A BLOG

Who uses Apps?

This past summer, I became fascinated with smartphone Apps. I’m really interested in thinking about their potential for cultivating ethical (and virtuous) practices, particularly in relation to troublemaking and care. I plan to write a lot about apps in 2012: which ones I use, how I use them, how to trouble them, how to read them with/against self-help products. The first app I hope to write about soon is Bloom (first reaction: ugh and self-help is too tied to business and financial success). For now, I thought I’d post some details from Pew Research and an App study from their Internet and American Life Project. These charts come from Part 4: What types of Apps are adults downloading?

For Figure 11, I wonder: why is race only Black and White? Pew Research has had some other studies (like this one) that discuss smartphone use among Latinos. After doing some digging, I discovered that Latinos (Hispanics) are mentioned in the full report. So, why are they left off of the abbreviated one? And why aren’t other races/ethnicities considered, like Asian American? Is it because they weren’t statistically significant (I must admit, I really don’t know much about statistics…)?

Finally, I wanted to add this figure on managing health, because I’m becoming increasingly interested in how people are using apps to care (physically, emotionally, intellectually, spiritually) for themselves.

more on white privilege and challenging racism with humor

A few weeks ago, I posted some resources for thinking critically about privilege. Here are a few more that came to my attention in the last 72 hours or so:

1. Yo, is this racist? I first saw this tumblr blog several weeks ago when a facebook friend posted it. I was reminded of it after reading this Colorlines interview with the creator/writer of the blog. Here’s how Andrew Ti  describes his overall goal:

“What I would like to have, the resource that seems most needed based on the questions in general and the hatemail from indignant white people,” says Ti, “is just an examination of white privilege, and of all privilege in America. That’s what I try to bring to the table, without being too serious about it: an examination of privilege. Because at the end of the day, I’m making jokes and making fun of people, and if that sting of embarrassment can make one in a hundred people think, ‘why is that? Why do I feel this way?’ That’s what I can bring.

2. Another resource that uses humor to expose, examine and challenge white privilege is Franchesca Ramsey’s YouTube video, “Shit White Girls Say…to Black Girls.” Posted on January 4th, it has “blown up the Internet“:

This video is all over the place. I even found it on the VH-1 blog (via my Flipboard)! I found an interesting comment on the Racialicious article about the video. Yonnie writes:

I hope to see Racialicious do a more analytical article on this video and more importantly, the comments/reactions to it on the internet.

I do think that a critical analysis of the comments/reactions to this video might be good…if you have a strong stomach. I can only imagine the racist, privilege-denying rants that this video could spark. I do have hope that humor can reach and positively challenge people, like here.

 

are troublemaking kids better able to resist and “just say no”?

I just came across an article on Jezebel: Pain in the Ass Kids Are More Likely to Just Say No I’ve been interested in a lot of the Jezebel posts lately; I’ve retweeted several of them. Linking to a Live Science article, Jezebel author Anna North describes how a recent study on teens and peer pressure, just published today in Child Development, indicates that teens who talk back to their parents are more willing to stand up to peer pressure from their friends to drink or do drugs. Here’s what North concludes about the importance of the study:

It’s no shock that kids who learn to assert themselves at home are better able to do so with their friends. Arguing with parents, however annoying for the parents involved, might give kids a crucial model for how to stand their ground, something they can use in potentially higher-stakes situations involving peers. The study does have limitations — kids’ self-reports of their drug use and friendships might not be accurate, and they might not fight with their moms the same way in the lab that they do at home. Still, it offers a pretty good argument for letting teens plead their case, rather than shutting them down. Parents have been campaigning against backtalk since time immemorial, but they might change their tune if they knew it could keep kids off drugs.

I first wanted to post about this study because it reinforces the idea that troublemaking (in the form of talking back and refusing to merely accept) is valuable for kids to practice and cultivate. Cool. I agree….even as I struggle with it as a parent sometimes. But, I don’t understand why the study focuses exclusively on mothers as the parent that kids should resist. What assumptions are reinforced by the idea that kids should talk back to their moms? What about their dads? What happens when kids talk back then? I was able to access the actual study (it’s important to go beyond reports about scientific studies and look at the actual study; I learned that from Bitch Media’s great post, Mad Science). Nothing in their method section explains why they focused exclusively on mothers. Is it just assumed that mothers are the primary care-givers? Or, could it be that kids’ deviant behavior is (always) the mother’s fault? Check out one of their possible conclusions in the discussion section (and the implied, “it’s the mother’s fault):

maternal behaviors in interactions with adolescents were also linked to apparent susceptibility to peer influence. Teens who were observed to experience high levels of support from their mothers at age 13 were less likely to adopt levels of substance use consistent with their friends’ use later on in midadolescence. Notably, maternal support was assessed in a different observational task than the recanting behaviors assessment above—a task designed to capture, not autonomy struggles but rather qualities of attachment relationships and supportive behavior. It may be that teens who are secure in their ability to turn to their mothers under stress are less likely to end up feeling overly dependent upon their close friends and thus less likely to be influenced by their friend’s behavior.

Note: As I was researching how various news sources reported on this scientific study, I was struck by how some included Mom in the title while a few others referred more generally to parent. Some examples: Teens Who Butt Heads with Mom Better at Resisting Pressure, Does Your Teen Constantly Challenge You?, Pain in the Ass Kids are more likely to just say no, Study of the Day: Arguing with Mom Protects Teens from Peer Pressure

I wanted to write about this study because I am bothered by how it (and many of the popular representations of it online) might encourage placing even more of the burden of difficult/exhausting parental labor on the backs of mothers. As I write these last couple lines, I’m also curious about thinking through what the study means by arguing with Mom. What were the different ways that this occurred? How did the race and gender of the teen affect how they argued? What connections can be drawn between being a “pain in the ass” and making/staying in trouble?

on a side note: I am often fascinated by comments and seeing how various readers react to a post. The comments on the Jezebel article are all focused on how pointless it is to resist parents (many of the more detailed stories focus on the futility of standing up to Dad/Grandpa and not Mom…hmmm….) and how much easier it is to just tell parents what they want to hear. I’d like to read these comments beside the scientific study.

“I Don’t Want to Learn!”

The other day I bought Mindy Kaling’s audiobook, Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me (and Other Concerns). I was particularly struck by the following passage:

As a teacher, coming from a family of teachers: 2 parents + 2 siblings who all participate/d in educating others in some way, and a long-time student—26 years of education! Yikes!, I place a lot of importance on learning, becoming aware, being curious and always questioning in the efforts to more deeply engage. I think this is great but…it can be too much sometimes. Kaling’s line about “the afternoon becomes ‘unlocking Mindy’s passion for Frisbee'” really hit close to home. While I don’t try to force friends or family members to be passionate about the same things I’m passionate about, I do encourage them to always be learning and thinking and engaging. Maybe learning doesn’t need to happen all of the time. Maybe we do need to shut it down and take a break. Maybe we should have space to yell out, “I don’t want to learn! I don’t want to learn!” Of course, this idea of not learning and just relaxing on the lawn with a book is not new to many. In fact, it’s not new to me; I understand it…in theory. But having spent most of my life learning and teaching and thinking and questioning, I always need a reminder of the value of relaxing and the importance of not (always) learning. 

 

I was 7 in 1981…

This is a LEGO ad from 1981. I was 7 in 1981…

How I found this: On twitter via @worstprofever’s RT of @urchinette’s original tweet. I tracked it down to Peggy Orenstein’s post from May 14th, 2011. Before moving into a discussion of this advertisement, I’m curious about how and why certain images and entries pop up again, months after they have first been posted. How many people will be like me and post or tweet about this image again? (When) is it important to track down the original source (is Orenstein the original source?) of a post? How reflective do we need to be about the links/sources we find? How important is it to make visible the tracing of those sources? These questions aren’t really about this image, but are prompted by other recent experiences of sharing  old sources that had gone viral again–like the video of an Iowa college student whose impassioned speech about his two moms that went viral a few years ago started making the rounds again last month….Okay, I just did a quick search and found that this ad was discussed on Feministing (found it via MAKE) way back in January, 2010. Feministing found it on the FLICKR account of Moose Greebles. There was another great Lego photo there too, from a 1980 magazine ad. (I also found a post for the ad on Sociological Images). Hmmm…through even more searching, I found a recent article at Huffington Post about a new line of Legos for girls, called “Lego Friends” for 2012. This new event must be why the image is resurfacing. 

Would this be a useful exercise for students/users who are developing digital literacy skills?  It seems potentially time consuming, but it might be a good exercise to try a couple of times…

Anyway, I love this advertisement for Lego from 1981. I was 7 in 1981, so I probably saw this picture (in their description for FLICKR of this photo, Moose Grabbles writes that they found the ad in a Decorating and Craft idea magazine; my mom had tons of these and I loved looking at the pictures). My mom probably also saw this picture. If she were alive, I would have enjoyed asking her about it. And my first grade teacher, Mrs. White, would most likely have seen this picture. Since I don’t have too many strong memories from when I was a kid, I can only imagine that this picture helped to shape an environment (a pre-Disney Princessified environment–Orenstein claims the Princess Phenomenon started around 1985), that encouraged me–at least a little–to think and live beyond the rigid and confining gender box of a girl who is only supposed to like pink (not that there’s anything wrong with pink…not all girly-girls are simply and unwittingly reinforcing rigid gender rules/roles) and princesses. Of course, I don’t want to romanticize the (early) 80s. After all, it was also the decade that brought us, “Get in Shape Girl!” I know I didn’t own any of this stuff, but I do remember watching the commercial (I couldn’t find the exact date for when this ad was aired):

One last thing, here’s another Lego ad that Moose Greebles posted on FLICKR:

Why hasn’t this image made the rounds too? I also like to see positive and (somewhat) gender-neutral images of siblings. Speaking of brothers and sisters, here are a few more images and ideas that are related:

1. A comment by Sally from an article on the new Legos for girls:

I played with Legos as a kid (and Barbies, and Hot Wheels). I sometimes wonder if girls actually prefer pink/sparkly things because it keeps their stupid brothers from, I dunno, stealing their toys and hoarding all the Lego.

2. “Sisters and Brothers” from Free to be…you and me: