Monday, February 28, 2011

Conservatives and Universities

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MONDAY February 28th

BLUMER ROOM – 402 BARROWS HALL
2:00-3:30pm

The Berkeley Sociology Colloquium Series
Spring 2011 Presents:

The Institutional Making of the Modern Day Conservative:How Universities Influence Right-Leaning Styles

Amy Binder
Department of Sociology
University of California, San Diego

College plays a critical role in establishing and elaborating the worldviews and public performances of political actors. But while scholars know a good deal about progressive politics on campus, they know considerably less about college student conservatism. This paper compares the political styles of conservative students in two university systems—Eastern Elite University and Western Public University—and finds them to be markedly different. The authors locate the experiences of politically active conservative college students in a number of organizational structures, each of which provides additional layers of meaning to students’ unfolding political sensibilities. We find that students are active agents in their cultivation of political styles, but that they are also enabled and constrained in their individual proclivities by the organizational resources and cultural repertoires available to them on their campuses. We argue that styles of campus conservatism are much more than the result of “natural inclinations” that students bring with them to college—a simple mirror of students’ social class origins or early political expression. Rather, we contend that these dispositions are developed on campus—they are organizational products, which are built up through multiple interactions of shared culture.

Amy Binder is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of California San Diego and a 2010-2011 Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University. Her primary areas of research are in the sociology of culture, education, social movements, and organizations. She is co-authoring Creating Conservatism: How Campuses Shape Political Discourse and Style with Kate Wood, a graduate student at UC San Diego

Sunday, February 27, 2011

44 years later, Tally's Corner is revealed

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44 years later, Tally's Corner is revealed

Elliot Liebow, left, in a family photo taken during the 1960s, grew up in Washington and wrote "Tally's Corner," above.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
In college, I read Elliot Liebow's classic book "Tally's Corner: A Study of Negro Streetcorner Men." Where exactly was the street corner that he wrote about?
- Christine Helms, Washington
According to many sources, it was Ninth and P streets NW. Except Answer Man happens to know it wasn't. We'll get to its true location in a moment, but first, have you read "Tally's Corner"?


Answer Man hadn't. It's a remarkable book, an academic work - it grew out of Liebow's doctoral thesis - that isn't dry or boring. It's an in-depth look at a group of men who routinely hung out on a Washington street corner in the early 1960s. These are poor men, flawed men, unemployed and underemployed men. But they are treated with respect. And although Liebow used pseudonyms, giving the men such names as Tally, Sea Cat, Richard and Leroy, they come across as flesh-and-blood individuals. When "Tally's Corner" was published in 1967, the New York Times called it "a valuable and even surprising triumph." The late senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.) called it "nothing short of brilliant."

READ MORE

Friday, February 25, 2011

The Last Monarchy: The Inevitable Fall of Hierarchy and the Birth of the Intelligent Organization

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Palo Alto Research Center (formerly known as Xerox PARC) is ground zero for innovations in technology that characterize modern life (it's where the computer mouse was invented). They have a number of free lecture series very much worth going to. It's just over an hour from Mills, very straightforward drive.

DATE: Thursday, March 3

TIME: The talk will take place from 6:00-7:00pm, with networking (including light refreshments) beginning at 5:30

SHARE THIS: http://bit.ly/i2DuaO

WHO: Greg McKeown, Wall Street Journal Bestselling Author

WHAT: The Last Monarchy: The Inevitable Fall of Hierarchy and the Birth of the Intelligent Organization

How smart is your team? Have you ever been on a team where the individuals were intelligent but the team was unintelligent? While each team member could solve problems and learn quickly, did the team struggle in adapting to new realities to achieve its objectives? In this talk, I will share key bottlenecks that restrict smart people from creating smart organizations, as well as five concrete strategies for creating smarter teams.

WHERE: Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), a Xerox company | 3333 Coyote Hill Road | Palo Alto | CA | 94304

ABOUT THE SPEAKER: Greg McKeown is headquartered in Silicon Valley, where he works as a strategy advisor and executive coach to senior executives and their teams, as well as teaches around the world. He most recently worked with or taught groups at Apple, Google, Facebook, Salesforce.com, Symantec, and Twitter. He has conducted significant research in the fields of collective intelligence, leadership, and human systems, and is the co-author of the Wall Street Journal Bestseller Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter; Harvard Business Review article, Bringing out the Best in Your People; and Ivey Business Journal article, Are You An Accidental Diminisher? Prior to this research and teaching, Greg worked for Heidrick & Struggles' GlobalLeadership Practice assessing senior executives around the world. His work included a year-long project for Mark Hurd (then CEO of Hewlett Packard) assessing the top 300 executives at HP.

Greg holds a B.S. in Journalism and an MBA from Stanford University. Originally from London, England, he now lives in Menlo Park, California with his wife, Anna, and their four children.

Sunday, February 20, 2011

Student Volunteers for Pacific Soc Meetings in Seattle Next Month

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I don't know how current this request for help is, but if you are going, you might want to contact Ms. Burdsall. -- Dan

Student Volunteers for PSA Registration Table

STUDENT VOLUNTEERS NEEDED TO HELP AT REGISTRATION  IN SEATTLE
If you are a graduate or undergraduate student, please consider volunteering to help staff the PSA registration table during the annual meeting in Seattle. In return for three hours of volunteer time, PSA will waive the 2011 membership dues of $15 as well as the $20.00 registration fee for the meeting.  We will need several volunteers during the following PSA Registration times.
March 10th Thursday,  8 am to 7 pm.
March 11 Friday   8 am to 5 pm.
March 12th Saturday   8 am to 4 pm.
If you are interested, please contact Tina Burdsall, Portland State Univ. at tdb@pdx.edu 

Sunday, February 6, 2011

Web Science Academy this Summer in Germany

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 Web Science Summer Academy - Koblenz 2011
Nothing like the Web has ever happened in all of human history. The Web is the largest human information construct in history. The scale of its impact and the rate of its adoption are unparalleled. If we are to ensure that the Web benefits the human race we must do our best to understand it, engineer its future and ensure its social benefit. Web Science is the new interdisciplinary field targeting these objectives. The *Web Science Summer Academy* offers a unique combination of 8 courses in Web Science. The courses cover socio-economic as well as computer science subjects. All courses award 3 ECTS credits for transfer to home institutions upon passing exams or assignments.

Following the Web Science Conference in Koblenz, http://websci11.org,  June  15-17, all courses will be held in English in a 4 weeks period between June 27th to July 22nd in the same venue.
 
Join Web Science Summer Academy and:
  • explore interdisciplinary facets of web science.
  • earn credit points for your studies at your home institution.
  • meet a lot of interesting people.
  • have fun enjoying a variety of social events.
  • if you want: acquire basic skills in the German language.
Courses
Participation in Courses
We recommend participants to register for two or three courses. If you apply for three courses (or even more) please consider the amount of work and exams you will have to master in a rather limited period of time.
 
A good command of English is required to successfully participate in the courses.
 
Registration fee per course amounts to 175 Euro (late registration: 200 Euro), which includes the course materials. Students from Partner Universities of the Department of Computer Science of the University of Koblenz-Landau will receive fee waivers.
 
Traveling and Accommodation
 
Located at the banks of the rivers Rhine and Mosel, at the heart of Europe, and with only 1 hour distance to three international airports, Koblenz is easy to reach from anywhere.
 
The Summer Academy offers various accommodations for a low price. You may apply for a sponsor-subsidized accommodation.

The Web Science Summer Academy is held as part of the Summer Academy of University of Koblenz-Landau.
 
Please find more details about the (Web Science) Summer Academy on our website: 
 
Contact 
University of Koblenz-Landau
Campus Koblenz
Universitätsstrasse 1
56070 Koblenz, Germany
Email: summerac@uni-koblenz.de