I am slowly learning that I am addicted to the Internet. I check my email more than anyone I know, although I do not leave it on all day with an audible alert reminding me that someone has sent me another message. I check Facebook just as much. I check my blog more. I am consumed with wondering if people like my writing, love me, or are paying attention to my world. I am equally consumed with knowing what others are doing throughout the day. I am going to make a conscious effort to check my electronic shackles no more than once an hour. For me, that will be challenging. So, if you email me, text me, Facebook me, or whatever, know that I will only be checking once an hour. I am consumed. I am sure I could get four times as much done with my life if only I didn’t compulsively police my cyberworld. That being said. I am giving it a whorl, which I just Googled and learned that I am really giving it a whirl. If I spent as much time reading, writing, and studying as I do online playing Snood, Bejeweled, Googling, Youtubing, or watching South Park Studios, I would be a fucking genius with a 4.0 GPA. Usually, I justify my enslavement to electronics through my hunger for knowledge. I need to play online because I am learning. I am doing research. I am writing. Well, I am.
I am taking American Indian literature right now as I have said before. We just read the Women are Singing by Luci Tapahonso and “There is No Word for Feminism in My Language” by Laura Tohe. I think it is interesting that cultures that have been oppressed typically look back into their histories for role models, while those of us who are part of the dominant culture look around us for role models. For example, Tohe says that Dine (Navajo) women resist modern day feminism because there is no place for them within it. Instead, Dine women look back to Changing Woman adn their female ancestors for strength and inspiration. As a female in the US Western culture, I look around me for theorists who support and challenge me. I look for my colleagues to inspire me. Perhaps, what I am realizing in takign this class is that I need to look back to my ancestors to find hope. My great-grandma made the trek across the ocean through Ellis Island, where they changed her name, in order to see a better future for herself and her furture children. My grandma and great-aunt had to learn English at school. My grandma made gears at Allisons during the war and then became a journeyman meat cutter for Marsh. My other grandma was, at one time during the 1960s, one of the highest ranked female civilians in the US military machine. She was one of the smartest women I have ever met. For crying out loud, if I look way back on my dad’s side, there were women who came over before the Revolutionary War and made houses out of nothing. I come from a long line of strong women. Judith Butler doesn’t hold a candle in the wind to them, but I can’t exactly quote my foremothers in an academic paper, now can I? As I look back at them, I can’t help but think two things: (1) you come from strong-ass stock, and (2) you come from the opposite side of the coin as the women whose writing you love. What does that mean? It’s something I wrestle with. Chances are my ancestors owned slaves. My last name is Roberson. But chances are my other ancestors were slaves. My mom’s side is named Pappas and comes from a poor village in the foothills of Greece. Weird hybrid, huh?
Reason Breeds Insanity 