Read, Listen, Watch

Staff Picks and Suggestions

Sometimes (but not often enough) a book from class is a great read!

I (was forced to) read In Search Of Respect: Selling Crack in El Barrio by Phillpe Bourgois in on of my anthropology classes and now it’s one of my favorite books. The book provides detailed insight into the lives of crack dealers in East Harlem in the early 1990s. Bourgois studied the drug economy there for 3 years, moving his wife and new born into East Harlem. What he found is truly amazing- a society that has it’s own value system. Bourgois argues this has developed due to the plight of the poor who have been rejected from society. In search of respect, they create a new value system they are able to uphold. The detailed insight into the lives of those both overlooked and condemned by society is a perspective rarely seen. The book is a very humanizing element in discussion about drugs or the poor, for it showcases the daily lives and struggle of individuals one can easily identify with. It reveals that the drug economy is not an effective method of providing an income, but becomes a last ditch effort at survival for those unable to find employment. In Search of Respect has changed my perspective on society and the drug war. After reading this, it seems to me the people most hurt by both the drug economy and the war on drugs are already marginalized and never really had a fair shot at getting out of poverty. You can find In Search of Respect in Snell library, I recommend you give it a read!

jump start

Have you ever been so enthralled by a book that when you finished it, everything else seemed to pale in comparison? I have.  For the past two or three months I have started a few books and not finished a single one.  Normally, I am not so fickle when it comes to reading but I simply cannot get excited about any of my selections.  In late January, I finished an incendiary piece by Christopher Hitchens in which he presents a case against organized religion.  If you have read any of Mr. Hitchens’ work, you know that he might not always be right, but he sure brings his A game in a fight. (Hey, that rhymes!)  I tried to read a book by noted humorist John Hodgman, a piece of popular history about the 6 most historically signicant drinks (beer, wine, tea, coffee, liquor and soda).  I also cracked open some old favorites in hopes of sticking with a book, no luck.  Don’t get me wrong, none of these books were bad, or poorly written, I just couldn’t get interested in any of them.  I can’t take this much more.

The Page 69 Test

The Page 69 Test is a fun and easy way to decide whether a novel is right for you. Simply open a book you think you might enjoy to page 69 and read that page. If you enjoy it, there’s a good chance you’ll enjoy the rest of the book. So the next time you’re in a bookstore, or here in Snell, try out the Page 69 Test and see if it works for you.

Pandora’s box of music

Do you ever get bored at work? (Note: if your boss is reading this, you should probably answer “No” to this question).  If so (or…not [see above]), then I have a great site, called Pandora Radio to share.  It’s a “radio” where you can sort of make your own playlists!  You can just type in a favorite song or artist and the radio will play songs by that artist and other songs from similar sounding artists.  You do have to register for the site, but the best part is, they save your playlists (and you don’t get annoying spam emails from them, either).  It’s something fun to play around with, or just have in the background at your desk.  You don’t even have to let anyone know what kind of music you’re listening to, so go ahead- listen to your guilty pleasure songs and music genres!  In my case, this is country music (ok… I guess I lied when I said Gretchen Wilson was the only country on my iPod.  Heh).

Baseball!

Hey folks, it’s late March, and I wish I were in Fort Myers, Florida. Not just because it was snowing in Boston this morning, although that’s probably a good enough reason. But no, the real reason I’d like to be there is ’cause then I’d already be enjoying some Red Sox baseball! Opening Day is just around the corner, and I can’t wait. The Sox are due to be playing their much-hyped season-opening games against the Oakland A’s in Japan in just a few short days. Yes, you can catch those on TV — too bad the start time for both is 6:05 AM, Eastern Daylight Time! Maybe you want to read something about the team to get psyched up for the start of the season. One title I definitely enjoyed is One Day at Fenway — a great choice for anyone who (like me) hasn’t actually got tickets to a game. Author Steve Kettmann and his team of researchers attended the August 30, 2003 Red Sox-Yankees game at Fenway and had access to multiple different viewpoints — celebrities in the crowd, everyday fans, team owners, even the scoreboard operator. The resulting book is an incredibly detailed and fascinating look at one regular-season baseball game with pennant-race implications (the Sox-Yanks rivalry helps!) and, more broadly, the relationship of fans of all stripes to the sport. Definitely a fun read, with all kinds of interesting tidbits and background information about the game that you probably didn’t know. Snell Library has lots of other books on baseball, and on the Sox: for example, try a Subject search on Boston Red Sox. And yes, if you must, you can also get Subject results for the New York Yankees, but I’m not going to automate that search for you. 🙂 Happy reading, in anticipation of that wonderful soon-to-be-heard cry, “Play ball!”