Code Switching at Lehigh University

Screen Shot 2014-03-06 at 10.03.56 PMOn April 14-15, 2014, Lehigh University will be hosting a Code Switching Workshop inspired by, and comprised of, Culture on the Edge‘s Monica Miller, Merinda Simmons, Leslie Dorrough Smith, and Vaia Touna. They will be joined by two other Lehigh faculty members: James Peterson, Associate Professor of English and Director of Africana Studies, and Jackie Krasas, Associate Professor of Anthropology and Sociology and Director of Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies.

The topic of code switching here at the Edge began last summer (2013) and then developed into a couple of blog posts (here and here).

Stay tuned to learn more
about the upcoming workshop…

 

Pizza Hut: The Best Indian Food Around

 pizza

I had the good fortune to be able to accompany a group of my students on a short-term study abroad trip to India last year.  It’s perhaps no surprise that, while there, I consumed a lot of Indian food.  On the surface, that last sentence may seem rather ridiculous if only because it seems so obvious — much like saying “While in India, I saw Indian things!”  But an event on our trip forced me to reconsider just how simple that observation really is, and where the parameters surrounding “authentic” and “traditional” cultural labels really lie. Continue reading “Pizza Hut: The Best Indian Food Around”

Romance and Puke: A Story of Love

heart clouds

Lest the title of this post leads you to believe that I am about to recount the major details of my college love life, this is, rather, another tale of how the terms we use to define ourselves and our relationships operate as strategies rather than simple, obvious descriptions.  As an example of this, I often ask my students what it means to “be in love,” whereupon they usually talk of romance, giddiness, and a strong chemistry between two people.  But when I ask them how they think their parents might answer that same question, they often get uncomfortable – quickly – for it doesn’t take a room of eighteen year olds very long to figure out that their parents may actually behave in the ways that they were just indicating. Continue reading “Romance and Puke: A Story of Love”

Who Are You? I’m Short (… And Cute)

short girls

Who Are You?” asks members of Culture on the Edge to reflect on one of their own many identities (whether national, gendered, racial, familial, etc.), theorizing at the same time the self-identification that they each chose to discuss.

Although “short and cute” aren’t the first adjectives that I would usually choose to describe myself, they are among the more powerful identity categories that I deal with on a daily basis.  I have always been one of the smallest of my peers, occupying the front row of group photos and living life with most of my kitchen cabinets just out of comfortable reach. Having said that, I am not unusually short – I’m a little over 5’1”, and I wear a women’s size XS or S.  In other words, while I would never claim that my appearance is representative of the majority of women in my culture, there are still plenty of others right around my size. Continue reading “Who Are You? I’m Short (… And Cute)”

Why Durkheim Was Right: On the Perils of Being a Young, Cute Shoplifter

Shoplifting Gum

In yet another entry from the annals of my parenting adventures, a particularly memorable event has always served me well as a reminder of Durkheim’s claim that the beliefs that we often perceive to be so central to our identities are often arrived at only after sufficient (and usually physical) conditioning creates them. Continue reading “Why Durkheim Was Right: On the Perils of Being a Young, Cute Shoplifter”

Santa, Jesus, and All Those Other White Guys: Why “Reality” is No Barrier to Identity

Santa and Jesus cartoon

If you haven’t already heard, the latest news from FOX news correspondent Megyn Kelly is that Santa Claus must be a white man.  Kelly’s remark was prompted by an article written by Slate journalist Aisha Harris, wherein Harris pointed out how Santa’s constant depiction as a white man is a particularly powerful and, to many children in particular, damaging example of white normativity.  After speaking to a group of panelists about various facets of the issue, Kelly reassured the children of America that Santa (and Jesus, too) are white.  How do we know these things?  One of Kelly’s panelists remarked that Santa is based on none other than St. Nicholas, a white,Greek bishop.  In a equally problematic characterization, Jesus’ whiteness was claimed as a self-evident fact of history. Continue reading “Santa, Jesus, and All Those Other White Guys: Why “Reality” is No Barrier to Identity”

We’re All Beautiful

real beautyAlmost ten years ago, the folks at Dove personal care products created quite a stir with their “Real Beauty” campaign.  The photo above became one of the iconic emblems of Dove’s self-described attempt to change the definition of beauty to include “real bodies,” perhaps better defined as the bodies of average women.  While Dove’s initial goal with this campaign was to “widen the narrow definition of beauty,” it has lately described a shift in focus onto building female self-confidence and self-esteem, calling the latest incarnation of its work “an unprecedented effort to make beauty a source of confidence, not anxiety.” Continue reading “We’re All Beautiful”

Subtle Screams

toddler screamingWhen my oldest child was still a toddler (and in that phase where she was old enough to say “no,” but still young enough to be completely irrational), I called my wise mother one night having a tantrum of my own.  I wanted her to tell me how to reason with my daughter – what to tell my precious offspring that would make her eat her breakfast,  separate from a beloved toy, or submit to a nap.  In short, I was asking for the holy grail of toddler parenting. Continue reading “Subtle Screams”