They will say we are not here

“We are here,” said David Kato, Ugandan LGBT activist, before he was killed. The New York Times has posted a short, “opinionated” documentary on Kato, aptly entitled “They will say we are not here.” I urge you to watch the five-minute documentary. Given his death, it was hard to hear him say “So if I run away, who will defend the others?”

I am working on a research project with Ashley Currier and Tara McKay on political homophobia in Africa, so the statement Kato makes in the film, “Politicians now, they are fueling homophobia in people,” was particularly poignant. For more background on political homophobia, I recommend Ashley’s recently published piece in Gender and Society.

no woman, more cry

Last week, in Malawi’s major cities, some women had been stripped of their clothing, allegedly by small-scale vendors (men). The reason? The women were wearing pants, mini-skirts, or leggings. I initially found the news shocking as I have often worn pants in Malawi, as have a number of my female Malawian research assistants, without so much as a peep from any man.

Women responded by holding a sit-in/rally in Blantyre on Friday. Vice President Joyce Banda was there as was potential UDF presidential candidate Atupele Muluzi, both dressed in white to express solidarity with the movement. Below are a few pictures from the Blantyre rally. The T-shirts in the photograph translate to: “Vendor: Today I buy from you, tomorrow you undress me?”

Demonstrating for Women's Rights in Blantyre, photo by Basileke Gift Mwalima

Vice President Joyce Banda, photo by Basileke Gift Mwamlima

Rally in Blantyre, photo by Basileke Gift Mwamlima

As to the source of these attacks on women, women cite the poor economic situation in Malawi and how it has particularly affected street vendors, the ruling party points the finger at a regime-change plot, and some men in the country blame the mini-skirts themselves. See especially the comments in the linked article. In this article about how a vendor representative was chased away from the Blantyre rally, I noticed one commenter posted the phrase “akazi ndi zidole,” which translates to “women are toys.”

I certainly didn’t think there was gender equality in Malawi before the undressing assaults on women, but as others have commented on the situation, it is eerie how the former dictator Kamuzu’s dress code for women seems to be lurking at least in the minds of some.

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This post was written with the assistance of Basileke Gift Mwamlima. I thank Gift for sharing her photos and insights with me. She is an excellent research assistant, by the way, in case anyone is looking.

to my enemies

I owe thanks also to my enemies, for the stimulating discouragement which has kept up my spirits to persist in the task. Long life and health to them to go on with the good work!

That is from the preface of Jomo Kenyatta’s Facing Mount Kenya, an anthropological account of the Gikuyu printed in the United States in 1962. Interesting trivia: Kenyatta was a student of Bronislav Malinowski, an anthropologist at the London School of Economics who is “often referred to as the first researcher to bring anthropology ‘off the verandah’.”

spring semester study tips: how to take notes

Last semester I had a student stare at me the entire lecture, every lecture. I’ll admit it felt odd, not just because it was mildly creepy, but because he wasn’t taking any notes. I wondered why someone would come to class but never take any notes. It’s not because my slides are uploaded to the internet (I would never choose to do so) and it’s not because anyone is recording the lecture (at least, they’re prohibited from doing so). Still, maybe this student heard someone say that he would do better if he just listened rather than trying to copy my every word.

There is plenty of research that shows what we might all expect: verbatim notetaking is an ineffective learning strategy. But let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Evidence also shows that the probability a student will recall textual information if that student wrote the information down in notes is 34% compared to a 5% chance when students fail to record the information.

I see notes as requiring two functions: notation and review. I think the best way to take notes is to listen and when the speaker pauses to try and condense what they’ve said in your own words, using as many abbreviations as possible. Then, review your notes afterwards and identify what you have learned and what you are uncertain about. Try to probe the reading or the instructor about those things you aren’t clear on. Then, remind yourself what you’ve learned. Do all of this by actively writing each step of the way.

Perhaps because of this perspective, in my own class I’ll be telling students about the Cornell note-taking system. For those who are unfamiliar, the Cornell method was designed by a Professor of Education at Cornell University, Walter Pauk, who wrote How to Study in College. Essentially, as seen in the diagram to the right, students write notes on only a fraction of the page during lecture, and leave a lot of white space between notes. Then, after lecture, the students will write in the left-hand column main ideas or questions that connect the notes together. Finally, (and again, this is after the lecture) at the bottom of each page, the student will write in his/her own words a summary of the notes.

I’ve tried finding evidence on whether using the Cornell note-taking system actually impacts students’ grades or other learning outcomes. I’ve come across a few anecodtes (i.e., a physics teacher whose students’ that made most use of it scoring twice as high on a national physics test as those who didn’t; and a comparison of science teachers who used it vs. those that didn’t, with the formers’ students having higher average grades). I also found a study that compared students who used their own notetaking method, to Cornell method users, to students who didn’t take any notes. These were students taking English as a foreign language. The evidence in the study indicates the Cornell method is the best, but we should be wary to extrapolate to all course subjects. Still, I’ve seen no complaints or shortcomings written about Cornell note-taking and think providing some structure to students could be helpful. Ask me again at the end of the semester if I think it worked.

In case you’re sold on the idea, here is a link to print your own Cornell notes PDF.

Here are a few resources I consulted that may be of use if you care to look further into note-taking:

• Effective Listening and Note-Taking by Johnie Scott, CSUN Pan-African Studies Department.
• James Madison University’s step-by-step guide on how to use the Cornell method.
• Here is the handout I give students about the Cornell method that uses language similar to SQ3R.

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This post is part of a series on studying in college.

Kim Chu Cha (1929-2012)

my grandmother holding my then-baby girl (taken January 9, 2008 in Merced, CA by Josh Wood)

Last Thursday my grandmother died and what I’m most sad about is that the world knows so little about her. Maybe her story isn’t all that unique, and maybe I’m biased in thinking she and other immigrant women like her deserve more recognition. Here is what I know of her life, peppered with bits about why she mattered so much to me.

My mother estimated her birthdate at March 6, 1929 (she calculated a conversion from a Chinese lunar calendar). So when she died, she was just two months shy of her 83rd birthday. She had been living in hospice for over a year now in Merced, CA and before that was being cared for by my uncle’s family, who lived in Winton. Her life in America had come full circle — as California’s Central Valley was the first place in America she had called home.

Kim Chu Cha was her married name. She and her husband had eight children, all but two of whom immigrated to the United States (the other two died in their early twenties). My mother, her third child, was born during the Korean War. My grandmother was pregnant with two small children trying to navigate through a war that killed an estimated 2.5 million Korean civilians.

The family of 10 was poor, even by Korean standards, living in a one-room house on a rice farm shared with her husband’s family in Nonsan. Her husband died when their youngest child was not even 2 years old, though a few of her children were then old enough to take care of themselves and help her as well.

Fast forward four years later and her daughter (my mother) meets my father, an American in Korea with the United States Air Force. They have a child (my brother) and get married. At the same time, my mother’s sister was pregnant with my cousin. So my grandmother had two daughters married to Americans, and my aunt was even moving to America–land of opportunity–to have her baby. My mother would do the same when she was pregnant with me. (I believe there was something about delivering girls in America, where there was “better luck” for girls.)

I was still a toddler when my grandmother immigrated to America to stay with us in Atwater, CA. She cared for me when both of my parents worked (which was literally around the clock). She grew a huge vegetable garden in our backyard that included some of her favorite foods from Korea. What I loved most were the homemade pickles she would jar and keep in the cool garage. Even though she was only 4 feet 10 inches tall, she would carry her huge, Korean-American 4-year-old granddaughter on her back — all over town, because she couldn’t drive.

Eventually, she wanted her own place and settled into a double-wide not far from the Air Force Base. Like most immigrant women in the area, she would get occasional work in one of the canneries in town or pick fruits and vegetables — depending on the season. When she wasn’t working, I would go to her home after school and she would let me help her in the kitchen to make all of my favorite Korean foods. It was especially nice on hot days, when I remember there were always milk jugs emptied and refilled with poricha, cold and inviting in her refrigerator.

My favorite memory was when the entire family would gather at her home twice a year to commemorate the life and death of her husband. There was always mountains of food and cousins to play with.

She never remarried. She spent most of her life in America taking care of her children’s children, until finally, a few years ago, she couldn’t care for others anymore and sometimes needed care herself. She spent some time living in Hawai’i near my mother. She spent some time living in Las Vegas, near my aunt. But eventually she moved back to the Central Valley, where she lived with my uncle and his family until having to be moved to hospice.

The photo I have posted here was when she was still living with my uncle. She was a little blind then, and had some trouble walking, but that didn’t stop her from getting dressed up to see her granddaughter’s little girl. Though others worried about putting a wriggly baby in her arms, I knew my daughter would be fine. After all, this woman had spent nearly her whole life taking care of her babies and her babies’ babies.

mbalimbali

• Taking it Slow (an undergrad’s first foray into field research in which she learns not everything comes fast-fast)
• How much to referee [academic papers] and how to do it
• Why I’m Thrilled the United States Has Stopped Excluding Haitians from Temporary Work Visas -or- as I refer to the post: Making Research Matter
• The Gay Rights Movement