SHOOT ME NOW

I'm about 30-60 days from finishing my PhD dissertation and meanwhile I get to read articles like this.

All self-deprication aside though, one of the things that Voice article raises is what the future of adjunct and lecturing positions will be, especially as there is an increased push for unionization among such faculty. Academia, for all its pretenses, is not that far removed from the rest of the labor market. I've been insulated from much of this reality by being at Berkeley which, while hiring many adjunct instructors, still seems to have a mostly FTE base but at many other campuses, it seems like close to 40% of the total teaching positions are filled by part-time faculty with no job security, few benefits and no advancement future, i.e. the exact opposite of what academia is supposed to promise.

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Damn, Korean American poet Ishle Park becomes the poet-laureate for Queens. You go girl!

Also NY-related, Imaginasian is opening an Asian/Asian American film theater in NYC.

Last but not least, do Asian American students kill interest in collegiate football?. I'm with the Angry Asian Man; that's a stupid theory when you consider that many Division I football schools, especially in the Pac 10, have enormous Asian American student support. USC, UCLA, Cal? The idea that an Asian American student body is killing interest in the football program sounds like insipid scapegoating rather than a rational theory. Bring me back some qualitative data and we can talk again.
(credit: Angryasianman.com)

Speaking of morons, I agree with Catchdubs on this one: HomelessAtNYU.com needs a swift kick in the ass and transfer to a community college in upstate Wyoming for being a whiny little beeyotch with entitlement issues. Boo fucking hoo - you can't afford housing at NYU? You ever heard of CUNY/SUNY? Anyone want to put down a bet this guy is white?

Actually, NYU has been off the rails this year. Multiple suicides. This dumb ass above. And most recently, a freshman was busted for selling drugs out her dorm room. What's going on over there?

To my L.A. peeps, try to get out to the Visual Communications Asian American Film Festival which kicks off tomorrow night. Movies worth seeing:

Chan Is Missing - new, restored print of the best Asian American film ever made.
A Good Lawyer's Wife - a devestating Korean film about sex, patriarchy and family
Life Is Cheap...But Toilet Paper Is Expensive - Wayne Wang's "lost" film. So rare even I haven't seen it!
Take Out - excellent narrative feature on a day in the life of a NY deliveryman. Better than it sounds, believe me.
Last Life in the Universe - I wrote about this already but just a great, great film. Catch it now or wait until September.
Zatouchi - Beat Takeshi's take on the long-running Blind Swordsman series. I caught this on Chinese bootleg already and it's pretty damn entertaining. Much funnier than you might expect.

And just for the hell of it: Hip-Hop + Pez
(credit: Different Kitchen)