Mortality Salience and Ideology
I've been reading a lot about ideology for a class recently and there have been a few insights that I've found to be pretty beneficial, beyond their use for academic purposes. One of the most interesting findings in the studies I've been reading is the concept of mortality salience (making subjects aware of the end of their own lives). Although there are a host of factors that contribute to the development of ideology (societal construction, heredity, childhood development, education, cognitive dispositions, &c), mortality salience was one that I had never really considered on its own merit.
MORTALITY SALIENCE AND EXPRESSED POLITICAL ATTITUDES
"For example, mortality salience appears to produce greater patriotism and hostility toward critics of one’s nation, a stronger endorsement of the unique validity of one’s own religion, stronger support for traditional gender norms, greater attention to established norms of proce- dural fairness, increased levels of stereotyping, and a generally stronger preference for aggres- sive responses to individuals and groups who are perceived as threatening to the cultural world- view"
MORTALITY SALIENCE, AUTHORITARIANISM, AND SELECTIVE EXPOSURE TO POLITICAL INFORMATION
An experiment by Lavine et al. (2005) revealed that a mortality salience manipulation led high (but not low) authoritarians to se- lectively expose themselves to information in a manner that was consistent with their position on capital punishment. This find- ing suggests that not everyone responds to threatening stimuli in the same manner (see also Davis & Silver 2004, Stenner 2005). It is important to point out, however, that low authoritarians did not show greater open-mindedness (or a decrease in selective ex- posure) following mortality salience priming (Lavine et al. 2005, p. 232). Lavine et al. (2005) concluded their article by emphasiz- ing elective affinities, that is, “interactions between dispositional motivational needs and cognitive styles on one hand, and ex- igencies of the social and political environment on the other” (p. 240). Specifically, they suggested that those who tune into “the now ubiquitous format of one-sided (generally right-wing) talk radio (e.g., Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Michael Savage, Bill O’Reilly)” are motivated not merely by chronic anger and resentment but that “viewers’ preferences for one-sided vs ‘fair and balanced’ formats are at least partly a function of perceived environmental threat” (p. 240).
Certainly an interesting phenomena when applied in combination with demographics of aging voters, or in combination with religious groups.
Social Network (2010) and Catfish (2010)
Over the weekend, I saw Social Network and Catfish (back to back, in fact). It has been a while since I have been impressed with theatrical releases, so this weekend was a great re-introduction into worthwhile contemporary films.
Catfish is a documentary about an artist based in New York and his interactions with a family in rural Michigan. If I say any more about the film, I will invariably ruin it. I was fortunate enough to go see it without any idea what it was about (based purely on recommendations from my close friends) and ended up enjoying it a lot. Some things that are important to keep in mind are the fact that it is 100% real and that there will be moments in the movie where you think you've gleaned the moral already, but you really have to wait until the end to get everything it has to offer.
Social Network was a terrific adventure in film-making. It had me hooked from the first dialog scene, and kept me intently engaged the entire time. I thought Aaron Sorkin did a wonderful job adapting the screenplay from the Ben Mezrich book, the editing and packaging of the film was terrific and David Fincher excelled in his role as a director (one of my friends whom I saw the movie with was bent on arguing that it was his best film yet).
With reference to the subject matter of Social Network, I thought the film-makers did what they had to do, which was to take a pretty complex set of events, and create a viable story out of it, to tell the audience. All the vitriol and backlash about inaccuracies and poor portrayals of Zuckerberg may be well-founded, but that is not the purpose of a film, as a piece of art. One argument that I did find especially beneficial to read was Larry Lessig's reaction in The National Review. He argues, in essence, that the film missed an opportunity to make some really important commentary on the nature of an enterprise like Facebook being so different from other successful enterprises in the past.
All in all, it was a great movie weekend, and both of the aforementioned films come highly recommended from me.
The work of a face, hands and feet on the mind
In a crowded, dark theater in Downtown Chicago, after a long day of work is not where you expect to find yourself immersed in thought about human connection but that is exactly where I happened to find myself on Wednesday evening. Performing as part of the Chicago World Music Festival, Anjal Chande presented an hour-long performance, comprised of four pieces that blended her mastery of the South-Asian classical dance form Bharatnatyam and her contemporary artistic sensibilities.
Although a dancer by training, Anjal showcased her art through a variety of media. Her spoken word, set to music composed by famed Sitarist Gaurav Mazumdar, Hindustani classical singer Gaurav Venkteswar and collegiate a cappella group Chai-Town (composed and directed by Arjun Venkataswamy) all provided backdrops to Anjal’s dance that pulled the audience into the performance. Anjal brought the audience in closer with her use of her face, hands and feet. The emotive expressions on her face, the meaningful use of her hands and the rhythmic cadence of her feet all worked together to accent the frame of a dancer who commanded not only the stage she performed on but the attention and emotions of her audience.
Anjal explored ideas of thought, creativity, darkness, happiness and human connection with her original pieces. Tapping into the urban lifestyle and its ephemeral nature, Anjal developed one of her pieces around distractions in the mind and the inevitable frustrations that grow out of constant yet shallow contact. In “Darkness,” Anjal proposed that happiness actually lives in darkness and that our imagination is not something to be feared, but something to be coveted. In her final piece, Anjal released her larger-than-life-self onto the stage, darting to and fro while having a delightful conversation with the music she danced to.
Throughout her performance, I found myself fixated on Anjal’s artistic thoughts. She created an entire habitat for me, and the audience, to explore ideas that she brought forth. Without any realization that I was doing it, I found myself meandering through my own conceptualizations of happiness, imagination, darkness, distraction and expression. In this, Anjal accomplished something that artists hope to accomplish with every expression. She presented her art with confidence and her real self shined on stage. Anjal embodied, almost literally, her convictions and painted them in an aesthetic that was irresistible for the audience. The entire performance was memorable not because it was foreign or her specific interpretation on human connection, but because it was personal and familiar and reminded me of my own convictions.
Unipolarity and Multipolarity in the International System
I spent part of today reading through two important pieces (some would say canonical pieces in International Relations theory) on the stability of an international system characterized by multipolarity or unipolarity. A great debate in international relations is centered on the argument of whether we currently inhabit a unipolar or multi-polar system, obviously with the United States as the focus of the unipolar world (if that is what exists). My purpose here is not to discuss whether we live in multi-polar or unipolar system (incidentally, I'm of the mindset that we live in a multi-polar world), I am interested in taking up the notion of stability. Stability is defined by a maintenance of the status quo, without adding or subtracting the core number of great powers in the international system.
The pieces, full citations below, construct basic syllogisms that argue on either side. Kenneth Waltz argues, in essence, that a bipolar world is in fact the most stable and durable for peace in the international system. His major contribution to this syllogism is the idea that, in a multi-polar world there are more opportunities for miscalculations between the many alliances and groupings that form, leading to more instability.
Singer & Deutsch argue that a multi-polar system is in fact more stable because the major powers have more incentive and opportunity for cooperation and are more likely to have their attention diffused from just focusing on one polar antagonist.
Although Waltz's logic is much stronger and presents a difficult obstacle to overcome in trying to break it down, I would have to side with Singer & Deutsch because I do see multi-polar systems, with their increased opportunities for cooperation and interaction to be far more stable and conducive to peaceful interaction than bipolar systems.
Of course, all of these calculations and theories are complicated ten-fold in reality with the question of terrorism, non-state actors, rogue states and non-military inputs. None the less, I think it's a worthwhile analysis.
– Waltz, Theory of International Politics, ch. 8. (R)
– Karl Deutsch and J. David Singer, "Multipolar Systems and International Stability," World Politics, Vol. 16, No. 3 (Apr. 1964), pp. 390-406. (R)
The Post-American World by Fareed Zakaria
I just finished The Post-American World by Fareed Zakaria. It was a quick read since it mostly feels like a long-form journalistic essay, more than a tough piece of non-fiction. I didn't particularly find anything about this book to be earth-shattering or controversial, but it was a fair description of the ways in which the global system is undergoing important changes, with the U.S. still at the center.
In a nutshell, Zakaria argues that the U.S. is still enjoying a hegemonic unipolar status in the world and certain economic, military and social blunders notwithstanding, America is not being challenged for its primacy in any major way. He spends a good chunk of the book praising China and India for their successes and describing all the ways in which their growth and progress is shaping the international system. He laments on the excess in politics, technology and economics that has led to some of the ills in the world today. He argues about security in a unipolar world and the existence of the major power outside the realm of the system of international initiatives (something I plan on taking up on this blog later this week).
One of the more interesting thoughts I took from the book was a footnote near the end about Zakaria's position on Iraq and the invasion of 2003. Here it is, replicated below -
"It is not a subject for this book, but I was in favor of the effort to oust Saddam Hussein, though I argued from the start for a much larger force and an internationally sanctioned intervention and occupation. My reasoning was mostly related to the fact that Western policy toward Iraq had collapsed-sanctions were leaking, countless civilians were dying because of the embargo, Al Qaeda was enraged by our base in Saudi Arabia, from which we operated the No Fly Zone-and I believed that a more modern and moderate Iraq in the middle of the Arab world would help break the dysfunctional political dynamics of the Arab world. I opposed, from the first few weeks, Washington's occupation policies. In retrospect, I underestimated not merely the administration's arrogance and incompetence but also the inherent difficulty of the task. I continue to believe that a modern, moderate Iraq would make an important difference in the politics of the Middle East, I hope that Iraq will, in the long run, evolve into such a place, but the costs have been ruinously high-for Americans, for America's reputation, but especially for Iraqis. And foreign policy is a matter of costs and benefits, not theology."
I thought this passage was especially interesting because Zakaria writes honestly about his support for the deposing of Hussein and the evolution in his thought processes, leading him to where he is today. Most left-of-center thinkers would be quick to dismiss ever having supported intervention efforts, based primarily on the folly that the situation has turned into today. Zakaria's honesty here is commendable.
New Yorker's 20 writers under 40
The New Yorker has a piece online about 20 writers under 40 in which they ask all the writers the same set of questions and also link to some great pieces that these writers have contributed to the magazine in the recent past. One of the most interesting questions in the Q-and-A is "did you ever consider not becoming a writer?" The answers are somewhat varied, but almost without fail amount to some version of "Yes. Duh." Here are a couple of my favorites
Did I ever. Do I ever. For a long time, I thought I would like to be a doctor. Such a good profession. So explicitly good. Never a waste of time. No obstetrician goes home at the end of a long day and says, “I delivered four babies. What’s the point?”
Since I easily imagined that I’d never get published, I considered doing other things. As a fallback plan, I went to film school and trained as a film director. This was my attempt at pragmatism. I have also taught. When things are going badly, I still consider doing other—legitimate—things. Considering doing other—legitimate—things sometimes feels like a second career.
Higher literacy thanks to Bollywood
The Boston Globe has a new article up today about some research about how music videos are leading to booming literacy rates in rural India -
Same-language subtitling extricates literacy from the tangles of school infrastructure and teacher availability. And since television, more than any other medium, has the power to reach out to billions across the developing world, it holds unique promise for hard-to-access groups like rural women, who are discouraged from venturing outside their villages once they hit puberty.
Essentially, the broadcasting of music videos with same-language subtitles has led to a noticeable increase in literacy and functional literacy rates in rural villages in parts of India. By extension, it's common to notice that progress in societies is often part and parcel with literacy rates, and especially literacy rates among women.
Extending this observation further, I think it is important to consider the social value systems that are also being transmitted, along with reading skills, through these music videos. Media theorists, one after another, have brought attention to the idea that the medium through which something is communicated (or in this case taught) carries with it important values, limitations, assumptions and consequences. Educating rural citizens of India through Bollywood music videos could very well lead to a clash in value systems that are characteristic of rural Indian societies versus those found more often in Bollywood films. Although I think these are valid concerns, it goes without saying that higher literacy is a social good that is beneficial, almost without caveat.
Math Camp
The last 9 days of my life have been focused around an intensive quantitative survey called Math Camp. It was offered as a voluntary pre-term course to all students entering the social sciences graduate fields to either strengthen existing quantitative skills or be introduced to new quantitative concepts that the department encourages the students to have a better mastery over.
Over the 9 days we studied complex sets, numbers and functions, single-variable integral and differential calculus, matrix algebra, multi-variable calculus and probability & statistics. Of the different quantitative fields, I have the strongest background in statistics, which was strengthened further this summer at my internship at a polling firm.
I was most surprised at how much retention and comprehension power I had over such complex topics just over the span of 9 days. The course was filled with nearly 6 months worth of instructional material, condensed into 9 days. What I really took away from it was the idea of setting a higher standard of instruction and assuming far more capacity to excel from students than has been the norm in my academic career thus far. I have found too much time wasted and too many goals or skills confounded by the idea that students are not smart enough to grasp concepts, students need to be spoon-fed or some perverse form of lack of confidence. I found great merit in the confidence the instructor had in his pacing and abilities as an instructor and in us as the students. I do not claim (at all) to be have mastery of the concepts I was introduced to, but I am sufficiently impressed by the ways in which this model of instruction succeeded.