Author Archives: Durrell Bowman

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About Durrell Bowman

Delivery Driver, Occasional Musician, and Former Academic (Ph.D. in Musicology)

Meet Prof. Doe

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A history professor (Jonathan Rees) recently referenced the 1941 Frank Capra movie Meet John Doe. In it, a fake, world-despairing “everyman” (played by Gary Cooper) ends up having value despite being imagined into existence by a newspaper columnist (played by Barbara Stanwyck) and then being appropriated by a power-hungry aspiring politician.

Rees’ idea is that something similar is going on with the providers of online university courses (MOOCs) apparently thinking about hiring celebrity actors to “teach” their courses. It’s not a great analogy, though. For example, in the contexts of adjunct instructors and other disenfranchised academics, the world-despairing is not actually being faked at all. Tens of thousands of post-secondary courses are now being taught by academics (including thousands of Ph.D.s) who do not have offices, benefits, or pensions. Actually, some people with Ph.D.s are worse off than that:  I know, because I’m one of them.

So, someone should write a screenplay called Meet Prof. Doe. The title character would be perfect for someone like Matt Damon, especially given his early success with 1997’s Good Will Hunting. (Ben Affleck may direct the movie, but he may NOT appear in it!)

Public Music History & Culture

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As I sit here starting to put together Experiencing Rush: A Listener’s Companion (2014) and look back over my dissertation (“Permanent Change: Rush, Musicians’ Rock, and the Progressive Post-Counterculture,” 2003), it’s perfectly obvious that we do lots of great research and writing for our Ph.D. dissertations.

However, despite what every academic career guide says, it’s also perfectly obvious that we should not be adapting our dissertations into academic-press products for a couple of hundred colleagues, a couple of dozen academic libraries, and (if we’re “lucky”) a couple of thousand people who will never get past the excessive jargon, overly-technical analysis, and so on.

We should be adapting our dissertations into intelligent, non-fiction books for hundreds of thousands of people in the general public, such as through thousands of bookstores and public libraries, in e-books and public talks, and so on.

There are only famous non-fiction writers (including a certain curly-haired one of my acquaintance) because 95% of academics do the former instead of the latter 95% of the time.  There are also tens of thousands of exploited adjunct instructors purely because almost no-one has bothered to figure out how to do something way more useful than that.

Fantasia on Themes by Rush

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The Royal Conservatory presents: “Fantasia on Themes by Rush”
with the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony

Saturday, November 9, 2013  8:00 p.m.
Koerner Hall – TELUS Centre for Performance and Learning
273 Bloor Street West, Toronto, ON

Tickets start at $30 – SPECIAL OFFER: 25% OFF TICKETS! (Use discount code: RUSH25KWS)

This spectacular concert features three incredibly skillful and creative composers who defy every rock/classical music cliché. Hear Nicole Lizée’s “2012: Triple Concerto for Power Trio and Orchestra” (Fantasia on Themes by Rush), two new pieces by electronica genius Dan Deacon, and a stunning orchestral showcase by Bryce Dessner of The National.

More Information

Buy Tickets

Development vs. Design – gladwell.com, etc.

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What They’re Using

I suddenly found out that my new website for Malcolm Gladwell (on which I spent around sixty hours) has been replaced visually by something virtually the same as the old site from before I worked on it.  However, the new version still uses the WordPress structure I developed for its content and data.  My contributions include:

  • article categories and dating, to organize a post-archive of New Yorker articles
  • the addition of articles to cover the past two years
  • the organization of the site’s pages for book excerpts, etc.
  • content editing & formatting for all posts and pages
  • updated and corrected purchase-links
  • a browser favicon derived from Gladwell’s new book cover

However, given the nature of website “design” vs. “development,” almost no-one (other than you) is going to know that I had anything to do with it.

What’s No Longer There

A lot of people had told me that they really liked the look and improved functionality of my new design for the website.  My version had:

  • a thin, site-wide header-image showing Gladwell, plus highlighting his latest book and listing the other four
  • below the header (i.e., also site-wide), a custom menu with book-purchase locations and info-page-links for all five books
  • a sidebar widget with links to all article-types and a dated archive (again, site-wide)
  • a way for you to share any page or post to Facebook or Twitter (or to print or email it)
  • a biography right on the home page (the new design doesn’t have one at all)
  • the book covers and book-cover icons right on the homepage
  • a page of professional photographs (again, the new design doesn’t have any)
  • the capability of doing a site-wide search from wherever you are on it

Now, however, it’s gone, and no-one will ever see it.  To see a website I developed AND designed, please visit the Grand Philharmonic Choir.

The Need for Dynamic Content & User Interaction

All of the research about modern websites and the efficacy of online presence indicates that:  (1) your content must change reasonably often and (2) your visitors have to feel empowered to be able to do certain things.

1.

A website should include a blog, newsletter, or some other dynamic content that is updated at least a couple of times every month.  If you have a website plus Facebook, Twitter, and/or similar social-media accounts, then the content should be integrated so that your website’s new posts automatically appear on the other platforms.  An alternative would be to have things from the other platforms automatically appear on your website.  At the very least, you should provide basic links on your website to your social media pages.

2.

Site visitors should be able to share your posts to their own accounts on Facebook, Twitter, and/or similar social-networking sites.  In most cases, they should also be able to comment on your posts and pages.  Comments can be moderated (such as by an appointed lieutenant), in order to keep out all “trolls” and the vast majority of spam.  You can also choose not to allow comments on selected posts and pages.

Without dynamic content and at least some kind of basic possibility for user interaction, a return visit to a website is not very likely.

Technology Constantly Changes

Technology–especially internet technology–constantly changes.  From 1997 to 2013 (in addition to also being a Ph.D. in musicology, writer, musician, etc.), I have used and/or formally studied the following open-source and other website development technologies:

  • HTML
  • Dreamweaver
  • Expression Web
  • XHTML
  • CSS
  • ASP.NET
  • JavaScript
  • PHP
  • MySQL
  • Drupal
  • Omeka
  • WordPress

I have also studied and/or used object-oriented programming (C#), object-oriented analysis & design, databases (SQL, including SQL Server) and used various additional content development tools for images, video, and so on.  Whatever the merits or outcome of my studies (GPA of 3.97 in 2009-10) and work (a number of significant web projects since 2010), I know that it is not a good idea in 2013 to design a website that looks and works almost entirely like it has for many years–and could have looked and worked in 1996.

Self Employment Networking

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Yesterday morning, I met some of my fellow participants in “SENG” (Self Employment Networking Group) at a workshop by Kelly Craft about social media.  There was a wide array of ventures, including visual arts, expressive arts, life coaching, digital assistance, HR consulting, and bookkeeping.  Hopefully, I’ll be able to do website work for some of these people.  I gave a brief introduction to my previous business idea (OurMus.Net), to the website development projects I’ve done since then (for the Grand Philharmonic Choir and Malcolm Gladwell), and to what I’m doing now (Bowman’s Websites).  I handed out business cards to most of them and also got some of theirs.

Kelly’s presentation was useful.  However, I’m struggling with how to make use of my existing networks on Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. (which include hundreds of academic and/or music people) while separating my business activities from my numerous posts about other topics.  I decided to make my website’s main page show only three posts, sticking the one introducing my business at the top and otherwise showing the two most recent ones.  That should keep the site reasonably well-organized, but also somewhat dynamic and changing.  However, I might change the underlying WordPress code so that the main page will only show posts categorized as “Bowman’s Websites.”  I also need to find a good WordPress plugin for Search Engine Optimization (SEO), to add a YouTube channel with things related to Bowman’s Websites, and to get people who visit this website and/or like the Facebook page (etc.) to give me some business and/or share the information with others.

I can choose to send every new post to my public Facebook page for Bowman’s Websites (my other Facebook posts are for “Friends” only), to my Twitter page (which will probably come to include a combination of business and non-business posts — thus more “freewheeling”), and/or to my LinkedIn profile (which I’ve refocused to be mostly about the business).  I changed my existing sidebar Facebook widget item to go the new business page and added one for LinkedIn.

On Thursday, I’ll be attending an Employment Ontario “job club,” so hopefully I’ll be able to do some more networking there, even though it mostly won’t involve self-employed people.

The Glacial Pace of Academia

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I just filled out the American Musicological Society’s enhanced profile, a very basic section of the AMS website that apparently took them more than three years (!) to develop.

Compare that to the mere six weeks that it took me to develop the AMS’s most popular website section: Doctoral Dissertations in Musicology.  Also compare it to the fact that I developed a prototype for a possible new website for Malcolm Gladwell in the last day and half!

Naturally, on the new AMS profile system, I filled in as much information as I could:  publications, articles, works in progress, and as many external links as possible — thus excluding “Departmental Web Page.”  Of course, I also had to leave the “Institutions” field blank.

For obvious reasons, I’m looking forward to Malcolm Gladwell’s new book — David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits and the Art of Battling Giants (Oct. 1, 2013).

An Article about Adjunct Instructors

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An Article about Adjunct Instructors – by Celine James

My followup:

In my field (musicology or “music history & culture”), only about 20% of Ph.D.s ever get continuing full-time positions, including temporary/adjunct ones and the handful of multi-year post-doctoral fellowships.  The best I had was a pair of 8-9 month temporary full-time positions and a pair of multi-year part-time positions (single courses).

This situation is pretty normal in the arts and humanities.  Music academia has 75 new positions per year for 375 new Ph.D.s (not to mention existing Ph.D.s who change jobs), but it does almost nothing to prepare the other 80% for any other type of career direction, such as “alternative-academic” careers (libraries, museums, research projects, etc.).  To me, that’s a much bigger issue than the problem of universities cutting costs by now using adjuncts to such an extent and closing tenure lines.  See also my posting about such issues at:  https://durrellbowman.com/?p=946.  In addition, I recently gave a semi-autobiographical conference paper on the subject.

Kiss Me, Deadly (1952) & Kiss Me Deadly (1955)

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I finally read Mickey Spillane’s detective novel Kiss Me, Deadly (1952), in order to compare it to one of my favourite films noirs, the adaptation directed by Robert Aldrich and co-written by A. I. Bezzerides:  Kiss Me Deadly (1955).

The film keeps many of the book’s characters, situations, and gender dynamics (e.g., “hard-boiled” detective Mike Hammer and a collection of what might be called “femmes semi-fatales”) and transposes them from New York State and NYC to California and LA.  However, the film otherwise completely transforms the book’s cautionary tale about international drug smuggling into a vastly more bizarre and fascinating one ultimately involving a rich, eccentric, medical-doctor collector of “new art” (i.e., atomic materials) during the early Cold War—as well as his connections to the criminal world.

In a related matter, the film adds numerous relatively “highbrow” cultural references to the story, such as Christina Rossetti’s poems (especially “Remember”), symphonic music and opera, and even Mike Hammer and his “secretary” Velda abandoning their sleazy divorce PI existence for rather more “sophisticated” intrigue than the mob/drug context of the book.  The film also derives a more upper middle-class context, especially re Mike (including his expensive sports cars, his reel-to-reel answering machine, and his habit of screening his phone calls), but also re his policeman friend Pat (who, in the film, takes on much of the elevated-social-status character of the “feds”—who are far more prominent, and generally in “higher-level” contexts, in the book).  In addition, the film has more of a multicultural milieu than the book does (including Greek-, Italian-, and African-Americans), although the secondary, “hyphenated-American” characters are shown mainly in working class (mechanic, out-of-work singer) and service-type (bartender, barroom jazz singer) contexts.

It’s a great book, but a quite different great movie.  I feel the same way about Laurence Olivier’s film adaptations of Shakespeare and also about many of the films of Stanley Kubrick.  However, I do not feel that way about recent movies involving wizards and hobbits.

Career Archetype Test

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On the Career Archetype Test, my top categories were Sage (81%) and Revolutionary (75%).

Apparently,

The Sage never stops learning and has a desire to understand everything.  This understanding doesn’t necessarily mean a desire to act on that truth, which can sometimes keep the Sage a dispassionate observer in his or her own life.  If Sage is dominant, you will feel most comfortable in a learning culture where people are valued as much for their knowledge and expertise as for the amount of work they generate.  Strengths: Discovering the deeper truths in situations means that the Sage is less likely to get caught up in an emotional reaction to short term problems.  You may have a capacity for critical analysis and tend to be a good strategic thinker.  Traps to avoid: The Sage can study issues forever and never act.  There is also a danger of getting caught up in a particular way of studying an issue, shutting out new or revolutionary ways of doing things. (from Sage)

By comparison, and in contradistinction to the end of the previous section,

Revolutionaries are unconventional risk takers with a tendency to do things differently just to be different.  Revolutionaries are rarely content with the status quo and will create new ways of doing things, even when the old ways are working just fine.  If you have a strong presence of the Revolutionary archetype you will feel comfortable in a work environment that encourages innovation and gives people the freedom to be themselves.  Strengths: Revolutionaries are innovators.  The innovation applies not just to products and process, but also culture and thought.  If you are a Revolutionary you are comfortable taking risks and usually don’t care what other people think about you.  Traps to avoid: The Revolutionary needs to avoid change for change’s sake.  Anarchy and chaos can overtake the reasonable order and discipline it takes to get everyday tasks accomplished. (from Revolutionary)

Those sound about right, but the only job types both in Sage and Revolutionary are Education and Science and Research, with IT-type things (computer software, hardware, and executive/consulting) also under the former category and Arts and Entertainment also under the latter.  My next three categories were Explorer (68%), Creator (68%), and Magician (62%), which certainly also explain my: (1) adventurous, but chaotic and unfocused, self-reliance, (2) inspiration, vision, and single-mindedness, and (3) over-complicating desire to redefine the issues in order to meet a new situation.

None of that is much help in my job search, though, I have to say!  Indeed, the fact that my highest “grades” on these scales are not actually very high underscores the issue that my diverse background (Ph.D. in musicology, academic research, university course instruction, professional choral singing, arts admin, IT studies and work, website and web content development, small business programs, etc.) has not actually coalesced into an employee profile that makes much sense in the “real world.”  I guess the results do motivate me, however, to think more about the idea of writing digital-only e-books on music-related subjects (for students and lifelong learners) and maintaining a related purchase, media-clip, and discussion-hub website.

Music and Labour – conference

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Friday May 24th’s “Working Situations II” is going to be a weird session, with a pair of papers about improvisational live electronic music and remix aspects of electronic dance music and my completely unrelated and semi-autobiographical one about the academic, alternative-academic, and non-academic labour situations for Ph.D.s who specialize in popular music.

I find it interesting that the conference is, on balance, largely about economic uncertainty impacting the music industry.  So, I guess my paper on economic uncertainty also impacting music academia is at least semi-related to that.