« August 2008 | Main | October 2008 »
Cecil seems glad we're home. Or at least that the suitcase is. Had a great time at Public Address - thanks to the Wisconsin folks for putting on a great conference at an outstanding venue. Professor Keynoter was his usual smart, prepared, engaging, funny self and was a sharp-dressed-man to boot (and as for those of you who assumed that somehow I had anything to do with his great look, I accuse you not of sexism but of a complete lack of attention to my obvious fashion illiteracy). Oratorical Animal, never actually seen but rumored to be hanging out in a gin joint across the street from the hotel, got his own share of shout-outs at the conference. There was smart stuff all around, and Joshie Juice even gave us the Dean Scream and Elvis, which of course made me think about FDR and radio. Awesome. Add to that a heap of love (or, as one conference organizer put it, a "Love Bubble") for this year's honoree, Karlyn Campbell, and you couldn't get much better. Except that you could, because I also had a run near the lake with jmsloop, a great visit with Niece #4, some good Wisconsin beer, and the usual pleasant time with friends. And, to top it all off, I got an idea for my next book project. Which rocks.
These two images from today's NYT make a telling juxtaposition, don't they? Guess we know who's really in charge now...
image credits, l to r: Jim Watson, AFP/Getty; Andrew Councill, NYT
For Friday...3 images and the stuff folks are writing about them.
The BAG explains why sometimes combing photographs for visual evidence is a useful exercise.
How to photograph environmental transformation? Aric Meyer reflects, at No Caption Needed.
Photographing viewers viewing the ultimate painting about viewership, Velasquez's Las Meninas: at the Prado with Thomas Struth via Notes on Politics, Theory, and Photography.
Thanks to all for the comments above on the Palin/Rosie image. Funny how a few days can change the way one reads pictures. In light of the dramatic developments in the economy over the past couple of days, and the rise in justifiable anxiety about what the candidates might (or might not) do, the Rosie image now reads to me as beginning of the end. Not only of "the Palin phenomenon," but also of people's willingness to entertain the dishonesty and cluelessness of that ticket. If Olbermann last night is right that Palin's favorability ratings plummeted over the weekend (and I pray he is), then perhaps Rosie-esque efforts to cast Palin as a proto-Hillary will fall by the wayside too. But Mindy's comment about Palin-as-worker points to another thing that needs to fall by the wayside (or, more to the point, be kicked swiftly into the gutter): the idea that the Republican ticket is good for workers. Paired with McCain's clunky Hooveresque proclamations that "the fundamentals of the economy are strong," Palin/Rosie's raised fist gesture (which, as Kimble and Olson point out, was a recognizable gesture of union solidarity among the Westinghouse workers for whom the poster was initially produced) reads much more like that gesture of obscenity commenter dhawhee sees.
While we're all waiting for that economic lightbulb to go off over John McCain's head, we might pay close attention to what Obama said yesterday in a speech on the economy at the School of Rock (as Our Grim so lovingly calls it). Cuz this is serious stuff.
image credit: Robert LeSieur, Reuters, Sept. 14, 2008.
So, so, SO much to say about this appropriation of the iconic Rosie the Riveter poster, which itself has its own complex rhetorical history (as James Kimble and Lester Olson have marvelously chronicled). Busy with an illustrious campus visitor today, but more on this later, I promise.
Image credit: Carolyn Kaster, AP (via today's NYT and this article about women & the campaign)
| Sun | Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Sat |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |
| 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 |
| 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 |
| 29 | 30 | 31 |