gilbertrollins

"As far as I can tell, I'm going right to the toilet." ^sarcasm. let us lol together

^Yep. I think you'd essentially have to kill it if you went to the interdisciplinary program. I bet it's like trying to do a degree in comparative literature or something -- tiny and elite club.

I thought the graduate students at Indiana were especially smart and outgoing. The culture at Indiana really is everything the rumors say -- the faculty and students gel extremely well and there is a ton of extremely vigorous work taking place. Lots of coursework, if you're opposed to that kind of thing. But that's veritably the only detriment, and nobody I talked to had an enormous problem with it. Forceful place.

I've considered interdisciplinarity pretty heavily per my interests; I might be able to help some. After quite a few years walking this path and especially after researching programs and thinking on chances, I'm rather cynical. "Interdisciplinarity" means to many scholars "fancy way to label things we don't agree with on the fringe of our discipline." And you're right, I think, to hesitate to go to the niche program because of that. Programs have tried to emphasize interdiscplinary options at their campuses, and I think this is a great direction for the academy to take. That does not reduce that it is, professionally, a high-risk and high reward strategy. It has to be done extremely well. The distribution seems to be bi-modal. There are people who connect literatures and rooms of scholars and become extremely salient for doing so -- and there are people who try, fail, and end up cordoned in third tier journals (I'm not married to this assessment and am open to argument against it). Personally I opted to find a discipline whose methods at least were my preference, so that the warrants for my arguments would be ascertainable to the mainstream of sociology journals, even if the topics I'm interested in are strikingly non-traditional and contentious. The reverse would have been true in economics, and a half-way house like various political economy programs were not right for me. If you're absolutely married to your project and you see a trend building around the topic, I would probably go for the niche project. Personally I can see myself branching more, and want to try to cast a wide (loud? ha) net. Also note that small speciality programs are a different culture -- you're applying to be an apprentice, bottom line. I've heard, for instance, that Ezra Zuckerman at MIT Economic Sociology is very strictly interested in particular topics and methods germane to his projects -- people who end up not fitting that description apparently do not do well at MIT Economic Sociology. I imagine that scenario generalizes to other small niche programs, because it seems like a result of the institutional incentives and structure (rather than say, a product of Zuckerman's or anyone else's personality). You said your potential adviser loves you. If you hear bells ringing -- tie the knot. The best way to decide will I think be to have a very frank conversation about this with your potential adviser at the niche program. It will (1) give you the opportunity to see just how easily you all get on, and (2) likely give you much better information about your probabilities for success in the two environments.

As far as I can tell, I'm going right to the toilet.

On productivity v rank: I talked to a senior faculty at a T20 who told me he goes straight to the writing sample on job market. "Nobody gets on the short list without publications. It's not like it was years ago. Nobody gets hired on promise anymore, because of phone calls from their adviser." That said, I've had several faculty at all my lower ranked offers openly discuss in which ways the training will be better at a T5. It's. matter of maximizing your productivity and quality of pubs based on a multi-dimensional set of program attributes. Productivity is the goal. Not brand names. Nobody cares if you went to Berkeley if you don't finish.

My understanding is that people who end up ABD for years on end usually do because they get sucked into teaching or other work (and may prefer it). I wouldn't start out in that position. My impression is also that research professors enjoy few other things outside their research - an occassional hobby maybe (boozing, for instance). So if your goal is research professorship I would approach it like a lifestyle, not a job. If your goal is to teach and you enjoy a wider range of activities and consumption opportunities, I can see working part time at a lower ranked program working out ok.

This was largely true for a long time. Sociologists were during the influence of French structuralism, postmodernism, etc violently opposed to testing hypotheses, and a majority of what they were doing looked more like literary theory or philosophy than science. C Wright Mills complains about this some in Sociological Imagination, which I think is about 1952 or so. This is why the rest of the academy thinks sociologists are a bunch of retarded, prevaricating, obfuscate, pomo, bullshit artists. For quite a long time they were on many fronts. Of course with the new emphasis on empiricism, relevancy of theory, organizations analysis, acceptance of multivariate statistics, and so on this has changed quite a bit. Many economists in fact now have a good deal of respect for empirical sociologists, recognizing at least that what most of the quantitative empirical people looks exactly like what applied microeconomists do every day. Anthropology and sociology were almost completely lost to epistemological and ontological debate for decades, and it's taken quite a while for these disciplines to rebound and begin repairing their image as anything other than evidence-less social advocacy programs. You can all call me a condescending prick or whatever for pointing all of that out, but it's all true. This comes from someone who wants to work in sociology, remember.

What's wrong with freely admitting to being condescending and arrogant when I'm angry and feeling attacked? I mean, I understand most people are too spineless to openly admit that they act like a piece of shit when they're angry, but we all do. And whether anyone wants to agree with me or not, I have been consistently attacked on this forum. It was for instance constantly suggested to me by everyone here (including people who now exchange ideas and links with me) that I didn't belong in sociology, wouldn't fit, needed to read more, etc -- mostly (but not always) without any kind of substantive explanation of why I appeared to be so a-sociological (leaving me of course to presume). I mean, what the fuck kind of advice is that? I started discussing my research interests in order to establish fit, and everyone threw a goddamn temper tantrum about supply and demand, rationality, markets, protection, and all the other old hobby horses. I didn't even get a fucking chance to talk about my interest in networks, or the fact that my entire senior thesis hinges on a critical mass threshold model -- a main-stream idea in sociology. Now everyone's moral glorying about how this place is just for applications advice. Are you fucking kidding me? Where exactly did I get ammunition to interject my politics into the forum? Thin air? I've started maybe four or five threads here, tops. Everything else I've said here has been replies to political, theoretical, or methodological remarks other people have made first. The "mixing anarchy" thread would be a perfect example. Everyone's sitting around stroking each other's politics about "anarchy," and I contest the position -- all of a sudden I'm a trouble maker for interrupting everyone's bliss parade or something. I'm the one that needs to grow up? And then everyone stomps around crying when I confront them about their politics -- that they're publicly advertising in the first place. Indeed, ultimately accusing me of seeking out a bridge to troll under because I'm some alleged reactionary libertarian. I mean for fuck's sake -- the stereotypes just keep coming and coming. You put up a debate on here and people respond with fifth grade shit like "obviously econosocio suffers from an all too typical personality," blah blah. Apparently people on the forum feel like it's no problem to throw passive aggressive jabs at me, and then turn around and suggest that I'm just causing problems and a huge dickhead when I understandably take offense and condescend back to them. You know how this out of control flame war started this last time? I said, "'lifecourse' sounds redundant and silly." Then some typical do-gooder gets her kleenex out because I offended her noble intentions to save the world by making a simple critical comment about the title of her subfield. All of that shit I just said about how much I've been loving the sociology I've been reading? We never got to that on the public forum because everybody was too busy pissing their pants trying to keep anyone except sympathizers out of their political conversations, and suggesting that anyone who had research interests that didn't immediately jive with their narratives of exploitation ought to sit down and think long and hard and do a lot more reading about whether or not they're cut out for sociology. I've encountered some of the most intellectually stunted argumentation of anywhere on the internet on this forum. I mean, what the fuck: I can't even remember who it was that laughed at me and said "good luck in sociology -- there isn't one environmental sociologist who agrees with you" when I had the brazen audacity to suggest that food quality has gone up since the green revolution, a fact that's supported by billions of people who no longer starve in the developing world. But, clearly, I'm the asshole here. Anyone on the forum who's thrown ad hominem at me freely without any admonition from other members is forgiven because I putatively always start it. And hey - even if I didn't start it - I barely have any right to be here and voice an opinion because I haven't read enough sociology yet, am an undergraduate, and believe a lot of things people here generally find ethically offensive.

I mean, c'mon. Seeeriously? Nobody else here has hot, sharp debates with their adviser or peers? You guys are missing out. It's the best. That's that cultural difference between economics and sociology. Then again, that kind of culture is also common in law, philosophy, and mathematics. Probably elsewhere too. You get a lot done that way, and only rarely do people get severely hurt in the fray -- because everyone's accustomed to it. I suppose I have learned something over the last few months. Sociology students are very, uhm, touchy feely (well, until you hurt their feelings and they get hostile). Anyway, it's nbd. xoxoxo

Well no, not really. My opinions and actions on the forum weren't unconsidered or accidental in the first place, so I'm not like moment-of-clarity embarrassed or something. It's just a great bear hugging video that makes everyone feel good. At the end of the day, bear hugs of drag-out intellectual discussion was my intent here. Everyone should have understood in the first place that (hard nosed argument) =/= (careless attempt to hurty every feels).

Generally you'll want to ask as many snide, passive aggressive questions about the department's focus as possible, single out the faculty's top publications for open scrutiny, and work to quickly identify and offend the politics of your peers that host you. When you start getting blowback from that, lecture the students and faculty about how they need to grow a thicker skin. Lastly, express heartfelt excitement in the program before passing gas in the elevator on the way to the airport.

Let's do some damn shots in here! (ps - I'm probably what you'd call a bleeding heart libertarian and a recovering Marxist, in case anyone's interested)

Did you read the rest of my post, or only the first paragraph. I mean, I understand I was being somewhat mocking, but within that I was being completely sincere about my intentions here, excitement about the discipline, etc.

Sup Bradley, Thanks for chiming in. Methodological, theoretical, and political concerns are most important to my applications and decision to switch to sociology. So you're absolutely correct that I came seeking these discussions, deliberately. Is that supposed to be a subtle analysis? It's something I've stated outright before, if it wasn't totally transparent from my actions. I don't hold a lot back, chu know? A majority of other disciplines think sociology is a joke, a professional political lobby, and an ineffectual one at that. This discipline is stacked with over 90% democratic voting, exceeding averages in disciplines like law, economics, philosophy, history, etc. If that doesn't scream agenda and a lack of critical discourse, I don't know what does. But because I'm such a maverick contrarian you know , I questioned that and said: "Gee those people have some really great models of behavior, especially the economic sociologists, and they can't all be half-wit political activists." My limited sample of the board confirms that hypothesis. About 10-20% of the people I've spoken with here are extremely intelligent, interested in reasoned debate over opposing views, interested in defending their ideas, mature enough not to throw up their hands in ethical offense the minute someone says something critical to them in a condescending tone. The other 80% fulfill just about every negative stereotype that exists about this discipline. And all is fair in love and war, no? No doubt I fulfill just about every negative stereotype all you flag waving liberal activists have of economists, don't I? And hell! I'm not even an economist! I'm a snot nosed undergraduate! I hang my head in shame - Lord forgive me, for I do know what I do, and do it anyway. If I'm killing your buzz, Haas, you're free to ignore me -- like Cherub pointed out, there's even a nice little feature to help with that (the progress of technology creates Pareto improvements in welfare again! Boom!). Thankfully, that 10-20% that I found on the forum has really reassured my decision to move over to sociology, and I couldn't be happier and more confident about the move i made, ESPECIALLY considering the volume of explosively smart sociological literature I've read in the last couple few months. I'm really looking forward to working with some of these wicked smart people I've found in sociology. Some of them have been extremely generous and welcoming as well. I couldn't be happier, to tell you the truth. I haven't even been dealing with a lot of anxiety about my applications because I'm just so glad to have found a home and a solid direction again. Big shout outs to everyone who's participated in long tete a tetes with me on here and in private message -- you guys really helped with one of the most important decisions in my life. Sigh. I really do love this. You can't imagine. Edit: I mean seriously. It's a very exciting time in sociology, you know. It has the largest inlets of network and complex adaptive systems work, natural language processing, and corpus analysis of culture. In my view, these will only spread and increase in their analytical tractability and applicability. They have real promise to solve ancient problems like understanding the mechanics of how structure and belief get built, satisfying micro and macro social accounts simultaneously. I really couldn't be happier to moving into sociology. It's days of having a garbage reputation for accidentally getting entranced with French structuralism and "critical" (read: ideological) theory are numbered. Exciting, exciting times.

It's "brazen." It must be difficult to imagine someone could form a qualified criticism of professional scholarship at the undergraduate level, considering you obviously haven't been challenged to do so, but keep dreaming big, champ -- anything is possible! But I suspect you're right. I'm sure what really pushes people over the edge (and I've been saying this from the beginning) isn't that my views and readings of literature differ with theirs -- it's the combination of customary outrage at opposing view in combination with that I putatively have no right to comment because I'm not from sociology proper, and because I'm an undergraduate. Thank you for evidencing precisely the point I was making in the other thread. If you can calm down for a moment and maybe take a look at a couple recent threads I've posted in, you'll note the collegial interactions I've had with a bunch of people here, even in midst of these debates (DEBATES!?!?! IDEAS!?!?! ACADEMIA!?!? WTF?!!??). I tend to get hostile and condescending when, well what do you know -- when people attack me with meaningless warrants about my training, clout, ethos, background, and personal conduct. Crazy stuff.

The videos you proudly posted clearly show direct action anarchists pushing other protesters out of their way, to which you add in your comments a warning for others to not get in your way. Is it radical news to you that the state is fundamentally coercive? This is an idea from first-course political theory taught in every department in the nation, and one that spills over into major subfields of anthropology, economics, and sociology. You would have some currency to purchase the request people address you in a "polite and interested" manner, had you not already spent yours by addressing others like this: "yawn." "This is so beyond offensive it's not even funny, you are so inherently bigoted towards "anarchists" there would be no point in even debating this." "It's clear to me that you're a total prestige snob" Three separate board members have sympathized with me privately that you are abusive, immature, and irresponsible in the way you behave here. And I suspect many more stay away from dialogue with you because of your embarrassing attitude and lack of erudition. As I pointed out in the other thread - I've known quite a few abusive, immature, and irresponsible academics. Seemingly these people get away with it because they are otherwise brilliant and offer enormous contributions to their colleagues. I haven't seen an insightful thought come out of your mouth yet. You lurk on threads, posting generic one-line application advice occasionally, and otherwise chime in on debates uninvited just to throw politically-charged ad hominem around. This apparently constitutes a "diversity of tactics" approach to political action. I don't deny that I'm arrogant and condescending. At least I make some attempt to translate that into constructive dialogue. Your belligerence gets channelled into pronouncements that "there is no point in even debating." I've brought people into my apartment that were blind from teargas -- you are precisely the kind of idiot that instigates this sort of harm. Your actions are the reason police fire beanbags at people. Your politics are a disgrace, and I expect nothing but disappointment from your scholarship as well lest you spend less time flaming people on the internet, playing shoot em up video games, watching bloody fights on TV, and more time considering your own priors more deeply.

^My adviser reports that whether you're hosting someone at a conference, emailing for help, visiting at a program, or attending a workshop or seminar -- you must always read the person whom you intend to speak with before you do. It's bush league not to (their words).

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Mind = blown. Nice find, Jose. Lol - I gather from his youtube feed that this kid is the guy behind the camera while those guys were doing fire extinguisher throw-ups and attacking other protesters who were chanting "no violence." He likes video editing software tutorials and posted the 17 year olds trying their best to act like thugs; so it's just an inference. Turns out, he also likes first person shooter video games (because those aren't a product of capitalist oppression), but he doesn't want the video game community to forget about PC gamers. He's also into mixed martial arts fighting (the ones where the guys just totally brutalize one another). He owns a pitbull named Lucy. He likes straightedge hardcore (a group of kids known for jumping people for, say, smoking cigarettes) like Earth Crisis (great band, have to admit -- though everything after the first album was garbage). A sample of his youtube commentary erudition: "Hahaha. I feel sorry for you, you posted like this like you somehow got one up on the senator, but you just embarrassed yourself. He totally owned you, you should just quit politics and disappear into a dark hole. You sir, are a joke." What kind of Fight Club fantasy are you living in? Is your fulfillment of 21st century masculinity-crisis cliches pastiched with political slogans a form of protest, like ironic performance art? ProTip for you, champ -- black clothes and lemon juice aren't new or revolutionary -- people were doing ineffectual "anarchist" direct action a long time ago. You know what your behavior does, man? Turns about 60% of the world off completely to anything remotely similar to whatever philosophies attend to property destruction and misguided youth aggression. Get a hold of yourself.

I saw Eigen viewing this thread an hour ago. He has removed two of LanieB's posts, the first of which started this entire controversy -- note that the first link in Jose's post above no longer points to a particular post anymore, but the second does. Eigen: did LainieB contact you and protest that my behavior was abusive, requesting to have herself removed from the conversation? Is that the policy of the board -- alter the course of debates where people aren't using profanity or other hate speech, in order to protect the feelings of people who call board members condescending? Or maybe LainieB used the "hide" option to hide her OP.

^First downvote: xdarthveganx. Who called me a bigot two months ago for suggesting that dumpster diving wasn't anarchy.

In fairness, Lainie's behavior is a pretty typical maneuver people make in arguments: jabbing at someone aggressively at first, then switching to passive aggression, and running for the moral high-ground by claiming to be a victim (e.g. "I didn't come here to be singled out") in order to avoid engaging any of the counter arguments you've prompted. This is somewhat similar to the times that in four short months I've been called variously, a bully, a bigot, condescending, and an asshole on the forum. I think I've been rather patient and dignified here considering the standard of discourse on the board. Often times in structural social sciences, we are asked to evaluate how our ideologies influence our own theories and preferences, and how we may propagate oppression with our ideas. Just so. But I think the real problem here is that -- useful as that analysis is -- it turns into a monster when it serves as an excuse to eviscerate people who express an opinion that one feels represents an oppressive ideology. This effort turns the fight against ideological tyranny into itself an ideological tyranny. When you believe that everyone is merely a product of ideological frameworks, and in particular False Consciousness, it degrades your sense that the people you argue with have made responsible assessments of their own ideas. Put simply -- when you believe the world is full of retarded cattle who need to wake up, and when you believe that the way thus to save the world is to go get a PhD and refine the right messages to scream from the mountaintops, you have virtually no incentive to refrain from hostile personal attacks at those you don't agree with. Further, that framework implies that the social scientist de facto obtains a privilege on truth. Pretense of knowledge. When you believe that you're sticking up for the little guy, and a lone voice who can start a revolution if you just scream loud enough and in the right way, you're likely to cause quite a bit of collateral damage in your ideological war. People who cause this damage give their discipline a terrible name, because it starts to look a lot more like a religion waging a holy war than a reasoned, scientific inquiry. Criticize logical positivism's shortfalls (when it's taken to extremes) if you want -- some of the people I've encountered here suffer an abject lack of it. Anyway I'm not completely in agreement with Jose's generalizations about sociology. From the not-small volume of sociology I've read in the last three months, it appears there is actually quite a bit of nuance and fair and mature entertainment of interlocutors in it. I think there is quite a bit of self-selection and adverse-selection bias on this forum. It's not a representative sample of the discipline. I've had other board members sympathize with me privately about how intellectually and emotionally immature a group of regulars are here. I don't have positive evidence, but I don't not see a good deal of people not wanting to socialize where a basic level of criticism is often times unwelcome, and where people toss a lot of ad hominem around when they don't like what other people are saying. That scenario would of course just leave the choir and the preacher here without a congregation. Jussayin. It would seem like not offending anyone guarantees the freedom of everyone -- until one realizes that such a situation turns anyone's offense into a weapon, limiting the freedom of everyone. If you aspire simultaneously to a PhD and social activism, and you want a more tolerant, diverse, and inclusive world -- lead by example.

And as you demonstrate here -- sarcasm too -- something else you see plenty of in professional journal articles, right along with condescension, passive aggression, and bickering. The thing is -- it's not pointless. Arguing is how we arrive at warranted belief.

And passive aggressive, I agree. Just a little public service announcement to everyone who has in the past and presently taken wild offense to a critical tone, and acted with astounded dismay at sharp arguments. These are common in Professional scholarship. I'm not quite sure what kind of courses you guys have been taking where people don't get into heated debates, laugh at one another, argue each other down, and so on. But this type of thing is absolutely common in the academy. You really ought to get used to people making it more than obvious when they think something is stupid. And you ought to be concerned if your peers and mentors don't tell you when they think your ideas are stupid -- it's a good sign that they're embarrassed for you or otherwise don't respect your intelligence enough to correct you. If you're going to study things like race, exploitation, and so on -- it pays to have some control over your ethical and political outrage if you're going to conduct a dispassionate analysis of the issue. The general culture of intolerance for strong argument on this board is really troubling. Social science isn't a back-slapping political rally with your ideologically homogenous buddies. I mean, seriously. This is just ridiculous. Who are you mentors? One of my letter writers responded to something I said in class once by laughing and saying it sounded like something that came out of the Sokal postmodern essay generator, in front of 70 people. I got sharp and clarified my point. Who edits your papers? Another one of my letter writers puts comments in my papers that say things like "Do not ever make this mistake again; it's immature prose" and "This section is very good - the rest is pure fluff." Do you guys get gold stars and teddy bears at the top of your writing? A friend in the academy will tell you how wrong you are when you discuss a working paper (or an idea in academic internet chat) -- an enemy will wait for you to publish and skewer you then. And frankly you ought to take it as an honor to stand and deliver your paper and get ripped apart by a room full of bright people. For Christ's sake, arguing with people should be a way to show someone you want to engage them, persuade them, etc. This mamby pamby ethic where it's not ok to criticize one another because it might hurt someone's feelings is the death of critical thought. If you want to see where the tradition of arrogance and derision has gotten completely out of hand -- go take some advanced pure math courses. Some of those guys are out of control, (e.g. "That is a stupid question; don't ever come to my office and ask me a question again."). So I sympathize with the position that too much criticism can just supplant constructive discourse. But holy Christ, I assure you, this board is in no danger of reaching those heights and could use some more scientific curiosity in opposing views.