May 2010
1 post
Mixed Race U.S.
A lot of my friends tell me that they don’t consider me as identifying as mixed race. I’m always troubled by this considering that growing up inter-ethnic-ly has been a huge issue in my life, filling me with doubt, confusion, feelings of rejection and searches for “ethic authenticity,” eventually culminating in an academic pursuit which seeks to examine the exclusive...
January 2010
2 posts
Graduate School in the Humanities: Just Don't Go
From the Chronicle of Higher Education
Nearly six years ago, I wrote a column called “So You Want to Go to Grad School?” (The Chronicle, June 6, 2003). My purpose was to warn undergraduates away from pursuing Ph.D.’s in the humanities by telling them what I had learned about the academic labor system from personal observation and experience.
It was a message many prospective...
December 2009
2 posts
November 2009
6 posts
Alone.... a little
When a Latino moves away, I mean far away… all the way to Santa Barbara-way. The world hits you hard.
Remember your Latina mom that washed your clothing and cooked for you, and that every time she did you had to reprimand her and tell her that she shouldn’t. The reason was because she should do something for herself and also that when you do move away you wouldn’t know how to do anything. That...
Striving for "Goodness"
Goodness
Let us make goodness more stalwart, my friends. Good, too, is the knife that excises the rotten flesh and the worm; and good is the fire burning in the forest, that the good plow might cleave the earth.
Let us make goodness more resolute, my friends. Every weakling with weepy eyes and delicate words, every cretin with obscure motives and condescending gestures, wears goodness, awarded...
for the ones who cannot out. →
this loss of life is terrible, but it points to something bigger.
that we need to list all these accomplishments to make this life worth grieving.
since when does a brown man shot in the “ghetto” worth so much attention?
once his life is made valuable by participating in the institutions most people like him are excluded from.
and if you notice, many of the articles say that this...
close to home.
when the violence hits so close to home it’s paralyzing.
every day it seems like another kid dies.
going to school, going to a party.
and we have to sit in our classrooms ignoring what is happening in this city.
until now, never having to look at the gunshot wounds,
never having to feel the impact of the bullets, the shells lain in front of the neighbor’s doors.
and it’s...
October 2009
5 posts
Until you're away
hasta que estes lejos from home will you understand the true implications of what it means to be.
Signs change, and habits change.
Tears become hesitation and distraction becomes honesty.
Late nights filled with smoke and residual passion for home.
I’m be the happiest person on that plane to Chicago.
Until you are away will you see what it means to be a person in their totality.
sometimes, just sometimes, i notice the ways i try to prove myself.
i don’t even know for which audience i am performing.
a lot lately it’s been the large unknown called “grad school admissions committees”
i’ve been told of the importance of “telling my story”
but really, it’s a telling of how close i fit the script.
my experiences are...
Y como dijo Gloria, "I'm more scared of not...
En realidad, writing can be scary…en ratos. Pero….I like writing from the heart. This is my first post, on my first blog ever. I usually write, but other than professors, no one really reads my thoughts. I think this may be part of the reason why it has taken me so long to finally write on here….I’ve been very overwhelmed lately, with the law school application process. I’ve gone to a...
familia.
i am really grateful for the people who are helping me find myself in all of this.
carlos, i really wanted to say i love you, but not sure it would come out right.
but that’s what i wanted to say.
because i think you’re a really good person in this world.
and sometimes i feel like i have a family again.
September 2009
4 posts
spanish classes
“Paying for culture. When I was born between the legs of the best teacher I could have had.” - Cherrie Moraga
almost there
I’m finding out how hard goodbyes are. It’s probably because I’ve never done a “real” goodbye. I’m not happy I’m leaving, but I’m not sad either. I’m not reacting as I imagined I should or would be, which is wailing with river of tears that I’m leaving almost everything I’ve come to know and love. My guess is I’m the result of a prominent film industry that has told me how people should act at...
climbing the ivory tower
A topic that has come up recently in my conversations with my sister is the issue of diversity in higher education. I’m talking about more than demographics and ststistics, what I really mean is diversity in ideas.
I’ve had several instances of extreme isolation when I am in a classroom and people are talking about how all poor people are passive how exconvicts are traitors to the...
Somos (we are)
We wanted to start one blog with several writers but with commonality, but also not really. We’re all from Chicago and all Latinos, but among these similarities there are tremendous differences.
I’m Carlos Jimenez, I just finished my B.A. in Communication and I’m going for a M.A./Ph.D. in Film Studies at University of California Santa Barbara, I move in four days!
Sandra Rodela, just finished...