duck tongues
Duck tongues at Double Li
The end of April was a lot of fun. I did two day trips to Chicago. The first was to the MDW art fair, a show of funky emerging art in Chicago. My first stop was at the Double Li restaurant in Chinatown. I had lunch with a very lively group pf Northwestern soc grad students: Margarita Rayzberg, Justin Louie, George Balgobin, and Diego de los Rios. I ordered the duck tongues (odd crunchy/squishy texture); they ordered tofu and spicy pork.
Excellent conversationalists.
They sure know how to pick ’em in Evanston. The conversation was great. We ranged from interactive web based ethnography, to objected oriented ontology, to Estelle Getty,* to ajiaco.I promised Margarita I’d link to this documentary about health care, Paris: Invisible City, and this series of lectures by David Harvey on Marxist social theory. I seriously recommend having lunch with these people.
Unidentified broom sculpture from “Harold Arts”
The next stop was the MDW art fair. It was held in this building called the “Geolofts,” an old warehouse that’s been rehabbed for eco-friendly/sustainable business. The MDW fair itself is definitely a DIY production, run by the grungy, yet vibrant, emerging Chicago art scene. A few highlights: a super cool book by Internet artist Brenna Murphy; photos of plants by Heidi Norton (Ebers Moore gallery); Philip von Zweck’s free art booth (he’ll make photocopies of art); and Anni Holm’s currency exchange project. Wrap up: Chicago dog at Morrie O’Malley’s.
The next Saturday was spent meeting with our friend and guest blogger emerita Christine Percheski. We had a wonderful lunch at the Merchandise Mart and walked through the Art Chicago and Next fairs. A few highlights: Seung Wook Lim’s baroque abstractions; Coke Wisdom O’Neal’s creepy “people in boxes” photos; and C.C. Ann Chen’s odd pictures. I also spent some time in the West Loop. Golden Age is the go to place for printed art material in Chicago. Theaster Gates (civil rights based art) and Huma Bhaba (conceptual) both had some great sculpture exhibitions.
* Dudes, I looked this up and Getty (b. 1923) is not the youngest Golden Girl. That title belongs to Rue McClanahan (b. 1934). But I give partial credit: Getty is a few months younger than Betty White and Bea Arthur.
orgtheory.net 
Is knowledge of Estelle Getty the lurking variable behind the GRE/grad school success association?
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George
May 10, 2011 at 1:29 am
We can only find out with an instrumental variable model.
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fabiorojas
May 10, 2011 at 1:54 am
I don’t understand why this post isn’t getting as many comments as the GRE posts. you would think that people have some strong opinions about duck tounges and Estelle Getty
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Diego
May 10, 2011 at 2:20 pm
*toungues
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Diego
May 10, 2011 at 2:20 pm
okay, I can’t spell today. my apologies. I meant to say duck tongues
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Diego
May 10, 2011 at 2:21 pm
A taste for duck tongues is correlated at 0.35 with success in graduate school, but only in specific sorts of departments.
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Kieran
May 10, 2011 at 2:59 pm
“Is knowledge of Estelle Getty the lurking variable behind the GRE/grad school success association?”
Pace George (and, earlier, Vaisey), I reject such “variable-oriented thinking.” My old-school crisp-set QCA model of sociology grad school success in the greater Chicago area yields _multiple_ causal combinations. As I examined my results, I realized that the key difference between schools was knowledge, not of Estelle Getty per se, but knowledge of _any_ of the guest stars appearing jointly in an episode of Fantasy Island originally broadcast on 24 March 1984, Mermaid and the Matchmaker/The Obsolete Man. “Knowledge of Estelle Getty,” _in the role of “Money Lady,”_ determines success at Northwestern; knowledge of Bert Convey, _in the role of “Mitchell Robinson,”_ determines success at Chicago; knowledge of Gloria Loring, _in the role of “Charlene,”_ determines success at UIC, etc.
Playing further with the specification of the model, I found that knowledge of Hervé Villechaize (in any role) yields a single configuration determining success in sociology grad school in the greater Chicago area. The paper is still under review at Poetics, but there are other interesting results (e.g., Ten years post-Ph.D., students who had viewed Robert Downey Sr.’s _Greaser’s Palace_ (1972) as children had citation counts in the top decile for their cohort).
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GoldenGirl
May 10, 2011 at 4:32 pm
I’m waiting for Fabio’s (next?) book on networks among artists, agents, and buyers. I feel like I got an exclusive preview by touring the art show with him!
Midwest folks: I highly recommend checking out Art Chicago next year!
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cperchesk
May 11, 2011 at 1:01 am
[…] Martine is an artist/curator/generally artsy person in Chicago. I met her at the MDW Fair in April (see my write up here) and she told me she was finishing up a book on Black film. I decided to check it […]
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book spotlight: implications and distinctions by martine syms « orgtheory.net
August 17, 2011 at 12:08 am