Amazing Thailand Revisit

Hello everybody!

Today's post is actually a reference to another post on another blog. As you may or may not already know, the Sociology Department here at Covenant College is very closely associated with the Spring Semester in Thailand Program, run by Dr. Mike Leming of St. Olaf College in Minnesota.

Every year, Dr. Leming, his wife, and a few interns lead a diverse group of students from across the country to Thailand, where (we hope) they'll have the experience of their lives. Students engage Thai culture on a number of levels, learning the language, living with a Thai family, and taking classes at a Buddhist university. They will also participate in an internship at some institution, whether it is the Buddhist University in Chiang Mai or somewhere else.

This particular post comes from one of the students currently in Thailand. She writes about the group's experience in a Karen village, which is an integral part of the experience in Thailand. The Karen are a tribe of people who live in the Himalayan foothills in the North of Thailand. Dr. Leming and his crew have had connections with the village for years, and every year they spend a certain amount of time in the village.

So, without further ado, click this link to go to the blog post.

You can also click here to go to the homepage for the Spring Semester in Thailand program.

Happy surfing!

Infomania

I've been on an infographic kick lately. If you don't know what that is, it is essentially taking information (usually some kind of statistic or number) and putting it into a series of picture or images. This could be a simple graph, or something more complicated. "Infographic" is a recent word with origins on the internet, and is a a portmanteau of the words "information" and "graphic".

While not particularly in-depth, they are usually used to lay out the results of a study or survey very simply, and in a way that is aesthetically pleasing and interesting to look at. I'm a visual learner, so  this kind of thing is right up my alley.

For example, here's an infographic from Mashable.com about how online gaming is more likely to get you a date than online dating, which seems to be counterintuitive, and goes against the common stereotype about World of Warcraft players. While this may seem silly (because it is) you can't say it's not interesting or mentally stimulating in some ways. But for your serious types, click here for a serious infographic on internet censorship around the world.

For all the infographics your eyes can stand, you can click here to go to Mashable (just type "infographic" into the search bar) or here to the blog Graphic Sociology.

Random fun fact: according to several dictionaries, the term "infographic" is not a real word. Yet.

Masters in Counseling

What exactly can I do with a BA in Sociology, you might be asking yourself. I know I do.

Don't worry, there's always mercenary work.

Well, luckily for you, the American Sociological Association has conducted an enormous amount of research on that very subject. Here's a link to the page with some of the results on career choices and other data.

While there are certainly career choices available for you, even in this tough job market, perhaps you are considering graduate school? It is a legitimate option, and may make your job search a bit easier.

Here is a link to a great Masters program at Milligan College near Elizabethton, Tennessee. While similar in size to Covenant, Milligan has been ranked as one of the top liberal arts colleges in the United States.

Just to add a few more links to the page, click here for the Milligan homepage, and here for the Wikipedia page (for those of you wanting to do some in-depth research).

Go Go Gadget Social Theory

For those Covenant College students currently or soon to be enrolled in a Sociology course, be sure to be on the lookout (see what I did there?) for our new website.

For now, I'd like to share a recent discovery made while working on said website. One of the pages for the new site is a "Resources" tab, which will have links to everything from paper-writing tips to research sites. On of the subcategories is a list of links to helpful websites and blogs that could be used as either support or ideas for papers and research. While researching this, I stumbled upon a page entitled "Top 50 Sociology Blogs". You can look at the full page here.

This was our reaction here in the office.

After cleaning up the drool, I decided to check some of these blogs out, as most of them had helpful descriptions of what the topics were. You might be surprised just how far you can stretch your social and sociological knowledge. These blogs cover everything from economics to the environment to sociopaths.

So, without further ado, here is a list of some of our favorite blogs, from the above page and beyond:

• PurseLipsSquareJaw - Written by Dr. Anne Galloway, a senior lecturer at the School of Design at Victoria University, and focusing on art and aesthetics. Though she's not actually posting anymore, you can still access the archives of all her posts.

• What Is the What - A blog about the pop culture and other recent news.

• Racialicous - Though there are several blogs about race and race relations on the original page (all of them great), this one had the most interesting title.

• Graphic Sociology - This one is great. It takes data and transforms it into helpful and creative visualizations. If you're a visual learner (like I am), then this is the blog for you.

• The Grumpy Sociologist - This blog focuses on issues like masculinity and violence, covering everything from #Kony2012 to sports.

• Religion and Other Curiosities - Written by the famous (sort of) sociologist of religion Peter Berger, this blog covers his thoughts on religion and society in America and the world.

Be sure to be on the lookout (I did it again!) for our new website! Coming soon to a Chattanooga area near you.

N'awlins

This past week, the Sociology Department embarked on a perilous journey through hostile terrain, seeking a mythical land rumored to hold untold riches and danger.


No, we didn't go to Skyrim, or Narnia, or even Peru. We went somewhere better: New Orleans. Oh yes, that place filled that's with danger, strange folk speaking in strange tongues, and millions upon millions of little plastic beads.


Just to recap, last week we went to the annual meeting of the Southern Sociological Society (SSS, or S-cubed) in New Orleans, Louisiana. The conference was held at the historic Hotel Monteleone, a confusing jumble of hallways and salons situated in the middle of the French Quarter. If you missed out, fret not! There's always next year.


Here's a few pictures, to showcase some of our experiences.

The view from our
 hotel,the Bienville House

Roughing it in New Orleans.

You might not want to see what they're looking at.

She didn't smile after she
 realized it was alligator.

Beignets

Bourbon Street...on a Wednesday

Another view from the
Bienville House balcony

Dr. Chiareli & Kate about
to give their presentation

You Mustn't Choose

It seems like such an intuitive answer. As the use of the Internet for things like news and current events, the use of traditional media like newspapers and television decreases. Why would you pay for a newspaper subscription when you can just google it and read it for free? 


Every few weeks, there seems to be a newspaper article or television special (if you use such archaic contraptions anymore) about the decline in readership for traditional medium. Take, for example this article from the New York Times about the drop in newspaper readership, and what companies are doing about it. Or this one in the Guardian. Or here on Wikipedia. I'm not sure if it's ironic that all of those links came from a Google search about "dropping newspaper sales", mainly because I've been informed several times I don't understand how to use the word ironic correctly.

Irony?

So, reader, you might be asking what exactly this post is about, if the conclusion seems inevitable. It seems obvious that newspaper readership is declining, and perhaps television will be next. Heck, there's even a website dedicated to keeping up with the death of newspapers.


Despite all of this, a recent post on Psypost.org boldly proclaims that "Internet does not make young people abandon traditional media." Really? If that's true, that would sure make the New York Times blush for crying wolf.


But while the title of the post may seem definitive, the reality is much more nuanced. The article states that "Admittedly, people in this age group (9-24) do watch TV and listen to radio and recorded music somewhat less today than 30 years ago." So that trend seems to be undeniable. However, later on in that same thought, the author states that "it seems like people use the internet to complement and not substitute older media" (italics added).

Taking a step back from objectivity (whatever that is), the author of this particular post feels that this matches his experience precisely. While an avid consumer of online media, it's not like I never pick up a newspaper or flip on the television. Indeed, speeches are better to watch live than see on the internet, where the buffering demon knows no mercy. And while this take on the issue may not be taken into account as much in the popular media, that does not mean there isn't any research on the subject.

So how do we explain this? First off, it is helpful to notice that oftentimes the percentages of dropping readership mentioned in the earlier articles are more-often-than-not in the single digits, and usually over a period of the last decade or so. Looking at it that way, it seems less like we need to put the newspaper industry on life support, and more like the market and consumers are simply making space for the rapidly maturing online media industry, which is more convenient for those with internet access, and usually cheaper as well.

And while we will miss the Encyclopedia Britannica, it's not like the New York Times or the Washington Post are going anywhere anytime soon.

Despite what these crybabies may say.

Britannica & the Matrix

Quick! What happened in the year 1768? If you can't name any, it's ok. Unless you're a history major, in which case you might want to do some serious soul-searching.

Only kidding. Here's a bulldog puppy to cheer you up.

But seriously, to name a few events that happened in 1768:

• Philip Astley staged the first modern circus in London.
• Saint Isaac's cathedral founded in St. Petersburg.
• The 1st Methodist church in the US opens in NYC.
• 1st Edition of the  Encyclopædia Britannica published.

For the rest of the events, visit this page. Did you catch that last one though? Recently it Britannica may have fallen out of vogue with many younger generations, in lieu of the seemingly-omniscient Cyber-trinity of Wikipedia, Google, and Siri (I might be starting to push it with these religion jokes). However, older generations remember Britannica as the encyclopedia that one owned if they were anybody. A definitive source for general knowledge, compiled from thousands of authors and with a history spanning centuries.


No literally, Britannica was in publication in four different centuries, beginning in 1768. Think about that for a minute. This encyclopedia is older than the United States and the modern states of Germany & Italy, and outlived Prussia, the Ottomans, and the British Empire.


Unfortunately, it was just announced yesterday that the Encyclopædia Britannica will go out of print. To quote that article I just linked, this decision comes as "an acknowledgement of the realities of the digital age" not to mention competition from the bane of many purist academics, Wikipedia. The editors of Britannica announced that instead of print, they will instead focus on the online edition of Britannica, which is able to be updated continuously, rather than annually.


This blog has talked before about the effects of digitalization of stuff in the modern world. And while digitizing books may not be a huge shock for many (e-readers have been around for years, after all) it may still be a hard blow to many for something as much a part of Western history as tea (we stole from China) and gunpowder (we also stole from China).

They also release educational material.

And while there may be dissidents to digitizing books - such as this older article which criticizes the e-reader fad - it seems to be a unstoppable tide. While it is doubtful that printed material will disappear entirely, the industry has certainly taken many hits over the last few years. Take, for example, the website Cracked.com. While originally a print magazine meant to be a counterpart to the popular MAD Magazine, it was forced to give up the printed part of its production in 2007, and now exists solely as a website (that you should definitely check out). And this is by far not the only example. Most magazines or newspapers worth their salt at least have a website, because they recognize the need for it. Even the newspaper in my hometown has it's own website and even a mobile app, which isn't too shabby for a newspaper of a town of less than 200,000 people.


I'm not sure if there's a lesson in here somewhere. I, for one, am not too crazy about e-readers. Maybe it's just because books are usually cheaper, or perhaps I am just trying to give myself an ego boost by having display cases full of books with fancy titles and authors.