Sweet, I love io9.

Is every show about middle class anxiety? I like my Adorno or Marcuse as much as anyone, but I think the time is past when economics had much to say about pop culture. I'd like to hear what she has to say about whiteness, too bad they didn't pursue that . . .

Quoting Winspur: I would rather listen to these two for three hours than Ann Althouse for one minute.

Well put. This diavlog was waaaaay too short. Let's have a return visit soon (and not necessarily shoehorned into SciSat). Thanks for this half hour, though.

Copy that! I only got to listen to a little bit through headphones with screaming children and feuding family (gotta love the Holidays) in the background. But I can't wait to watch the rest (in peace.) And IO9 may be the coolest website I've seen in a long time. I'm not particularly a Sci-Fi junkie, but IO9 kinda makes me want to be.

I agree this diavlog was far too tentative. Every topic is its own future diavlog, and nearly every minute contains information I found new and interesting. And, both speakers could come back with any other person they talked about for a follow-up interview. This is why fixed pairing and arbitrary limits are bad- why did Hitchens and Wright get a chance to hog bandwidth and not these two?

So when Hughes brought up the theoretical quandaries involved in cultural studies, the question of what is actually being studied, Analee quickly moved away. It would be particularly interesting to hear something about the new literature involving lesbian cyborgs, especially about the ambivalence the cyborgs feel about industrially produced sex toys. The technology of artificial pubic hair and the anxiety it can produce in the lesbian cyborg communities of our jointly imagined future is also fascinating. Are bjk and bjkeefe alternative sobriquets for the same lesbian cyborg? By the way, I can't recommend too highly the forthcoming novel about a lesbian cyborg community that has a Frankfurt School Institute located in what is today known as Brazil. This is by the little-known author TK Prendergast, the transsexual author who splits her time between Missoula, Montana and Barcelona. I wish I could attend the conference that is referred to at the end of this diavlog.

Quoting ledocs: The technology of artificial pubic hair and the anxiety it can produce in the lesbian cyborg communities of our jointly imagined future is also fascinating..

I agree that this is a truly fascinating subject, but it would surprise me very much if some American university press (Nebraska?) hadn't already published a ground-breaking study on black holes.

Quoting ledocs: Are bjk and bjkeefe alternative sobriquets for the same lesbian cyborg?.

A most intriguing hypothesis.

Quoting ledocs: By the way, I can't recommend too highly the forthcoming novel about a lesbian cyborg community that has a Frankfurt School Institute located in what is today known as Brazil. This is by the little-known author TK Prendergast, the transsexual author who splits her time between Missoula, Montana and Barcelona..

Qui l'eût cru?

Quoting ledocs: I wish I could attend the conference that is referred to at the end of this diavlog.

Well, you can always attend the MLA as a last resort (Modern Language Association for those fortunate enough to be uninitiated).

I see that I misspelled "Annalee." I don't think I've heard this name since it was used in the biggest hit by the Band, "The Weight," about 40 years ago. "What about young Annalee?" A very good question. Is this diavlog the answer? Probably not. This Annalee is too young to be the same one mentioned in the song. On the other hand, both Annalees might be primarily mythical characters. Also, in the song "Lee" may be a surname, or a middle name, or neither. I choose to believe that it was meant to be part of a compound first name, as with our diavlogger. For those among us who are too young to have grown up with this song, check it out on the Internet, if necessary.

I probably owe Annalee Newitz and the readership of the forum an apology for having just written some things here that were supposed to be funny but may have been in very bad taste. I discovered, after writing these posts, that Annalee Newitz in 1994 was an avowed bisexual for whom bisexuality was an explicit political/intellectual issue.

At that time, she was concerned that bisexuals not be subsumed into the categories of gay or lesbian. So the first thing that needs to be said is that when I wrote the prior posts I was unaware of this history. Having now become aware, I am somewhat embarrassed by what I wrote.

In fact, though, I must have "picked up on a vibe" and run with my reaction in a way that was probably inappropriate and does not do justice to the complexity of the issues involved. It was not my intention to "out" Annalee Newitz in any way, and I do support the extension of civil rights to all sexual minorities. This is the final frontier of liberalism, as far as I am concerned. I have had some problems with lesbians in my personal life (not the rejection of a

read more . . .

Quoting ledocs: [...] In conclusion, if you took offense at my posts, I can understand that.

Since you mentioned my name in your earlier post, I'll state for the record that I took no offense at that part. I can't speak for Annalee, obvs., but nothing else about it bothered me, either. I figured it was just you riffing/streaming your consciousness.

Quoting ledocs: This probably is not the time or place to explore some very complex issues.

Au contraire ... although I suppose you are correct that certain of this forum's regulars might not be able to handle it.

Quoting ledocs: Finally, my intended humor had to do more with the division of labor/knowledge in the American academy than with anything else, at least at the conscious level. I am not really comfortable with the balkanization of knowledge which has resulted from according every minority its own academic department or field of study. At the same time, I don't know if there was or is a real alternative to this balkanization..

If it is any comfort to you, that is how I read your post. The balkinization of academia, in the humanities and social sciences at least, around gender/racial/sexual politics is one of the most striking things about the American system of higher education.

Great vlog. It would be great to have them back on to tackle some of these subjects more thoroughly. I thought it was interesting that zombies are associated with working class and vampires with ruling class. The very last section talking about new fiction sounds cool. I'd like to look into the evangelical AI book.