W. Bush became the catalyst for the biggest partisan schism of the U.S. population since the civil war. His all-or-nothing mentality has infiltrated our society. The result of Bush's cummulative failure is an America that has forgotten the meaning of democracy.

It is with a heavy heart that I make this claim, but it is excrutiatingly evident in this year's presidential election. Citizens are enraged. The majority of this election's voters will not be voting based on issues, but on the basis of party loyalty or party distrust.

In his farewell address on September 19, 1796, George Washington warned about the dangers a two-party system. He said:

"The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism."

He saw the threat to democracy early on. He anticipated society edging toward a more pragmatic two-party method, if conducted the way it is currently, can provide. No one else anticipated a George W. Bush in 1796, but Washington did. Washington anticipated a president that would throw out the basic principles of a party and he also anticipated party loyalists that would be willing to take the hit in order to save the party. But why? Neither the United States Consitution, the Declaration of Independence nor the Pledge of Allegience mentions anything about party loyalty. Our democracy was not intended to be dependent on the political parties and has no obligation to them. In a democratic state, if a party is inefficient, what reason do the Amerian people have to put up with it? What makes them hesitate?

What makes them hesitate is tradition, duty, money, many things I suppose. But this is not the kind of open-minded ever-changing mentality that we need to make a democracy work. The two-party system was developed as a shortcut. It is a way to help a representative democracy work a little faster. The parties make it easier to raise money and support for a candidate, but over time they can give voters tunnel-vision type worldview. They promote stock issues, uniform ways of thinking, and cause voters to lose sight of their own individual experience as an American citizen. Yes this individual thinking can slow things down, but a large-scale democracy is a complex system that requires complex thinking and complex solutions most of the time. Again I ask, what makes us hesitate to reform the two-party system?

Now I return to Bush. Bush's administration stressed compliance based on fear tactics. You all know this. I'm sure you were as scared as I was. But most importantly he promoted the idea that if you're not with us, you're against us. He started the first wave of McCarthyism in the twenty first century. Compliance or Guantanamo goes against the fundamental principles of democracy. Democracy does not work without opposing views coming together for compromise. Why would a democratic president (this is not a partisan label) want to instill these kinds of opinion limitations? To harbor more power than the founding fathers intended. Now I'm sure you know this too, but what I think goes unnoticed by most is that all these travesties against democracy worked. People made George Bush out to be a bit dull because his ideas were simple, but they were virtually fool-proof.

Bush's zealous, polarizing tactics are now evident in both parties. He was able to solicit the same type of behavior from the opposite party by insulting their intelligence. And instead of disregarding these provocations as catty banter the opponents allow their rage to build. He has done his own party a great diservice by leading them in a trivial direction. Right now the Republicans are so desperate to preserve a positive party image that they will cling to any paradigmatic arguement that will stick. Bush has also done the country a disservice by dumbing down the arguments of both parties.

It is important for me to mention, as my liberal biases tend to shine through at times, that I am not making a direct attack at a particular party. I have spoken with many Republicans who feel that Bush does not properly represent them or the fundamental ideals of the Republican Party. Because of his partisan ties, Bush has unavoidably done more damage on the right side, but the blood on his hands will plague the entire U.S. Government for years to come. He is not the enemy of Democrats or the Republicans, he is an enemy of the greater good.

I'll leave you with more from George Washington. This is what he predicted would happen in 1796 if one political party were to gain too much power:

"But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of public liberty. "

Please remember your country in this next election before your party.

It's Thursday, it's rainy.

2008-08-28T13:44:00.000-07:00

Its been a while since my last post. So much for my spontaneous resolution to write everyday.

I spent the majority of this fine August trapsing around Europe doing a bit of subtle communication research.

It just so happened last my last week of summer courses fell on the same week that two of my dear friends were getting married...in Slovakia. I wasted no time worrying about skipping out of finals. Finals happen every semester. An excuse to go to Slovakia only comes around...well, probably just this once. So as I traveled by bus, plane, train, car, and foot to the small town of Dolny Kubin, Slovakia. It took almost three whole days to journey there from Minneapolis and I had my nose in my Communications Theory book for most of the journey. We had been studying intercultural communication right before my departure, specifically uncertainty management theory.

Uncertainty management theory attempts to explain why and how people identify and adjust to different cultural surroundings and behavior. The theory claims that people will attempt to define their surroundings and if they are unable to do so, will possibly clam up and refuse to try to communicate at all.

I began to see this theory take shape as I finally landed (after eight and a half grueling hours in coach) in Stockholm, Sweden. I was greeted by "beware of pickpockets" signs with images of a masked bandit nabbing someone's wallet out of their back pocket. I wasn't sure how seriously I should take this threat. I had never been in this airport. Was someone going to rob me blind? I immediately began a mental inventory of all my valueables. Passport? Check. Wallet? Check. Camera? Nope, couldn't find it. Those pickpockets must have already worked their magic, I had decided. My heart rate immediatly increased when I noticed that my cell phone had no bars at all. No service. No communication to the US at all. I was officially, uncertain. My management of the situation was to completely freak out. I had never been so unearthed before. I was suddenly hyperaware of the lack of English being spoken and of my uncertainty about my bags and my ride from the next airport. What if they couldn't find me? What I was stuck in Vienna for a week?

My worries began to snowball into panic. I couldn't find my camera, I coudldn't find my phone and I was convinced that everyone was lying to me. This was surely uncertainty management failure. I was not able to isolate any of my worries or reason with my illogical fear. I compeletly shut down. Once I gave up on figuring out the payphone, I sat down at my gate for the full hour and a half layover without speaking to anyone.

About 2 hours later, I finally landed in Vienna. My ride was of course waiting for me as planned and he got me to the correct train with no major problems to speak of. From that point on, I decided to pay attention to the pattern of my thoughts. I found myself trying to generalize every peculiarity I noticed as a general truth. For example, all people in Slovakia and skinny, all bathrooms in Slovakia are dirty, etc. I was totally aware that all the generalizations my mind was dishing out, but I was also consciously aware that they may not be true, but just a defense mechanism. It was like my conscious mind was ripped into two parts. The voluntary and the involuntary.

This became a major challenge throughout the trip. There was a constant battle between when to monitor myself so as not to seem rude and when to relax so I would not seem uncomfortable or uninteresting. The whole mental process was exhausting. I found solace in the cheap and always available alcohol.

The experience made me realize that I have severly underrecognized the significance of culture in the past, even on a small scale. I had not previously begun to fathom the depth of culture and it's fundamental role in respective realities.

After I returned home from the sixteen day soiree, I had to face some inevitable questions. How was your trip? How was Europe? What is it like in Slovakia? I struggled to answer. I humored them most of the time. Oh, the trip was great! Slovakia was beautiful! I want to go back next summer! But the truth is, it shoved me even further into this identity crisis that I've been struggling with. What's worse, it completely took me by surprise. I didn't expect it, nor do I fully realize how to interpret it to this day. I am still communicably stumped.

Because Being a Writer Means Writing Everyday

2008-07-15T13:52:00.001-07:00

Senior Year Blues...

A question that has plagued my restless mind lately is how to define passion? Followed shortly by so...does passion equal purpose? and who really needs a purpose anyway? Hell if I know. My mind is in a very maleable state these days. Envision your senior year of college. The vastness of what lies ahead is entirely too large to fathom or make sense of. How do you manage this day-by-day existence? How long can a person go through life avoiding thoughts of the future without loosing the ability to think altogether? Perhaps I'm being a bit dramatic. But this is one of those frustrating moments where advice will never suffice because it is just an experience everyone has to soldier through on their own. No two identity crises are the same. Gag me with a damn diploma.

In the Spirit of Pride Weekend

2008-06-27T09:17:00.000-07:00

As Minnesotans celebrate another year of Gay Pride events this weekend with rainbow flags, nudists, and many other in-your-face activities, we are again reminded that the the long, grueling battle for couples of all sexual preferences to be legally married under federal law is still not over.

Though some states have passed their own laws allowing such marriages they contain their progress within their own borders. Unfortunately, this leaves millions of other Americans powerless to proclaim legally that they are in fact wife and wife or husband and husband. Why has this been such a struggle? Why does our supposedly-secular government choose to drag on this war of morals? For what reason, other than religiously-based strongholds, could this basic right be denied to all Americans?

The fight is not a religious one. The morality of being of a supposed "alternative" sexual preference in no way effects the reality that two people of the same gender can and will have an equitable relationship together. Therefore, they should be able to take advantage of the same insurance, tax, and child custody benefits as any other couple in the eyes of the United States government.

The American people who are opposed to passing such laws are naive to think that policy against such practices of homosexuality will in anyway change the behavior of homosexuals. Not facing the reality, does not make the "problem" in their eyes go away. It simply creates more problems. Let me refer to a current practice in my home state of Oklahoma. Known for their extremely religious protestant Christian population, Oklahoma has a strict policy of teaching abstinence in public schools. However, among 15-19 year olds with abstinence lectures still fresh in their heads, the pregnancy rate exceeds the national average. Shouldn't these numbers be teaching the Oklahoma state legislature and the School Board a little bit about what type of progess these idealistic policies achieve?

It is time for the United States Supreme Court and the American poeple to face reality and provide the same types of marital benefits to all citizens. Those who oppose homosexuality are welcome to their opinions and are certainly welcome to control what happens in their own churches, but the United States Government is not a church and the United States Constitution states that it should not be opperated as one.

So to all those gay, straight, and otherwise who are out enjoying your food, fun, and free stuff at the Pride festival this weekend, rememeber that having pride in your lifestyle is great, but having respect and recognition from your government, takes more than a parade.

On the Free Press National Conference for Media Reform

2008-06-10T11:45:00.000-07:00

While watching Bill Moyers' speech on Saturday at the 2008 NCMR and I was deeply touched by his concerns. His insight on the state of media in our current democracy was at least, hopeful. However, I feel that there was a gaping hole in the direction of the speech and the effectiveness of the entire conference this weekend.

First, I noticed that with the exception of a few concerned citizens, most of the attendees, including myself, were in some way closely tied to media/journalism itself. We, as the public/independent media community are aware of the attack on public media, but how do we reach the PUBLIC on this problem? With our distribution channels being compromised, how do we get this message out?

As I sifted through even the local twin cities news sites this weekend and watched the local evening news, I was not able to find a single mention of the conference this weekend. This weekend devoted itself to educating the media community, however it is the, shall I say, laypersons whom we are trying to reach. How will these laypersons recieve our message if there is no big media press coverage of our event? Again we have found ourselves at the base of a virtually immovable stronghold on information. It is nice to analyze the news with my future colleagues, but I would much rather hear that local social studies teachers are analyzing the news with their students. How do we effect the demand of the public to the ultimate end of no more big media conglomerates? How do we re-structure the people look at news so that the demand for reform is coming from their mouths? This is a mystery I have yet to solve.

So far what has been streaming from the mouths of Caroline Fredrickson of the ACLU and Phil Donahue former host on MSNBC are calls for more regulation by Congress and the FCC. However regulations are what have got the public media into this mess. Regulation does not only limit the private media, but also the public. And if regulations were to benefit one more than the other, that would go against the original goal of democracy in media. Ed Baker of the University of Pennsylvania reminded the heated crowd that the protection of Freedom of Speech is not something promised to us by big media, but is instead a promise from the United States Government. Big media has no obligation to uphold free speech. Technically these big media conglomerates should and are being treated as people under the law with right to convey whatever message, be it balanced or biased, that they see fit.

There is a sharp contrast between the goals of the public media and the private that seem to doom the misinformed populus. The public media community views information delivery as a public service. Like voting or donating blood, public media advocates view accessible, fair and accurate news as well as accessible educational resources as a civil obligation. However, private news firms are subject to a market economy. News is their product, not their goal. Like all private businesses, they must follow the most economically advantageous track.

We as the public, must lobby the private media. If reform is truly what we want, we must make these news producers aware of the demand, aka, the potential profit at stake. Regulation is not at the heart of democracy. People are at the heart of democracy. If the people can't win this battle, it can't be won. If the people don't want to win, we will no longer have a democracy.

Child’s Play: A Visit From Peter Brosius

2008-05-07T22:24:00.000-07:00

If you write him a script for children, Peter Brosius will probably throw it out। As artistic director of the internationally-renowned Children’s Theater Company (CTC) in Minneapolis, Brosius is taking "theater for young people" in a new direction.

Expanding their season by three shows each year with the help of their new Cargill space, CTC goers should expect a totally unique theater experience every time।

On September 20, Brosius appeared at Augsburg College as part of the Theater Arts Department’s Artist Series। He sat in an armchair next to his interviewer, Julie Bolton, in traditional black attire with tan cuffs and collar peeking out from the edges of his sweater. Each strand of hair was perfectly placed. He looked serene, collected, and heck, it looked like this might be a boring evening. However, in the near two hour discussion to follow, his eager hands could sit still no longer than his tongue in his excitement to tell a group of emerging thespians about his journey in the theater.

When asked about his favorite audition story, he sprang to his feet to act out an audition where an actor violently chopped up a raw fish in the room. As his arms were flailing and swinging at the imaginary tuna, approximately 150 bottoms scooted closer to the edge of their seats, The whole audience captivated by Brosius’s ability to engage impressionable minds.

Growing up in smog-filled Southern California, Brosius dabbled in Community Theater for years before heading to Berkeley to study Law. But it wasn’t long before Brosius lost interest in the legislature he says because he “wasn’t watching justice happen, [he] was watching deals happen."

It wasn’t until he took a long sabbatical in Europe that he came to the realization that if he wanted to enrich his life, he had to face the things he feared most. He had always leaned on language in the past, but after studying law, Brosius came to believe that "language [was] a lie."

In accordance with his new fearless outlook, Brosius began studying puppetry and dance at Hampshire College in Western Massachusetts. First, he mastered the wordless art forms. Then he started to add more elements, including text, to form the type of art that would eventually become the total theatrical experience one now expects from a Peter Brosius show.

He has worked with directing legends Anne Bogart, Zelda Fichandler, and Nobel-Prize-winning satirist Dario Fo. In accordance with his international interests, Brosius is greatly influenced by the aggressive German theater movement of the 1970’s. He told a particular story of a revolt by German educators against prohibiting children from seeing a show about sexuality. Brosius still advocates the same amount of discretion in his productions for young audiences. He doesn’t believe in “dumbing it down” for children.

At CTC, Brosius embarks on a mission to "create extraordinary theatre experiences that will educate, challenge and inspire young people।" His operative word, of course, is challenge. He wants his productions to challenge everyone involved. When he commissions playwrights for his company he demands that they "write the best work of [their lives]” and he holds a strong commitment to presenting work that is "as smart as the audience.” Brosius aims to bring people together for an experience that resonates with audiences of 8 to 85 year-olds.

A common tactic Brosius uses to engage all-age audiences is to base his stories on younger characters, but use conflicts and themes that are relevant to all ages. Some examples from last season are Antigone and The Lost Boys of Sudan, both containing plots that traveled alongside youthful protagonists forced to make grave decisions about survival and honor.

Brosius and his creative team can now explore their possibilities even further with the help of their new totally adjustable Cargill Space (which debuted in the 05-06 season). The Cargill differs from the Main Hall in that it has no stationary seating. Brosius set a goal to never repeat the same set-up for a show in this space and so far he has stayed true to that mission.
Right now in the Cargill space you can enjoy Fashion 47, an interactive mystery show where the audience is in on the scandal. For more information on CTC’s staff, season, and mission go to www.childrenstheatre.org.

Fishtanked- 02/08

2008-05-07T22:23:00.000-07:00

Fish Tanked
"Whatever you missed, we missed too." This repeated line poked out at my brain several times during my viewing of Fishtank at Theater de la Jeune Lune last Sunday evening. I couldn’t help but feel that I was missing something from this choreographed sit-com of nada. I was irked threefold by this potentially existential line. Could it be that they were repeating the line as a joke and in fact there was nothing to miss? Or was it that I was missing something and they were rubbing my nose in it? Or perhaps the third and most irritating option is true: maybe there was something going on, but neither the creators nor the viewers could tap into it. What if, both of us were missing an unperceivable, but potentially profound message and the message itself was making fun of us! It’s exhausting to contemplate really. All this mind-wrestling action put a new spin on the term ‘drama.’
This lack of story revolves around an unorthodox airport terminal in which three Darjeelingites whose names are interchangeable(Dominique Serrand, Nathan Keepers, and Steven Epp, also co-writers) cause mischief with a quirky, soft-spoken airport attendant named Coco (Jennifer Baldwin Peden). Their journey begins with a vending machine, makes a right at a gigantic fish tank, hangs a left at an old-school projection "interactive" TV, and loops through some mysterious tunnels with no apparent final destination or motivation. The show is complete with dancing flowers, a taste of nudity, and the characteristic "Jeune Lune" ending of an isolated dramatic musical number.
The creators utilize blocking and sound effects to construct most of the piece. The text is not intended to advance a story or develop stakes. Instead, the words are mostly instructional, intensifying or explanatory to the actions taking place. Most notably, they are void of any sort of emotion or contextual cues. The success of this tactic is difficult to determine. It reads as neutral. It just is. The creators are successful, however, at making the text almost irrelevant. At times I found myself ignoring what was being said because my brain established that the actions were most important. Was I correct? Heck, I still don’t know.
The text relies heavily on the actions taking place and repetition for its humorous context. The menacing line, "Whatever you missed, we missed too," is used at the beginning of the show when Keepers announces there will be no intermission. Keepers encourages the audience to still get up during the show to get a drink, smoke a cigarette, or go to the restroom if need be during the show. Then, he assures the audience not to worry, "whatever [we] missed, [they] missed too." Later on the line’s humor emerges when the actors repeatedly exit and enter the scene through tunnels on stage. When Keepers returns from one of the tunnels after a prolonged period of time, Baldwin Peden (Coco) assures him that it’s ok because "whatever [he] missed, [they] missed too."
During this same section of the play, the text takes some more obvious existential turns. There are several lines thrown out about being in one situation, but then "conversely" being on the other side of the same situation, for example, being on one side of the wall, but then being on the other and the difference between the two perspectives, etc. There are too many "conversely" statements to count.
This production proves that when language is vague or ambiguous, its significance is demoted to the level of mannerism. Also, engaging drama is possible through neutral dialogue; however, not without putting extreme pressure on the actors and the director to keep the show afloat. Unfortunately, under pressure of this type, there were several points in which this company did, in fact, tank.

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Mandating HPV Vaccine (reference for the facebook group)

2007-08-02T17:29:00.000-07:00

Controversy has been stirring in the hands of state lawmakers as Merck, maker of the HPV vaccine Gardasil, pushes to mandate the immunization to attend public school. Gardasil is a new vaccine that protects against the four most common strains of the Human Papillomavirus, also known as HPV. Due to its 90-100 percent success rate in its testing, the FDA gave Gardasil a special expedited approval for production.
According to CQ Press, conservative lobbyists are against the mandate for a vaccine against an STD in the public school system. They say there are insufficient reports on longer-term results, and also claim that it “encourage[s] inappropriate sexual activity and override[s] parental autonomy.“ Gardasil supporter William Schaffner of Vanderbilt University, however, claims that it is “a hugely impressive advance for women's health.”
Cervical Cancer is a disease that will affect 11,000 women in America this year alone and an estimated 3,700 will die from the disease. Public health experts say that Gardasil “targets cancer-causing HPV strains 16 and 18, which cause 70 percent of cervical cancer, and types 6 and 11, which cause 90 percent of genital warts. “
Muree Anne Dougherty of Augsburg College responded to the vaccine with lackluster support. “ I don’t know how I feel about the schools forcing kids to take [Gardasil], but I don’t think a lot of parents realize how common HPV is…how big of a threat it is to their daughters.“ She supports the movement to raise awareness about HPV in schools. “If people know more of the facts, they won’t need to mandate it, I believe most people will want [Gardasil]. “
Feedback from another Auggie, Jessica Rogers, was a bit more heated. “This is a disease that kills almost 4,000 women a year and we have a significant preventative,“ says Rogers. “The country has a duty to protect us from that. Even if it means a mandatory vaccine.“ She was reminded of the vaccinations that were required of her in middle school. “ Hepatitis is considered an STD, and the government requires vaccinations against that, I don’t understand the hesitation by some parents.”
Gardasil protects against the four main strands of the virus that are “known carcinogens,“ leading to cervical cancer. The vaccine will be administered to females from 9-26. However, physicians recommend the vaccine the most for girls ages 11 and 12. For more information on Gardasil and the Human Papillomavirus, go to medlineplus.com and search for HPV.
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(This is for the people responding to my facebook inquiry, feel free to comment, I do check them)

MPR, For Minnesota and the Globe

2007-07-25T06:34:00.000-07:00

The scene as I walked into the building of Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) was nothing short of 2001 a Space Odyssey. As I walked in the doors, I saw a building equipped with a 300in television screen, white bubble chairs that broadcast MPRÕs three radio stations inside, and a wide open structure filled with floating staircases. It made the single floor of KFAI studios look like a storage closet.

Aside from the aesthetic, MPR also has several state of art recording studios for recording live music during their segments. These studios are completely climate controlled to protect the instruments and equipment. Also, the studios are completely soundproof from the outside. Imagine quiet rooms where you actually canÕt hear a pin drop.

In the newsroom, the energy was palpable. At one point a technician ran out of one of the studios yelling about a problem patching the governor through to their show. The class stood and watched as the man banged his hand against a cubicle and seemed to come up with a solution in his head. He then quickly parted through our mob and went back into the studio.
For keeping up with the latest headlines, there is an entire room of equipment and professionals dedicated to monitoring satellite feeds on world news. MPRÕs news station covers most of Minnesota and also broadcast in various cities internationally. You can find out more about their coverage area and broadcast affiliates on their webpage (listed below).

The studio runs on the dollars of their listeners. The station does a 9-day telethon three times a year that brings in most of their dollars. They also rely on federal and state grant money, and by product endorsements, an enterprise similar to advertising, but with very specific guidelines for content, to bring in the rest of their multi-million-dollar annual budget.

MPR is dedicated to providing the Mid-West with the latest news, the biggest repertoire of quality classical music, and sounds of the latest local bands on their contemporary music station, The Current. You can catch the sounds of MPR broadcasting in the Twin Cities on 89.3fm(current), 99.5fm(classical), 91.1fm(news), or catch the live feed of all three on the web at minnesota.publicradio.org.
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Update On the Nature Post...

2007-07-19T13:49:00.000-07:00

Okay so I started doing my research for this whole natural -environment-learning-affective thing (this is a new official subject matter that I have created of course...). So far, I have been unsuccessful in attaching nature to learning ability, however, my questions did lead to many studies on Seasonal Affectiveness Disorder (SAD). This research forced me to have to recall some the brain facts I learned back in Psych 105. So here's a little review:

First of all the centers in the brain that are believed to hold "declarative memory" and possibly spatial memory (orientation) as well are called the Hippocampi (Singular: Hippocampus). They are these two kidney-bean-shaped blobs located inside the temporal lobe (the big one in the middle towards the bottom from the profile view).

The second thing you need to know about is Melatonin (similar to serotonin, the neurotransmitter that makes you feel happy or content) Scientists now think that increasing the amounts of this neurotransmitter in the brain may stunt the progression of Alzheimer's Disease or maybe even reverse them.

Ok so here's what I pieced together. Melatonin secretion is thought to be triggered in the penial glan by light coming in through through the retina (so in sunnier seasons, the retina receives more incoming light). A study at the University of Illinois on lab rats done to observe the corrolation between the functioning of the hippocampi and the level of melatonin showed that rats lacking the melatonin receptors (MT(2) knockouts) displayed more gradual progress in maze tests than those whose receptors were unchanged. Thus, concluding that low levels of melatonin effect the 'potentiation' (effectiveness) of the hippocampi, which as we reviewed before, are responsible for creating new declarative memories (learning).

Now that's pretty technical, but there was also a study done with people that is a bit easier to comprehend. The National Public Health Institute in Finland did a study to test the effects of light and exercise on the people showing signs of depression. I'll skip all the boring details that had to take into the account and give you link at the end if you're interested in the full story. The results were considered successful if the participants decreased their symptoms of depression by 50% according to the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale. Out of 98, 42 ( 5 men, 37 women) had successful results. Yes that is less than half of the participants, but those are only the ones who reached the 50% improvement rating, not the measure of the progress of those who did not quite reach that level. It's some pretty interesting stuff.

I hadn't heard about SAD before I moved to Minnesota, and having painfully survived one and half winters here, I understand how the absence of light can cause depression. However, I was not aware that it may also put a damper on your ability to learn new things. Not good news for Minnesota educators.

Some ways to improve your mood, and maybe your hippocampi potentiation are to go tanning during those darker months. The UV exposure from tanning bulbs is just as effective on your mood as the natural sun. But if your already dark enough, there is a UV bulb thing-a-majigger(you can contact CCHP for the actual name of it) located on the top floor of the library that supposedly helps as well.

For more information or to access the full reports on the above mentioned studies, check out these sites:

Rat Study:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=16203090

Excercise and Light Study:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=15306031&query_hl=12&itool=pubmed_docsum
Search these topics on Wikipedia:

Hippocampus

Melatonin/Serotonin

Seasonal Affectiveness Disorder

Pineal Gland

Never Prepared, always left behind.

2007-07-16T06:44:00.000-07:00

Note that this first sentence is the only one that I am writing during the time this blog is suppose to be written. (Pause for tour to KFAI radio).

Ok...so we went to KFAI. It is a new concept to me that people actually volunteer their own time and money to fund a community supported radio station. I come from a part of the country where respect for obscure opinion, art, and information holds little value. I was amazed that a group of broadcasters can actually thrive and continue to grow from producing this sort of material for the public.

I was particularly impressed by the professional environment at KFAI. I recently interned at the not-for-profit theater, Patrick's Cabaret. Now I don't want to smear the organization whatsoever, but the limited budget that they operated under was apparent. Scrimping for every penny, we were always using both sides of printer paper, constructing sound systems out of ordinary home stereo equipment, and any other necessary measure needed to save a buck. But at KFAI, the story is quite different. They use state of the art equipment, all of their studios are skillfully soundproofed, and their staff doesn't have to cart their own materials in from home.

Since Journalism seems to be my new great interest on top of my previous interest in voice over work, the whole experience has made me decide to look into to radio station internships after I complete my internship at Juene Lune.

A Walk Through Nature, Close to Home.

2007-07-11T06:36:00.001-07:00

Good News! As you may have already noticed, I made it through the first day. In fact, today I was able to arrive at school a little under an hour early to finish editting and printing my story for class.

With the feeling of success floating under my feet, I practically bounced my way to the library this morning to use the computer. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a peculiar sight. There was a robin akwardly hopping on the sidewalk. I stopped to watch as it climbed over the edging and toppled into the flowers. I took a few steps closer and noticed that the bird didn't flutter away. I thought perhaps it might be hurt, so I slowly increased my proximity and stretched out my hand to the bird. As the reflection of my fingers grew bigger in the bird's eye it convulsed and let out a startling squawk that almost made me lose my footing. By the time I recomposed myself I saw the bird scurry into the flowers out of sight.

My encounter with the bird this morning made me start to think about the environment here on the Augsburg campus. I feel that the being surrounded by nature and its scavenging little creatures puts me in the right mood to learn in the morning. During the season of beautiful summer mornings, that is. In fact, the weather affects my mood so much, that I would almost opt to take most of the classes in the summer and the fall when the weather is nicer for the longest amount of time. In fact, I'm even thinking about doing a statistical article about the affectiveness of the weather on grades as opposed to just moods. I feel that this information would be useful for teachers to be aware of if in fact the results prove my theory to be correct.

Stay tuned for more...

The First Day...

2007-07-09T07:58:00.000-07:00

While squinting at 8:30 in the morning under the flourescent lighting in sverdrup 205, I realize that I'm thankful there is no clock in this room. I do not want to be able to track how slow the time is passing. I haven't been up before noon in a month or maybe more. That said, the 7am alarm is worse than the all my hangovers freshmen year. One thing is for sure, with two summer classes both starting at 8:30 in the am, it's going to be a long six weeks.
The class I'm in this morning is English 227: Journalism. My recent decision to tack on an English minor to my current Theater studies requires me to tear myself away from my pillow and remote control to become a mentor for a local somali youth (part of the Augsburg Experience requirement for graduation). Other tasks include: a transforming story (like how long it takes to transform myself into a human being when I have to get up so early), an interview (most likely featuring how my classmate enjoys camping or how their favorite food is Thai), and staying awake for two films about the news.
Considering how easy it is for me to write this off the top of my head without having comsumed a real meal yet, I figure I'll probably be able to handle it. But I'll have to kiss my days of no alarm clocks good-bye. At least for a while.