A few days ago I finished reading Chris Kelty’s wonderful book Two Bits: The Cultural Significance of Free Software (Duke University Press, 2008).  During the academic year, I could not get to it but it was a treat to read it at a time in which it could be the only big thing that I was reading (as opposed to reading it alongside course readings).  While I would have benefited greatly from reading it last year (when my involvement in the issues that it treats really began to expand), it will do me much good in the days ahead, as it relates very centrally to the work that I am now doing on scholarly communications issues.  It provides invaluable context on the emergence and present-day life of open source software, but it also offers a range of valuable theoretical, interpretive and methodological tools that are portable to other contexts.  The book also examines, in a very sophisticated way, the manner in which the processes and ideas and values of free and open source software have been extended into projects like Connexions (about which my department held a really fruitful meetup recently) and the Creative Commons license system.  All of this work is done very artfully and in ways that we can all learn from.

This post is no surogate for a careful review, but I want to flag the book’s importance to me and to suggest that it is going to be touchstone work for many of the projects that I am increasingly involved in. More ambitiously, I want to plead with my friends and colleagues to read it so that we can talk about it and draw upon it in our efforts together and in our conversations. It is a great work of ethnography, history, and theory.  It is also an experiment that modulates the very processes that it describes, as is evident on the excellent and innovative website that Chris has built to extend the book.  One can purchase the book the conventional way, but it is also available to freely read and remix in a variety for formats via the website.  Some of the background for this is also provided in the “Anthropology of/in Circulation” project that Chris led and that I particupated in.  Find the article version of that project here in IUScholarWorks Repository.

Thank you Chris.

At Open Access Anthropology, I (re-)posted news of an key pro-OA announcement by 10 North American university presses. It is found here.

It has been talked about in depth in a number of places already, but I want to highlight the remarkable developments unfolding in and around the newly formed Open Anthropology Cooperative. The number and diversity and energy of the people who have been rapidly showing up at the new ning site and who have started rolling up their sleeves to build something new and interesting is remarkable. Congratulations to all who are engaging with this experiment in reorganizing an entire discipline at a worldwide level.

A new volume (=issue) of Cultural Analysis, volume 7, has just been published. It has a special focus on “Memory.” Find the new issue as well as the entire back content, plus information on the journal at http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~caforum.  CA is an open access journal that publishes peer-reviewed articles and assorted editorially reviewed genres in PDF and HTML formats.

The editors also announce a call for papers for a special issue (volume 9).  The CFP follows:

CALLS FOR PAPERS:

1. Call for Papers for Special Issue Volume 9: Here, There, and In-Between: Virtual and Actual Social Space

Cultural Analysis is currently seeking submissions for an upcoming special volume on the virtual. Folklore’s power to constitute collectivities has made it a frequent site of shared virtual spaces. As scholars increasingly engage with the effects of digital media on culture, it is useful to reflect on the historical virtualities of folklore as well as the newly emerging folklore of the digital virtual.

The editors welcome submissions from a variety of disciplines and perspectives that touch on the production, transmission, performance or reception of virtual social spaces. Possible subject areas could include the digital virtual (The cultural geography of digital spaces, online social memory sites, etc), other forms of virtual presence (“real but not actual” social spaces) or connections between virtual and actual spaces.

2. General Submissions

In addition to submissions for our special volume, we always welcome submissions for our general issues. These submissions should critically interrogate some aspect of folklore or popular culture, but can approach these topics from a range of disciplinary perspectives. Cultural Analysis encourages submissions from a variety of theoretical standpoints and from different disciplines including anthropology, cultural studies, folklore, media studies, popular culture, psychology, and sociology. As the mission of Cultural Analysis is to promote interdisciplinary dialogue on the topics of folklore and popular culture, pieces that engage with multiple methodologies are especially welcome. For a representative sample of our publications, previous volumes can be viewed on our website.
Submission Guidelines:

Authors should submit research articles of approximately 20-25 pages in length, in accordance with the Chicago Manual of Style, and include an abstract of 100 words and a “Works Cited” section. Microsoft Word (version 95 or later) is the preferred format for all electronic copies. Electronic copies may be submitted on a PC formatted disk or sent as e-mail attachments to caforum@socrates.berkeley.edu. Further submission information can be found on our website.

About Cultural Analysis:

Cultural Analysis is an interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed journal dedicated to investigating expressive and everyday culture. The journal features analytical research articles, but also includes notes, reviews, and cross-disciplinary responses. Cultural Analysis is global in scope, with an international editorial board. The journal was founded in 2000 at the University of California, Berkeley.

Cultural Analysis is published electronically in HTML and PDF formats as well as in a limited print run. Access to these files is available free of charge at the Cultural Analysis website,
http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~caforum.

Please feel free to email Cultural Analysis with any questions:
caforum@socrates.berkeley.edu

Address all postal correspondence to:
Cultural Analysis
232 Kroeber Hall
University of California, Berkeley
Berkeley, CA 94720
USA

I am very pleased to note that my brother Craig has earned tenure and been promoted to the rank of associate professor in the Department of Psychology at Virginia Wesleyan University. Craig’s research and teaching focus on issues in social psychology, specifically social cognition, impression management and formation, person-environment fit, and group dynamics. Well done!

Congratulations go to Jethro Gaede*, who has today successfully defended his dissertation and earned the Ph.D. in anthropology at the University of Oklahoma.  Jethro’s dissertation is titled “An Ethnohistory of the American Indian Exposition at Anadarko Oklahoma: 1932-2003.” I was honored to serve on Jethro’s committee, both as an OU faculty member and as a visiting member since my move to Indiana. Well done.

*Jethro is an instructor of anthropology at Monroe Community College.

Congratulations go to Arle Lommel, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Folklore and Ethnomusicology, for very successfully completing his doctoral exams and reaching candidacy. Arle’s dissertation project is tentatively titled “Ancient Instruments: The Hungarian Folk Revival and the Search for Authenticity.”

I am pleased to note the openning of the “One Hundred Summers: A Kiowa Calendar Record” exhibition at the Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History in Norman. I have not yet heard how the openning events have gone, but I look forward to seeing the exhibition myself this summer.  Learn more about the show here.  Find the associated book, authored by Candace Greene and published by Nebraska, here.

Congratulations to Teri Klassen on the publication of her review of the book A Cherokee Woman’s America: Memoirs of Narcissa Owen, 1831-1907. Her review appears in the latest issue of the (print only, but not-for-profit) journal Material Culture*. Well done.

*Volume 41, No. 1, Pp. 92-96.

Copied from a H-Folk posting by Harris Berger:

The Department of Performance Studies at Texas A&M University announces a new Master of Arts degree in Performance Studies. This interdisciplinary program emphasizes the ethnographic study of vernacular culture. The Department of Performance Studies has strengths in Africana studies, dance and ritual studies, ethnomusicology, folklore, performance ethnography, popular music studies, religious studies, theatre and media studies, and women’s studies. Application deadline for Fall, 2010 is January 15, 2010. Assistantships are available.