Comments for Suzanne Pharr http://suzannepharr.org Political Handywoman Sat, 22 Nov 2008 06:01:02 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.3.2 Comment on Andrea Smith—the Mind Will Not Be Contained by DH Garcia http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/28/andrea-smith%e2%80%94the-mind-will-not-be-contained/#comment-84 DH Garcia Fri, 01 Aug 2008 17:40:07 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/28/andrea-smith%e2%80%94the-mind-will-not-be-contained/#comment-84 I just did a quick library search on Andrea Smith and came up with 7 peer-reviewed articles, and that was on the first page. I used a university search engine and searched only academic publications. In short, Smith Record, you're wrong. Some things to consider: 1) do you still believe Andrea Smith doesn't deserve tenure. 2) rather than read the criticism openly you immediately tried to dismiss it, otherwise why do the search (badly, at that), 3) given that you are incorrect perhaps you can reevaluate why the denial of tenure was made. Ms. Smith is the smartest person I ever met. That, of course, doesn't automatically qualify someone for tenure. If it did, then janitorial staff would have total job security. However, trying to frame her denial of tenure as simply a lack of academic output is disingenuous. Dan I just did a quick library search on Andrea Smith and came up with 7 peer-reviewed articles, and that was on the first page. I used a university search engine and searched only academic publications. In short, Smith Record, you’re wrong. Some things to consider: 1) do you still believe Andrea Smith doesn’t deserve tenure. 2) rather than read the criticism openly you immediately tried to dismiss it, otherwise why do the search (badly, at that), 3) given that you are incorrect perhaps you can reevaluate why the denial of tenure was made.

Ms. Smith is the smartest person I ever met. That, of course, doesn’t automatically qualify someone for tenure. If it did, then janitorial staff would have total job security. However, trying to frame her denial of tenure as simply a lack of academic output is disingenuous.

Dan

]]> Comment on Homophobia: A Weapon of Sexism marks its 20th. by mike perez http://suzannepharr.org/2008/03/10/homophobia-a-weapon-of-sexism-marks-its-20th/#comment-77 mike perez Sat, 26 Jul 2008 05:49:01 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/03/10/homophobia-a-weapon-of-sexism-marks-its-20th/#comment-77 Hola Suzanne I don't see how to order the book. Is it only downloadable? I have been busy with Soulforce and Evangelicals Concerned. Also, finished an emergency stint with Entre Hermanos as their exec director. Hope you are doing well, you sounded great on our quick conversation. love mike Hola Suzanne
I don’t see how to order the book. Is it only downloadable?
I have been busy with Soulforce and Evangelicals Concerned. Also, finished an emergency stint with Entre Hermanos as their exec director.
Hope you are doing well, you sounded great on our quick conversation.
love
mike

]]> Comment on Beyond November by Kristin http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/20/beyond-november/#comment-49 Kristin Fri, 25 Apr 2008 00:43:00 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/20/beyond-november/#comment-49 Suzanne, I'm stumbling across your blog after meeting you so many years ago in Portland, Oregon. I was a somewhat adrift political activist and now a much more grounded activist and mother of two. I have a small, very new blog with a friend of mine called Poligot (i.e, you got politics? I also blog at www.BlueOregon.com). I've been thinking thoughts very similar to the ones you wrote in this piece -- would you consider a cross-post? Suzanne,

I’m stumbling across your blog after meeting you so many years ago in Portland, Oregon. I was a somewhat adrift political activist and now a much more grounded activist and mother of two. I have a small, very new blog with a friend of mine called Poligot (i.e, you got politics? I also blog at http://www.BlueOregon.com). I’ve been thinking thoughts very similar to the ones you wrote in this piece — would you consider a cross-post?

]]> Comment on Homophobia: A Weapon of Sexism marks its 20th. by Jane Know http://suzannepharr.org/2008/03/10/homophobia-a-weapon-of-sexism-marks-its-20th/#comment-46 Jane Know Fri, 18 Apr 2008 02:05:30 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/03/10/homophobia-a-weapon-of-sexism-marks-its-20th/#comment-46 Thanks for writing this wonderful, visionary book. Coincidentally, I randomly picked this up from my girlfriend's books collection last week, and read it cover-to-cover that night. It is amazing how timely the issue is still today. Thanks for writing this wonderful, visionary book. Coincidentally, I randomly picked this up from my girlfriend’s books collection last week, and read it cover-to-cover that night. It is amazing how timely the issue is still today.

]]> Comment on Download “Homophobia: A Weapon of Sexism” by An333D http://suzannepharr.org/2008/01/30/download-homophobia-a-weapon-of-sexism/#comment-24 An333D Thu, 03 Apr 2008 10:55:15 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/01/30/download-homophobia-a-weapon-of-sexism/#comment-24 My first internet- experience was not successful. But anyway I keep posting from time to time. All information online is for people to discuss. I think this is the most important thing why internet is so popular everywhere My first internet- experience was not successful. But anyway I keep posting from time to time. All information online is for people to discuss. I think this is the most important thing why internet is so popular everywhere

]]> Comment on Beyond November by Miriam Yeung http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/20/beyond-november/#comment-10 Miriam Yeung Fri, 07 Mar 2008 16:04:26 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/20/beyond-november/#comment-10 I'm not so sure FinanceBuzz. Read Suzanne's post on desire and hope! I’m not so sure FinanceBuzz. Read Suzanne’s post on desire and hope!

]]> Comment on Andrea Smith—the Mind Will Not Be Contained by Smith Record http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/28/andrea-smith%e2%80%94the-mind-will-not-be-contained/#comment-9 Smith Record Thu, 06 Mar 2008 21:56:12 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/28/andrea-smith%e2%80%94the-mind-will-not-be-contained/#comment-9 ISI Web of Knowledge lists 5 journal publications for Smith based on her work at Michigan, that I can find. None of them are research articles. Instead, 2 are editorials, 1 is a literature review, and 2 are book reviews. She has also written a book, "Conquest: Sexual Violence and American Indian Genocide" which is a good achievement, but books are not peer reviewed. Any other publications of hers must be in journals that are not included by ISI, which can be a sign that they are not strong journals. So it appears that Smith has essentially no new, peer-reviewed contributions to the field, and probably that is why she is not getting tenure. Her political activism is not counted in an academic department. Creating organizations (INCITE), giving speeches at meetings or rallies, magazine and newspaper articles, interviews, nominations for awards, etc., are not viewed as academic activities. She has to publish original research in peer-reviewed, high quality, archival journals. The evidence for that seems to range from non-existent to very thin. ISI Web of Knowledge lists 5 journal publications for Smith based on her work at Michigan, that I can find. None of them are research articles. Instead, 2 are editorials, 1 is a literature review, and 2 are book reviews. She has also written a book, “Conquest: Sexual Violence and American Indian Genocide” which is a good achievement, but books are not peer reviewed. Any other publications of hers must be in journals that are not included by ISI, which can be a sign that they are not strong journals. So it appears that Smith has essentially no new, peer-reviewed contributions to the field, and probably that is why she is not getting tenure. Her political activism is not counted in an academic department. Creating organizations (INCITE), giving speeches at meetings or rallies, magazine and newspaper articles, interviews, nominations for awards, etc., are not viewed as academic activities. She has to publish original research in peer-reviewed, high quality, archival journals. The evidence for that seems to range from non-existent to very thin.

]]> Comment on The Politics of Longing and Desire by Luz Guerra http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/21/the-politics-of-longing-and-desire/#comment-8 Luz Guerra Fri, 29 Feb 2008 22:19:36 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/21/the-politics-of-longing-and-desire/#comment-8 It is interesting that you pose these questions, Suzanne, as this afternoon I clicked on Youtube randomly and came across a video called Lusaka Sunrise. It tells the story of organizers in Lusaka, Zambia who are using the passion young people have for soccer (football) in Lusaka to educate them about HIV/AIDS. As one soccer coach and organizer says—you take something that people are passionate about to bring them together, and then you use that opportunity to educate them—Their efforts go beyond education, as the young people then go on to organize in their communities around issues related to HIV. I think of this popular education effort as a transformation of both fear and passion—every young person interviewed had lost family members to AIDS—how could they not live in fear for themselves and their loved ones? But the existence of fear does not negate passion. Indeed, it can fuel passion given the right conditions. On a very basic level, most people have a longing for home and for community. Most people desire recognition of their true selves and the opportunity to express themselves freely in a space where they will be upheld and celebrated. I think of an organization in San Antonio, TX called Fuerza Unida, originally founded to launch a boycott campaign against Levi Strauss by laid-off workers. The immigrant and Mexican American women who made up the majority of these workers traveled the country, to college campuses and churches, to shopping malls and community centers to gain support for their cause—to improve the benefits package given to workers by Levi Strauss when the main San Antonio plant was closed down in the 1990. The campaign included a class action lawsuit (defeated in 1996), a mail-in campaign of previously-purchased Levi's products and a national boycott. Since the boycott and lawsuit, Levi's has given more notice to other workers of a plant closure, larger benefit packages and more extensive retraining programs. Over the years, a core group of women remained together as Fuerza Unida, and turned their attention to community organizing and being a worker’s center for other women in the textile industry and in the barrio in San Antonio. They formed a sewing cooperative, they run a food bank, and they have a catering service. They have also begun to organize cross generationally, identifying themselves as middle aged and older women whose “focus is to empower young women from working class backgrounds to find their voice, develop their leadership and protect the right to govern their own body, mind, and spirit.” The primary organizers of Fuerza Unida—Petra Mata and Viola Caseres—are great inspirations to me. When I feel frustrated about the very issues you bring up, Suzanne, I often look to them for direction. They are an example of an organization that has found a way to meet at that juncture of fear/anger and passion/longing. There are models already in existence, like Fuerza Unida, who exemplify transformed and transformational organizing. Perhaps one way for us to discuss the questions you pose is to look for these examples and dissect them—what has worked, what hasn’t worked, what can we learn from them as we look for that space of sustained heat for organizing over time. It is interesting that you pose these questions, Suzanne, as this afternoon I clicked on Youtube randomly and came across a video called Lusaka Sunrise. It tells the story of organizers in Lusaka, Zambia who are using the passion young people have for soccer (football) in Lusaka to educate them about HIV/AIDS. As one soccer coach and organizer says—you take something that people are passionate about to bring them together, and then you use that opportunity to educate them—Their efforts go beyond education, as the young people then go on to organize in their communities around issues related to HIV.
I think of this popular education effort as a transformation of both fear and passion—every young person interviewed had lost family members to AIDS—how could they not live in fear for themselves and their loved ones? But the existence of fear does not negate passion. Indeed, it can fuel passion given the right conditions.
On a very basic level, most people have a longing for home and for community. Most people desire recognition of their true selves and the opportunity to express themselves freely in a space where they will be upheld and celebrated.
I think of an organization in San Antonio, TX called Fuerza Unida, originally founded to launch a boycott campaign against Levi Strauss by laid-off workers. The immigrant and Mexican American women who made up the majority of these workers traveled the country, to college campuses and churches, to shopping malls and community centers to gain support for their cause—to improve the benefits package given to workers by Levi Strauss when the main San Antonio plant was closed down in the 1990. The campaign included a class action lawsuit (defeated in 1996), a mail-in campaign of previously-purchased Levi’s products and a national boycott. Since the boycott and lawsuit, Levi’s has given more notice to other workers of a plant closure, larger benefit packages and more extensive retraining programs.
Over the years, a core group of women remained together as Fuerza Unida, and turned their attention to community organizing and being a worker’s center for other women in the textile industry and in the barrio in San Antonio. They formed a sewing cooperative, they run a food bank, and they have a catering service. They have also begun to organize cross generationally, identifying themselves as middle aged and older women whose “focus is to empower young women from working class backgrounds to find their voice, develop their leadership and protect the right to govern their own body, mind, and spirit.”
The primary organizers of Fuerza Unida—Petra Mata and Viola Caseres—are great inspirations to me. When I feel frustrated about the very issues you bring up, Suzanne, I often look to them for direction. They are an example of an organization that has found a way to meet at that juncture of fear/anger and passion/longing. There are models already in existence, like Fuerza Unida, who exemplify transformed and transformational organizing. Perhaps one way for us to discuss the questions you pose is to look for these examples and dissect them—what has worked, what hasn’t worked, what can we learn from them as we look for that space of sustained heat for organizing over time.

]]> Comment on The Politics of Longing and Desire by Kay Whitlock http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/21/the-politics-of-longing-and-desire/#comment-7 Kay Whitlock Mon, 25 Feb 2008 23:20:47 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/21/the-politics-of-longing-and-desire/#comment-7 Thanks for this timely and provocative reflection. Politics have been so fear-soaked, so boundaried by the false idea that there is a scarcity of rights, of social and economic goods, that I think it is tough for us to think beyond the violence and injustice done to us in the immediate moment on into a vision of what communities that are both beloved and just would look like. I am wrestling with this question – the ways in which organizing based on a sense of fear, anger, and victimization can produce different results from organizing based on longing, desire, vision, and dreams – in relation to anti-violence strategies in the LGBTQ movement. And in relation to how those relate to the overall way in which "law and order" agendas have undermined, fragmented, limited, and contained movements for social and economic justice. You're right; how we begin is not always an either/or choice. Fortunately, we always have opportunities, should we seize them, to ask how our strategies reflect and illuminate our organizing approaches. My own thoughts are unfinished, but I am grateful to you and others who challenge us to consider to what degree our visions are limiting and to what degree they open vast new roads into liberating possibility. Thanks for this timely and provocative reflection. Politics have been so fear-soaked, so boundaried by the false idea that there is a scarcity of rights, of social and economic goods, that I think it is tough for us to think beyond the violence and injustice done to us in the immediate moment on into a vision of what communities that are both beloved and just would look like.

I am wrestling with this question – the ways in which organizing based on a sense of fear, anger, and victimization can produce different results from organizing based on longing, desire, vision, and dreams – in relation to anti-violence strategies in the LGBTQ movement. And in relation to how those relate to the overall way in which “law and order” agendas have undermined, fragmented, limited, and contained movements for social and economic justice.

You’re right; how we begin is not always an either/or choice. Fortunately, we always have opportunities, should we seize them, to ask how our strategies reflect and illuminate our organizing approaches. My own thoughts are unfinished, but I am grateful to you and others who challenge us to consider to what degree our visions are limiting and to what degree they open vast new roads into liberating possibility.

]]> Comment on Beyond November by FinanceBuzz http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/20/beyond-november/#comment-6 FinanceBuzz Mon, 25 Feb 2008 22:01:34 +0000 http://suzannepharr.org/2008/02/20/beyond-november/#comment-6 Change is nothing more than a buzzword. Almost all the candidates are promising change. Obama is incredibly eloquent, but when he makes a speech is says little more than nebulous, feel-good messages. The reality is that he is not really any different than liberal politicians in previous elections. A review of his positions on his web page shows this. More government solutions, less economic freedom, more class warfare, etc. His liberal rhetoric is simply updated for the contemporary issues of 2008. How is this change? It is not a change from Democrats of the past. It may be a slight change from President's Bush's policies but not for the better. That is unless you like higher taxes, more government infringement into your daily life. and the specter of destroying our healthcare system via socialized medicine. As for young people's enthusiasm, I cannot share your excitement. This is the generation who seems to know more about the American Idol candidates than the presidential candidates. Their young idealism makes perfect candidates to have their naivete of the political process preyed upon by slickly packages candidates like Obama, though they are not mature enough and have not spend enough time dealing with economic realities to recognize the damaging policies of such a candidate. Yes. Obama is about change, but what little change he offers, is change we do not need. Change is nothing more than a buzzword. Almost all the candidates are promising change. Obama is incredibly eloquent, but when he makes a speech is says little more than nebulous, feel-good messages. The reality is that he is not really any different than liberal politicians in previous elections. A review of his positions on his web page shows this. More government solutions, less economic freedom, more class warfare, etc. His liberal rhetoric is simply updated for the contemporary issues of 2008. How is this change? It is not a change from Democrats of the past. It may be a slight change from President’s Bush’s policies but not for the better. That is unless you like higher taxes, more government infringement into your daily life. and the specter of destroying our healthcare system via socialized medicine. As for young people’s enthusiasm, I cannot share your excitement. This is the generation who seems to know more about the American Idol candidates than the presidential candidates. Their young idealism makes perfect candidates to have their naivete of the political process preyed upon by slickly packages candidates like Obama, though they are not mature enough and have not spend enough time dealing with economic realities to recognize the damaging policies of such a candidate.

Yes. Obama is about change, but what little change he offers, is change we do not need.

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