About nook

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/nook/features/

I am just about sold. After leering at Kindle all year what makes me feel confident about jumping on the BN nook just like that? I think it’s the 3G wifi, 17000 book capacity (with expansion slot) and ability to share/synch books I download with my laptop. This is a first gen widget and typically suspicious of first gen technology because it is inevitably rushed to market with known bugs. There is a two year protection plan that is supposed to make me feel better about my purchase. I’m not looking to replace or even get away from paper but it can be a handy thing for a student/writer to be able to search and find every time an author refers for example – to “brown walls”. I will be starting a Steinbeck seminar next week. This course marks the half way point in the obstacle course to my master’s degree, and it is also the first of my classes where all of the texts are available electronically. Unfortunately nook won’t be available until after the seminar so I will be using e-books on my laptop instead.

(I am going to think of that song lyric “I did it all for the nookie” everytime I see the gizmo. I don’t think anyone made memorable use of the word “kindle” like that).

Filed under: Books, Grad School, ebooks, reader, wifi

Who’s Afraid of Jane Austen?

I’m not (afraid). The review of Who’s Afraid of Jane Austen?: How to Really Talk About Books You Haven’t Read, by Henry Hitchings caught my eye because I’ll be taking a seminar on Jane Austen this autumn – and we will be reading several of her works. Austen isn’t my preferred reading material but this class is kinda sorta pretty much required for my degree. And I gather many chick lit books are based on Jane Austen. So I may pick up a thing, or two or three about technique. It’s all good.

Filed under: Books, Grad School, Henry Hitchings, Jane Austen

Psychology of culture and other musings

My critical theory class (now completed yeehoo!) in which I opted to focuse on psychoanalytic and marxist critique, and the death of Michael Jackson had me thinking about the psychology of culture. I’ve spent time on Michael Jackson fan boards that I truthfully never knew existed until a few days after he died. Who are these people that comprise the world wide audience? What is at the root of their devotion to Michael Jackson? African/African American fan memorials prefer pictures of young Michael Jackson, brown skin, big black eyes and a fuzzy afro (‘type 4B’ in hair club speak). In other parts of the world where people never knew “original Michael” so they only relate to his new face. Some even go as far as to include fake, nobby looking noses as a part of their Michael Jackson costume. Michael was a singer and dancer par excellance but he was also a corporate brand that has been elevated to the level of deity by some. Can a corporation create a divinity?

Anyway these questions added to my interest in psychology that’s been simmering on a back burner for a long time and has me thinking about how to best incorporate it into my graduate English studies. As a step in this inquiry I decided to sign up on the spur of the moment for an undergrad level developmental psychology part deux course. I’ve had kiddie psych courses several times over the years which usually drift away and come to a close just after the age of 6, but never took anything about the process of becoming an adult and stages within the adult lifespan.  I think this is actually a problem for all of us. Most people have an understanding of how children think, but from adolescence on individual expression becomes more pronounced and no one gets it. People become who they are. Different stages of adult development manifest and most people have no what the heck they’re looking at in others – or even understand what they’re feeling about themselves. So the idea is that taking the time to focus on human psychology throughout the lifespan will somehow meld into and ferment with the soup from which I will extract my M.A. thesis next year. I think it will be interesting.

Filed under: Grad School, critical theory, developmental psychology, Michael Jackson, psychoanalytic theory, psychology of culture, type 4B