Body Awareness

Actor Packet Theater J, Fall 2012 Dir. Eleanor Holdridge

Aspergers Syndrome (3-9) Overview of Aspergers..3 Australian Scale for Aspergers Diagnosis..4 Excerpt from NY Times article about over diagnosis of Aspergers.7 Excerpt from I Had Aspergers Syndrome. Briefly. by Benjamin Nugent.8

Table of Contents

Annie Baker on Shirley..10 Same-sex parenting in Vermont..13 Life in a Vermont College Town ..14

Shirley, Vermont (10-16)

A Brief History of Photography..15 Concepts of Photography20 Nudes in Art.21

Photography (15-21)

Feminism and Body Awareness (24-29)

Male Gaze 101.24 Reactions to Frank Cordelles The Century Project.25 Womens Bodies, Womens Wisdom reading guide27 University of Louisville Body Awareness Week schedule of events..29

Brief History of English Language Dictionaries30 How I Became a Lexicographer32

Dictionaries and Lexicography (30-34)

Life as a McDonalds EmployeeA Candid Interview (34-35) Glossary (36-37)

Aspergers Syndrome
General info: Asperger's Disorder is a milder variant of Autistic Disorder. Both Asperger's Disorder and Autistic Disorder are in fact subgroups of a larger diagnostic category. This larger category is called either Autistic Spectrum Disorders, mostly in European countries, or Pervasive Developmental Disorders ("PDD"), in the United States. In Asperger's Disorder, affected individuals are characterized by social isolation and eccentric behavior in childhood. There are impairments in two-sided social interaction and non-verbal communication. Though grammatical, their speech may sound peculiar due to abnormalities of inflection and a repetitive pattern. Clumsiness may be prominent both in their articulation and gross motor behavior. They usually have a circumscribed area of interest, which usually leaves no room for more age appropriate, common interests. Some examples are cars, trains, French Literature, doorknobs and hinges, cappuccino, meteorology, astronomy or history. The name "Asperger" comes from Hans Asperger, an Austrian physician who first described the syndrome in 1944. Asperger's Disorder may not be the only psychological condition affecting a certain individual. In fact, it is frequently together with other problems such as:

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD) Depression (Major Depressive Disorder or Adjustment Disorder with Depressed Mood) Bipolar Disorder Generalized Anxiety Disorder Obsessive Compulsive Disorder There is no specific treatment or "cure" for Asperger's Disorder. All the interventions outlined below are mainly symptomatic and/or rehabilitation oriented. Psychosocial Interventions: Individual psychotherapy to help the individual to process the feelings aroused by being socially different Parent education and training Behavioral modification Social skills training Educational interventions Psychopharmacological Interventions: 3

For hyperactivity, inattention and impulsivity: Psychostimulants (methyphenidate, dextroamphetamine, metamphetamine), clonidine, Tricyclic Antidepressants (desipramine, nortriptyline), Strattera (atomoxetine) For irritability and aggression: Mood Stabilizers (valproate, carbamazepine, lithium), Beta Blockers (nadolol, propranolol), clonidine, naltrexone, Neuroleptics (risperidone, aripiprazol, olanzapine, quetiapine, ziprasidone, haloperidol) For preoccupations, rituals and compulsions: SSRIs (fluvoxamine, fluoxetine, sertraline), Tricyclic Antidepressants (clomipramine) For anxiety: SSRIs (sertraline, fluoxetine), Tricyclic Antidepressants (imipramine, clomipramine, nortriptyline).

THE AUSTRALIAN SCALE FOR ASPERGER'S SYNDROME

M.S. Garnett and A.J. Attwood The Australian Scale For Asperger's Syndrome (A.S.A.S.) is reprinted on the ASPEN website with the permission of Tony Attwood, PhD. This is excerpted from his extremely informative and easy-to-read book ASPERGER'S SYNDROME: A GUIDE FOR PARENTS AND PROFESSIONALS. The following questionnaire is designed to identify behaviors and abilities indicative of Asperger's Syndrome in children during their primary school years. This is the age at which the unusual pattern of behavior and abilities is most conspicuous. Each question or statement has a rating scale with 0 as the ordinary level expected of a child of that age. A. SOCIAL AND EMOTIONAL ABILITIES Rarely/Frequently 1. Does the child lack an understanding of how to play with other children? For example, unaware of the unwritten rules of social play? 0123456 2. When free to play with other children, such as school lunchtime, does the child avoid social contact with them? For example, finds a secluded place or goes to the library. 0123456 3. Does the child appear unaware of social conventions or codes of conduct and make inappropriate actions and comments? For example, making a personal comment to someone but the child seems unaware of how the comment could offend. 0123456 4. Does the child lack empathy, ie. the intuitive understanding of another person's feelings? For example, not realising an apology would help the other person feel better. 0123456

5. Does the child seem to expect other people to know their thoughts, experiences and opinions? For example, not realizing you could not know about something because you were not with the child at the time. 0123456 6. Does the child need an excessive amount of reassurance, especially if things are changed or go wrong? 0123456 7. Does the child lack subtlety in their expression of emotion? For example, the child shows distress or affection out of proportion to the situation. 0123456 8. Does the child lack precision in their expression of emotion? For example, not understanding the levels of emotional expression appropriate for different people. 0123456 9. Is the child not interested in participating in competitive sports, games and activities. 0 means the child enjoys competitive sports. 0123456 10. Is the child indifferent to peer pressure? 0 means the child follows crazes. For example, does not follow the latest craze in toys or clothes. 0123456 B. COMMUNICATION SKILLS Rarely/Frequently 11. Does the child take a literal interpretation of comments? For example, is confused by phrases such as "pull your socks up," "looks can kill" or "hop on the scales." 0123456 12. Does the child have an unusual tone of voice? For example, the child seems to have a "foreign" accent or monotone that lacks emphasis on key words. 0123456 14. When in a conversation, does the child tend to use less eye contact than you would expect? 0123456 15. Is the child's speech over-precise or pedantic? For example, talks in a formal way or like a walking dictionary. 0123456 5

16. Does the child have problems repairing a conversation? For example, when the child is confused, he or she does not ask for clarification but simply switches to a familiar topic, or takes ages to think of a reply. 0123456 C. COGNITIVE SKILLS Rarely/Frequently 17. Does the child read books primarily for information, not seeming to be interested in fictional works? For example, being an avid reader of encyclopedias and science books but not keen on adventure stories. 0123456 18. Does the child have an exceptional long-term memory for events and facts? For example, remembering the neighbors car registration of several years ago, or clearly recalling scenes that happened many years ago. 0123456 19. Does the child lack social imaginative play? For example, other children are not included in the child's imaginary games or the child is confused by the pretend games of other children. 0123456 D. SPECIFIC INTERESTS Rarely/Frequently 20. Is the child fascinated by a particular topic and avidly collects information or statistics on that interest? For example, the child becomes a walking encyclopedia of knowledge on vehicles, maps or league tables. 0123456 21. Does the child become unduly upset by changes in routine or expectation? For example, is distressed by going to school by a different route. 0123456 22. Does the child develop elaborate routines or rituals that must be completed? For example, lining up toys before going to bed. 0123456 E. MOVEMENT SKILLS Rarely/Frequently 23. Does the child have poor motor coordination? For example, is not skilled at catching a ball. 0123456 6

24. Does the child have an odd gait when running? F. OTHER CHARACTERISTICS For this section, tick whether the child has shown any of the following characteristics: (a) Unusual fear or distress due to: ordinary sound, e.g. electrical appliances______ light touch on skin or scalp______ wearing particular items of clothing______ unexpected noises______ seeing certain objects______ noisy, crowded places, e.g. supermarkets______ (b) A tendency to flap or rock when excited or distressed ______ (c) A lack of sensitivity to low levels of pain______ (d) Late in acquiring speech______ (e) Unusual facial grimaces or tics______ If the answer is yes to the majority of the questions in the scale, and the rating was between two and six (i.e. conspicuously above the normal range), it does not automatically imply the child has Asperger's Syndrome. However, it is a possibility and a referral for a diagnostic assessment is warranted. New York Times Excerpts The controversy surrounding the over-diagnosis (and often, over-medication) of Aspergers disease in young people blew up in the news last year when the New York Times printed several pieces addressing the issue. Paul Steinberg, of the Times, reported: Asperger syndrome and Aspies the affectionate name that people diagnosed with Asperger syndrome call themselves seem to be everywhere. Considered to be at the high-functioning end of the autism spectrum, Asperger syndrome has become more loosely defined in the past 20 years, by both the mental health profession and by lay people, and in many instances is now synonymous with social and interpersonal disabilities. But people with social disabilities are not necessarily autistic, and giving them diagnoses on the autism spectrum often does a real disservice. A 1992 United States Department of Education directive contributed to the overdiagnosis of Asperger syndrome. It called for enhanced services for children diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum and for children with pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified (P.D.D.-N.O.S.), a diagnosis in which children with social disabilities could be lumped. The diagnosis of Asperger syndrome went through the roof. Curiously, in California, where children with P.D.D.-N.O.S. were not given enhanced services, autism-spectrum diagnoses did not increase. Too little science and too many unintended consequences. 7

The downside to this diagnosis lies in evidence that children with social disabilities, diagnosed now with an autism-spectrum disorder like Asperger, have lower self-esteem and poorer social development when inappropriately placed in school environments with truly autistic children. In addition, many of us clinicians have seen young adults denied job opportunities, for example in the Peace Corps, when inappropriately given a diagnosis of Asperger syndrome instead of a social disability. That scholarly article was accompanied by an op-ed titled, I Had Aspergers Syndrome. Briefly. written by Benjamin Nugent, director of creative writing at Southern New Hampshire University and the author of American Nerd: The Story of My People. Mr. Nugent also happens to be playwright Annie Bakers brother.
January 31, 2012 I Had Asperger Syndrome. Briefly. By BENJAMIN NUGENT Manchester, N.H. FOR a brief, heady period in the history of autism spectrum diagnosis, in the late 90s, I had Asperger syndrome. Theres an educational video from that time, called Understanding Aspergers, in which I appear. I am the affected 20-year-old in the wannabe-hipster vintage polo shirt talking about how keen his understanding of literature is and how misunderstood he was in fifth grade. The film was a research project directed by my mother, a psychology professor and Asperger specialist, and another expert in her department. It presents me as a young man living a full, meaningful life, despite his mental abnormality. Understanding Aspergers was no act of fraud. Both my mother and her colleague believed I met the diagnostic criteria laid out in the American Psychiatric Associations Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition. The manual, still the authoritative text for American therapists, hospitals and insurers, listed the symptoms exhibited by people with Asperger disorder, and, when I was 17, I was judged to fit the bill. I exhibited a qualified impairment in social interaction, specifically failure to develop peer relationships appropriate to developmental level (I had few friends) and a lack of spontaneous seeking to share enjoyment, interests, or achievements with other people (I spent a lot of time by myself in my room reading novels and listening to music, and when I did hang out with other kids I often tried to speak like an E. M. Forster narrator, annoying them). I exhibited an encompassing preoccupation with one or more stereotyped and restricted patterns of interest that is abnormal either in intensity or focus (I memorized poems and spent a lot of time playing the guitar and writing terrible poems and novels). The general idea with a psychological diagnosis is that it applies when the tendencies involved inhibit a persons ability to experience a happy, normal life. And in my case, the tendencies seemed to do just that. My high school G.P.A. would have been higher if I had been less intensely focused on books and

music. If I had been well-rounded enough to attain basic competence at a few sports, I wouldnt have provoked rage and contempt in other kids during gym and recess. The thing is, after college I moved to New York City and became a writer and met some people who shared my obsessions, and I ditched the Forsterian narrator thing, and then I wasnt that awkward or isolated anymore. According to the diagnostic manual, Asperger syndrome is a continuous and lifelong disorder, but my symptoms had vanished. Last year I sold a novel of the psychological-realism variety, which means that my job became to intuit the unverbalized meanings of social interactions and create fictional social encounters with interesting secret subtexts. By contrast, people with Asperger syndrome and other autism spectrum disorders usually struggle to pick up nonverbal social cues. They often prefer the kind of thinking involved in chess and math, activities at which I am almost as inept as I am at soccer. The biggest single problem with the diagnostic criteria applied to me is this: You can be highly perceptive with regard to social interaction, as a child or adolescent, and still be a spectacular social failure. This is particularly true if youre bad at sports or nervous or weird-looking. As I came into my adult personality, it became clear to me and my mother that I didnt have Asperger syndrome, and she apologized profusely for putting me in the video. For a long time, I sulked in her presence. I yelled at her sometimes, I am ashamed to report. And then I forgave her, after about seven years. Because my mothers intentions were always noble. She wanted to educate parents and counselors about the disorder. She wanted to erase its stigma. I wonder: If I had been born five years later and given the diagnosis at the more impressionable age of 12, what would have happened? I might never have tried to write about social interaction, having been told that I was hard-wired to find social interaction baffling. The authors of the next edition of the diagnostic manual, the D.S.M.-5, are considering a narrower definition of the autism spectrum. This may reverse the drastic increase in Asperger diagnoses that has taken place over the last 10 to 15 years. Many prominent psychologists have reacted to this news with dismay. They protest that children and teenagers on the mild side of the autism spectrum will be denied the services they need if theyre unable to meet the new, more exclusive criteria. But my experience cant be unique. Under the rules in place today, any nerd, any withdrawn, bookish kid, can have Asperger syndrome. The definition should be narrowed. I dont want a kid with mild autism to go untreated. But I dont want a school psychologist to give a clumsy, lonely teenager a description of his mind that isnt true.

Shirley, Vermont
In fall 2009, Playwrights Horizons in New York produced the premiere of Annie Bakers play CIRCLE MIRROR TRANSFORMATION. That play was the second of Bakers plays to be produced naming Shirley, Vermont as its setting. Her play THE ALIENS, running at Studio Theatre in November, is the third story to give us a glimpse into the inner-workings of this fictional town and its citizens. As Playwrights prepared to open Bakers play, Literary Manager Adam Greenfield interviewed the playwright about her background and writing influences. The following exchange is excerpted from that conversation. Adam Greenfield: I have a confession: it wasn't until our workshop of Circle Mirror Transformation last fall that I realized Shirley, Vermont, is a fictional town. I actually tried to find it on Wikipedia one day after rehearsal, thinking Id find some charmingly quaint Chamber of Commerce website. And then, when no Shirley turned up, I realized how totally real this place has felt to me in reading your playsCan you tell me about Shirley? If there was a Wikipedia entry about it, what might it say? Annie Baker: Wow. Thank you. Here's the Wikipedia entry: Windsor Country Vermont, located in Central Eastern Vermont, was named for the town of Windsor, Vermont (which was actually named after Windsor, Connecticut.) Windsor was the birthplace of Vermont, where the state constitution was signed, and until 1805 it served as the first capital. Montpelier then became the official state capital. Shirley is a town in Windsor County, Vermont. The population was 14,023 in the 2000 census. Shirley is home to Shirley State College, and it hosts the annual Vermont Gourd Festival. The American Gourd Society reports that the domesticated bottle gourds widely used by prehistoric peoples were likely brought to the Americas some 10,000 years ago from Asia. These bottle gourds may have been brought in boats from Asia, hand-carried across a land bridge, or floated across the Bering Strait. It is interesting to note that this research shows that the bottle gourd -- essentially a container, not a food crop -- is the earliest known domesticated plant grown here.

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Two Abenaki children in traditional dress.

Once a fishing place for the Abenaki tribe of the Northeast, Shirley was settled by the English in 1754 and named for Lord Henry Shirley, the man who was eventually responsible for one of the first acts of biological warfare in North America. In response to various Native American uprisings in the 1760s, Shirley approved a plan to distribute smallpox-infected blankets to the Indians, whom he referred to as an execrable race. It is actually Lord Jeffrey Amherst (for whom Amherst, Massachusetts in named) who is accused of this act. Amherst College explains that, In the summer of 1763, attacks by Native Americans against colonists on the western frontier seriously challenged British military control. In a letter to Colonel Henry Bouquet dated July 7, 1763, Amherst writes "Could it not be contrived to send the Small Pox among those disaffected tribes of Indians?" In a later letter to Bouquet Amherst repeats the idea: "You will do well to try to inoculate the Indians by means of blankets, as well as to try every other method that can serve to extirpate this execrable race." It is accurate to say that Lord Jeffery Amherst advocated biological warfare against Indians, but there is no evidence that any infected blankets were distributed at his command. Shirley has never moved to a mayor-council or council-manager form of government; instead, it has maintained the tradition of a town meeting and select board. In 1853, pure spring water was discovered near Shirleys Plum Brook, and for the next few decades the town was home to the Shirley Hydropathic Institute and became a curative health resort destination until 1882. Now the former Hydropathic Institute is home to the Shirley School, a small preparatory school for dyslexic students. Public nudity was legal in Shirley until 2008, and for years the towns Saturday Morning Farmers Market was a destination point for nudists. But in 2008, by a narrow margin, the town banned nudity on the main roads or within 300 feet of any school or place of public worship, and the face of the Farmers Market (always held in the parking lot of the Unitarian Church) was forever changed.

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Vermont has no state laws against public nudity, but communities can write their own bans. At least eight cities and towns have anti-nudity ordinances, according to the Vermont League of Cities and Towns. The town of Brattleboro, Vermont has debated instituting a ban for several years, after public nudity became

an issue for downtown business owners. No matter the result, some faced the question with typical New England pragmatism: "As soon as winter comes, there won't be a story anymore," stated Town Clerk Annette Cappy. Notable historical residents have included Gilbert Rosebath, astronomer; Edwin Hunt Lessey, reed organ maker; and Elizabeth Collins, poet. In the 1980s and 90s Shirley became home to a small community of Cambodian refugees who were fleeing the Khmer Rouge regime. The community is still thriving, and now all Shirley public school newsletters are distributed in English and in Khmer. AG: Amazing...What is it about Shirley that keeps you coming back? Did you grow up there? I think what keeps me coming back to Shirley is just the fact that Ive thought about it so much, and so as a result I have a cast of like 600 characters in my mind. When I start writing a new play, its very tempting to use some of those characterscharacters that were mentioned in passing in other plays, or characters that Ive just come up with for fun because Im a crazy person. I didnt grow up in Shirley. I grew up in Amherst, Massachusetts, which shares some characteristics with Shirley, but Amherst is definitely a different beast. Shirley is a combination of Amherst with a bunch of Vermont towns that fascinate me. Vermont fascinates me, period. The remoteness and the self congratulation and the embracing of diversity and the fear of diversity and the beauty and the good intentions and the old farmers and the old hippies and the new farmers and the new hippiesI love all of it. Steinbeck wrote about Salinas. Carver wrote about the Pacific Northwest. Faulkner had Yoknapatawpha. Will you continue to write about Shirley, or do you think youll leave it someday? You know, I have no idea. I will probably continue to write about Shirley for the rest of my life, but hopefully not in such an exclusive and compulsive way. Hopefully if you check in with me five years from now Ill have branched out a little bit.

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Same-Sex Marriage in Vermont

In April 2009 Vermont became the fourth state to legalize same-sex marriage. While BODY AWARENESS was written before that legislation passed, Vermont has long been seen as a safe-haven for alternative families, as it was the first US state to legalize same-sex relationships in the form of civil unions, in July 2000. This was before any US state or Canadian province had legalized same-sex relationships and before any nation had legalized same-sex marriage. Over 2,000 same-sex couples took advantage of that new legislation during the first year of its enactment. The majority of couples came to Vermont from other US states, despite the fact that civil unions were not recognized by their home state.

Vermont is also seen as very friendly towards alternative families, marked by their liberal policies regarding adoption (relative to other sattes). Vermont is one of only 18 states and Washington, DC that allow same sex couples to adopt through joint adoption. Joint adoption offers some protection of the rights of both parents, though there is still the possibility that parents may face difficulties even in these states, when travelling, moving to another state, or when facing the dissolution of the union. Between 2 million and 2.8 million children in the US are being raised by LGBT parents. In the United States, 69 percent of children live with married, heterosexual parents, down from 83 percent in 1970, according to recent reports. Today, an estimated 24 percent of female same-sex couples, 11 percent of male couples and 38 percent of transgender Americans are raising children. Ironically, the states with the highest number of children being raised by LGBT families are those with the most restrictive laws. While states like California and New York have high numbers of same-sex couples, those most likely to be raising children live in Mississippi, Wyoming, Alaska, Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Kansas, Alabama, Montana, South Dakota and South Carolina, in that order. In these states, nonbiological samesex parents have little to no legal rights regarding their child; cannot include a child on their health insurance; and can be denied access to a hospital in an emergency or be left out of health care decisions.

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Life in Burlington, Vermont, Home to University of Vermont, Burlington College, and Champlain College The largest city in the state of Vermont, Burlington was settled on Lake Champlain amid the Green Mountains to the east and the Adirondack Mountains to the west. Home to several colleges including the University of Vermont, Burlington College and Champlain College, the city enjoys weather typical of New England: four distinct seasons highlighted by beautiful springs and autumns, snowy winters and warm summers. With a lake and two mountain ranges coupled with the variety of weather throughout the year, students can enjoy nearly any kind of outdoor activity. Biking, hiking and boating are all popular, and there are numerous mountains throughout the state, allowing skiing and snowboarding. Every April, UVM hosts SpringFest, a music festival that brings in some of the most talented and popular artists from around the world. Past headliners have included The Roots, MSTRKRFT and Ziggy Marley. If youre going to be around in the summer, make sure you check out the Festival of Fools, a street theater celebration held every August downtown. Where to Eat and Drink For some of the tastiest and healthiest meals you can get on campus, go to Brennans, which uses only local, organic foods on its menu. Theres also a microbrew, so stop in for a drink after youve finished class for the day. And of course, any time spent in Vermont would be incomplete without enjoying Ben and Jerrys ice cream, a staple of the state. Enjoy a cone (or a pint) of their deliciously wacky concoctions, such as Chunky Monkey, Ginger Snap and Dublin Mudslide. Did You Know? UVM is one of the leaders in sustainability on college campuses. All copy paper used on campus is made from 100 percent recycled material.

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Photography

A Timeline of Photography History:

Ancient times: Camera obscuras used to form images on walls in darkened rooms; image formation via a pinhole 16th century: Brightness and clarity of camera obscuras improved by enlarging the hole inserting a telescope lens 17th century: Camera obscuras in frequent use by artists and made portable in the form of sedan chairs 1727: Professor J. Schulze mixes chalk, nitric acid, and silver in a flask; notices darkening on side of flask exposed to sunlight. Accidental creation of the first photo-sensitive compound. 1800: Thomas Wedgwood makes "sun pictures" by placing opaque objects on leather treated with silver nitrate; resulting images deteriorated rapidly, however, if displayed under light stronger than from candles. 1816: Nicphore Nipce combines the camera obscura with photosensitive paper 1826: Nipce creates a permanent image 1834: Henry Fox Talbot creates permanent (negative) images using paper soaked in silver chloride and fixed with a salt solution. Talbot created positive images by contact printing onto another sheet of paper. 1837: Louis Daguerre creates images on silver-plated copper, coated with silver iodide and "developed" with warmed mercury; Daguerre is awarded a state pension by the French government in exchange for publication of methods and the rights by other French citizens to use the Daguerreotype process. 1841: Talbot patents his process under the name "calotype". 1851: Frederick Scott Archer, a sculptor in London, improves photographic resolution by spreading a mixture of collodion (nitrated cotton dissolved in ether and alcohol) and chemicals on sheets of glass. Wet plate collodion photography was much cheaper than daguerreotypes and the negative/positive process permitted unlimited reproductions. 1853: Nadar (Felix Toumachon) opens his portrait studio in Paris

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1854: Adolphe Disderi develops carte-de-visite photography in Paris, leading to worldwide boom in portrait studios for the next decade 1855: Beginning of stereoscopic era 1855-57: Direct positive images on glass (ambrotypes) and metal (tintypes or ferrotypes) popular in the US. 1861: Scottish physicist James Clerk-Maxwell demonstrates a color photography system involving three black and white photographs, each taken through a red, green, or blue filter. This is the "color separation" method. 1861-65: Mathew Brady and staff (mostly staff) covers the American Civil War, exposing 7000 negatives 1868: Ducas de Hauron publishes a book proposing a variety of methods for color photography. 1870: Center of period in which the US Congress sent photographers out to the West. The most famous images were taken by William Jackson and Tim O'Sullivan. 1871: Richard Leach Maddox, an English doctor, proposes the use of an emulsion of gelatin and silver bromide on a glass plate, the "dry plate" process. 1877: Eadweard Muybridge, born in England as Edward Muggridge, settles "do a horse's four hooves ever leave the ground at once" bet. 1878: Dry plates being manufactured commercially. 1880: George Eastman, age 24, sets up Eastman Dry Plate Company in Rochester, New York. First half-tone photograph appears in a daily newspaper, the New York Graphic. 1888: First Kodak camera, containing a 20-foot roll of paper, enough for 100 2.5-inch diameter circular pictures. 1889: Improved Kodak camera with roll of film instead of paper 1890: Jacob Riis publishes How the Other Half Lives, images of tenement life NYC 1900: Kodak Brownie box roll-film camera introduced. 1902: Alfred Stieglitz organizes "Photo Secessionist" show in New York City 16

1906: Availability of panchromatic black and white film and therefore high quality color separation color photography. J.P. Morgan finances Edward Curtis to document the traditional culture of the North American Indian. 1907: First commercial color film, the Autochrome plates, manufactured by Lumiere brothers in France 1909: Lewis Hine hired by US National Child Labor Committee to photograph children working mills. 1914: Oscar Barnack, employed by German microscope manufacturer Leitz, develops camera using the modern 24x36mm frame and sprocketed 35mm movie film. 1917: Nippon Kogaku K.K., which will eventually become Nikon, established in Tokyo. 1921: Man Ray begins making photograms ("rayographs") by placing objects on photographic paper and exposing the shadow cast by a distant light bulb; Eugegrave; ne Atget, aged 64, assigned to photograph the brothels of Paris 1924: Leitz markets a derivative of Barnack's camera commercially as the "Leica", the first high quality 35mm camera. 1925: Andr Kertsz moves from his native Hungary to Paris, where he begins an 11-year project photographing street life 1928: Albert Renger-Patzsch publishes The World is Beautiful; Rollei introduces the Rolleiflex twin-lens reflex producing a 6x6 cm image on rollfilm.; Karl Blossfeldt publishes Art Forms in Nature 1931: Development of strobe photography by Harold ("Doc") Edgerton at MIT 1932: Inception of Technicolor for movies, where three black and white negatives were made in the same camera under different filters; Ansel Adams, Imogen Cunningham, Willard Van Dyke, Edward Weston, et al, form Group f/64 dedicated to "straight photographic thought and production".; Henri Cartier-Bresson buys a Leica and begins a 60-year career photographing people; On March 14, George Eastman, aged 77, writes suicide note--"My work is done. Why wait?"--and shoots himself. 1934: Fuji Photo Film founded. By 1938, Fuji is making cameras and lenses in addition to film. 1935: Farm Security Administration hires Roy Stryker to run a historical section. Stryker would hire Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, Arthur Rothstein, et al. to photograph rural 17

hardships over the next six years. Roman Vishniac begins his project of Jews of Central and Eastern Europe. 1936: Development of Kodachrome, the first color multi-layered color film; development of Exakta, pioneering 35mm single-lens reflex (SLR) camera World War II: Development of multi-layer color negative films Margaret Bourke-White, Robert Capa, Carl Mydans, and W. Eugene Smith cover the war for LIFE magazine 1947: Henri Cartier-Bresson, Robert Capa, and David Seymour start the photographerowned Magnum picture agency 1948: Hasselblad in Sweden offers its first medium-format SLR for commercial sale; Pentax in Japan introduces the automatic diaphragm; Polaroid sells instant black and white film 1949: East German Zeiss develops the Contax S, first SLR with an unreversed image in a pentaprism viewfinder 1955: Edward Steichen curates Family of Man exhibit at New York's MOMA. 1959: Nikon F introduced. 1963: First color instant film developed by Polaroid; Instamatic released by Kodak; first purpose-built underwater introduced, the Nikonos 1970: William Wegman begins photographing his Weimaraner, Man Ray. 1972: 110-format cameras introduced by Kodak with a 13x17mm frame 1973: C-41 color negative process introduced, replacing C-22 1975: Nicholas Nixon takes his first annual photograph of his wife and her sisters: "The Brown Sisters"; Steve Sasson at Kodak builds the first working CCD-based digital still camera 1976: First solo show of color photographs at the Museum of Modern Art, William Eggleston's Guide 1977: Cindy Sherman begins work on Untitled Film Stills, completed in 1980; Jan Grooverbegins exploring kitchen utensils 1978: Hiroshi Sugimoto begins work on seascapes. 18

1980: Elsa Dorfman begins making portraits with the 20x24" Polaroid. 1982: Sony demonstrates Mavica "still video" camera 1983: Kodak introduces disk camera, using an 8x11mm frame (the same as in the Minox spy camera) 1985: Minolta markets the world's first autofocus SLR system (called "Maxxum" in the US); In the American West by Richard Avedon 1988: Sally Mann begins publishing photos of her children 1987: The popular Canon EOS system introduced, with new all-electronic lens mount 1990: Adobe Photoshop released. 1991: Kodak DCS-100, first digital SLR, a modified Nikon F3 1992: Kodak introduces PhotoCD 1993: Founding of photo.net (this Web site), an early Internet online community; Sebastiao Salgado publishes Workers; Mary Ellen Mark publishes book documenting life in an Indian circus. 1997: Rob Silvers publishes Photomosaics 1999: Nikon D1 SLR, 2.74 megapixel for $6000, first ground-up DSLR design by a leading manufacturer. 2000: Camera phone introduced in Japan by Sharp/J-Phone 2001: Polaroid goes bankrupt 2003: Four-Thirds standard for compact digital SLRs introduced with the Olympus E-1; Canon Digital Rebel introduced for less than $1000 2004: Kodak ceases production of film cameras 2005: Canon EOS 5D, first consumer-priced full-frame digital SLR, with a 24x36mm CMOS sensor for $3000; January 2012: Eastman Kodak files for bankruptcy. 19

Basic Photography Concepts, According to Photography.com Lighting and Exposure Have you ever taken pictures that are so light or so dark that you can hardly make out the subjects? If so, youre aware of how important the proper lighting and exposure can be in photography. How the lighting of a scene affects the exposure of the film is one of the most basic photography concepts. The more light within the scene, the more the film will be exposed. Conversely, the less light a scene has, the less the film will be exposed. While overexposed film turns out pictures that are too bright, underexposed film will be too dark, appearing blackedout. Understanding how to manipulate lighting will help a photographer properly expose his film. In any given scene a subject can be fully lit with direct light, fully lit with indirect light or partially lit with backlighting or ambient lighting. Any directly lit subject is relatively easy to photograph, meaning that the film will be properly exposed and the picture will turn out. On the other hand, partially lit subjects are a bit more elusive: generally, the lighting or film speed should be manipulated to ensure the adequate level of exposure. Learning how to alter the film speeds and lighting in poorly lit scenes takes some effort. However, a photographer can purchase a light meter, a tool that measures the amount of light in a scene. Given this measurement, the photographer can choose the appropriate film speed. Composition and Camera Angles Another basic principle of photography is composition, or the technique of setting up the subject within the cameras frame. The proper composition of a shot is directly related to the angle at which the photographer takes the picture. With a particular camera angle and a planned composition, a photo can draw in the viewers eye, add meaning to the image or add a sense of movement and dynamism to the scene. If the photographer wants his viewer to focus on a certain aspect of the shot, he can place the subject in a certain area of the frame. For example, putting the subject higher in the frame gives the subject an imposing presence on the viewer. On the other hand, placing the image lower tends to make the subject more submissive and possibly more mysterious to the critical viewers eye. By drawing the viewers eye to a particular part of a picture, the photographer also invests a particular meaning of feeling to his shot. Depending on the subject photographed, its placement within the frame can make it appear more mysterious, forceful, compliant, or intriguing.

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Another set of basic photography concepts involves the skills used by a photographer to make an image appear dynamic. For instance, a shot with the subject framed directly in the middle can make the viewer feel as though he is falling into the subject. An example of this would be a picture of a person looking through a hollow log while the photographer is at the other end of the log snapping a picture of the persons face. In this shot, the viewers vision moves through this tunnel, shooting immediately towards the persons face. While not as overtly dynamic as action shots, this sort of compositional concept adds a subtle sense of movement to the picture. More Advanced Photography Concepts If you want to further expand your knowledge of photography concepts, start experimenting with some more advanced techniques, such as: Aperture settings Depth of field measurements Focal lengths

The Nude in Art: Piece de Resistance or Pornography?

The art and practice of photography was developed during the Victorian era, a time when strict moral and social moirs dictated all areas of life. The art world was frequently rocked during this time, by controversies surrounding the depiction of the nude figure. In 1865 Manets Olympia, inspired by the composition of The Venus of Urbino by Titan, caused such uproar when it was hung that viewers had to be physically restrained so that they would not ruin it. The public was livid that Manet had depicted a courtesan in his painting--a real woman from the working classstaring directly out from the canvas. This gaze in and of itself was a cause for outrage because women were not supposed to meet the eyes of a man.

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In 1907 the Spanish painter Pablo Picasso offended the Paris art scene with his panting Les Demoiselles d'Avignon, depicting five nude women in a brothel. The painting rejects both the expected styles of the timeleading the way for cubismand the expected values and traditions of middle-class society, instead exposing and highlighting the sexual freedom implied by a brothel. Into this world nude photography emerged, originating in France, where Victorian standards of propriety held less sway than in England and the US, and where life drawing was considered an integral part of artistic training for which nude photographs proved an affordable substitute for a live model. Still, many nineteenth-century photographic nudes were intended as works of art in their own right. Others were assigned the title artist's study to evade government censors and legitimize images actually intended for the sexual excitement, rather than cultural enrichment, of 19th Century men. The film industry first met the debate over art versus pornography when, in 1932, eighteenyear-old Hedy Lamarr appeared in the Czech film Extase (Ecstasy). In it, Lamarr plays a lovehungry young wife of an indifferent older husband. In the movie she bares her breasts and runs naked through the woods, making it the first fully nude shot in commercial film history. The National Legion of Decency banned importation of the film, and Pope Pius XI publicly denounced it. By the sexual revolution of the 1960s, nudity took on new meaningsas declarations of freedom from societal rules; as explorations of sexuality and gender roles; and as responses to the AIDS crises.

Sally Mann photographed her children during the 1980s, often naked. Perhaps best known for Immediate Family, her third collection, the book consists of 65 black-and-white photographs of her three children, all under the age of 10. The pictures were taken at the family's summer cabin where the children played and swam in the nude. Many depict typical childhood activities but others touch on darker themes like loneliness, sexuality and death. The book instigated intense controversy, including accusations of child pornography, both in America and abroad. 22

One image of Manns 4-year-old daughter (Virginia at 4) was censored by the Wall Street Journal with black bars over her eyes, nipples and pubic area. Robert Mapplethorpe became one of the most famous and infamous photographers of the 1980s, perhaps of all time, with work that frequently courted controversy. In the late 1970s, Mapplethorpe documented the New York S & M scene in his photographs--considered shocking both for their content and remarkable for their technical and formal mastery. Mapplethorpe told ARTnews in late 1988, "I don't like that particular word 'shocking.' I'm looking for the unexpected. I'm looking for things I've never seen before I was in a position to take those pictures. I felt an obligation to do them." In 1989 the travelling exhibit Robert Mapplethorpe: The Perfect Moment was cancelled by DCs Corcoran Gallery of Art in the wake of public and government outrage over the material in the exhibitwhich was partially funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. The Corcoran's decision sparked a controversial national debate that continues today: Should tax dollars support the arts? Who decides what is "obscene" or "offensive" in public exhibitions?

Derrick Cross, 1982

Robert Mapplethorpe, Self-Portrait, 1975 23

Feminism and Gender Studies FAQ: The Male Gaze (from Feminism 101 Blog)
Before talking about the male gaze, it is first important to introduce its parent concept: the gaze. According to Wikipedia the gaze is a concept used for analysing visual culture that deals with how an audience views the people presented. The types of gaze are primarily categorized by who is doing the looking. While the ideas behind the concept were present in earlier uses of the gaze, the introduction of the term the male gaze can be traced back to Laura Mulvey and her essay Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema which was published in 1975. In it, Mulvey states that in film women are typically the objects, rather than the possessors, of gaze because the control of the camera (and thus the gaze) comes from factors such as the as the assumption of heterosexual men as the default target audience for most film genres. While this was more true in the time it was written, when Hollywood protagonists were overwhelmingly male, the base concept of men as watchers and women as watched still applies today, despite the growing number of movies targeted toward women and that feature female protagonists. Though it was introduced as part of film theory, the term can and is often applied to other kinds of media. It is often used in critiques of advertisements, television, and the fine arts. For instance, John Berger (1972) studied the European nude (both past and present) and found that the female model is often put on display directly to the spectator/painter or indirectly through a mirror, thus viewing herself as the painter views her. For Berger these images record the inequality of gender relations and a sexualization of the female image that remains culturally central today. They reassure men of their sexual power and at the same moment deny any sexuality of women other than the male construction. They are evidence of gendered difference because any effort to replace the woman in these images with a man violates the assumptions of the likely viewer (Berger, 1972: 64). That is, it does not fit with expectations but transgresses them and so seems wrong. [Wykes and Barrie Gunter (pp. 38-39)] The male gaze in advertising is actually a fairly well-studied topic, and it rather than film is often what comes to mind when the term is invoked. This is because, more than just being an object of a gaze, the woman in the advertisement becomes whats being bought and sold: The message though was always the same: buy the product, get the girl; or buy the product to get to be like the girl so you can get your man in other words, Buy the image, get the woman (Wykes, p. 41). In this way, the male gaze enables women to be a commodity that helps the products to get sold (the sex sells adage that comes up whenever we talk about modern marketing). Even advertising aimed at women is not exempt: it engages in the mirror effect described above, wherein women are encouraged to view themselves as the photographer views the model, therefore buying the product in order to become more like the model advertising it. If you look at the image at the top right of this post, you can see that the image being sold to men is that of an attractive woman (they are encouraged to look at her in the same way the men on the curb are)

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while the image being sold to women is that if they buy the product that they, too, can be the recipients of male attention. Thus the image being sold, for both men and women, quite literally becomes that of the male gaze. As feminist popular culture critics emerge, so does the use of the term in regard to areas such as comic books and video games. Indeed, it is from one of those areas that we can find a clear example of the male gaze in action:

The above image, which is a panel taken from the comic All Star Batman And Robin, the Boy Wonder juxtaposed with the script written by author Frank Miller (released in the directors edition of the comic), illustrates the way that the male gaze works in a concrete way. When Miller says, We cant take our eyes off her he is speaking directly of his presumably male audience, and the follow up (Especially since shes got one fine ass.) says loud and clear that her sexualized portrayal is for the pleasure of the envisioned heterosexual male viewer. In essence, Viki Vales character is there to reassure the readership of their hetero-masculinity while simultaneously denying Vicki any agency of her own outside of that framework. She is the quintessential watched by male watchers: the writer/director (Frank), his artist, and the presumed male audience that buys the book. As illustrated in the above examples, the term has applications outside of the framework that Mulvey initially imagined. Although it is most easily illustrated in places where creator intent is clear (or, in Frank Millers case, blatantly stated), creator intent is not actually a prerequisite for a creation to fall under the male gaze. Nor does the creator and/or the audience have to be male, nor does the subject of the gaze have to be unhappy with the result. In the end, the simplest way to describe the male gaze is to return it to its roots of the female model/actress/character being looked at by the male looker.

Controversy over The Century Project from Inside Higher Ed.

Standing Up for Explicit Exhibit
Submitted by Scott Jaschik on February 22, 2010 Today at the University of Louisville, an unusual art exhibit called The Century Project will open as part of a week of activities designed to promote healthy body image. Because the project features photographs of nude women and girls, the university is facing pressure to call off or adjust the exhibit, as the University of North Carolina at Wilmington did last year, when it removed the images of girls as a condition of allowing the program to proceed. But Louisville has

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declined to demand changes and is standing behind the exhibit, saying that its message has been distorted by critics and that principles of free speech and academic freedom are at stake. Shirley Willihnganz, provost at Louisville, said in an interview that she has been approached by people in the local community and by state legislators angry about the exhibit. And she said that while she is happy to explain the context of the exhibit, she is not willing to cancel it or to order its modification. "I don't know what else to do it but talk to people," she said. But she added that part of what she explains is that "the core of the university is the idea of freedom of expression and freedom of speech." Critics, galvanized by a professor at Oklahoma State University, say that the exhibit exploits women and girls and encourages violence against women -- charges vehemently denied by the photographer and the university. The Century Project consists of more than 100 nude photographs of women and girls of all ages, accompanied by their stories. The statements deal with the women's lives and bodies. The project's Web site says that one of its goals "is to effect change in societal attitudes towards womens bodies. Its method is to give voice to women through pictures and words, which project, among much else, courage, vulnerability, strength, diversity, multiplicity, and uniqueness." The most controversial part of the touring exhibit is the inclusion of young girls. Frank Cordelle, the photographer, explains on his Web site that all girls are only photographed with both their consent and that of a parent, and that they report that their inclusion was a positive experience for them. The leading opponent of the exhibit is John D. Foubert, an associate professor of college student development at Oklahoma State University and a consultant on college and other programs to prevent rape. Foubert has created a Facebook group and some publicity about the exhibit, and that in turn has led some conservative groups and legislators in Kentucky to protest. In an interview, Foubert acknowledged that the photographs in the exhibit are "legally not child porn." But he said that wasn't the key question. "This is about full frontal nude pictures of children. What is the educational value of showing nude 12-year-olds on their campus, and how is that helpful?" Foubert said that extensive studies show that exposure to pornography can encourage men to rape or exploit women. Asked why that research was relevant, given that these photographs are not pornographic, he said that some of the studies weren't based on extreme pornography but that of the sort published in Playboy. And while many viewers might think these photographs are unlikely to turn up in Playboy, he said that what matters is the image of those photographed "in the eye of the beholder," who in this case could be a male Louisville student. "You have men walking through this exhibit, looking at pictures of women and girls. What goes on in their head when they look at these pictures?" Foubert asked. "How does this affect what they look at and fantasize about?" A self-described "controversial academic," Foubert said he believes in free expression. "I'm a strong proponent of the First Amendment. I'm using those rights to bring attention to how they are abusing children. It is because of my First Amendment right that I can speak out about what they are doing," he said. Foubert said he wouldn't protest someone giving a lecture about the photographs, but that showing the photographs shouldn't be viewed as free expression.

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"What people don't understand is that there are limits on free speech. You can't make threats against someone else," he said. "They are threatening the safety of their own students by bringing this exhibit." Willihnganz, the provost, rejected all of the talk that the show is exploitative or pornographic, and she noted that a previous showing at the university yielded "positive reactions." She said that "if you take out the context, it sounds horrible and I can understand how people would be upset and uncomfortable, but this is part of a week about helping women develop more positive selfimages about their bodies," she said. "This is not about objectifying women," but about telling their stories. "This is about as opposite of pornography as you can get. This is about women coming to terms with their bodies." And Willihnganz noted that while the discussion may be awkward for some, institutions that have censored some of the images have also had awkward discussions. Blocking some or all of the exhibit, she noted, does not make the controversy or the issues go away.

A Quick Guide to Womens Bodies, Womens Wisdom Dr. Northrup seeks to incorporate into medicine not only medical care but what I [know] about nutrition, lifestyle, and the experience of being female in this culture (xxv). Her healing and medical practices come from an aim to acknowledge and work past the institutional and implicit biases of being a woman that are present in the healthcare and medical fields. Dr. Northrup is highly critical of what she terms the aggressive patriarchy of the medical profession and writes that the modern medical preference for drugs and surgery as treatments is part of the aggressive patriarchal or addictive approach to disease (8). Her outlook takes into account the many ways in which medicine and science reflect how Americans have been socialized by the culture at large. Dr. Northrup encourages a womans active participation in her own healing through the channeling of positive energies and practices in ones life and body. Much of Dr. Northrups healing advice is based in the Chakra tradition, which revolves around seven specific energy centers in our bodies known as chakras (73). As Dr. Northrup acknowledges, Western medical science does not recognize chakras. She is also influenced by Dr. Deepak Chopras writings about the mindbody and mind/body connection. Many of Northrups diagnoses revolves around the suppression of childhood memories, which influence the bodys energy field and impact physical health later in life. Dr. Northrup advocates the use of many alternative health remedies but writes numerous times that, for instance, though I use many alternative treatments in addition to drugs and surgery, conventional medicine is necessary and helpful (553). I teach women that there are many choices and they need not exclude entire categories that could help them either conventional or alternative, she continues (553). Also, many of Dr. Northrups patients come to her after already exhausting more traditional medical options. Dr. Northrup is a board-certified OB/GYN, who draws on her early professional experiences in her writing. The production glossary contains some information on Dr. Northrups critics, who 27

tend to hone in on a few eye-catching statements without acknowledging her broader points about patriarchy and bias in medicine and science. Nowhere in Womens Bodies, Womens Wisdom does Dr. Northrup assail Western medicine, never recommending someone stop a certain treatment; rather, she expresses her concerns and offers alternatives. She does, for example, prescribe mammograms (contrary to what some of her critics have noted), while remaining noncommittal as to their necessity. Its very tough for me argue with a woman who does not want a mammogram since I dont practice should-ought patriarchal medicine, she writes (302). I advocate following the wisdom of our intuition (302). Because our culture worships science and believes that it is objective, we think that everything labeled scientific must be true. (11) First paragraph of Reclaiming Our Own Authority (12) is very helpful. First paragraph on page 18 provides an example, in the context of herpes, of one type of healing Dr. Northrup supports. Naming and Healing Emotional Pain and Its Physical Consequences (19-21) provides another helpful example, and some more explanation of Dr. Northrups approach to healing and medicine. Beliefs are Physical (35-39) is a good overview of Dr. Northrups philosophy. I have found that most women with persistent genital warts, herpes, or ovarian cysts have experienced or are continuing to experience emotional and psychological stress or unrest. In these cases, a history of sexual abuse, abortions that havent been resolved emotionally, or some conflict involving relationships or creativity is almost always present. These conflicts live in the bodys energy field until theyre resolvedthey are healing opportunities simply waiting for our attention. (42) Our illnesses often exist to get our attention and get us back on track. (44) Chapter Four, The Female Energy System, is also a good introduction Table Five, The Anatomy of Womens Wisdom (96) is good quick reference. The poem on page 95 makes a very interesting point about how society views menstruation. For menstrual cramps, Dr. Northrup recommends variations of dietary changes (no dairy and limited red meat), vitamins, minerals, etc.; to Jane, she prescribes apply castor oil packs to the lower abdomen two times per week, stop eating all dairy food and red meat, take a multi-vitamin twice or three times a day, begin plans to move to Idaho, do some reading on codependency (117) The story excerpted in page 40 of Body Awareness, from page 287 in the book, comes after a discussion of the nurturing quality of breasts. Dr. Northrups suggestions for altering the labor process are interesting (390-396) On Depression: Page 445 talks a bit about Chakras and Depresssion. 460-461 covers it in regard to Menopause, but there isnt much more in the book. Chapter Fourteen, Menopause, covers ageism within our culture, vaginal dryness (the quotation on page 70 of Body Awareness), osteoporosis and bone density, sexuality in Menopause (page 457), and more. (430-484) 28

Events at the University of Louisvilles Body Awareness Week Jump Rope for Heart: Campus teams will compete in a competition and fitness program. Red Barn, Feb. 22, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. "America the Beautiful": A film about America's obsession with physical perfection. Multipurpose Room, Student Activities Center (SAC), Feb. 22, 7 p.m. Health Fair: Multipurpose Room, SAC, and Red Barn, Feb. 23, 11 a.m.-2 p.m. "Do I Look Fat": A film that focuses on seven gay men who struggle with eating disorders and body image. Multipurpose Room, SAC, Feb 23, 7 p.m. International Tea: A discussion about cultural perspectives on beauty. Cultural Center, Feb. 24, noon-1 p.m. "The Century Project": A traveling exhibit of highly personal statements and nude photos of "real women" that serves as a platform to address healthy body images and beauty. Multipurpose Room, SAC, Feb. 22-26, 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Conversation about "The Century Project": Photographer Frank Cordell will discuss the exhibit. Multipurpose Room, SAC, 6 p.m., Feb. 24. Panel discussion about "The Century Project": Louisville's WAVE 3 personality Dawne Gee will lead a discussion with some of the women Cordell photographed for "The Century Project." Multipurpose Room, SAC, Feb. 24, 7 p.m.-8:30 p.m. "Eat Your Way to Happiness": Author Elizabeth Somer will talk about how dietary changes can help improve mood and energy levels. Feb. 25, two locations. Kornhauser Library, Health Sciences Campus, noon-1 p.m.; Room 101, Strickler Hall, Belknap Campus, 5:30 p.m.-7 p.m. Your Sexual Body Health Workshop: A Discussion of issues pertaining to sexuality. Room 254, Ekstrom Library, noon-2 p.m. Feel Good in Your Jeans/Genes: Donate gently used jeans to The Healing Place all week. Collection boxes in some residence halls, SAC, Crawford Gym and Human Resources.

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Dictionaries and Lexicography

ENGLISH DICTIONARIES by Dr. ALEC GILL MBE

The history of how English Dictionaries came into being is like reading an adventure story. The hero (or editor) seemed in constant battle with those in authority until, in the end, a volume is produced. It is worth noting as well that English Dictionaries have never been produced by the British Government, official body or learned committee. It was always left to enthusiastic eccentrics. Bryson (1990) "In a kind of instinctive recognition of the mongrel, independent, idiosyncratic genius of the English tongue, dictionaries were often entrusted to people bearing those very characteristics" (p.144). Earlier, poor attempts included: 1604 Cawdrey's Table Alphabeticall 1721 BAILEY, Nathaniel Universal Etymological Dictionary and others - but these were highly specialized and fairly sloppy. 1755 (June) JOHNSON, Samuel. The Dictionary of the English Language. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) was blind in one eye, fat, incomplete education, and coarse in manner from a poor background. He was given the contract by the London publisher Robert Dodsley. His finished dictionary contained - many inconsistencies (uphill/downhil); - he was biased toward Saxon spellings and so ended words like critic / music / prosaic with a 'k' - little realizing that they were of Latin origin! - he defined 'oats' as a grain that sustains horses in England and people in Scotland. - some rambling sentences ran to 250 words. Nevertheless, Johnson's work is a landmark in English literature: - he defined some 43,000 words supported by 114,000 quotations; - he was paid less than 200 per year - from which he had to pay assistants; - he laboured away in a garret off Fleet Street; and - he achieved in under nine years what forty members of the French Academy could not do in forty years - he captured the majesty of his mother tongue, and gave it a dignity that was long overdue. CONCLUSION: In the wake of Johnson's Dictionary, grammarians felt the need to set down rules (shall / will). Standard of correctness crept in and the debate is still kept going by the purists. The Johnson museum in Lichfield is a wonderful experience. I have yet to visit his London base off Fleet Street. 30

WEBSTER, Noah (1758-1843) was a pernickety schoolteacher / lawyer in Connecticut, severe, correct, humourless, religious, temperate man who was not easily liked. He was short, pale, smug and boastful - a charmless loner who criticized almost everyone - but greatly plagiarized the work of Englishman Thomas Dilworth. Webster boasted 23 languages. He published a series of books and was probably the best-seller in American history (after The Bible) who sold at least 60 million copies. His major work came in 1828 called The American Dictionary of the English Language containing 70,000 words. He suggested spelling changes such as bilt, groop, tuf, tung, wimmen - but few American writers took any notice. His suggestions for center / theater, however, were taken up. He was a passionate patriot who insisted that American English was as good as British. He refused royalties, sold his rights and so never gained the wealth his labour merited. After Noah died in 1843, the rights were bought by Charles and George Merriam who employed Webster's son-in-law to expunge all the ridiculous spellings. The Merriam-Webster Dictionaries have been a great success since 1847. THE OXFORD ENGLISH DICTIONARY 1884 The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) first volume "a-Ant" first appeared in the February that year. Its ambitious intention was to record every word used in English since 1150 and trace it back through all its shifting meanings, spellings and uses to its earliest recorded appearance, plus at least one citation for each century of its existence. MURRAY, James Augustus Henry (1837-1915) was chosen for this arduous undertaking. He was a Scottish-born bank clerk, school teacher, self-taught philologist. An unlikely choice. Murray had a flowing white beard and liked to be photographed in a long black housecoat plus his mortarboard. He got his eleven children involved in sifting through several million slips of paper. He believed the work would take about 12 years and cover 6400 pages. The whole project took more than four decades and 15,000 densely printed pages. Hundreds of volunteers helped with the research, sending citations from all over the world. As with Murray, some of them were also eccentrics. James PLATT specialized in obscure words. He owned not one book. Worked for his father in the City and each lunch-time borrowed one book from the British Museum Reading Room. He scoured through it and replaced it the next day with another book. Weekends he haunted London's opium dens and dockyard pubs looking for native speakers of obscure tongues whom he questioned on small points of semantics. 31

Dr.W.C.MINOR, an American expatriate, who contributed tens of thousands of words from his private library. In one year alone he contributed 12,000 entries. There came a time when he was invited to a contributors' meeting, but he had to decline. He was an inmate of Broadmoor, a prison hospital for the criminally insane. He had been committed while in America and after his release he fled to London because he felt he was being persecuted by Irish people. One evening while walking in a London street he felt believed was being followed. He took out a pistol, turned around and shot dead an innocent pedestrian. Murray worked ceaselessly for 36 years until his death in 1915 aged 78 - while working on the letter "U" (Undertaker?). His assistants completed the work in 1928. Five years later it became the OED. The second edition was published in 1989 in 20 volumes: 615,000 entries 2,412,000 supporting quotations, and 60,000,000 words. It is perhaps the greatest work of scholarship ever produced. No other language has anything remotely approaching its scope. Because of it existence, more is known about the history of English than any other language in the world. AG: The OED is the De Brett's of English words they each have their own historic, aristocratic background. Every word has its detailed pedigree in the OED. REF: MURRAY, K.M.Elisabeth. 1977. CAUGHT IN THE WEB OF WORDS: James A. H. Murray and the Oxford English Dictionary. NEW HAVEN (Conn). Yale University Press. Lexicographer By ERIN McKEAN 've wanted to be a lexicographer since I was 8. (A lexicographer, as those of you who read this space regularly well know, is someone who writes or edits dictionaries. The word "lexicographer" is one you'll find in even the smallest dictionaries -- call it a point of professional privilege.) I read an article in a newspaper about the late Robert Burchfield and the making of the second edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, and after that, you might say, my path was defined. When I'm asked how I became a lexicographer and give the since-I-was-8 answer, the hopefuls look a little less hopeful. For one thing, everyone who has ever asked me how to become one has been a great deal older than 8, making the questioner feel immediately as if he or she is already starting too late. (One little girl who attended a talk I gave in New Orleans did show an initial interest, but after some consideration decided that she would rather be "a real writer.") Although it's a job that has an impressive name, several professional organizations (the Dictionary Society of North America and Euralex being the largest) and even a best seller associated with it ("The Professor and the Madman," by Simon Winchester), there's not a wellmarked route to actually becoming a lexicographer. The hopefuls want to be told that there's a

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certification process, a test to take -- your alphabetization comps, perhaps -- a degree to earn or at least a trade union to join. Sadly, there is no central credentialing body, at least not in the United States. (There are a few schools in Europe that offer certificates or M.A./M.S. degrees in lexicography; the programs at the University of Birmingham and the University of Brighton are the best known. There is also the Lexicography Master Class, which offers training courses to companies and individuals and is run by the noted lexicographers Sue Atkins, Michael Rundell and Adam Kilgarriff.) There have been classes taught in lexicography in this country, but no degree-granting programs. The hopefuls always ask the same questions. Should I major in English or linguistics? Should I get my doctorate? Should I freelance, or should I try for a fulltime staff position? My answer, too, is always the same: it depends. Dictionary-making, as a career, has several striking disadvantages. There are fewer than a dozen major employers in the United States, clustered in the Northeast, which tend to hire on a cyclical basis as projects wax and wane. Each dictionary has its own defining style, meaning that there's considerable relearning to do if you change employers. The number of full-time working English-language lexicographers in the United States, including freelancers, is probably well below 200; adding those working on scholarly and academic dictionaries might double that number, but not much more. I polled, in a highly unscientific manner, my colleagues in the Dictionary Society of North America, and I found that lexicographers in this country do have a common qualification for the jobs they hold or have held: they have all been lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time. Several lexicographers, including Wendalyn Nichols and Enid Pearsons (both formerly of Random House), Orin Hargraves (a freelance lexicographer who has worked for Oxford and other houses) and Debbie Sawczak (formerly of the Canadian Gage dictionaries) answered newspaper ads that in essence said, "Lexicographers Wanted: Will Train." Joanne Despres (senior editor at Merriam-Webster), Ed Gates (who also worked at Merriam on the Third International), Daniel Barron (late of Longman) and Peter Gilliver (of the O.E.D.) also responded to job postings, some literally put up on bulletin boards. The late, much-missed Rima McKinzey (a freelance "pronster," also known as a pronunciation editor, or orthoepist) was recommended for a job at Random House by one of her professors, Arthur Bronstein; Steve Kleinedler (senior editor at American Heritage) took a class from Richard Spears (a slang lexicographer) at Northwestern University, which led to freelance work. Robert Parks (of Wordsmyth) taught a Politics and Language class and was called in as a consultant for a company making electronic dictionaries in Japan while there on a Fulbright; Robert Wachal (who has edited a dictionary of abbreviations and acronyms for American Heritage) taught linguistics and was "scouted" by a publisher while giving a paper at a Dictionary Society meeting. Grant Barrett, a journalist, volunteered to be the Web master for the American Dialect Society, which led indirectly to his becoming the project editor for the Historical Dictionary of American Slang. What on their resumes got these lexicographers their jobs? As you might expect, the majority have degrees in English, linguistics or foreign languages. But at least one, Peter Gilliver, has a degree in math, and several more have journalism backgrounds. Another commonality among working lexicographers is that each says that his or her course of study was the ideal one to

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prepare for the job, which is not as parochial as it may sound: dictionaries cover so much, so broadly, that you can find a way to apply pretty much any kind of expertise you might have. If you really think that lexicography is for you and are undaunted by the odds, there are some ways to help your luck along. A quick trip to the bookstore or the library will provide you with the names and addresses of all the major publishers, or better yet, you can check job listings on their Web sites. You can join the Dictionary Society, sign up for its e-mail list (where jobs are occasionally posted) and attend its small and collegial meetings, which are held every other year. (The next one will be in Boston in 2005.) While you wait for lightning to strike, familiarize yourself with all the major American dictionaries -- Merriam-Webster, American Heritage, Webster's New World and the New Oxford American Dictionary -- not just whichever one happens to be your favorite. However accidental the beginning of their careers as lexicographers, once well dug in, most never want to do anything else. They find, as Thomas Paikeday (editor of The User's Webster dictionary) put it, that "lexicography suits my scholarship, skills and even my temperament." In the dozen years that I have been working on dictionaries, the suspicions of my 8-year-old self have only been confirmed: it's the best job in the world, and well worth trying for.

Life as a McDonalds Employee

The following are excerpts from a candid interview on the website Reddit with an anonymous (but confirmed to be real) McDonalds employee of five years: There was a young kid working on fries and he dropped the fry scoop into the fry vat. Without thinking about it, he reached into the vat to get it. I can still hear the screams... If you ordered extra anything, my policy was to try and make you never order extra again by giving you so much extra it was ridiculous. We had an old man who drove a brand new Cadillac always park, walk into the drive through area, and look for change that was dropped on the ground for his senior coffee. We got sick of telling him to get out of there. So, one day me and co-worker went out 34

there and glued a ****load of change to ground. The next time he came, he spent an hour trying to pry the change up to no success. He never came back after that. Tip: If you want fresh food. Go when it is busy. Fruit and yogurt parfaits come prepackaged with yogurt already in a cup (looks like a semen sample). Employees add frozen strawberries and 5 blueberries into the cup. Almost everything at McD's comes pre-assembled. Every few months, the restaurant undergoes an inspection from a McOpCo consultant. This is called an FOR. Before the FOR, the owner gets everyone to clean, paint, brush up on their skills/habits, etc. On one of these occasions, I was tasked with cleaning behind the vats and the grills. The accumulation of grease, dropped, rotting meat and chicken products that were festering underneath was enough to give me nightmares. The grease was pooled on the floor and there were grease stalagmites on the ground. Trapped in the burnt and encrusted filth were hundreds of flies. The cost of soda is about 1 cent per centimetre of drink. Our store is generally quiet...in the parking lot however, **** does go down. One time somebody had smashed a customer's car window and was in the process of hot-wiring it when the customer came out (big fella) and pummeled the **** out of the guy. I was taking orders in drive-thru and saw the whole thing. I only eat the snack wraps and the occasional burger, so I have managed to stay fairly slim. I also work out and run, so I'm pretty healthy despite working there. I will never eat a double filet. We have at least 5 regulars who order it everyday. The smell is repulsive...I guess that's the only reason why. Occasionally we get the McRib as a promo. Stay the **** away. That stuff festers in the cabinet for years man. I wouldn't go as far as to say I've "defiled" someone's food. Ruined it, yes, defiled, no. There were a few times...One time some douche came thru drive thru and ordered a big mac meal, extra sauce. Cool, no problem, I put an extra two squirts of Mac sauce on his burger and we sent him on his merry way. Dick comes back through drive claiming there was not enough sauce on his burger, and he wasn't cool about it. He had to get a manager come, refund his money and still demanded a replacement big mac. So I made it again, but this time, pretty much unloaded the sauce gun on his sandwich. It honestly looked like a puddle of semen, or some pulsating, bleeding cow heart on a bun. I could barely close the box. The folding part of the box was leaking sauce, there was so much. I make $12/hour. When I first started, I made $7.25. 35

Body Awareness Glossary Asperger's Syndrome A psychological condition characterized by a difficulty relating to others. Aspergers is one of the psychological conditions on the autism spectrum. Autodidact (n.) A person who is self-taught instead of being taught by others. From the Greek Autodidaktos, which literally translates to self-teacher. Brandeis A private liberal arts college outside of Boston, notable for being the first Jewish-sponsored college in the United States. Brandeis currently has roughly 3,000 undergrads and 1,200 graduate students. Bushmen The indigenous people of Southern Africa, traditionally hunter-gatherers but since the 1950s primarily agricultural. Bushmen is a name given to this group by Western colonizers, and they prefer to call themselves the Son people. Crime and Punishment/Raskolnikov 8, An 1866 novel by Fyodor Dostoyevsky about a young man named Raskolnikov who murders two people in a botched robbery and is slowly driven insane with his own guilt, eventually turning himself in to the police.

Daguerreotype An early technique for mechanically capturing images which is considered a precursor to photography, developed by Louis Daguerre between 1829 and 1839. Daguerreotypes were not reproducible in the way photographs are, as they were transferred directly from the lens onto a silvered copper plate. They suffered from a long exposure time, making them impractical for anything other than still-lifes or posed portraits. Deepak Chopra - 3 (1946-) Indian-born American doctor and advocate for alternative medicine. Chopra was an assistant to the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, the founder of the Transcendental Meditation movement, until he started publishing his own books about New Age spirituality and medicine in the late 1980s. He has since

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become a prominent figure within the New Age movement, and has found a great deal of both money and popularity through his books and speaking engagements. Chopra has come under criticism from the scientific and medical communities for advocating health practices they feel are not grounded in research and leading sick patients away from more traditionally-proven treatments. Dialectical Dialectical reasoning is a process by which two people with dissenting opinions come to a conclusion which may or may not resolve the issue. This mode of argument was adopted by the German philosophers Georg Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx as a fundamental way of constructing reality, becoming a central part of the way in which history is currently understood. Judaism has been described at times as a dialectic religion because of its emphasis on discussion and interpretation of sacred texts as an important part of religious practice. Dilettante One who engages a little bit with a subject without fully committing to its practice or study. Garrote (v.) To strangle a person or animal with a wire or cord. Gaze (Male Gaze) The idea, originally espoused by feminist film theorist Laura Mulvey, that artistic product in a maledominated society is intrinsically made from a male perspective. The idea has since been expanded beyond film to encompass perspectives on all kinds of art. Lexicographer A person who compiles dictionaries. Becoming a lexicographer often requires an advanced degree, either a masters or a doctorate, in either English or linguistics. There are no advanced degrees in lexicography in the United States, though there are some in Europe and the UK. Societies for lexicographers include the Dictionary Society of North America and Euralex. Mastectomy (n.) A surgery to remove one or both breasts, sometimes part of a treatment for breast cancer. Peruse (v.) To carefully read through something; often misused in daily speech to mean skimming or reading something quickly. "Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom" A book published by OB/GYN Christine Northrup in 1994 about the mind-body connection from a womans perspective, written from an anatomical/psychological point of view. It sold very well upon its release and has been reprinted three times since its original publication. From her website: Dr. Christiane Northrups vision of mind-body wellness has received an extraordinary response from women all over the world. Her groundbreaking classic, now completely revised, Womens Bodies, Womens Wisdom powerfully demonstrates that when women change the basic conditions of their lives that lead to health problems, they heal faster, more completely, and with far fewer medical interventions.

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