At least 900 people will apply for these post-docs (this is the norm). Statistically I have no chance of getting it, but someone has to get it, right? Just like someone has to win the lotto and someone has to be eaten by sharks and someone has to be taken hostage by Somali pirates. You never know if you don’t try! [That's what everyone keeps telling me.] So in a nutshell, I have no chance of getting this, but I’ll spend a whole day working on it anyway. This is not good for morale. What is also not good for morale:

I just realized that all my documents are formatted to A4 paper size, which is what is used in the UK. So I had to change the paper size to US letter size and now my CV has gone haywire and is now 4 pages instead of 3 (not good).

And then I was looking over my writing sample just now, which is 25 pages from my dissertation. I chose an excerpt from my chapter on Fight Club, because that is my strongest writing. Once I was finished editing it and formatting it, I realized that the excerpt contains the word “dildo” 3 times and the phrase “F-ck Martha Stewart” and lots of other f-words because, you know, this is Fight Club. You can’t quote from Fight Club without that kind of language appearing. And now I just don’t have time to put together another writing sample, because I just don’t have time and I’m tired, so I’m stuck sending this potty-mouthed excerpt to the Ivy League.

You stay classy, Anglofille.

Dead Taliban soldiers being pissed on = war crime

Live women in porn being pissed on = sexually arousing

[Of course, the difference is that the women in porn "choose" this and they "enjoy" it. For men, even dead ones, this is humiliating.]

The news that U.S. Marines in Afghanistan pissed on dead Taliban soldiers is drawing comparisons to the torture at Abu Ghraib. In both cases, the soldiers filmed/photographed themselves degrading the prisoners/corpses. This is significant. The term “war porn” was often used to describe what happened at Abu Ghraib, but only in that sloppy way the word “porn” is often used to describe various things (i.e. “food porn”), which is completely detached from all critical analysis and context.  Only a few brave writers (mostly feminists) drew comparisons between what happened to the prisoners at Abu Ghraib and to what actually happens to women in pornography every day. [Most commentators on the left-wing remained silent about this aspect, not surprisingly.]

D.A. Clarke’s essay “Prostitution for Everyone: Feminism, Globalisation and the “Sex Industry” [PDF], which I first read in this book, includes an addendum about Abu Ghraib. I thought of this essay today when I read the news about the pissing Marines. I’ve included a few quotes from the essay below, but the whole thing is worth reading:

Our reaction — as a nation and a public — to the use of Iraqi prisoners in amateur pornography shows that we believe this was a deeply humiliating experience for them. Our media have made much of the “special” characteristics of Arabs, to explain why this experience is so very humiliating for them in particular — whereas it is of course perfectly harmless and good for the women and girls spread, splayed, stripped and mocked throughout our commercial advertising/porn media nexus.

[...]

Structural similarities between the documented humiliation of prisoners and the conventions of “normal” pornography are many and strikingly obvious. The prisoners were made to masturbate for the camera; images and footage of women masturbating are a stock theme in commercial porn. The prisoners were made to pose in tableaux suggestive of homosexual activity such as fellatio; a large and profitable subgenre of commercial porn is “girl/girl”, in which (presumably heterosexual) models are posed in tableaux mimicking lesbian sex, or directed to engage in sexual behaviour with each other while the camera rolls. These models usually bear little resemblance to real-life lesbians, being selected (like most porn models) for their conformity to commercial and male-defined standards of heterosexual attractiveness.

In these forms of documentary porn there are surely two gratifications, one overt and one tacit. The overt gratification is the fantasy of violation of privacy, of spying on the intimate and private acts of another person. But the Abu Ghraib pictures should illuminate for us a further, tacit or covert gratification: the gratification of knowing or believing that the persons depicted were compelled or persuaded or paid to submit to a violation of privacy in reality, to strike poses and perform acts in reality which most people would not care to have seen or photographed by others. This is one sense in which this genre is genuinely documentary.

The “kick” of girl/girl porno lies partly in its catering to the fantasy of violating the privacy of lesbians, of making even sex between women — something quite threatening to male sexual prerogative — serve a male agenda; the other, tacit element is the kick of seeing “normal girls” made to emulate lesbian sexual activity. The assumption is that homosexual activity is repulsive, and that therefore the models are disgusted by it and endure it under some compulsion — whether the compulsion of money, force of personality, or physical threat.

[...]

Misogyny drips from all accounts of Abu Ghraib, and from all attempts to analyze it. The outrage of Arab men that the Americans “treated our brothers like women.” The idea that making men wear “women’s undies” is a form of torture. The overarching, stunning hypocrisy of the world’s largest pornography-exporting nation acting so dreadfully shocked when its line troops treat POWs in the same ways that its prison guards and stronger inmates treat weaker men, and that its pornography and prostitution industry treats women, every single day.

For this radical feminist the Abu Ghraib pictures merely elucidate what porn is really about. The essence is not obfuscated for once, because the victims are men, and literally prisoners behind bars and facing guns (instead of behind economic bars, facing hunger/homelessness). Therefore we can suddenly perceive that they are victims, that they have personal pride and dignity which have been assaulted, that they have rights which have been violated. The nameless, traceless women posing for websites like “See Asian Sluts Get What They Deserve” or “Farm Girls And Their Pets” — whether guns are pointed at them in the course of their work or not — arouse no such outrage or compassion.

A blogger with a communist/socialist POV has two excellent posts that debunk many left-wing arguments championing “sex work” as liberating, radical and feminist: The Limits of Sex Work Radicalism and On Privileged Engagements with the Sex Industry. These are a must-read for anyone interested in this topic.

I also want to recommend the Canadian feminist blog called The F Word (not to be confused with the British blog of the same name, which I do not recommend). This blog deals with a wide variety of feminist issues from a mostly radical perspective, including posts about the sex industry. Highly recommended.

Finally, below is a video that shows women being abused on a porn set. Trigger Warning for sexual abuse. I must stress this — do not watch this video if you are sensitive. I have done a lot of research into the sex industry, yet I just watched this myself and feel terribly shaken by it. If you know anyone who thinks porn is great, send them this video. Of course, any porn apologist will just say these are isolated events, but when you watch porn, do you know what happened behind the scenes? Nope, not unless you were there in person.

2012 is going to be a major year of transition for me. I’ll finish my PhD. And I’ve just started querying literary agents in NYC with my novel, so we’ll see how that goes. It’s finally happening!

I’m also applying for post-docs and scouring the academic job adverts in the US, UK and worldwide. I’m not going to MLA in Seattle this week — I couldn’t really afford it and I didn’t have time to prepare. To be honest, I have no idea what I’m doing in this job search. My university didn’t prepare me at all. I feel at a big disadvantage in the job market because of this. I think I need to pour all my energy into getting published. For me, a job is likely to come from that.

Anyway, I am feeling upbeat, despite having a huge question mark hovering over this year. None of us can predict the future, but I have no idea where I’ll even be living.  The US? The UK? Elsewhere? I’m just living out of a suitcase at the moment. If I think about that, and looming student loan repayment, and unemployment, it becomes too overwhelming, so I won’t think about it. I just need to finish this thesis first and then go from there.

Posting will be light around here (or possibly non-existent) until I submit my thesis, which I hope will be the week after next. You’ll know when I’m done — you’ll hear my screams of joy wherever you are in the world. Yes, it’ll be that loud.

The first four books represent my female Modernist kick. I have no idea why these books all appealed to me at once. The first two are by Mina Loy:

Stories and Essays of Mina Loy

The Lost Lunar Baedeker: Poems

H.D. Collected Poems 1912 – 1944

Jean Rhys: The Complete Novels

I got a new copy of The Vindication of the Rights of Woman as well as Lyndall Gordon’s Vindication: A Life of Mary Wollstonecraft

I love the film and have always wanted to read The Talented Mr. Ripley — I’m excited to finally have the book

And another by Patricia Highsmith — Little Tales of Misogyny

Edith Wharton’s The Writing of Fiction, which I’ve started reading and it’s brilliant

Joan Didion’s Blue Nights

Oh — and one book by a man!  Geoff Dyer’s Out of Sheer Rage: Wrestling with D.H. Lawrence

I also have a gift certificate that I haven’t spent yet…

Did you get any books this holiday season?

My beautiful birthday cake!  I’ve had a lovely day — breakfast out, dinner out, gifts and sweet messages, and a browse around the Sundance store, where I was bought a beautiful turquoise necklace. Now it’s time to cut the cake (though I hate to cut it — it’s too pretty).

Sorry I haven’t posted since I’ve been back in the USA. Between jet lag, catching up with family, eating all my favorite foods and working on my thesis, my mind has been elsewhere. I hope you’re all enjoying the holiday season.

Conversation of the day:

Me to hotel receptionist (who said he speaks English): “Hi. My room smells like raw sewage. Can I change please?”

Receptionist: “Sewage?”

Me: “Yes, like a sewer. Do you know what a sewer is?”

Receptionist: “Yes.”

Anyway, I’m making my way to Paris CDG tomorrow and flying out early on Friday –> back to the USA on a very long but thankfully non-stop flight to where my parents live in the western part of the country. On my way up to Paris I’ve stopped in Cannes (where I’d never been before) and Avignon (which I visited last year).  I’ll share a few photos, but I haven’t taken many. I’ve lost my tourist mojo and have just wandered along the seaside in Cannes, browsed in boutiques and enjoyed the Christmas market in Avignon.

The photo at the top is La Croisette in Cannes. People have compared Cannes to Beverly Hills and I can see the similarities — a lot of snobbish designer boutiques and pretentious rich people whose skin is so over-tanned and leathery you could make a handbag out of it. But the beach was lovely:

Standing in the same spot, looking in the other direction, it looked like this:

It was a Jekyll-and-Hyde sky. The sunny and bright section was such a rich, beautiful blue — I suppose that’s why they call it the Azure Coast!

Here is me parked at a cafe drinking hot chocolate:

And while we’re on the topic of food, here was lunch:

And that was it for Cannes. The train ride between Cannes and Marseille was so beautiful. For most of the time we were right on the coast, looking at the sea. Then we moved inland and I was surprised at how autumnal everything still looks, even in December.

I hardly took any photos of Avignon, since I took tons last year. But here are a couple, beginning with a glimpse of the moon and a church spire:

I really liked this scene — a dark street and at the end of it, a burst of bright autumn light (and the Palace of Popes):

Finally, inside the Avignon McDonalds, which had these giant paintings all over. In France, even McDo is cute:

When I get home, I’ll probably do a wrap-up post about my time in France. But until then, I bid you adieu. Next stop:

I took a day trip to Saint-Paul-de-Vence today, which is a windy 5-minute bus ride down the mountain from where I’ve been living. According to Rick Steves, Saint-Paul-de-Vence is the most visited village in France.  It’s a medieval village on a hill filled with very narrow and steep cobblestone paths. Let’s just say I got quite a workout today. The town is full of art galleries, shops and cafes, though many of them were closed because this is, according to one shop owner, “the dead season.”  This is one interesting thing I’ve learned about the French Riviera. I always thought of it as the Florida of France, where people would flock in the cold months to soak up the warmth and Mediterranean sunshine, but it’s not like that at all. It’s too chilly in the winter to be like Florida.

Saint-Paul-de-Vence is chic and has a history of attracting artists, writers and actors. Marc Chagall lived there. The American writer James Baldwin lived and died in the town (I was too lazy to find his old home, which is apparently dilapidated and for sale). And for horror movie fans: the British actor Donald Pleasance also lived and died in the village. It was pretty deserted for most of my visit, which was nice, I suppose, but then a busload of Japanese tourists appeared to liven things up and spend money. I actually had to translate for a few of them in a shop (imagine that!), since the only non-Japanese words they knew were in English. One guy thought nougat was soap. That was pretty funny.

I’ll share a few photos from today, beginning with a photo of my favorite moment…stumbling upon the Alps!!!  This region of France is called Alpes-Maritimes, but I had no idea the Alps were so closeby. From my town, you can’t see them. It was such a thrill to see these snow-capped peaks — and from other vantage points in the village, you can see the Mediterranean sea, so it’s an interesting mix. [I should point out that this photo is through a zoom lens -- the mountains aren't as close as they appear.]

The next two photos are typical scenes in Saint-Paul-de-Vence:

I really loved this house:

A rare flat street in the village — you can see the swarming crowds too!

Sunset from one of the look-out points:

The cathedral:

I loved this scene at the entrance to the village — the whole area is like walking into a postcard:

Autumn vines (and a little kitty if you can spot her!):

Old men playing boules:

A public water fountain, out of which fresh spring water flows — they have these all over the region, in my town as well, though I’ve never seen one this cute:

I sat in the chair and she said: “Your hair is clear. Would you like it more French?”

Of course, this isn’t what she actually said, but it’s what I thought she said.  I was quite stumped by her assertion that my hair is clear — have you ever seen anyone with clear (i.e. see-through) hair?  And as for her question about whether I wanted French hair, I had no idea what she meant.

“Do you want it more French?” she kept saying.

“Well,” I said.  ”Ummmm….more French? I don’t know.”  I kept thinking…don’t French people have the same kind of hair as everyone else?  Then I thought she must have meant a French style. I started to panic, thinking that she wanted to do something cutting edge, like dyeing my hair platinum blonde.

She kept asking over and over again whether I wanted my hair French, until she finally blurted out, in English: “Darker.”

Ah. Turns out she wasn’t saying français, but foncé. I wasn’t familiar with the word foncé and the way she pronounced it sounded exactly like français to me. So of course I felt like an idiot. And she wasn’t saying that I had clear hair, but light hair. I didn’t realize clair also meant light. Thankfully I left the salon with the shade I wanted, which just happens to be très foncé.

Another interesting hair-related word: brushing. In French this means “blow-dry.” I’d love to know how that happened! This word must have been imported from English, but somehow the meaning was changed.

While I was having my hair done, I browsed through a stack of gossip rags. I read one article that said Kate Middleton is undergoing psychotherapy because QE2 fears she’ll end up like Diana. And another that said Demi Moore (and possibly her daughter) are anorexic alcoholics. Apparently, Beyoncé is faking her pregnancy and her father has bought a baby for her. Some of the gossip seemed a bit reckless and what was interesting is that one issue of Closer had a white banner across 1/4 of the cover saying something about how Charlotte Gainsbourg had won a judgment against them for something. I thought it was odd this was on the cover of the magazine — I’ve never seen anything like that before. Usually corrections and things of that sort are buried in the back where no one sees them.

Almost all of the celebrities were American, Canadian and British. I went through an entire stack of trash mags and saw maybe 3 French celebs — and Vanessa Paradis was only there because of Johnny Depp.  There were headlines like: “Justin Bieber est le père de mon bébé” and another that roughly translates to “Justin Bieber made my baby in 30 seconds.” There were also photos of Kim Kardashian and other z-list North American and Brit “celebs.” WHY? You French people have let me down again. Resist the evil anglophone empire!