Author Archives: legallysociable

Quick Review: Getting It Wrong

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The media seems to have a lot of influence as they both report on and shape perceptions of events. However, they can be wrong or overstate their importance. Journalism professor W. Joseph Campbell examines 10 media myths in the book Getting It Wrong: Ten of the Greatest Misreported Stories in American Journalism. Some thoughts on this interesting look at history and the media:

1. This is an interesting set of 10 events that includes William Randolph Hearst and his role in starting the 1898 war with Spain, Edward Murrow and challenging Joseph McCarthy, Walter Cronkite supposedly ending the hopes of Lyndon Johnson for winning in Vietnam, Woodward and Bernstein in their role in Watergate, and Hurricane Katrina. Many of the events are critical moments in history where a certain story has taken hold even though it is erroneous or misguided.

2. One issue that comes up in a number of cases is that of media figures overstating their influence. Take the incident between Murrow and Joseph McCarthy. While Murrow did preside over a scathing look at McCarthy, Campbell shows how the tide had already turned against McCarthy. Murrow was not the first to challenge the Wisconsin Senator and yet the story was built up over time to suggest that Murrow was the major force in bringing down McCarthy. Campbell suggests a lot of this happens because media figures build up the story over time to honor their own. Another case involves Walter Cronkite. For years after his 1968 editorializing against the Vietnam War, Cronkite said his statement didn’t matter much. However, a few years before his death, he changed his tune and started buying into the idea that he really had turned the tide.

3. Another issue that Campbell introduces is the inability of the media to reflect on its own problems, particularly when historical facts suggest the original story was wrong. Even with strong evidence in a number of these cases, media figures have continued to perpetuate narratives that highlight the role of their colleagues. When media outlets do reflect on mistakes or issues, they tend to bury these stories.

Overall, I enjoyed reading this book. With doses of history plus some thinking about what influence the media actually has, Campbell provides a cautionary tale. As important gatekeepers of knowledge, the media has a critical role in society that includes keeping track and improving upon its own record.

Risk of flying in different countries

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A new study suggests flying is more dangerous in the developing world compared to the Western, industrialized world:

Arnold Barnett, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan School of Management and a researcher on aviation safety, calculated that the odds of dying on a scheduled flight in first world countries such as Canada and Japan are one in 14 million.

But he found that flying in emerging nations such as India and Brazil leads to a one in 2 million chance of death per flight. Lesser developed countries, such as many found in Africa and in Latin America, were found to have a crash rate of one in 800,000.

Overall, Barnett says the data suggests airplane safety around the world is improving. Still, these figures could be frightening to some.

Barnett argues this issues in developing countries might be brought on “individualism and deference to authority.” I recall reading something similar recently that said there were more crashes and issues in an Asian country (perhaps South Korea?) because subordinates (anyone on the plane lower than the pilot) felt they could not challenge the pilot’s authority and therefore would not bring up possible problems if they saw them.

But these figures still obscure the fact that flying in an airplane is relatively safer than a number of other, more frequent activities. Check out this graph from the National Safety Council to see the odds of other activities.

The inequalities in higher education

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Christopher Shea takes a look at two books that call for reforms to the university and college system, reforms which would include possible reforms for the tenure system. After considering what these books have to say, Shea suggests the real issue is how universities and colleges are being split into two groups: those with considerable resources and those with few resources:

Here we have the frightening subtext of all the recent hand-wringing about higher education: the widening inequality among institutions of various types and the prospects of the students who attend them. While the financial crisis has demoted Ivy League institutions from super-rich to merely rich, public universities are being gutted. It is not news that America is a land of haves and have-nots. It is news that colleges are themselves dividing into haves and have-nots; they are becoming engines of inequality. And that — not whether some professors can afford to wear Marc Jacobs — is the real scandal.

This is an interesting observation though it isn’t just public schools that are struggling with finances: many schools with fewer resources have had to make changes. What would Shea (or others) suggest could be done about closing this gap between schools?

Job outlook: either high-paying or low-paying, few in between

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Perhaps adding to the bleak economic outlook, some economists are suggesting that future jobs will fall into two categories: high-paying or low-paying with few jobs in the middle.

This would have implications for the size of different classes within the United States. To have a high-paying job, employees will generally need higher-education or specialized degrees. Having a service job means struggling to make ends meet. In this scenario, what kinds of industries or sectors might provide more middle-class jobs?

Considering the effects of darker fiction on younger brains

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An academic conference this past weekend considered how fiction, particularly the darker fiction of recent years, might affect the brains of teenagers and children. Here is a quick overview of what was being discussed:

The trend for darkness and dystopia in children’s literature reflects concerns in the wider, adult world, Nikolajeva [the conference organizer] said. A hundred years ago, books for kids were dominated with stories about boys having adventures and girls finding husbands; then, from the 1950s to the 1970s, the themes were emerging sexuality and parental conflict.

Inside the teenage brain, synapses are breaking and reforming, and the chemistry keeps changing. Teenagers can’t make decisions in the same way adults can, Nikolajeva said, and she noted that authors, filmmakers and game developers have a moral obligation to make sure that their works contain some positive ethic.

As the Post writer notes, this sounds like an interesting conference. In general, narratives can have a powerful effect. If children’s literature has indeed turned darker, this could have implications for future adults.

And I’d be curious to know how people at the conference defined the “positive ethic” that Nikolajeva suggests should be included in children’s literature.

Quick Review: an Amtrak short trip

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In order to visit family, I recently traveled by Amtrak from Naperville, IL to Quincy, IL and back. I haven’t been on Amtrak for years – and so I’ll share a few thoughts.

1. The advantages to Amtrak travel: larger seats than found in coach sections in airplanes, plenty of space for luggage, a quicker trip than driving (4 hours one way and 3.5 on the return compared to 5 hours driving), the ability to read/do other things while traveling (instead of sitting behind a steering wheel), a reasonable round-trip price (cheaper than the gas would have cost and no extra wear on my vehicle), a generally quiet ride.

2. The disadvantages: limited travel times (either very early in the morning or later in the evening), no car to drive once arriving at my destination plus need someone to pickup/drive to the train station, having to travel with more people, a snack car with very limited offerings.

3. The kind of route I traveled seems to be one where the train could be positioned to succeed: the train cuts down on the travel time, the price is reasonable, and there is no competition from airlines. At the same time, there can’t be too much traffic on this route – while there were more people than I expected (undoubtedly helped by the fact that the train was linked to the third largest metropolitan area in the country), I imagine it might be difficult to generate revenue.

Overall: it was a good trip but there could be a lot of factors that would push me to drive instead. Perhaps this is an American perspective: driving is the default mode unless another form of transportation is an overwhelmingly better option. I could see why there are proponents of high-speed rail (and there are major plans to have a network in the Midwest that centers around Chicago): it would offer a helpful and needed alternative to driving.

The value of stretching for athletes

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Henry Abbott at Truehoop looks at some recent research regarding stretching which suggests stretching before athletic events is not that helpful.

The question arises: why then do athletes go through a stretching routine before a game? I’ll throw out a possible answer: stretching is part of a routine that is psychologically helpful in preparing for a game. Even if stretching beforehand has limited value, as long as it is not harmful, it could help athletes feel like they are doing something worthwhile. Perhaps it helps improve their mental focus. For many, I assume it is part of an established routine that they were socialized into either at a younger age or by an expert. Since they have been doing it in the past, going through the motions helps them prepare.

Where this research could be used is with younger athletes. It is hard to break people out of established patterns but teenagers and kids could chart a new path that includes little or no pregame stretching and more postgame stretching. These younger athletes could then establish new kinds of routines that will be with them throughout their athletic careers.

A course on strangers: Stranger Studies 101

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For a number of early sociologists, the city was a fascinating place. Of particular interest was the changing nature of human relationships – instead of primary group relationships formed in small villages or towns, more and more people were flooding into cities were relationships were characterized by indifference and blase attitudes.

Professor Kio Stark has picked up on these themes in what he calls “Stranger Studies.” At Atlantic, Stark has laid out a brief syllabus for what Stranger Studies 101 might look like.

This looks like a fascinating course. And Stark’s conclusion is humorous “Although I do not recommend it, by the end of the semester my students could likely launch successful careers as grifters.”

Finding community in the Wrigley bleachers

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In the midst of a gloomy Cubs season, a new book titled Wrigley Regulars: Finding Community in the Bleachers might provide some hope. Not written by just a normal fan, it is written by an anthropologist. The website Bleed Cubbie Blue provides some insights into the book’s content:

Before I tell you about this book, you should know a couple of things. First, Holly Swyers, who is an assistant professor of anthropology at Lake Forest College, is one of the “Wrigley Regulars” and has been a personal friend of mine for more than ten years. She asked me (and other regulars) to read through her drafts to make sure all the facts were correct, and that means you’ll find things about me (and about this site) in the book. It’s also written not just about baseball and the Wrigley bleachers, but it’s designed to be a college-level sociology/anthropology textbook about communities and how they come together…

This book is highly recommended for anyone who’s a Cubs fan — or baseball fan — to understand why some of us spend so much time in the bleachers. Yes, it’s about baseball, but as Holly points out, it’s also about community and those you get to know so well over the course of many baseball seasons become family. We all found this out just within the last week, when someone who is a bleacher season ticket holder and one of the “Wrigley Regulars” became seriously ill. The outpouring of love and concern I saw everyone show is a perfect example of the family and community that Holly writes about.

A couple of quick thoughts:

1. This sounds like a fun research task.

2. I haven’t read the book but I’ll take a quick guess at the premise: American community has declined over time as we have become more individualized and separated from others. Here, in the unlikely setting of the Wrigley Field bleachers, strangers came together, not just for Cubs game but for authentic social relationships that transcended typical social categories that tend to separate people (social class, age, gender, etc.).

3. The plug from Bleed Cubbie Blue brings up an interesting point: sports isn’t just about competition and winning for fans. Perhaps for males in particular, sports allows people to build bonds over an external focus. A friendly relationship or community can develop without having to sit down and have deep conversations.

Seeing TV tropes as a kind of programming language

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A new season of television is nearly upon us. Some of the new shows will survive, many will not. Most of the shows will draw upon established television tropes. (How many procedural shows do we need??)

In the midst of these tropes, Scott Brown of Wired suggests we shouldn’t expect novelty but instead should look for something else:

But here’s an original thought. Let’s embrace the standard semantics of tropery—let’s stop seeing a welter of clichés and instead call it what it is: a programming language. The site [tvtropes.org] was launched by a computer programmer, and the coder’s ethos comes through: Seeing all of TV (and film and literature and theater and manga) history written in Trope, you begin to understand how these story widgets—standard, reusable parts like phonemes or Legos or the basic codons of DNA—can be arranged and rearranged to create something unique.

This is an interesting perspective – instead of focusing on what is being repeated, viewers should examine how writers and producers use their creativity to rearrange the existing pieces of the existing television corpus.

This article reminds me of some other recent news, particularly that about college students and plagiarism. What some research has found is that some students have difficulty accepting the argument for intellectual property; they see content as sharable and open. What matters more then is taking existing content and putting it together in new ways.

Brown suggests “originality is dead.” I hope not. But perhaps taking his advice will make watching similar-but-slightly-different television shows more palatable.