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Women artists in conversation: Tiff Massey Q&A [Part II]

Tiff Massey is a young artist whose work ranges from wearable sculpture to large-scale public interventions. In the first of this two-part interview, Massey spoke with Benezit Dictionary of Art editor Kathy Battista about her work as well as her vision for bringing art education to underserved areas of Detroit. In the second part of the interview, Massey speaks about her influences and beginnings as an artist. You can read the first part of the interview here.

Kathy: Who were the artists who became important to you? 

Tiff: Issey Miyake, Nick Cave, and Edmonia Lewis. The pioneers were influences, but I didn’t necessarily understand how they translated into the things that I was making. I was fixated on hip-hop jewelry. At one point, I was calling myself ‘Tiff the Jeweler’, like Jacob the Jeweler. I thought that the forms that were being created for hip-hop were limited. There is so much that you can do within the metalsmithing room, but it’s just not exploited. Nobody is spending the time to create hollow forms. That’s where I felt my space was. Faith Ringgold was also important. With her being so blunt with the imagery, and with her Flag series, specifically – I thought of that when I made my own flag.

K: In Ain’t no Future in Your Front , when it reads “America is not for you,” do you mean for everyone or are you speaking specifically to the African American experience? 

T: I wanted to create something that was speaking to the political climate; it’s more than blacks now. People are starting to understand that this is a larger issue than a black and white situation.

Tiff Massey: Ain’t No Future in Your Front, wood and mirrored acrylic, 26 x 38 x 1.25 ins, 2017. Image courtesy of the artist.

K: Did you always want to be an artist?

T: No, I went to Eastern Michigan University for Biology. But I’ve probably been an artist all my life. I was into crafts growing up and my mom would take me art classes. I would go to the College for Creative Studies on Saturdays and paint. She would take me to museums and art fairs. She’s not an artist, but she made sure I saw it all.

K: But there was no talk that this could be a profession for you?

T: Oh, hell no. Even when I chose to go get my masters it was like, you can still go to med school! I talked to my mother recently about this building that I’m acquiring and she said, “They’re not going to give you a loan because you don’t have a 9-5.” I said, “Ma, you don’t get it, I get paid to do what I do.” It is a job. It is a profession.

K: What will you use the building for? 

T: For studio space. I own a live/work space in a former bowling alley, which I want to turn into a community center for high school kids utilizing the same pedagogy as Cranbrook Academy of Art: hiring artists in residence, having them live on site, and teaching more than just the seven genres, adding music and performance. When I bought this site, I bought it blind. I remember going to see it for the first time and I saw all these high school kids walking around. I grew up 10 blocks away from this building and there’s nothing to do over there. What would I have done if I had a space near me where I could work out some ideas or express myself? It would have totally changed my trajectory. How can I leverage my network and use my platform to help these high school kids? If I don’t think about them, nobody is going to. We barely have schools [in Detroit] and we definitely don’t have art in schools.

All of this stemmed from a friend of mine who introduced me someone saying, “This is Tiff Massey, and there will never be another Tiff Massey unless someone makes their kid actually do what you do.” That’s not a good thing. That’s like me having the only seat at the table and I don’t want the only seat at the table. So, how can I figure out how to get young people getting their hands dirty?

In 2018 the Benezit Dictionary of Artists has devoted a year to commissioning new biographies to revising and expanding current entries on women artists. Read the previous posts in this blog series here.

Featured image: Tiff Massey: Facet, steel, 216 x 54 x 6 (variable), 2010. Image courtesy of the artist. 

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How well do you know Merleau-Ponty? [quiz]

This July, the OUP Philosophy team honors Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-61) as their Philosopher of the Month. Merleau-Ponty was a leading French phenomenologist and together with Sartre founded the existential school of philosophy. He was best known for his major work, Phénoménologie de la Perception (1945, Phenomenology of Perception) which established that the body was the centre of perceptions and medium of consciousness.

The philosopher also had a longstanding interest in aesthetics. His writing on the philosophy of painting in the three essays: ‘Cézanne’s Doubt’, ‘Indirect Language and the Voices of Silence’ and ‘Eye and Mind’ explore how art and perception intertwine, in particular how paintings reveal the act of viewing the world in a way that is more truly representative.

You may have read his work, but how much do you really know about Merleau-Ponty? Test your knowledge with our quiz below.

 

Featured image credit: Mont Sainte-Victoire, ca.1887 by Paul Cézanne, Courtauld Institute of Art. Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.

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Innovation: in and out of the Budongo

In 2014, PLOS Biology published an article about a cousin of ours, a member of the Sono Community of wild chimpanzees in the Budongo Forest in northwestern Uganda. In a video shared in relation to the study, an alpha male, NK, gathers moss from a tree trunk just within his reach, a prize he will use to lap up water in a nearby pool. He is observed by a female, NB, who will be seen in another video to copy that behavior, diffusing an innovation already in play.

Not so extraordinary, you may say. NK was simply exploiting a hitherto unexploited characteristic of a natural niche, whereas the eusocial insects—wasps, bees, and ants—create whole cities; indeed, leaf-cutter ants practiced agriculture 30 million years before we got around to it. But there is a difference that makes a difference. Leaf-cutter ants did not design their cities; they did not invent agriculture; they did not intend to cultivate the edible fungus on the leaves they harvested. Their young did not learn the techniques of agriculture from their seniors. Unlike us and our cousins, leaf-cutter ants are programmed by their genes to harvest and cultivate. NK’s behavior is another matter. He intended to gather his moss; he did so because he thought it might be a useful tool for sponging up water. NB learned the technique from him.

While innovation cannot be taught, it can be modelled—its goal the bringing to fruition the talents of the talented. Richard Lewontin served as a mentor to the future distinguished philosopher of biology William Wimsatt. Wimsatt first encountered Lewtonin when, an undergraduate at Cornell, he attended a lecture unlike any he had ever experienced:

This guy was pacing back and forth, lecturing animatedly without any notes, talking and gesticulating, writing a lot of genetics on the board, and occasionally showing a slide… Philosopher Tom Goudge had just written a book on [evolution] in which he said that there was a lot going on, but that he was not going to talk about anything before it was settled. But this guy was a scientist, so he didn’t have to wait—he could talk about things he was trying to GET settled.

Lewtonin is not sending a bulletin from the cutting edge; he is the cutting edge, a model of innovative thinking. Wimsatt reflects that “being in Dick’s lab those 18 months was the most exciting intellectual period of my life, and has been intersected with most of my projects since.”

Why do mentors bother? They do so because they have a deep intellectual and emotional commitment to a practice whose continuance they want to ensure.

E. O. Wilson, a scientist for all seasons, exhibits another important mentor characteristic: intellectual work should be, equally, a voyage of discovery and of self-discovery. While completing his doctorate in Australia, one of his students, Aniruddh Patel, had an “epiphany.” With trepidation, he writes to Wilson that “the only thing I really wanted to study was the biology of how humans make and process music.” Wilson’s response is wholly in character: “You must follow your passion. Come back to Harvard and we’ll give it a shot.” Patel’s later career shows that Wilson was right to encourage him to follow his dream. In dreams, William Butler Yeats says, begin responsibilities.

While all successful mentoring seasons with praise criticism, mentorship differs with the task at hand. Javier Perianes takes a master class from the pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim; its focus is Beethoven’s penultimate piano sonata. Perianes plays the first movement skillfully. He not only reproduces every note, every indication of tempo, every fingering, every signal of loudness and softness in the score, he has thought his interpretation through; he is clearly playing, not just notes, but music. “Bravo,” says Barenboim after the performance. “But,” and he pauses, “there is always a but.”

Why do mentors bother? They do so because they have a deep intellectual and emotional commitment to a practice whose continuance they want to ensure. Their legacy is not just their personal contribution, their re-imagining of biology or Beethoven; it is also the next generation of biologists, philosophers of biology, and concert pianists. By means of such inspired mentoring, the inclusive fitness of a particular tribe increases, and the richness of a particular tradition of practice becomes more widely proliferated, more firmly secured against the winds of change.

Featured image credit: Uganda-947 by Helena Van Eykeren. CC-BY-2.0 via Flickr.

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Ten facts about dentistry

You use it every day; it’s a facial feature that everybody sees; and one that enables almost all animals to survive. We’re talking, of course, about the mouth. Our mouths truly are amazing, and enable us to eat, breathe, and form words. Unfortunately, our mouths can cause us problems too, leaving many people with intense fears of “the dentist.” Nevertheless, dentistry is a truly fascinating subject, and covers an enormous range of topics. This list of ten facts will open your eyes to some of the lesser-known facts about dentistry, including where the myth of the tooth fairy comes from, how braces work, and what Aristotle had to say about the art of dentistry.

1. Trendy teeth

Most civilisations in the world have practiced intentional dental modification at some point. These modifications range from the ablation of teeth, as practiced by hunter-gatherers in Africa at least 15,000 years ago, to jewels being implanted into teeth among the ancient Mayan communities, and inhabitants of western Micronesia slicing grooves into their teeth.

Image credit: Jade-Toothed Skull by David Dennis. CC-BY-SA 2.0 via Flickr.

2. Aristotle gets it wrong

Yes, you heard that right. The great Greek philosopher and scientist didn’t know absolutely everything. In this case, he wrongly believed that men and women have a different number of teeth. We actually have 32 each, with 1-16 located in the top row, and 17-32 in the bottom.

3. Aristotle gets it right

Admittedly, this is a much more common phrase, and Aristotle did in fact get a lot right about teeth. He astutely noted in around 350 BC that, “Teeth have one invariable office, namely the reduction of food.” The food that mammals eat and have eaten has a direct relation to how their teeth develop. Given that some mammals can take up to 10,000 bites a day, it’s important to have the right tools. An example of teeth being suited to the job are those of cats and dogs: cats have bigger, stronger canines for deep, prolonged killing bites while holding struggling prey, whereas dogs have relatively larger incisors used to inflict shallow, slashing wounds and to gather other foods.

4. It’s a knock-out

Dental surgery was one of the first uses for general anaesthesia in the 1840s, and it was in fact a dentist who provided the first public demonstration of anaesthesia being used in surgery. William Morton successfully demonstrated the use of ether for the removal of a tumour from a young man’s neck in Boston, Massachusetts. It was used widely across the world until the 1970s and 80s, when concern was raised over the number of healthy patients dying as a result of dental anaesthesia. As a result, general anaesthesia use for dental surgery was discouraged, and on 31 December 2001, the administration of general anaesthesia in dental surgeries in the UK was prohibited.

5. Charms and tooth-bones

In England, between the 15th and the 20th century, it was very important that a child’s tooth was disposed of as quickly as possible after it fell out. The traditional explanation was that if the tooth was simply discarded with other rubbish, a dog or pig might gnaw it, causing the child’s new tooth to be misshapen, like the animal’s.

A tried and tested method for disposing of teeth, which was used until the mid-20th century, involved the tooth being rubbed in salt and thrown onto a fire. It was quite popular to recite a charm while doing this:

“Fire, fire, burn a bone,

God send me another tooth again;

A straight one,

A white one,

And in the same place.”

This is slightly misleading, however, as teeth are not in fact bones. They are comprised of dentine, which is a calcified tissue, and enamel, which is formed of minerals and is harder than bone.

6. One Direction

You, or a fellow teenager during your school years, may well have had braces in order to straighten their teeth. For this, they would visit an orthodontist—“ortho” coming from the Greek word for “straight.”  Braces, or fixed appliances as they are professionally known, are attached to the teeth and give precise 3-D control of tooth movement. There are risks associated with fixed appliances however, including damage to the teeth and their supporting tissues.

7. Spit it out

Humans produce an average of 1.5 litres of saliva every day from 3 pairs of major glands. Why so very much though—what does it actually do? Firstly, it lubricates the mouth to ease the actions of chewing and swallowing. It also, helpfully, enables food to be dissolved, which is how we experience flavour. Saliva also helps to protect tissues in the mouth. It helps maintain the pH of the mouth, reduces the clotting time of wounds, accelerates wound contraction, reduces the growth and spread of bacteria, and has anti-fungal and anti-viral properties.

8. The Tooth Fairy

English and North American folklore dictates that when children lose their milk teeth, they are to put the tooth under the pillow for the tooth fairy to take and that she will reimburse them for it, usually with a coin. The origins of the tooth fairy are uncertain, although there have been several testimonies that the tradition was known in the 1800s. It may seem like a fairly random notion, but a 1600s poem, “Oberon’s Palace,” describes a grotto containing various small and useless objects from the human world, “brought hither by the elves,” including “childrens teeth late shed.” This is thought to be the earliest source linking fairies and teeth.

Image credit: Oberon, Titania, and Puck with Fairies Dancing by William Blake. Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons.

9. Missing something?

Permanent teeth that have been pulled out completely can be re-implanted straight away, although there are a few conditions to this. Firstly, it must be implanted within an hour of it coming out. If that isn’t possible, the tooth should be transported in either milk or the patient’s own saliva until it can be implanted. Secondly, you should never handle the tooth by its root. Thirdly, it must not be scrubbed, washed, or brushed.

10. Baby Teeth

While there is an expected time-frame for when babies begin the teething process, the timings can vary fairly widely, and for a number of reasons. English folklore had some rather less scientific reasons for the order in which babies cut their teeth, however. An 1849 comment reads, “If a child tooths first in the upper jaw, it is considered ominous of its dying in its infancy,” whilst a 1659 text reads that, “Soon todd [toothed], soon with God,” i.e. the baby would soon be dead and, expressed in a later proverb, “Soon teeth, soon toes,” which indicated that the mother would quickly be pregnant again. Further, it was believed by some that if a child was born with teeth that it would grow up to be vicious—Shakespeare states that this was the fate of Richard III in Henry VI.

Featured image credit: “ Woman dentist with gloves showing on a jaw model how to clean the teeth with tooth brush properly and right”  by Vadim Martynenko. Used under license from Shutterstock.com.

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How ‘the future’ connects across subjects

‘Today’s world is complex and unreliable. Tomorrow is expected to be more so.’ – Jennifer M. Gidley, The Future: A Very Short Introduction

From the beginning of time, humanity has been driven by a paradox: fearing the unknown but with a constant curiosity to know. Over time, science and technology have developed, meaning that we are now more able to predict and quantify the future than ever before. We live in a world of quantum possibilities and there is still no certainty in what might happen tomorrow, next year, or hundreds of years from now.

The below video explores the concept of the future and finds the connections that appear across a range of futures-related topics:

This got us thinking more about the future, so we’ve collected together some facts about this concept and its related topics:

To even be able to think hypothetically of a possible future is a remarkable and distinctive feature of human intelligence. Animals generally learn to adapt behaviour using their past successes, whereas humans can imagine a future, or number of futures.
The word ‘future’ in English was first used in the 14th century, with its origin (via Old French) in the Latin ‘futurus’, meaning ‘going to be’ or ‘yet to be’.
The genre of utopian literature, which is evidence of early future concepts, began in ancient Greece. Plato’s Republic is widely regarded as one of the first attempts to create a utopian, or eu-topian (meaning a good place), model of civilization.


Image credit: ‘Sundial, Perranporth’ by Tim Green. CC BY 2.0 via Flickr.


One way in which humans have tried to control the future is through measuring time. It is thought that the first farmers (around 10,000 BC) used primitive sundials, whereas most of the historical calendars (that we know about today) were invented 2,000–3,000 years ago.
Using models to predict the future(s) of climate change are crucial in order to try mitigating negative effects. Recent climate models suggest that global surface temperature will rise by 0.3°C to 0.7°C between now and 2035.
We use stories and literature to imagine different futures. In contemporary fiction, most images of the future are tied up with what impact technology will have, and the hope or despair that arises from that are usually seen through the figure of the child.
We may think of time as a simple linear dimension – the past, present, and future – but that may not be the case. Einstein created a four-dimensional picture of space-time, whereas Hawking and Hartle imagined the universe as a four-dimensional surface of a five-dimensional sphere.

Featured image credit: ‘High in the SuperTrees’ by Annie Spratt. Public Domain via Unsplash .

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Animal of the Month: 4 figures behind orca captivation beyond Blackfish

“You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince (1943)

The 2013 release of the documentary Blackfish revolutionized the way the world has since focused on orcas. Yet orca captivity in the United States and Canada predates the documentary by almost five decades. So who was behind the plight of these orcas?

Using Jason M. Colby’s Orca: How We Came to Know and Love the World’s Greatest Predator,  we compiled a list of figures behind the half century of orca captivity beyond Blackfish.

1. Ted Griffin

“Ted Griffin has been called many things—dreamer, entrepreneur, carnival barker, orca killer—but he grew up as a little boy who loved animals.”

Edward (Ted) Griffin was born in 1935 in Tacoma, Washington, growing up along the banks of the Puget Sound. Twenty-seven years later, Griffin opened the Seattle Marine Aquarium, hallmarking his lifelong devotion to killer whales. In 1965, Griffin first purchased Namu, the third captured orca ever, transporting Namu for display in the Seattle Marine Aquarium. However, Griffin established a relationship with Namu, and proceeded to become the first person to swim and perform alongside a killer whale. Through Griffin’s performative exploit with Namu, the capture, performance, and commercialization of killer whales became popularized, setting the precedent for the subsequent decades of orca capture and trade. Yet Griffin refused to renounce his past. Griffin had simultaneously caused the most damage to the orca population also prevented its extinction.

Image credit: Loro Park Orca Fish by Schmid-Reportagen. CC0 via Pixabay.

2. Murray Newman

“‘I loved that whale,’ Newman told reporters. ‘Capturing it was the best thing I ever did.’”

Born in 1924 in Chicago, Murray Newman became the curator of the Vancouver Aquarium in1955. Newman, fascinated with the prospect of displaying a killer whale within the aquarium walls, devised a mission for the harpoon capture of Moby Doll, the second orca ever captured and displayed in 1964. Griffin continued his performative streak with Moby Doll, realizing that he was able to feed the orca from his hands, much to Newman’s chagrin. Yet, despite Moby Doll’s fame as a performance killer whale, he sustained serious injuries from the harpooning, and died within the year of his capture. To cope with the embarrassment of the death of Moby Doll, Newman negotiated for the obtainment of a new killer whale for display: Skana.

3. Paul Spong

“‘Dr. Spong was a true hippie,’ [McLeod] recalled, ‘and he had some strange reflections about him.’”

Paul Spong, neuroscientist and cetologist, was born in 1939 in New Zealand—a country no stranger to the whaling industry, engaging in whaling until the 1960’s. Spong moved to the states to attend UCLA, and became fascinated with the study of orcas, as well as the anti-Vietnam movement. Yet, despite his profession, Spong still remained fearful of orcas until an encounter with Skana, another one of the first captured killer whales. Spong’s analysis on the brain of Moby Doll led to the realization of the capacity and capabilities of the brain of an orca. This discovery spawned empathy within Spong, influencing his call to action to release orcas from captivity. Spong delivered this revelation at a research conference at the University of British Columbia, emanating “an astonishing act of professional courage” (Colby 126). Spong’s contract with the Vancouver Aquarium was released the following day.

4. Mike Bigg

“‘Have you heard of the Candian Mike Bigg?’ ‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘I’m writing a whole chapter on him.’ ‘Good, because in my opinion he is the most important figure in the study of killer whales.’”

Mike Bigg is recognized as the founding father of killer whale science. Born in England in 1939, Bigg moved to Vancouver at the age of nine with his family, and thereafter pursued his Master’s in zoology at the University of British Columbia. While many consider Bigg’s work the antithesis to capture of killer whales, captivity enabled researchers, such as Bigg, access to live orcas for the first time. Yet Bigg’s subsequent research began to endorse the end of killer whale capture in the Pacific Northwest, drawing that the local killer whale population was approximately 300, and their capture directly affected the population dynamics of the area (Colby 238). Bigg, a marine mammologist for the Canadian Department of Fisheries, orchestrated the world’s first “killer whale census” for orcas on the Pacific coast in 1971. His system of distinguishing individual orcas, enabling his identification of orca matrilineal ties, as well as deciphering which orcas were fish-eating “residents”, and which were mammal-eating “transients”—now called Bigg’s killer whales (Colby 226). While Bigg passed away in 1990, he leaves a lasting legacy in research on the Orcinus orca.

Featured Image Credit: “Killer Whale Orca Whale Whale Show Jump Killer” by xanio. CC0 via Pixabay. 

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70 years of Middle Eastern politics, leaders, and conflict [infographic]

Since the end of the Second World War and the founding of Israel in 1948, the Middle East has been a bastion for the world’s economic, political, and religious tensions. From its economic hold on energy consumption to its complicated, generations-long military conflicts and its unfortunate role as a hotbed of terrorism, the volatile politics of the Middle East have had and will continue to have global implications into the future. Below, we’ve assembled a chronology of the most essential prime ministers, presidents, generals, and religious leaders that have driven Middle Eastern politics since 1948, some of whom will continue to influence international relations as time goes on.

Download the infographic as a PDF or JPEG.

Featured image credit: “Oil well fires rage outside Kuwait City in the aftermath of Operation Desert Storm. The wells were set on fire by Iraqi forces before they were ousted from the region by coalition force” by Tech. Sgt. David McLeod. Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons .

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One-sided etymology

There is a feeling that idioms resist interference. A red herring cannot change its color any more than the leopard can change its spots. And yet variation here is common. For instance, talk a blue streak coexists with swear (curse) a blue streak. One even finds to swear like blue blazes (only the color remains intact). A drop in the bucket means the same as a drop in the ocean. We can cut something to bits or to pieces, and so forth. Specialists have described this type of variation in minute detail.  A less trivial case is the use of what I would like to call a substitution table. For instance, what can be on one side? We’ll soon find out. A man from Peddleton (Lancashire) wrote in 1875: “All on one side like Rooden Lane is a common expression hereabouts. It arises from the fact of the village—Rooden Lane—being all on one side on the road, the other side being the high wall of Heaton Park, the residence of the Earl of Wilton.” Good information to store up, and nothing to wonder at: the park was private property, and a wall around it could be expected.

Rooden Lane today. The houses are certainly no longer on one side. Image credit: Yellows yellows by Ivy Barn. Public Domain via Unsplash.

This famous tower is certainly all on one side. Image credit: Leaning Tower of Piza Italy by TheDigitalArtist. CC0 via Pixabay.

Yet there is a little hitch here. In Essex, that is, all the way south from Lancashire, roughly to the latitude where London is situated, they say all on one side like Takeley Street. Wikipedia has an entry devoted to the village of Takeley but offers no comments on the simile. And yet, as early as 1889, one could read the following about the phrase in Notes and Queries: “This would be said of love, justice, right, &c, or of a slanting tower or spire. The village of Takeley, between Dunmow and Bishop’s Stortford, has all the cottages on one side of the road, and the squire’s park on the other.” The similarity of the two situations is striking. The speakers who had no contact with one another would hardly have come up with the same rather exotic image (think of love, justice, and right, all of which are like Takeley Street!). Apparently, the basis all on one side like was available, and, inspired by the local scene, one had only to supply the end.

I have noted more than once that etymologists (both professionals and amateurs) tend to reinvent the same wheel with monotonous regularity. Correspondents to Notes and Queries had the admirable habit of consulting the indexes to their favorite periodical before asking questions. However, some people were lazy (some still are). Sixteen years after the previous publication (that is, in December 1896), a resident of Essex, who chose the coy pseudonym Mus Rusticus (“Country Mouse”), asked about the origin of the Takeley Street phrase. Two weeks later, he received the following answer: “Takeley is a small village on the road from Bishop’s Shortford to Dunmow. I passed through it several times years ago, and my recollection is strong that all, or nearly all, the houses were built on one (the north) side of the high road.” Having given this explanation, Mr. W. T. Lynn looked through the indexes and discovered the early letter, to which he referred.

An etymologist at work. Image credit: Repair, bicycle, bike, and tie by Igor Peftiev. Public Domain via Unsplash.
Rus Musticus. Image credit: Wood Mouse Nager Cute by Alexas_Fotos. CC0 via Pixabay.

The regular subscribers to Notes and Queries, some of them versed in word history, antiquities, old literature, and folklore (James A. H. Murray, Walter W. Skeat, A. L. Mayhew, and Frank Chance, among them, to mention just a few illustrious names; on Frank Chance see my post for April 12, 2006: “The Unsung Heroes of Etymology”), might have come up with the idea of idioms as substitution tables if they had systematized the enormous material in the popular press. As early as 1861, someone wondered: “What is the origin of the saying all on one side, like Bridgenorth election?”  This was (perhaps still is: I have no way of knowing) a common idiom in Shropshire (West Midlands, a county bordering Wales). The answers were many and informative. First, a short reply appeared to the effect that there had once been an election in Bridgenorth, when all the votes were on one side. By way of afterthought, the correspondent mentioned the Devonshire saying all on one side, like the lock of a gun (Devon is in the extreme southeast).  He added that, since the lock is indeed on one side, the phrase needs no explanation. The plot thickens. In 1876, a letter appeared about the same phrase being used in Gloucestershire (we are now again in the southwest) and said “when anything is awry,” so also about love and justice?

According to the writer, “influence in the borough was supposed to be a possession of the owner of the nighbouring Apley estate, which includes nearly all the town.” Yet the MP was not always the nominee of Apley, a Tory, and the opposition did have a chance. “When the saying came into vogue, there were two members.” Ultimately, the Whigs lost all influence there, so that the proverbial one-sidedness triumphed. Amusingly, in 1929, someone again wondered where the phrase about Bridgenorth election came from. This time, no one seemed to remember the exchanges of old, but the answer is worth reproducing: “This saying is largely quoted from traditional history, and though Bridgnorth (sic) is connected with it, it might very easily apply elsewhere [hear! hear!]. It refers to the days of ‘tied’ Boroughs, when at a certain election a Whig dared to oppose the two Tory members, with the result, it is said, that only one vote was recorded for the opposition candidate, and that one was his own. Hence the election was all on one side. This occurred before the Ballot Act [1872], in the days of open voting [not by secret ballot], and could not very well occur today.”

The moral of the story is that such sayings might and probably did originate from local conditions, sometimes gained popularity, became known beyond their home counties, and were everywhere more or less convincingly tied to the local scene, with the substitution table being always close at hand. One last trip. We have already been to Devon. In 1876, they said there: “All on one side like Kingswear boys.” Kingswear, a village in Devonshire, certainly exists, but what was so peculiar about its boys that accounted for their touching unanimity? Or was it an ironic, disparaging remark? I have no idea. Perhaps some of our British readers may help.

Featured image credit: Jaguar Sisters by Friday Bredesen. Public Domain via Unsplash.

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“Fitting in” in the global workplace

With ever-increasing global mobility, today’s workers often find themselves struggling to get along in workplace cultures different from their native norms. Many disciplines, from managerial sciences to linguistics to education, have a vested interest in understanding and addressing these challenges. By and large, research focuses on how international workers adapt to new environments and how local workers accommodate foreign colleagues. Both of these goals are concerned with adjustment, where colleagues change their behaviors in order to avoid miscommunication and attempts to bridge barriers. But what does it really mean to “fit in?” Contrary to arguments in favor of conformity to local conventions, I found evidence in a recent case study that says embracing cultural differences can support successful social and work-related activities. This opens the possibility that, in our ever diversifying world, perhaps the best way to get along with other cultures is not to adjust to local norms but instead to use cultural differences to enrich interpersonal interaction.

Focusing on talk as the primary tool colleagues use to interrelate, I problematized the notion of “fitting in” using a case study of American student interns in Japan. One of the first challenges learners of Japanese encounter in professional settings is the language’s multi-layered system of honorifics, including so-called “polite forms.” Polite forms are verbal markers that don’t change the content of a sentence, but do influence how that content is presented with respect to the relationship between speaker and hearer. Learners of Japanese are frequently taught that careful attention to polite forms is necessary for building relationships, avoiding offense, and in general, to fit in by behaving as expected in Japanese society.

However, research in the field of sociolinguistics tells us that polite forms are not always polite. Instead, they are used when acting in a defined social role in order to present an on-stage, official identity. For example, Japanese mothers will switch to using polite forms with their children when they are doing “being a mother” (e.g., when disciplining, serving food, or giving instructions). Moreover, when the context foregrounds casual or interpersonal relationships over work-related hierarchies, using polite forms is unexpected even when talking to a superior. For example, one intern in my study was rebuked by his boss for using polite forms too frequently when they were chatting at a social gathering after work. This more nuanced use of language is often not appreciated or understood by learners of Japanese. As a result, attempts to fit in by “being polite” can lead to situations in which learners actually stand out for their unnatural use of Japanese honorific forms.

In fact, this is exactly what happened to an intern in my study. Typically, Japanese workers will begin and end interactions with polite forms to index their institutional roles but discuss technical, work-related topics in standard, plain forms. However, one intern did just the opposite, beginning and ending with plain forms and discussing work-related topics with polite ones. His reasoning made sense given what he had been taught: he was trying to open conversations by being friendly but then conforming to his relatively low position as a student intern when the topic shifted to work. By trying to conform to ideologies of politeness, he ended up behaving in a way that marked him for his unusual use of polite forms.

Contrast that intern with another one who worked in the same department the prior year but took a distinctly different approach. This intern made no attempts to conform: he dressed flamboyantly, spoke loudly, and would try to tease his colleagues by speaking English. Moreover, he recognized that being an outsider gave him a useable resource. For instance, he would explicitly state that he is a foreigner as a prelude to requesting help on projects or to gain forgiveness for a misunderstanding. In short, rather than trying to conform to appropriate behavior for Japanese workplaces, he intentionally invoked the fact that he is not Japanese as an excuse to behave in non-Japanese ways—even when such behaviors might be considered rude or inappropriate under a stereotypical Japanese social model. Yet his concern with projecting his own identity and personality actually led him to interact with others much more naturally. He never seemed to cause offense, his use of polite forms was much more consistent with Japanese norms, and his colleagues genuinely seemed to enjoy working with him. Remarkably, his boss even told me in an interview that the intern would not be a good case study for a foreigner in Japan because, “we all think of him as one of us.” That same boss never said similar things about the first intern, instead commenting that, “well, he tries hard.”

By trying to conform to ideologies of politeness, he ended up behaving in a way that marked him for his unusual use of polite forms.

In answer to the question, “which intern did a better job of fitting in?” evidence from interviews and participant observations overwhelmingly favors the second intern. Despite the former intern’s much more conscious attempts to conform, he visibly struggled to find his place socially with his colleagues, yet the latter intern enjoyed good rapport and strong relationships. But then, because they are American they are not expected to be Japanese. Thus, attempts to act Japanese came off as unnatural, while being true to one’s own personality and cultural heritage lead to much more ordinary interactions on both linguistic and social planes.

This study tells us something important about adjusting to intercultural settings and holds a powerful idea for those of us involved in preparing students to succeed in a global, intercultural world. While so much focus is put on accommodation, adaptation, and conformity, perhaps those efforts miss the mark a bit. If we value diversity, then we should use it for what it is: differences. In fact, bridging cultural barriers through accommodation and conformity effectively de-emphasizes differences. And while differences certainly do contribute to some cultural miscommunication and offense, it is precisely those differences that also enrich interactions and provide new perspectives. Rather than accommodation, it is exposure to others through interaction that matters and ultimately predicts success. At the end of the day, sometimes it’s best to just be yourself—and to let others be themselves too.

Featured image credit: Illuminated Offices in Moscow by Mike Kononov. public domain via Unsplash.

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Celebrating the Fields Medal [infographic]

This year, 2018, sees the world’s mathematics community come together once more at the International Congress of Mathematicians, hosted for the first time in South America in Rio de Janeiro.

A highlight at every ICM is the announcement of the recipients of the Fields Medal, an award that honours up to four mathematicians under the age of 40, and is viewed as one of the highest honours a mathematician can receive.

Here we honour past Fields Medal winners who we are proud to name as our authors. Hover over each name to learn a little more about who they are and what their contributions have been.

 

 

Featured image: Math concept. Shutterstock . 

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