I know I promised not to stop posting when I went back to the V.I., but there have been some glitches in my original living plans, at least until (promised--we'll see) September 1. Long story short: I'm back to having no Net access at night, during the weekdays I'm slammed with work, and on the weekends it's a bit of a tug of war with security to get into my office (which has no air conditioning on the weekends to save money.) Hence no posts of late. This is frustrating me, but since patience wins the day in this part of the world, I'm trying to roll with it.

That said, I am brainstorming about 25 syllabi right now (I'm not kidding!) so expect some furious posting from me soon. I may write what I have at home and then upload the whole thing in the morning before I dive into my 9 AM classes. We shall see.

Anyone have any good plans for Labor Day weekend? Any Burning Man people?

Here is a short movie to get a sense of the different accents and personalities of three of my students: Mikyla Frederick (Antigua), Diane Francis (Dominica) and Miniminhya DeMund (St. Croix). They are talking about braids (or "plats".)

If hair braiding is part of your cultural heritage, do their thoughts mesh with yours? Have you ever used the word, "kango"?

http://www.echonyc.com/~janedoe/movies/BRAIDING_LESSONS_UVI.mov

I should probably compress this further but I was losing quality...

If you are on my Friends List, you probably read this, but now I can announce it publically:

I have taken a position as Assistant Professor of Communication at the University of the Virgin Islands on St. Thomas.

My teaching time will be spent between standardizing curriculum/ adding media components for our two core classes (Public Speaking and Interpersonal Communication), running our fledgling internship program for Comm. majors, and heading up a capital campaign for our Communication Area (first three places on the agenda: Ford Foundation, NSF and NEH, so if you have info to share, please do!)

My research will stay in the area of new media and expressions of identity/community, but will now incorporate lots of things I am learning about living in area of the world caught between globalisation and postcolonialism. It's a bit overwhelming and I'm sure I won't do it the justice other people would, but hey, I'm there and they aren't so that's that.

I will post much more detailed stuff on my work soon. In the meantime, I'll put the obligatory URL to theview out my soon-to-be-porch door.

/End of Public Service Announcement

d_joshua weighs in on last season's America's Next Top Model and Tommy Hiligger's new show coming down the pipe. My fellow guilty pleasure indulgers, please swing by her journal and let her know your thoughts on this earth shattering information.