Chuck Ditzler

Some of my 2006 postings are about a criminology class that I taught that spring. It was by far my worse as a teacher. Some things happened outside of class in my life that I let affect my ability to concentrate on teaching well. Many of my students were unhappy with class, and I'm very embarrassed by that.

I'm probably going to switch from this site to Google's: http://chuckditzler.blogspot.com/ .  What might be better is for me to create a website containing links to free materials on the Web that are useful for teaching sociology. As a way to save my students money and to add variety to the readings, I've often assigned public radio stories, such as this one:

“What Really Happens in Marriage?" Audio story about John Gottman's research broadcast on "The American Life," March 26, 2004 [Click on Stream Episode under #261--"The Sanctity of Marriage," 03-26-2004, which is free. Story starts about 6 minutes into program and lasts for 23 minutes.] http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/261/The-Sanctity-of-Marriage
 

Last night I watched the 1924 silent film of Peter Pan, part of UW's Cimemateque, which shows free movies in a small theater on Friday and Saturday evenings. It was accompanied for over 100 minutes by a pianist. The family dog, which acted as a nanny for the kids, was played by a human in a costume on all fours. If they'd had the Oscars at that time, I wonder if the person who played the dog would've been nominated for a supporting actor award.

This year, they're also running a series of F. W. Murnau-directed movies, but I attended only one of the screenings, The Haunted Castle, back in January. His Nosferatu, probably the creepiest Count Dracula, I saw in the 80s.

I'm relieved this weekend not to be grading; however, next weekend I'll have to grade homework for both classes while I attend the Wisconsin Film Festival.

The criminology topic that I'm most familiar with--wrongful convictions and prosecutions--I'm not teaching in my criminology class this semester. The reason is that I'd had the impression that most of my students would have already taken a lower level class--criminal justice--that covers wrongful convictions. But on the first day of class I found out that fewer than 25% had taken it.

One way that I taught about human rights at the Graduate School of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and at the China University of Politics and Law was to teach about wrongful convictions in the US. Many of my students commented that if such mistakes are made in the US, there must be many more in China.

One of the homework assignments in my crim class deals with the gaps in my syllabus by asking students to create lesson plans for additional topics that they think should be taught. During discussion sections, they'll teach abbreviated versions of their lessons to small groups of classmates. One of them has already told me she'll do wrongful convictions; others will do such topics as the mafia/organized crime, the media, the relationship between music and crime, and terrorism.

This evening I bought a children's book, Arlene Sardine, about which one reviewer on Amazon said: "I was horrified to read this book and would not recommend it to anyone. To give a sardine 'humanlike' qualities and a personality and then describe the way 'Arlene' goes through the canning process is morbid and borders on the macabre. What next? A children's book on 'Elmer' and the embalming process? Arlene Sardine is not a book for either children or children at heart! Too bad there is not a 'no star' rating because this is what this book should receive!"

I first heard of it when Daniel Pinkwater and Scott Simon read from the book on Weekend Edition on August 24, 2002. [Six-minute audio clip is at this page.]

Half-Price Books is having a 20%-off sale these days. Madison has two branches of the chain, and I just got back from the one on the east side of town, where I spent nearly three hours. Besides browsing, a big chunk of my time was spent persuading myself not to buy a bunch of different materials to learn various kinds of foreign languages that I'd like to learn but don't have the time for.

One of the books I settled on was Arlene Sardine because it appears to have gone out of print and I think it would be an interesting book to share with my future kid(s).

Today is International Women's Day. Although the UN started in the 70s to use March 8 as a day to recognize issues that specially affect women, the first time I'd heard of it was in the late 80s or early 90s in China or from a Chinese in the US. On one International Women's Day while I was living in China, the women teachers at the school where I taught were given some toiletry products as gifts, such as shampoo and higher-grade soap, and they got the day off for some activities. This was back in 1991 in a city where such things were still expensive. [Here's a link to a UN website on International Women's Day. The page has a link to the history of the day.]

As I watched them with their baskets or boxes in the English-language office, I was reminded of how provincial and ignorant of the rest of the world Americans can be. What's so ironic is that the US is made up of peoples from the rest of the world, and it's not so hard to find here experts on various places and peoples.

One of my fellow grad students said this in an email: "Only in the US would we find no mention/celebration of this grand day!!! Must be because it is 'International' women's day. And even in Madison the only people I have heard making noise are the latino community!"

Although there are a lot of mis-conceptions about the US in China, the average Chinese student knows vastly more about the US than the average American student knows about China or any other country. When the results of that survey about lack of knowledge of the First Amendment came out recently--only about 28% could name more than one of the five freedoms in it--one of my thoughts was that I wouldn't be surprised if the average Chinese college student could name more of the rights protected in the First Amendment than can the average American.

Perhaps I'm preaching to the choir here, so a better issue is what to do about this. One small idea I have is that I wish that the sheep in charge of network television would do some good programs based abroad. I'm not talking about the superficial "reality" shows [which should be called sado-masochism TV] with only glimpses of life abroad. I mean something like a drama based in China, for instance, maybe with a foreign teacher of English. Lessons in Chinese could be integrated into the program, maybe with vocabulary and grammar at the start and then a little lesson while the teacher is studying Chinese. The same would be interesting in other settings.

Saturday night I went to what's called "Duck Soup Cinema" at the Capitol Theater, a theater palace that dates back to the 1920s and still has its original organ. The place was packed with over 1,000 people, lots of them families with kids, to see about one hour of vaudeville and then Harold Lloyd's Safety Last!, a classic silent comedy. [link to Wikipedia article on Safety Last!] Listening to the organ pre-show and during the movie creates a magical feeling, and the whole atmosphere is one reason that I've loved living in Madison.

The vaudeville acts were a contemporary dance group, a men's a cappella group, and members of the Gilbert & Sullivan company in town. As the latter sang selections from the Pirates of Penzance culled from the performance that I saw last summer, a baby high in the balcony started bawling after one woman hit some high notes. I'm not into Gilbert & Sullivan songs that much, but I really liked their show I attended in July. Saturday was the first time I've been to a "Duck Soup Cinema" without a magic or juggling act, such as a guy who juggles beanbag chairs.

I saw Safety Last! at the theater in spring 2001, and since then I've laughed whenever I've replayed in my mind the scene when Harold and his roommate evade the landlady. I was disappointed that I didn't laugh as hard this time at that moment, but I did for things I'd forgotten about. Late last fall I kept pushing some students to buy tickets to this; however, I saw none of them there. In fact, it seemed that few of the audience members were undergrads.

The whole thing cost $4. The price doubled from 2003 to 2004, went up by 50% in 2005, and up by 33.3% this year. I wonder if they'll increase it by 20% next year.

As I left the theater, though, I felt a little sad. It would've been nice to have experienced the evening with someone else, to have heard laughing hard beside me during the movie and then talked with afterward.

I've been wondering recently whether the main function of churches is to encourage or rationalize saying one thing but doing another or the opposite, that to say you're a Christian means that you put more emphasis on rituals and "faith" instead of on behavior in everyday life, such as being kind and honest to others.

Up until I was five years old, I attended Sunday school. I could sense that my teachers were unhappy with me whenever I'd ask questions they had trouble answering or I couldn't give money since we were poor. At least a couple of times, I went to the nursery to watch the babies while one of the Sunday school teachers talked about something. They'd ask me why and I'd say that the babies were more interesting. I guess that also made them unhappy with me.

When we moved from Pennsylvania to Kansas, we stopped going to church. My mom said that too many people who go to church say one thing on Sundays and do the opposite the rest of the week. But as I got older, I wondered if I was missing out of the sense of community that I imagined exists in churches. I read a little about Unitarianism but never attended a meeting or service.

I'm nearly always optimistic about people, but I'm getting a little cynical about some of those who say they're Christian. It's not only the behavior of some conservatives like George Bush but also some who say that they're liberals. I don't want to overgeneralize or jump to conclusions, though, so I hope that I can be persuaded that I shouldn't think this way.

I've just finished ordering my Wisconsin Film Festival tickets--8 films for me from Thursday, March 30 to Sunday, April 2. Here are my choices:

1. Laura--a restoration of a 1944 film that'll be introduced by Roger Ebert

( My list continued )

Back in 2003, student tickets were 16 for $25; this year the price is more than double! I heard Ebert in 2003 introduce a restored Hard Day Nights, and then he took questions after it. Ebert commented that one of the young women screaming while the Beatles performed probably had the only real orgasm he'd ever seen on screen.

I'm used to seeing movies for free on campus, especially at something called the Cinemateque, or for less than $3 at one of the discount theaters in Madison. Because I'm patient, it doesn't matter to me to wait a couple of months to see a movie. Last fall, for instance, I saw March of the Penguins for $2 in a theater that seats around 400. I was the only one in there until someone else showed up as the movie began. That theater has jacked up the prices, though, to $2.50 for matinees and $3 after 6 pm.

My "spring" break will start on Thursday afternoon, March 9, and end on Sunday, March 19. I want to go somewhere else, but I'm not sure where. Because I told my criminology TA that I'll do the dirty work, I'm grading the March 8 midterm, so I'll probably have to cart along over 100 tests.

One option is to visit my parents in Chattanooga and, while I'm down there, go see some civil rights-era sites and places like the homes of William Faulkner and Helen Keller. If I can get a good deal, I might try to fly to a warmer spot, but I want to avoid the traditional spring break destinations. The break is too short for a trip to China.

Last week at this time, a snow storm was about to begin. Since I usually walk or take the bus, I hadn't bothered to dig out my 1989 Corolla before I took this photo a few days after the storm.

It's been a mild winter. Before last week, our only other big snow came in early December and melted near the end of the month. In a previous entry, I complained about the cancellation of Madison's "Kites on Ice" this year; however, at the end of January and start of February, the temperatures were too high for strong ice to form on the lakes.

The main problem for me this winter hasn't been the cold but the heat. Sometimes my office and apartment have been too hot because of rising heat from lower levels.

While I was at the grocery store yesterday afternoon, I ran into a couple of my fellow grad students and greeted them by asking, "Hi, what're you doing here?" I wonder how long they'll kid me about my question.

I rarely watch television, but I've been turning on NBC lately to watch some of the Olympics. This evening I turned on the television while the nightly news was still on. This bothered me:

Brian Williams (the news anchor): "Coming up, news for women about a new form of birth control."

Why is that news for women? Why not also men?

After the commercial break, I learned that the story was about research findings that indicate users of birth control patches face twice the risk of blood clots than women who use the pill. Since this has something to do with an activity that men are also engaged in, shouldn't they be aware of whether their partner might be at increased health risk? Another thing, if a news story is "about women," shouldn't men pay attention since it has something to do with half of humanity?

During this same news broadcast was a commercial about a father incompetently trying to wash clothing and clean the house. I forget if the ad was trying to promote some kind of food product. Anyway, a daughter kept saying that mom wouldn't do it that way. I hope that some viewers will get out of the ad that they could do a better job than that guy, but I wonder if an underlying message is that we should leave housework to women since they are more competent, which is a rationalization for making women do all of the housework while men can take a break.

I have too much to say about this topic.

"He's comparing you to a piece of meat?!"--said in a slightly humored tone by a young woman talking on a cell phone while she exited the bus this evening. I wonder about the context of this statement.

While looking for online quizzes or tests for my methods students to evaluate, such as according to various kinds of validity and reliability, I took the test at http://www.findyourspot.com, a site that (according to its FAQ) will "instantly give you a tailored list of America's best places to live that expertly fit your personal style and needs. It's fun, quick and easy." After you answer various questions, such as on weather and activities, it comes up with a list of 24 places.

My list was all over the US, with bunches of places in Oregon, New Mexico, and Maryland. Salisbury, MD, is on the list; however, I'm pretty certain that I wouldn't want to live there. My mom grew up in Salisbury, and although I haven't been back since I was a teenager, I doubt it's improved enough. A couple of places are in Wisconsin, but Madison--probably the nicest city where I've lived so far--isn't one of them.

( Cut for My List )