Did the Yom Kippur fasting thingy: went very well this year since I’m accustomed to not eating for long periods of time at work. Stayed at my rents’ house for the night of Yom Kippur. Lots of self-reflection, per instructions.
In other news, FINALLY, the Subway opened in the Crystal City underground!!! Thus, for my first post-break fast meal I had a foot-long veggie max: yummy yummy.
This afternoon, my roommate and I cleaned the kitchen and got rid of the remnants of the leftovers from the party. We celebrated by playing virtual ping-pong. She needs to work on her trash-talking :)
Saw the WP headline “Election May Hinge On Debates”. That’s a shock; I next expected to see on the front page: “Fasting Makes You Hungry.”
Bookroll
- Love, Dishonor, Marry, Die, Cherish, Perish: A Novel
- David Rakoff
- 3 wds: Rhythmic Raw Rakoff
- The Signal and the Noise
- Nate Silver
- 3 wds: accessible, insightful, broad
- The Casual Vacancy
- J.K. Rowling
- 3 wds: captivating, political, believable
- The Black Banners: The Inside Story of 9/11 and the War against al-Qaeda
- Neil Shah
- 3 wds: Captivating, informative, redacted
- The Blank Slate
- Steven Pinker
- 3 wds: Rant, lengthy, correct
- The Trial
- Franz Kafka
- 3 wds: Disheartening, linear, skippable
More Books ยป
Aaron, I’m responding here instead of in my blog ’cause I figure you’ll see it more easily here…
I don’t know what I would have done if that guy had actually been a girl. It wasn’t like I was hesitant to interject my perspectives, as I said; he and I were the only ones talking. And I think part of the other girls’ silence was that people don’t often do the reading for the class. I guess I just kind of thought he should have given other people more of an opportunity to jump in than he did, even if they weren’t going to take him up on it.
Which actually is very indicative of differenes between men’s and women’s conversational styles; my mom gave me a book about that, written by a socio-linguist, and its’ *fascinating.* Apparently men interrupt more than women, and think it’s perfectly acceptable to do so, and she even says that among guys that immediate, back-and-forth, sparring kind of conversation is seen as good, because it shows that the audience is interacting with the speaker. But among women, apparently there is much more of an expectation that the speaker will pause for other people to jump in, or that if someone is speaking a lot then someone else will say “well sarah, you haven’t said much, do you have anything you want to contribute?” I don’t know if I’m describing it well, but there was definitely an element of that… and also this sociolinguist was saying that in mixed groups, people tended to follow the “male” conversational style, which was definitely the case here (even if there was only one guy). I dunno. It was interesting. Men apparently tend to devalue the way women speak, and when they learn about this conversational difference expect women to learn to speak their way, the “right way”. It’s usually phrased more subtly than that, as in a subconscious thought of “well, it’s the dominant style, so if you want to get ahead in the world, you have to learn to talk this way, just like you have to be ballsy and hard-hitting”–but it pisses me off.
*Anyway.* ;) Sorry. I get really enthusiastic sometimes, and honestly I found that book so very interesting because it was so applicable to my own life, so I tend to go overboard a bit. Apologies. :)
How are you?
Maja,
That book sounds interesting… Mind passing along the title? -j.
For everyone else: original discussion is here.
Maja, you raise some good points, some of which I had heard before. When people subtly argue that dominant speaking is the “right way,” I think we should counter with something to the effect of “the first step to earning respect is to respect others.”
Of course others may say that the first step to earning respect is to dominate others, but hopefully they’re wrong.