Keywords 002 Accountability

Leary’s first keyword, alphabetically, is: Accountability (N.); Accountable (Adj.)

Accountability has become a popular term the past fifty years. It has a Christian background that combines moral responsibility with counting. Both the left and the right finding it an appealing virtue, calling for corporate or government accountability, respectively. In 2004, the General Accounting Office, founded in 1921, changed its name to the Government Accountability Office (GAO). Its original mission was to seek “greater economy or efficiency in public expenditures.” Now, taxpayer replaces public, and it investigates “how the federal government spends taxpayer dollars,” with hostility directed to public spending.

Perhaps its greatest influence has come in the field of US public education reform, especially since the 2002 No Child Left Behind Act. As its law’s preamble put it, the NCLB set out “to close the achievement gap with accountability, flexibility, and choice, so that no child is left behind.” The Department of Education explained accountability in 2003 this way:

Under the act’s accountability provisions, states must describe how they will close the achievement gap and make sure all students, including those who are disadvantaged, achieve academic proficiency. They must produce annual state and school district report cards that inform parents and communities about state and school progress. Schools that do not make progress must provide supplemental services, such as free tutoring or after-school assistance; take corrective actions; and, if still not making adequate yearly progress after five years, make dramatic changes to the way the school is run.

This is a very nearly tautological definition, since it defines “accountability” by means of the mechanisms for being “held accountable.” This is an important quality of the term, however: while the concept of “accountability” presumes moral responsibility, the word is defined in terms of the mechanisms of enforcement. This means that, like stakeholder, accountability cannot be separated from a bureaucracy’s public performance of responsibility—you are accountable to the degree that you can be perceived as being accountable.

Accountability thrives in the management literature where leaders justify themselves to each other….

Accountability, in sum, mandates measurement and standardization in the fields in which it is applied. Of course, measurement and standards are not bad in and of themselves, even in education, defined as it is in the US by gross disparities in local school funding and teacher training. Rather, the problem is the degree to which accountability regimes overlook these structural impediments, given their reliance for data and enforcement on the bureaucracies that produce the metrics. Consider the example of police accountability: as the policing scholar Alex Vitale has argued, accountability measures, like body cameras and civilian complaint boards, are notonly subject to the authority of the police—who can turn off the camera or stonewall the board—but also “leave intact the basic institutional functions of the police, which have never really been about public safety or crime control.” Accountability is a technocratic ideal of justice, limited by the authority and prerogative of the bureaucracies to which one is held accountable. My own sense, as a teacher, has been that administrators only really begin counting things when they need to justify getting rid of them. When it combines the moral sense of duty with the bureaucratic zeal for quantification, accountability encodes the fiction that moral obligations can be measured, calculated, and, of course, valued financially.

Activity

What I have understood from my reading of accountability, is that it is a substitute for justice, based on “bean counting”. Whereas some beans can be ignored or put into different bags, because of their colour or shape, “virtual beans” can be added when it serves the bean counters’ purposes. So the actual number of beans counted, is exactly the same as the ones that the bean counters want to count.

If people think my comment is simply mythical thinking, I can assure them that this is not the case. One of my friends from the 1970s (who will remain anonymous) worked for the British Columbia Ministry of Education, as an economist. His job was to find statistical evidence to show that investments in trade education resulted in a 10% return on investment. The government was not interested in the actual return on investment, or any other measure of appropriateness. If the real ROI was more, then they would probably have to start more trade education classes, if it was less, then they would have to cut programs. So 10% was regarded as a safe figure! It didn’t rock any boats, or beans

While people are free to do what they want with this post, my hope is that they will reflect on it. If they feel inclined, they may add their own comments to personalize it, perhaps even deleting mine, and send it onwards to their friends. Please send them out BCC to protect people’s privacy. If they do so, I would appreciate receiving a copy.

Nøkkelord 002 Ansvarlighet

John Patrick Learys 2018 Nøkkelord: Kapitalismens nye språk Hans første søkeord, alfabetisk, er: Ansvarlighet (N.); Ansvarlig (Adj.)

*** sitat start ***

Ansvarlighet er et begrep som har eksplodert i popularitet de siste fem tiårene etter å ha vært relativt konsistent i århundrer. Den deler med innovasjon en dyp og mest glemt religiøs bakgrunn. Med kombinasjonen av moralsk ansvar beholder den fra sin kristne opprinnelse og den nå dominerende betydningen av oppgavebasert “telling”, tar ansvarlighet den populære fantasien av kvantifiserende dyd. Det er populært på både venstre og høyre i samtaler for bedrifts- eller myndighetsansvar. Den generelle regnskapskontoret, grunnlagt i 1921, endret navn i 2004 til regjeringens ansvarskontor (GAO), et subtilt skift som indikerer en betydelig endring i oppdraget. GAOs opprinnelige oppdrag var å søke “større økonomi eller effektivitet i offentlige utgifter.” Nå erstatter “offentlig” med “skattyter”, GAO undersøker “hvordan den føderale regjeringen bruker skattebetalers dollar.” Det nye oppdraget med vekt på privat skattyter over det felles offentlige, fanger fjendtligheten til offentlige utgifter som er typiske for en periode med konservative angrep på «stor regjering».

Kanskje sin største innflytelse har kommet i feltet av amerikansk offentlig utdanningsreform, særlig siden 2002, ikke et barn igjen etter loven. Som lovens innledning satte det, satte NCLB “for å lukke prestasjonsgapet med ansvarlighet, fleksibilitet og valg, slik at ingen barn blir etterlatt.” Utdanningsdepartementet forklarte ansvarlighet i 2003 på denne måten:

I henhold til lovens bestemmelser om ansvar, må stater beskrive hvordan de vil lukke prestasjonsgapet og sørge for at alle studenter, inkludert de som er dårlige, oppnår akademisk ferdighet. De må produsere årlige statlige og skole distrikt rapport kort som informerer foreldre og lokalsamfunn om stat og skole fremgang. Skoler som ikke gjør fremgang må gi tilleggstjenester, for eksempel gratis veiledning eller etterskolehjelp; ta korrigerende tiltak og, hvis det fortsatt ikke gjør tilstrekkelig årlig fremgang etter fem år, gjøre dramatiske endringer i måten skolen går på.

Dette er en nesten tautologisk definisjon, siden den definerer “ansvarlighet” ved hjelp av mekanismene for å være “ansvarlig.” Dette er en viktig kvalitet av begrepet, men: mens begrepet “ansvarlighet” antas moralsk ansvar, er ordet er definert i forhold til håndhevelsesmekanismer. Dette innebærer at ansvaret, som interessent, ikke kan skilles fra et byråkratis offentlige ansvarsevne – du er ansvarlig i den grad du kan oppfattes som ansvarlig.

Ansvarlighet trives i ledelseslitteraturen hvor ledere rettferdiggjør seg til hverandre ….

Ansvar, i summan, mandater måling og standardisering i feltene der den blir brukt. Selvfølgelig er måling og standarder ikke dårlig i seg selv, selv i utdanning, definert som det er i USA av brutto forskjeller i lokal skolefinansiering og lærerutdanning. Snarere er problemet i hvilken grad regnskapsregimer overser disse strukturelle hindringene, gitt deres avhengighet av data og håndheving på byråkrater som produserer beregningene. Overvei eksemplet på politisk ansvarlighet: Som politistyreren Alex Vitale har hevdet, er ansvarlige tiltak, som kroppskameraer og sivile klagefora, ikke bare underlagt myndighetens autoritet – som kan slå av kameraet eller stonewall styret – men også “la intakt de grunnleggende institusjonelle funksjonene til politiet, som aldri har vært om offentlig sikkerhet eller kriminalitetskontroll.” Ansvarlighet er et teknokratisk ideal for rettferdighet, begrenset av myndighet og privilegium for byråkrater som man er ansvarlig for. Min egen følelse, som lærer, har vært at administratorer bare begynner å regne ting når de trenger å rettferdiggjøre å bli kvitt dem. Når den kombinerer den moralske pliktfølelsen med den byråkratiske iver for kvantifisering, koder ansvaret for fiksjonen at moralske forpliktelser kan måles, beregnes og selvfølgelig verdsettes økonomisk.

*** Sitat slutt ***

Activitet

Det jeg har forstått av min lesning av ansvarlighet, er at det er en erstatning forrettferdighet, basert på “bønnetelling”. Mens noen bønner kan ignoreres eller settes i forskjellige poser, på grunn av deres farge eller form, kan “virtuelle bønner” legges til når det tjener “bønnetellerne”. Så det faktiske antall bønner talt, er akkurat det samme som de som “bønnetellerne” vil telle (eller fortalt til å telle).

Hvis folk tror at min kommentar er bare mytisk tenking, kan jeg forsikre dem om at dette ikke er tilfelle. En av mine venner fra 1970-tallet (som vil forbli anonym) jobbet for British Columbia Utdanningsdepartementet, som økonom. Hans jobb var å finne statistiske bevis for at investeringer i yrkesfag resulterte i en 10% avkastning på investeringen. Regjeringen var ikke interessert i den faktiske avkastningen på investeringen, eller noe annet mål for hensiktsmessighet. Hvis den virkelige avkastningen var mer, ville de sannsynligvis måtte starte flere yrkesklasser, hvis det var mindre, så måtte de kutte programmer. Så 10% ble ansett som en trygg figur!

Mens folk er fri til å gjøre det de vil ha med denne e-posten, er mitt håp at de vil reflektere over det. Hvis de føler seg tilbøyelige, kan de legge til sine egne kommentarer for å tilpasse den, kanskje til og med å slette min, og sende den videre til vennene sine. Vennligst send dem ut BCC for å beskytte folks personvern. Hvis de gjør det, vil jeg sette pris på å motta en kopi.

Keywords 001 Introduction

For many years, starting somewhere around 1994, we at Cliff Cottage have selected a virtues card, from a pack, each Sunday. We then focus on that virtue for that week. After more than 20 years, it is time for a change

For many years, starting somewhere around 1994, we at Cliff Cottage (the house we live in, in Norway) have selected a virtues card, from a pack, each Sunday. We then focus on that virtue for that week. After more than 20 years, it is time for a change

In 2019, I would like to reflect on a different set of words, taken from John Patrick Leary’s latest book, Keywords: The new language of capitalism. There are 47 sets of words. Set is used, because sometimes there is an adjective and a noun, or a noun and a verb, rather than just a noun or an adjective.

One change from the first original emails covering the introduction, accountability, artisans, best practices and brands is the use of quotations from John Patrick Leary’s book, Keywords: The new language of capitalism. Now, with the exception of the introduction, these direct quotes have been replaced with a paraphrasing of the content.

People who want the entire content, can order the book from: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/

Recipients are encouraged to casually discuss each keyword during the course of a week with family members and/or close friends. Discussions on Facebook, and other social media are seldom fruitful, although I have deliberately engaged in one discussion on Sunday, 2019-01-27 to see if there were any benefits. So far, all I have noticed, is that participants become entrenched in their original positions.

Many other topics than keywords are discussed in this web-log, including a more general one discussing the origins of keywords: https://keywords.mclellan.no/2018/12/31/keywords/

Language (n.) The music with which we charm the serpents guarding another’s treasure. Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary

Language, Ambrose Bierce tells us, cannot be trusted, and the sweeter it sounds, the less we should trust it. This is a book about words and their deceptions. The words in this book make up the twenty-first century language of capitalism, a metaphorically rich vernacular in which the defenders of private property speak of virtues and “vision,” where wage laborers become imaginative artists and agile athletes, and workplaces are transformed into vibrant ecologies and nurturing communities. In this language, the differences between creative resistance to capitalism and creative capitalism, health care and wellness, rebellion and disruption, and working-class power and the commercial slogan of empowerment can be difficult to grasp. These keywords are what Bierce might call charming words used to deprive others of their treasure: if we understood them better, perhaps we might rob them of their seductive power.

Keywords: The New Language of Capitalism is a field guide to the capitalist present, an era of unprecedented technological possibilities to bring humanity together—so we are regularly told, anyway—that also features privation on a scale comparable to Bierce’s late nineteenth-century Gilded Age. Are we living in a new stage of capitalism, though, or are today’s digital echnologies just a different version of our ancestors’ railroads and six-shooters, our Silicon Valley titans just the newest update to the ketchup and steel tycoons of an earlier, east-coast fantasy of wealth and opportunity? Identifying what makes our moment unique (or not) is no easy task, in part because we are living in it, and in part because the language we have to understand and describe our era’s inequality is itself one of the instruments of perpetuating it. How can we think and act critically in the present when the very medium of the present, language, constantly betrays us?

Nøkkelord 001 Introduksjon

I 2019 vil jeg reflektere over nøkkelord hentet fra John Patrick Learys siste bok, Nøkkelord: Kapitalismens nye språk, eller: Keywords: The Language of Capitalism. Det er 47 sett med ord. Sett brukes, fordi noen ganger er det et adjektiv og et substantiv, eller et substantiv og et verb, i stedet for bare et substantiv eller et adjektiv.

Jeg håper å sende ut en epost hver uke, og velkommen dine kommentarer tilbake igjen.

Mottakere vil motta mer enn en tweet, men mindre hele innholdet om ordet som finnes i boken. Hvis du vil ha hele innholdet, kan e-boken lånes av meg.

Mottakerne oppfordres til å diskutere “ordet” i løpet av uken med sine familiemedlemmer og / eller nære venner.

Hvis du ikke vil ha denne informasjonen, kan du enten ignorere / slette e-post fra meg med emnet Nøkkelord, eller du kan sende meg en e-post som ber om å bli fjernet fra adresselisten.

Jeg har også skrevet en blogg om disse nøkkelord på engelsk: https://keywords.mclellan.no/2018/12/31/keywords/

Beste hilsener,

Brock

John Patrick Leary 2018 Keywords: The Language of Capitalism

Introduksjon

Språk (n.) Musikken som vi beroliger slangerne, som vekter andres skatt.
Ambrose Bierce, Djevelens ordbok

Språk, Ambrose Bierce forteller oss, kan ikke stoles på, og jo søtere det høres, desto mindre bør vi stole på det. Dette er en bok om ord og deres bedrag. Ordene i denne boken utgjør det tyve-første århundres språk av kapitalisme, en metaforisk rik folkefortelling hvor forsvarerne av privat eiendom snakker om dyder og “visjon”, hvor lønnsarbeidere blir fantasifulle artister og smidige idrettsutøvere, og arbeidsplasser blir forvandlet til levende miljøer og nærende samfunn. På dette språket kan forskjellene mellom kreativ motstand mot kapitalisme og kreativ kapitalisme, helsevesen og velvære, opprør og forstyrrelse, arbeidsklassekraft og det kommersielle sloganet om empowerment være vanskelig å forstå. Disse nøkkelordene er hva Bierce kan kalle sjarmerende ord som brukes til å frata andre av deres skatt: hvis vi forsto ordene bedre, kanskje vi kanskje røve kapitalistene av deres forførende makt.

Nøkkelord: Kapitalismens nye språk er en feltveiledning for den kapitalistiske tilstedeværelsen, en epoke med enestående teknologiske muligheter for å bringe menneskeheten sammen – så vi fortelles jevnlig, uansett – det har også en beskjed som kan sammenlignes med Bierce sene nittende århundre Gilded Tidsalder. Er vi imidlertid i en ny fase av kapitalismen, eller er dagens digitale teknologier bare en annen versjon av våre forfedres jernbaner og vil vestens seks-skyttere, er våre Silicon Valley-titaner bare den nyeste oppdateringen til ketchup og stål tycoon av en tidligere øst-kyst fantasi av rikdom og mulighet? Å identifisere hva som gjør vårt øyeblikk unikt (eller ikke) er ikke en lett oppgave, delvis fordi vi lever i det, og delvis fordi språket vi må forstå og beskrive vår tids ulikhet er i seg selv et av virkemidlene til å videreføre det. Hvordan kan vi tenke og handle kritisk i nåtiden når dagens mellomstore språk sprer oss hele tiden?

Originalen:

Language (n.) The music with which we charm the serpents guarding another’s treasure.

Ambrose Bierce/ The Devil’s Dictionary

Language, Ambrose Bierce tells us, cannot be trusted, and the sweeter it sounds, the less we should trust it. This is a book about words and their deceptions. The words in this book make up the twenty-first century language of capitalism, a metaphorically rich vernacular in which the defenders of private property speak of virtues and “vision,” where wage laborers become imaginative artists and agile athletes, and workplaces are transformed into vibrant ecologies and nurturing communities. In this language, the differences between creative resistance to capitalism and creative capitalism, health care and wellness, rebellion and disruption, and working-class power and the commercial slogan of empowerment can be difficult to grasp. These keywords are what Bierce might call charming words used to deprive others of their treasure: if we understood them better, perhaps we might rob them of their seductive power.

Keywords: The New Language of Capitalism is a field guide to the capitalist present, an era of unprecedented technological possibilities to bring humanity together—so we are regularly told, anyway—that also features privation on a scale comparable to Bierce’s late nineteenth-century Gilded Age. Are we living in a new stage of capitalism, though, or are today’s digital technologies just a different version of our ancestors’ railroads and six-shooters, our Silicon Valley titans just the newest update to the ketchup and steel tycoons of an earlier, east-coast fantasy of wealth and opportunity? Identifying what makes our moment unique (or not) is no easy task, in part because we are living in it, and in part because the language we have to understand and describe our era’s inequality is itself one of the instruments of perpetuating it. How can we think and act critically in the present when the very medium of the present, language, constantly betrays us?

Keywords

The meaning of words changes. This does not present any significant problems if everyone in a culture adapts simultaneously to these changes, and it reflects agreed upon changes in that culture. Unfortunately, this scenario never happens. Rather, elites, usurp particular words, and impose their definitions on others, notably the marginalized, but everyone else as well.

Raymond Williams (1921 – 1988) examined the changing meanings of sixty words used in cultural discussions, beginning with the word culture itself. He intended this to appear as an appendix to Culture and Society (1958). That didn’t happen, but an extended 110 word version, including notes and essays was published as Keywords in 1976. By 1983 a new version added 21 additional words.

Keywords is not an abridged Oxford English Dictionary. It doesn’t include philological or etymological considerations. Instead, its focus is on meanings and contexts.

Culture, published in 1981, continued this work, but focused on this single concept, defined as “a realized signifying system” (p. 207). The work is especially concerned with cultural production, and reproduction (p. 206). What is a realized signifying system?

Chris Barker, Making Sense of Cultural Studies (2002), writes: “…a banknote signifies and constructs nationality while at the same time being used for purposes of exchange” (p. 34). Barker has difficulties understanding what an unrealized signifying system could be. Perhaps I can help him. It is best understood using a time machine. Lots of words have the potential to signify something, but do not yet do so. While the Han Dynasty introduced promissory notes in 118 BC, the first attempt to issue banknotes in Europe, occurred in Sweden in 1661. Before these dates, promissory notes and banknotes were unrealized signifying systems. In fact, for most of the world they were only realized much later.

Cultural materialism can best be described as a theoretical movement. Cultural materialists analyze how powerful elites use (historically) important texts to validate or inscribe certain values on the cultural imaginary, that is, that set of values, institutions, laws, and symbols common to a particular social group.

Political Shakespeare, edited by Jonathan Dollimore (1948 – ) and Alan Sinfield (1941 – 2017), is a seminal text of the cultural materialism movement, with four defining characteristics: Historical context, close textual analysis, political commitment and theoretical method. Most of us in the English-speaking world, have been required to read Shakespeare as part of our education and, in doing so, have adopted at least part of Shakespeare’s world view.

Neema Parvini (? – ) writes in Shakespeare and Contemporary Theory (2012) “… culture is irreducibly complex and made up at any given time by numerous cultures which are dynamically linked to each other. At any given time, there is not just one ‘culture’ but lots of different cultures with their own geneses in different epochal moments. Williams gives the examples of ‘feudal culture’, ‘bourgeois culture’ and ‘socialist culture’ which are all part of a cultural process. Culture is not static but processional and its different subcultures are in competition for hegemony. The status of a single subculture is liable to change over time. Williams identifies three different statuses: ‘residual’, ‘emergent’ and ‘dominant’. These are fairly self-explanatory. To use his examples: bourgeois culture is ‘dominant’ because it has hegemony; socialist culture is ‘emergent’, because it is still being created and perhaps may one day become dominant; and feudal culture is ‘residual’ because it is the remnant of a by-gone era, essentially an anachronism, but crucially it is still ‘active in the cultural process . . . as an effective element of the present’.” With reference to Raymond Williams, Marxism and Literature (1977) pp. 121 -2.

Fintan O’Toole (1958 – ), author and Irish Times journalist, notes, “Best thing that happened to me when I was young was that my father told me that everyone had read the complete works of Shakespeare by the time they were 14. It was life-transforming for me.” https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/dec/29/fintan-otoole-the-books-interview-brexit-english-nationalism

Unfortunately, I have never found Shakespeare life-transforming. Yes, there are days when even I can appreciate Shakespeare, although not usually at the theatre or even in book form. Much of my understanding comes from Coles Notes/ CliffsNotes, and the odd Classic Comic Book. My preferences are for: Scotland, PA, directed and written by William (Billy) Morrissette (1962 – ), a reworked MacBeth dark comedy made in 2001 in Nova Scotia, but set in 1975 at “Duncan’s Cafe”, a fast-food eatery in Scotland, Pennsylvania; and, Julie Taymore’s (1952 – ) 1999 Italian-American-British film interpretation of Titus Andronicus.

Not all commentators of Shakespeare are Marxist. The right-leaning, Foundation for Constitutional Government, Inc. notes his political importance in these terms, “… Shakespeare seems to have understood the concept of the regime (Greek: politeia) as developed by Plato and Aristotle—the idea that different forms of political organization encourage different forms of human development. Not every human possibility is equally available under every regime; it is difficult to be a Christian saint in pagan Rome (and as Hamlet shows, it is equally difficult to be a classical hero in Christian Europe). A monarchy will inevitably discourage certain forms of political activity (particularly those that challenge monarchy), while a republic may cause the very same activities to flourish. Shakespeare is generally praised for the immense variety of human types he portrays in his plays. Perhaps one of the keys to this success is the variety of regimes Shakespeare covers in his plays—from ancient pagan republics to modern Christian monarchies.” https://thegreatthinkers.org/shakespeare-and-politics/introduction/

Words continue to be important in political discussions. A Raymond Williams Society was established in 1989 to promote related work. Since 1998 it has published Key Words: A Journal of Cultural Materialism. Tony Bennett, Lawrence Grossberg and Meaghan Morris have edited, New Keywords: A Revised Vocabulary of Culture and Society. In addition, New York University Press has published several related books.

Keywords forAuthor(s)/ Editor(s)
American Cultural Studies (2014)Bruce Burgett, Glenn Hendlerr
Asian American Studies (2015)Cathy J. Schlund-Vials, Linda Trinh Võ, K. Scott Wong
Disability Studies (2015)Rachael Adams, Benjamin Reiss, David Serlin
Children’s Literature (2015)Philip Nel, Lissa Paul
Environmental Studies (2016)Joni Adamson, William A. Gleason, David N. Pellow
Media Studies (2017)Jonathan Gray, Laurie Ouellette
Latina/o Studies (2017)Lawrence La Fountain-Stokes, Nancy Raquel Mirabal, Deborah R. Vargas
African American Studies (2018)Erica R. Edwards, Roderick A. Ferguson, Jeffrey O.G. Ogbar

Most recently, in 2018, John Patrick Leary, in Keywords: The New Language of Capitalism, wrote: A keyword, according to the Oxford English Dictionary (hereafer the OED), is “a word serving as a key to a cipher or the like.” In his 1976 classic Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society, the Welsh literary critic Raymond Williams laid out the foundational vocabulary of modern British society in a wide-ranging project of critical historical semantics. He defined keywords as “binding words in certain activities and their interpretation,” elements of a living vocabulary that shape and reflect a society in movement. Keywords show what knowledge ties this society together, and how this common knowledge changes over time. As both Williams and the OED make clear, keywords are therefore “key” in a double sense: they are important, and they unlock something hidden.

Where should we be using keywords?

On Monday 2018-11-26, GM CEO Mary Barra announced cuts, explaining them as: “The actions we are taking today continue our transformation to be highly agile, resilient, and profitable, while giving us the flexibility to invest in the future, …” This transformation involves the discontinuance of six models, closure of five factories, and the lay-off of up to 14 000 workers in North America. This figure includes 3 300 blue-collar workers in USA, and 2 600 in Canada, in addition to 8 000 white-collar workers.

John Patrick Leary responded to this by tweeting, “Language was pronounced dead at the scene.” Resilient and flexible are two of Leary’s 47 keyword topics.

I have just started reading Leary’s Keywords. They are being read as published, in alphabetical order, except where a topic is too tempting to resist. DIY (Do-It-Yourself), is one such seductress. It begins with, “In a 2014 column in the New York Times, architecture critic Jayne Merkel argued that the underfunded New York City Housing Authority could address its vast backlog of unfinished repairs by training residents to make their own repairs.” and ends with “DIY’s present mixture of autonomous self-determination with entrepreneurial self-reliance is what makes propositions like Merkel’s so insidious. Rent-paying tenants of public housing have every right to expect their landlord to “do it” for them; in this case, the enthusiastic voluntarism of “do it yourself” has become more like an indifferent invitation to “do it your damn self.” Is the prospect of student debt preventing you from pursuing higher education? Find a cheaper alternative with “DIY education” in the form of free online classes and Project Gutenberg. Can’t afford a home mortgage? Buy some land and build yourself a tiny house. DIY celebrates individualistic substitutes for state obligations or political solutions, like free public education or affordable housing. In this way, DIY can become, like the more politicized versions of artisanal and maker culture, a practice of consumption masquerading as a practice of citizenship.”

The importance of keywords, by whatever author that attracts a person, is that it encourages everyone to examine how words are being used to manipulate thought processes. We have a duty to ourselves to be critical of everything that we are fed, intellectually, emotionally as well as physically. Some products are nutritious, but increasingly many are simply empty calories.