Dream

11/04/2026

My department here moved to an old, marginally maintained mansion it had reclaimed from use as graduate student rentals. To celebrate the move, and I think we were living there as well, it announced a party but did not tell anyone it was not providing food, drink, or music. Arriving guests were nonplussed. Then everybody … More Dream

Discrimination exists

10/04/2026

Discrimination exists. I started a card for an outgoing administrator who had been a breath of fresh air and all who signed were either instructors or professors of color. This caused me to see more clearly why the person had been refreshing. It was what they didn’t do. If it isn’t the non-discrimination, the instructors … More Discrimination exists

Sarah Ahmed

04/04/2026

In The Feminist Killjoy Handbook, I show how two anti-feminist tactics often work in tandem, the minimisation of harm and the inflation of power. I wrote then, “Even to identify something as harmful is treated as an attempt to exercise or to hold power over someone, as if feminists make slights bigger than they are … More Sarah Ahmed

What I am asking

04/03/2026

…is that they put hiring research faculty in Spanish, and revitalizing Spanish, in the strategic plan. Reasons are to stabilize the department (strong Spanish will do that), but also to serve the needs of the state and the region (if we don’t have the major and a path to an M.A., only LSU and Tulane … More What I am asking

More things

04/03/2026

1/ That AAUP grant report. Evans’ flight was $628 and his hotel was $349. We had planned on $943 and spent $977. That is what I think it was. I need to make this grant report. 2/ These headaches. I think they are repressed anger, frustration, lack of support, and also ANTI-SUPPORT, and from not … More More things

Vallejo and more

02/03/2026

I have so many files I had for work, that I got before the Internet. The ones I am recycling now are from RCLL in 1989 and thereabouts, including John Beverley on Tungsteno and why we should care about the novela social; Achúgar on literatura as a campo de batalla and what literature is generally, … More Vallejo and more

Not said

02/03/2026

P.S. Lagniappe: honestly, for recruiting, I would also turn the 300 level introductions into more focused courses on current topics. What hip people now do at the 300 level are things like this: – Latino Presence in the US (NOT “Spanish for heritage speakers” focusing on spelling and grammar for people who speak but haven’t learned to … More Not said