[NB: I’ve had 3 pints of Guinness, but I believe in telling the truth. So in the interest of full disclosure …. Also, sorry for the overly familiar tone, but I am trying to be playful.]
This past summer and early fall I had a (intellectual) crush on Elaine Svenonius. Seriously. That relationship has finally matured, though. Now I am simply trying to read all I can by Elaine. And enjoying doing so.
Nowadays I have a serious crush on Rebecca Green. What can I say? She (her writing, fool!) is getting me hot under the collar.
Somehow, somewhere, I stumbled over some of her articles on “conceptual syntagmatic relationships” when I was working on my paper for Carole Palmer on mapping thesauri for use by interdisciplinary scientists. I was unable to use much of her work—although I did manage to work in a bit—in that paper. But now that I’m working on relationships for LIS590RO this semester I have dove in deep into Bean & Green (2001) Relationships in the Organization of Knowledge. In fact, thanks to abebooks.com my own personal copy is on the way.
Rebecca has the intro chapter in Bean & Green and she cites one of her own papers (2000), “Locating sources in humanities scholarship: the efficacy of following bibliographic references.” Library Quarterly, 71, 201-229.
Her articles on “relationships” already had me all aquiver, but now I am totally smitten.
I am an inveterate footnote chaser. In fact, I rarely ever search, except for known items. Now I can even justify that tactic. Be still my beating heart.
You will be reading more about Dr. Green’s work here; that I can promise. You will definitely be reading about the humanities sources article once I’ve had a chance to re-read it. If you are a librarian who supports humanities scholars then don’t wait on me; “just do it” as they say. That is, read it.
One of the things they told us at the First-time Attendees brunch at ASIS&T was to just go up to the folks we admired and tell them because they’d get as big a kick out of it as we would. And they were right! It was painless and fun; I just wish I had done it with more people. I will definitely be keeping an eye out for Dr. Svenonius and Dr. Green the next time I attend a conference.
And now I want to know—current students, past students—who are, or were, your intellectual crushes? Don’t be shy. Fess up! Feel free to comment here or post on your own blog and link back here. C’mon. It can’t hurt.
28 responses so far ↓
1 Julian // Jan 23, 2007 at 12:12 am
From first-hand experience, I can say that Dr. Dr. Green (no typo) is also a great professor.
2 Mark // Jan 23, 2007 at 7:52 am
Welcome Julian, and thanks for that info. Makes me feel better about my choice; not that it really is a choice at all.
3 jennimi // Jan 23, 2007 at 9:41 am
My intellectual crush is on Hope Olson, who it looks like I might actually get a chance to meet in November! Oh no! I hope I don’t freeze up like a groopie. Olson looks at subjectivity in classification and how our world views affect, intentionally or no, how we classify info. She’s got a wonderful writing style and brings it with the philosophy.
I also have intellectual crushes on lots and lots of libloggers, especially the ones who bring art to their writing, and discuss the Big Stuff….
4 Mark // Jan 23, 2007 at 10:21 am
Hi jennimi! I’d have to say I’m fond of Dr. Olson. I haven’t read enough of her stuff to develop a full-blown crush yet, but I do have “The Power to Name: Locating the Limits of Subject Representation in Libraries” at home and am looking forward to (hopefully) reading it.
hehehe. That wasn’t supposed to be a pun, but it’ll do.
5 ranger // Jan 23, 2007 at 11:01 am
Most of my intellectual crushes have been on entomologists, although in the library world, I’d have to say that Ranganathan (sorry if I spelled that wrong) always rocked me. And oh, there was that crush I had on Sandy Berman. That man can wear a turtleneck like no other.
6 jenny // Jan 23, 2007 at 11:27 am
1. Michel Foucault. The man is all about power and observation–it would have to be weird.
2. Stephen Pinker- His putdowns are stunning, because they are so brilliant and so evil. And he writes about linguistics clearly, without academic pretension which I think that discipline is rife with. And he answers ALL EMAIL. Nicely, in fact. And he is just as sweet in person, at least on book tours. Being his student, I have been told, is a little different.
3. Paul Otlet. Duh. Like an index card internets. HOT.
I think I am on a brink with Raya Fidel.
7 jenny // Jan 23, 2007 at 11:30 am
also, maybe for the future, but i haven’t read enough–clay shirky
8 Mark // Jan 23, 2007 at 11:48 am
Foucault. Hmmmm? I’m kind of in a love-hate relationship with Michel at the moment, j.
I’m working my way through Archaeology of Knowledge right now and it is a *serious* slog. Maybe if I could read it in French….? I keep going though cause it seems important, or something.
I read a few of the later chapters at some point in the past–although I forget for which class–and I don’t remember it being so hard so maybe it’ll get more comprehensible (to me) soon.
9 ranger // Jan 23, 2007 at 11:54 am
I used to work with (read: for) Raya so that crush thing never developed, but I knew at least one person who’d fallen for her.
10 Christina Pikas // Jan 23, 2007 at 12:26 pm
Dr^2 Green has left us, sniff, sniff, for LOC. I’m not sure if she attends ASIS&T or not.
I fall in and out of intellectual love pretty quickly… Now I’m infatuated with dear old Dr. Kuhn as I read about normal science and scientific revolutions…
11 Mark // Jan 23, 2007 at 1:19 pm
Hi Christina! Hopefully that’s good news for LOC; sorry for your loss though.
Yes, there will always be a fond place in my heart for “dear old Dr. Kuhn.” Especially since, unlike most who go around invoking his name [not implicating you btw], I have actually read the book.
12 Mark // Jan 23, 2007 at 1:23 pm
Oh, BTW all … this does not have to be restricted to LIS folks. Jenny and Christina picked up on the right spirit.
Entomologists are special people, too, ranger. I must say your post about fig ecology was pretty hot in its own way. Made we wish I had TV. For a moment anyway.
13 ranger // Jan 23, 2007 at 2:26 pm
You don’t have to have tv:
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/queenoftrees/video.html
And yes, entomologists are people. Hot, hot people!
14 Mark // Jan 23, 2007 at 2:44 pm
Sweet! Thanks, ranger. I’ll watch it later. Right now I’m doing original cataloging of Vol. I, no. 1 of Our feathered friends: the official organ of the Mountain State Bird Club. January, 1914.
I get some of the coolest stuff! I can’t wait to turn to the “inmates” of the Female Christian Home and their 14th annual report, Jan. 1878.
15 jennimi // Jan 23, 2007 at 4:20 pm
well gee whiz Mark… not limited to LIS????? where would I even begin?????
16 Mark // Jan 23, 2007 at 4:38 pm
Wherever makes you happiest, my friend.
We can certainly stay with LIS, and I kind of originally assumed most would stay there, but considering that my current intellectual heartthrob (LIS or not) is leading me down the rabbit hole of linguistics, who am I to be restrictive?
17 And on a related topic … fun in the classroom | Off the Mark // Jan 24, 2007 at 8:41 am
[…] RSS ← Intellectual crushes and more mature relationships […]
18 Jenica // Jan 24, 2007 at 11:25 am
Wayne Wiegand, in LIS, who, when I was at the UW, basically told us “you’re going to learn a lot of theory, here. But your libraries serve users, who are people. Don’t you dare forget that.” He also let an emotionally charged and extremely angry class discussion go on for longer than I thought was right, and when I asked him about it later, privately, he said, “Which class are you going to remember, and which did you learn the most from?” …and he was right.
And John Frederick “Fred” Pfeil, who was my undergraduate advisor and many-times professor. He could talk about literature and society and culture and wordcraft in a way that made my head spin, and my eyes glaze over as I tried to take it all in. He taught me how to write, and if I could have found a way to stay in college just so I could learn more from him, I would have. He died recently, and young, of cancer, and the world is less rich for his absence.
19 jenny // Jan 24, 2007 at 2:14 pm
would foucault have it any other way but a love/hate relationship?
also–bill nye.
20 jennimi // Jan 24, 2007 at 8:57 pm
Bill Nye!!!! Yes, jenny has it!
Carl Sagan (ooh the turtleneck, the vowels, the talk of outer space)
Spock
Robert Venables (my Native American History prof from Cornell - I’ll never forget his heartbreak around Waco)
Philip K. Dick (yes, I put him in intellectual, as well as a bunch of other categories) - what is the term for crushing on a deceased intellectual…
Plato - he invented “the form of”, don’t believe those Saturday cartoons!
OK, I am being silly…. this was a great and fun post!
PS, LOVE the Weigand quotation.
21 Mark // Jan 24, 2007 at 10:32 pm
No, Foucault would have it no other way.
I agree, jennimi, this has been great fun! I was somewhat worried when I first had the idea and realized I was going to do it despite having had 3 pints of beer. Almost never a good idea to blog after that much libation. But it all turned out well.
Thanks all! And please feel free to continue. Others, feel free to join in! I hope to get a chance to add a bit more about some of what’s already here, but who knows?
22 A // Jan 26, 2007 at 7:21 pm
I’m late, because I wasn’t checking Bloglines at Midwinter, but I must chime in with my intellectual crush on Richard Dawkins. “The God Delusion” is currently rocking my world. Other ICs, in no particular order, and of no particular relevance to LIS, include: Vladimir Nabokov, Jessa Crispin (of bookslut.com/blog), George Carlin, and Ambrose Bierce. This is fun!!!
23 Mark // Jan 26, 2007 at 7:57 pm
Jenica, I was hoping you’d chime in with “Fred” Pfeil. I’ve read some of what you’ve had to say about him in the past, and anyone who matters that much to you should be shared with others. Hopefully some of us will have time to learn more about him.
I’ve only read a little Weigand, but I have met him at the best little conference I’ve ever been at–Library History Seminar XI. Impressive in both cases.
jennimi, I used to love me some Sagan back in the day. Cosmos was what television was supposed to be about! And a scientist for the common woman or man; what’s to complain about?
Hi A! And why pray tell did L’s picture from MW look just like yours?
Nice list there. I hope to have some time for “The God Delusion” one of these days. Of course, my list is already so freaking long.
24 Some things read this week, 4 - 10 March 2007 // Mar 11, 2007 at 9:19 am
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