Mindy Stombler, one of the academics targeted by the conservative backlash to cut funding to Georgia's universities has an interesting reflective piece on the whole mess in the Chronicle of Higher Education: http://chronicle.com/jobs/news/2009/05/2009050101c.htm

If you are new to AERA, here are a few suggestions that I have to make the most of it:

1) Search the program by name for scholars that you have read that are important to your area of study and see if you can attend one of their sessions to see what new ideas they are working on.

2) Introduce yourself to presenters after their sessions and ask if they have a moment to answer a question about your work.  You may even have to offer to walk with them for a few minutes -- but I've never had anyone say no to this.  Most people are quite pleased that you have enough interest in their ideas to follow them :-)

The fortunate follow-up to this story is that the professors in question were able to clearly and effectively address the state legislature.  No quotes from the prof. on queer theory though...wonder why?

http://www.ajc.com/news/content/metro/stories/2009/02/10/legislature_sex...

Two of those experts spoke to the House committee Tuesday. Kirk Elifson is listed as an expert in male prostitution. He said he became an expert while serving as a captain in the Army in Vietnam and later became a professor. The Centers for Disease Control, he said, sought out his expertise to help with the growing AIDS epidemic in the 1980s.

“We’ve done some cutting-edge research in HIV,” he said. “I’m proud of the work I’ve done.”

Georgia has one of the nation’s highest rate of sexually transmitted disease, he said, and his research is geared toward reducing that.

Due to an overwhelming number of submissions to the second issue of SPRINKLE we need to expand our base of reviewers.  If you know undergraduates and graduate students who have a background in gender and sexual diversity and would like to review papers for this journal, please have them send :

Well, this has been a busy semester, and this blog has gathered way too much dust for any respectable blogger.  But I've been deeply immersed in teaching "Introduction to Sexual Diversity Studies" this fall at McGill and have poured all of my creative energy and limited free time into developing and offering this course. 

It is an interesting beast as it is structured as a lecture-only format since there are 150 students in the course and the room assigned is an immense lecture hall.  Needless to say, I didn't find this the ideal format for a course that is designed to model and teach about queer theory, critical pedagogy and connect with students personally and intellectually.  Fortunately, I have 2 wonderful TAs and have managed to break the class down into seminar meetings throughout the term.

I am so excited to be a part of this project and to help others make links between their own work and the ideas advanced by Paulo Freire. There are many diverse scholars involved in this work and I just wanted to take a moment to talk briefly about what I hope to offer here on my blog. As a feminist scholar I am very interested in examining gender dynamics and as a queer scholar looking at how sex, gender, and sexual orientation shape and inform our identities and experiences.