Pernicious is a great word.

[maeveenroute]

I mention it because, in my fit of fevered 1-am-packing (can't sleep, empty suitcases will eat me), I found a response paper I wrote for my advisor's class this past semester. It feels profound to me, although as I recall, it sparked my last existential crisis (before the "hearing" thing). Anyway, I welcome comments from the two of you who read

Comments

[kopyor]

Jesus Christ, Nassira, don't give up on an anthropology PHD. Read Mary Douglas' Purity and Danger. Also, Erving Goffman's book Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity. In your spare time, of course.

[maeveenroute]

Dude, you have no idea how much it means to me to have someone I respect so much tell me I should be in their field. Thank you so much for warm-fuzzies that still haven't faded. :c)

Will add those to my booklist!

[museumfreak]

For an interesting application of Douglas & Goffman to disability, see Rosemarie Garland-Thomson's Extraordinary Bodies.

I think about Goffman from a different perspective than she does: as a person with a brain disorder, and I would think as a D/deaf person, one naturally turns to his discussions of face and footing in communication.

Yes, maeve, don't give up on a ling anth degree!

[kopyor]

thank you for this recommendation. i'm always looking for applications of these theoretical works...