Erlangen 91052—Resource Center

[a] Nearby RF

This series of posts explores both the specifics of living in Erlangen, Germany (91052), and the broader question of "what is 'Western' culture." It is a series of glimpses into language and life in Bavaria (actually, Franconia) in 2014. Click below for all of the posts in the series.

Erlangen 91052—Introduction
This is where to start.

Erlangen 91052 (1)—Billiger!
It's cheaper!

Erlangen 91052 (2)—Rauchen kann tödlich sein
Smoking is deadly.

Erlangen 91052 (3)—Bieber Fever
Justin and beyond.

Erlangen 91052 (4)—Unsere Olympiamannschaften
Our Olympic Team.

Erlangen 91052 (5)—Christkindles Markt Glühwein
I think it's the cinnamon.

Erlangen 91052 (6)—Konfuzius Institut New Year's Gala
Dump truck loads of language.

Erlangen 91052 (7)—Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto in D major (Bronze Medals)
The concerto is a lot of sweaty work (part one).

Erlangen 91052 (8)—Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto in D major (Silver Medals)
We move from sweat to flying hair...

Erlangen 91052 (9)—Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto in D major (Gold Medal)
It's like King Lear...and Emile Durkheim...

Erlangen 91052 (10)—Everyday Words: Einfach
Not as simple as it looks...

Erlangen 91052 (11)—Everyday Words: Genau
Exactly...

Erlangen 91052 (12)—Everyday Words: Tschuß!
Bye-bye... 

From the Geil Archive—Resource Center

Welcome to the Resource Center for the Round and Square series "From the Geil Archive." This center is your easy way to navigate the posts in the series, and will allow you to go either straight through the archival pickings (as it were) or choose topics that might interest you. I strongly recommend starting with the introduction to the series, and then at least reading the first few examples in order to get a sense of the sources and the series.

Posts are listed in order below.

 

Introduction                              01-Southern Mountain Museum            02-Sacred Mountain Map           

             
03-Hat and Cattle                    04-Seeking Anthropology                       05-Curly Fives
            
06-How to Write It                    07-Mortarboard Man                              08-Orator

09-Naming Unconventions      10-Not Like the Others                          11-Killed by Lightning 

12-American Flag                   13-Out of the Frying Pan                       14-One of Earth's Travelers

15-"Stamps" of Approval        16-Coin Extractor                                  17-Jack of All Trades 

18-Don't Call Me Reverend    19-Who Was Constance Geil?              20-Geil Visits the British Museum

21-The Tenacious Wall           22-Warring Pens                                   23-Geil: Intellectual Bricoleur

24-Voting Rights                     25-Friends in High Places                     26-A Yankee in the Land of Rhubarb 

27-Thinking in Fives               28-The Perfect 2                                    29-Confusion in Japan

30-The Sanitarium                  31-Immortality to Obscurity                   32-The Sarawak Museum

33-Geil on the Moon               34-A Ghostly...Three Teachings            35-Chinese Jews

36-Sentimental Geil

The Accidental Ethnographer—Resource Center

Welcome to the Accidental Ethnographer Resource Center. 

I have been doing research on William Edgar Geil for three years now, and some of my thinking about the man, his travels, and his writings is on Round and Square. This resource center is meant to help you negotiate the thousand-plus entries on the blog to find the forty or so that deal with Geil. 

Click the links below to find your way.

Phi Beta Kappa Lecture 2011
My first public lecture about William Edgar Geil. This is a very good place to start if you have not heard of him before.

The Isle That Was Called Patmos
This 1896 publication was Geil's first book-length travelogue. Each post in the series is linked to all of the others, so you will be able to find your way once you click the link above.

Click below for other posts from The Isle That Was Called Patmos:

                        Patmos 1          Patmos 2

Ocean and Isle
Geil's second book (1902) is the first to appear from his three-plus year journey across the globe. It focuses on the south seas, followed by an account of his extraordinary mission to Melbourne (many copies of this book are still on used bookstore shelves in Australia, 110 years later).

Click below for other posts from Ocean and Isle:

Isle 1            Isle  2            Isle 3           Isle 4            Isle 5            Isle 6            Isle 7
 

The Great Melbourne Revival

This is from the latter half of Ocean and Isle, but it has its own section on this blog, not the least because it brings out many streams of Geil's experience and talents (not always appreciated by the Melbourne press, but stunningly effective with audiences).

Click below for other posts from "The Great Melbourne Revival":

Revival 1              Revival 2              Revival 3              Revival 4

A Yankee on the Yangtze

Geil begins to hit a stride, of sorts, and to fall hard for China. He would still have many travels and many books to go, and this one has places that would make a China scholar wince...even in 1904. I tell a little about it, but let whole sections speak for themselves.

Click below for other posts in from A Yankee on the Yangtze:

Yankee 1          Yankee 2          Yankee 3          Yankee 4          Yankee 5

Lectures on The Accidental Ethnographer I

This is the first in a series of my own writings that try to explain Geil as thoroughly as I can from my own experiences in studying history, anthropology, and Chinese culture. It tells the story of "my discovery" of Geil all of the way up to the point where...I finished the preface to his last book (the first I read of his works). This is the beginning of the "long" version of an hour-long lecture I gave for the Doylestown Bicentennial Celebration on June 1, 2012. More will follow.

Click below for other posts from Robert André LaFleur's "Long Lecture...Part I" about William Edgar Geil:

Accidental 6a          Accidental 6b          Accidental 6c          Accidental 6d
Accidental 6e          Accidental 6f           Accidental 6g          Accidental 6h

Annals of Ostracism—Resource Center

Welcome to the Resource Center for the Round and Square series "Annals of Ostracism." Annals? Ostracism? The best place to begin is with the introduction to the topic. After that, feel free to explore the various posts in the series.

Annals of Ostracism: Introduction
Here's the beginning. It all flows from here (including people pretending that the other does not exist. "Flow" is a relative concept when it comes to ostracism.

(1)
Annals of Ostracism: Alone in the Arctic.
Kicked out of the igloo. This is not an optimal situation for an arctic anthropologist. Jean Briggs tells all.

(2) 
Annals of Ostracism: The Crime of Cephu
O.k., you are in a small tribe in the Ituri Forest...and you decide to "go it alone." Your pigmy colleagues ostracize you. Discuss.

(3) 
Annals of Ostracism: Discovered Notes
Imagine the misery associated with doing fieldwork...and having your fieldnotes discovered and read by the very people you are trying to understand (the levels of "problem"-atic only begin to show their threads...this is bad on all sorts of levels).

(4) 
Annals of Ostracism: Culture's Bounty
Headhunting in the NFL. It's despicable (and Rousseauian...sort of).

(5) 
Annals of Ostracism: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
Oh, how I despise that song. Click here to see why.

Primary Sources—Resource Center

The "Primary Sources" readings are broken down into various segments, starting with an introductory essay in eight parts and all of the elementary school readers from the Ministry of Education in Taiwan (c. 1985). Feel free to find your way. I recommend reading the posts in order, but it's your decision.

We're just getting underway in this series, and it will take the better part of two years to post all 276 texts. There is plenty here for starters, though, so let's get to work.

Introduction to "Primary Sources"

Introduction (a)—Education and Enculturation          Introduction (b)—Traditional Education     

Introduction (c)—Contemporary Education               Introduction (d)—Hong Kong and Taiwan

Introduction (e)—Butterflies                                       Introduction (f)—K-12, c.1985
Introduction (g)—Impassioned Communities            Introduction (h)—History, Language, and Culture, c.1985


First Grade, First Semester*
1A.01—I Get Up 我起來了                                        1A.02—Good Morning, Mother 媽媽早          
1A.03—Who Gets Up Early? 誰起得早                     1A.01-03 Review 

1A.04—My Book Bag 我的書包                                1A.05—One Person Short 少了一個人
1A.06—Playing Ball 玩皮球                                       1A.04-06 Review 

1A.07—Little Bird 小小鳥兒                                       1A.08—Come With Me, Little Doggie 小狗跟我來
1A.09—Little White Rabbit Races 小白兔比賽          1A.07-09 Review

1A.10—I Make a Boat 我做一條船                            1A.11—In the Park 公園裡
1A.12—Through the Mountain Tunnel 過山洞           1A.10-12 Review

*Note that the first semester of first grade has only twelve texts. This is because the first half of the semester is spent learning the 注音符號 (zhuyinfuhao) pronunciation system and doing pronunciation drills. All eleven semesters that follow have twenty-four lessons per semester.

First Grade, Second Semester

Bricolage Bibliothèque—Resource Center

The "Bricolage Bibliothèque" Readings will be broken down by subtopics (see below). The place to start, however, is with the introduction to the series. After that, navigate the materials under the various subtopics.

Introduction to Bricolage Bibliothèque
Bricolage Bibliothèque—Introduction

Bricolage? What's that? There is plenty of stuff for you to review here, but let's get to the heart of the matter. A French anthropologist named Claude Lévi-Strauss made a point five decades ago about how we craft culture. Let's simplify it down to its key roots: we take stuff from the world around us and we fashion or craft solutions...[continue]...

For more background on the concept of bricolage, see the following posts: 
Theory Corner 1a: Bricolage
Theory Corner 1b: Bricolage and Thought (American Pie)
Theory Corner 1c: Bricolage and Change

Bricolage Biliothèque Posts
Bricolage Biliothèque 1: Bike Seat
Even Americans who have not watched much television are probably vaguely familiar with a certain hefty figure—a UPS driver with formidable appetites—who came to be known as the King of Queens. You might think you know where this post is going, but, well, you don't. I am not much interested in the show, and was just zapping through channels aimlessly the other night (I am on the road and the hotel channel-changer was relentless) when I saw the following scene. Thank heavens and the Internet for YouTube. Here is an entire episode, but all that you need takes place in forty-five seconds between 17:45 and 18:30. Check it out...[continue]...

Theory Corner—Resource Center

The "Theory Corner" Readings will be broken down by topic (see below). The place to start, however, is with the introduction to the series. After that, navigate the materials under the various subtopics.

Introduction to Theory Corner
Theory Corner—Introduction
 
Theory Corner: Claude Lévi-Strauss and the Concept of Bricolage

Theory Corner 1a: Bricolage
Theory Corner 1b: Bricolage and Thought (American Pie)
Theory Corner 1c: Bricolage and Change

Please note that the concept of bricolage is expanding on Round and Square to include a new series:
Bricolage Bibliothèque—Resource Center
Bricolage Bibliothèque—Introduction