It is too hot and despite 744 friends in Facebook, Erkan feels lonely because people are either busy or in vacation. This is the 32nd summer in my life and I am yet again not ready to encounter this damn season. Crazy ideas: Everyone must work. Why people go to vacation all the time. There must be a fixed amount of time, that people should go to vacations. Otherwise, we must all work. I don't like to be alone in the office:) In fact, this is damn academia. Too much freedom:)

Hans and Özgür are two buddies who are helping out though. Special thanks to them. Malta collective seems to have collapsed. It all started with the formula. I had formulated a grade system for our playing cards and since then playing cards had turned into a competition, not any more entertainment. This created hostilities, frustrations. Those who weren't successfull began to whine. All began to play for the score. And now we do not come together anymore. That's the greatest blow in my life. Probably because of this lack of Collective in my life any more, i had become disarmed and fell in a desperate love recently. It is over now, but it was an exhausting period. Damn me, if i ever fall in love.

Nurdan is back at her parent's home which means i am all alone in my apartment. Although I missed to be alone, I am struggling to survive. More shopping needed.

However, Erkan is back after a few therapeutic days. Special thanks again for Hans (and Özlem) and Özgür (Özge-but not that Özge who finds my blog boring). I will keep my blog as I like and in the mean time there is one constant in my life: Dissertation writing. Despite all whining here I am working on it everyday and I guess I like what I produce. I was talking to Can, who happened to be my student this year, with whom I also coordinate Public Relations Club activities and who happens to be the son of the professor who happened to be the very first professor for whom I had ever worked as a teaching assistant! Oh yeah I was talking to Can about the Leninist organization model. The only thing I liked about it was the iron willed determination in the revolutionary process whatever happened to the party. At one point in my life I found this very inhumane but I feel like a revolutionary when I continue writing despite all whining. ehehehe strange connections. all due to summer heat.

Some things to be dealt with:

* Learn new military regulations and see if you can ever postpone it again:)

* Do something about the giant translation project you are coordinating.  

* Pay credit card bills. Grrrr

What I want now?

To drive as I listen to the new selection of songs I just burnt.

  I have not attended any of my own graduations. Here is my very first one in the gown, as a lecturer, attending graduation...

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 Our first year students in PR department are presenting all day on social flows in Istanbul tomorrow. The program here. Most of the talk will be in Turkish... This will also be the first activity of Public Relations Club in which I happen to the academic advisor:)

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It has been two weeks now that I wake up with a list of things to do and stressed immediately as they cannot be done that day.

31 March and 1 April are deadlines for several significant conferences and i still cannot react.

Towards the end of April, I am invited to a talk in US and i haven't started visa renewal tasks which is a real burden. At least my paper is ready for that:)

There are two related projects on Hate Speech issues and one is pressing as I have to prepare a project proposal real soon.

My dissertation writing has really slowed down recently.

A paper has to be started to be revised for EASA Media network.

Tens of emails to be replied.

AND some more spontanous issues. In the last two days, i did not like my performance in teaching. Fridays are very loaded. Six hours of teaching in two courses. The previous Friday was fantastic. But yesterday in my Rhetoric course, nothing productive:(

Daily traffic stress. Financial problems at existential levels (!) blah blah blah

And in exactly 5 hours, there comes another BJK-FB derby!!! Because of all these stress sources, I could not even be excited for the game:( Well, i cannot attend the game. Dammit why I haven't bought the season pass! And state of Beşiktaş is so miserable. FB is the favorite of the game....

and friends. Well, there are at least good friends i have.      

Continue reading "Towards a breakdown..." »

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I am off to Brussels on 12 March. I will be attending

EuroBlog 2008: Brussels March 13-15

The Euprera EuroBlog2008 Symposium, Social media and the future of PR: New ideas, new research, new business, takes place in Brussels on March 13-15.

• Programme

I am working on my presentation entitled as "Introducing New Media to new Public Relations Students". I have been investing on cybercultural issues for a while but there will be a new angle here. How new media can be integrated into educational practices.

Like all my previous trips, I am anxious. I feel better the moment I arrive. But before that there are always details to deal with and these make me exhausted. Throughout this week, I had to get up early and in addition to lecturing in three courses, i have attended two very important workshops/brainstorming sessions for new projects and one regular meeting for an ongoing project, all of which lasted more than three hours. There were the administrational stuff, trip related issues, emotional ups and downs, usual evening card tournament sessions, readings and football related high tensioned moments.

after coming from the morning workshop, before i could have a nap, my parents showed up. i am always tense when I drive with dad, and after five months i had my another small accident. well, there is not even material cost involved this time but this was a blow to my driving pride (!).

anyway, before leaving the apartment for some socially necessary engagements,  i leave you with some posts from a Public Relations focused blogger:

Continue reading "Getting ready for EuroBlog 2008..." »

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In another bad weather I decide to join the crowds in İnönü. It is snowing in Istanbul. I will now rush to Taksim to deal with some annoying visa issues (I am applying for Belgium visa) and after that I will go to Beşiktaş to have the routine after a few months. I was in the game with Sivasspor in the first half and since then I am away from the stadium. With last week's defeat to Kayserispor, Beşiktaş shows signs of instability again- which is also a routine- and it is thus the hard times again that I should stand by Beşiktaş:)

In the mean time, we had a faculty party last night and here are some more photos from the event.  

And there is an important development in Turkish football:  

NEW ERA AND NEW BOSS IN TURKISH FOOTBALL(SOCCER)!...

By Ahmet Turgut

Hasan Dogan has been elected the 37th president of the Turkish Football(soccer) Association (TFF)in Ankara....

Continue reading "Back to the stadium" »

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In our first foundational year course, Hayri Fehmi Yılmaz as an art historian focuses on rituals of Istanbul in his two-day seminar. The foci of rituals throughout Istanbul's history... He held the first one today, and we all loved his presentation. I later learnt that he is associated with a Foundation called CULTURAL AWARENESS FOUNDATION. 

Here is what the foundation does, which seems to be quite active in a substantive manner- and check out for more in their website.  

CULTURAL AWARENESS FOUNDATION

OUR FOUNDATION

Our Foundation -Cultural Awareness Foundation- (CAF) was established on March4, 2003 by 148 founding members from many diverse professions like academics, businessmen, artists, archeologists, architects and art historians. There are also 114 associates of CAF who cooperate with our founders in almost all areas of activities and responsibilities. Our headquarters are in Istanbul....

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A relatively calm and peaceful way the day started: We had a one hour session, in which several presentations were offered for PUB 149 course. One major presentation was about the urban legends related to the Borax mineral reserves in Turkey. Well, we could not really deconstruct the legends but we hopefully have a better understanding on the issue:)

 Well, that peaceful start has been disrupted in early afternoon as I learn that I won't be lecturing for MED 204 course. This is a course designed as an introduction to popular culture theories. It would be a follow up of PUB 203 which covers a range of issues in the history of western thought (from the Enlightenment) until the emergence of posttructuralism. So MED 204 would start where PUB 203 ended in my imagined world but since I am not a member of Media department and this course is owned by that department, nobody thought that I could be assigned. Seemingly there are some issues of misunderstanding or miscommunication. Anyway, my initial frustration is over and i will then satisfy myself with a new course: MED 432:

PUB 432 - Communication and Persuasion

The course focuses on communication skills such as persuasion, negotiation and attitude change. Students will become familiar with a variety of social-psychological theories of attitude change and persuasion. Those theories will also be applied to a variety of communication situations. Students will be given real-life situations to develop their oral and written presentation skills. 

Since I heard about the course, I am quite excited. In this elective course, the first half will be more theoretical and rhetoric and propaganda oriented and the second part will be more practical with presentations and guests.

This little afternoon episode tired me. Instead of staying at the office and peacefully work, I will go to my Malta shelter to do some reading and to wait for the game. Well, I seem to be ditched at that front, too. I could not find a ticket so far and i will then miss the stadium atmosphere...

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"A city that has a metro [subway]" 

- it could be...  

From a first year lecture...

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Still dreamy with the Liverpool victory.... 

In our first year course, PUB 149, which is quite experimental, we hosted Amar Bakhsi for the first hour today. His quest for how America is perceived in Turkey continues. Most of my students were hesitant to talk in English and when they talked, mostly they made generalizations. This is exactly what we want to escape. Our objective in the long run: argumentation based on empirical data. This is a life long project in fact:)

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January 25, 2005

Continue reading ""some radical changes in my research strategy..." »

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December 29, 2004

December 28, 2004

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Continue reading "Student' discovery, meeting with Prof. Sirman...." »

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November 20, 2004

Winter starts practically

November 18, 2004

'hypothesis crisis'

Our extended deadline to find an hypothesis for the term project ends tomorrow (For MED 391 class) So between 12:00 and 18:00, I was surrounded with helpless students who cannot produce acceptable hypotheses. I just felt as helpless as they are since Prof Isen rarely accepts student proposals....

Now my office is silent and i am alone and after checking my email accounts, I will start working on my weekly report for Interpress... So I will have more time tomorrow to assist student proposals...

November 15, 2004

First two days of bairam

This is the second day of Bairam. I might benefit from visiting my relatives this time. I met a guy/nephew?, Suleyman, who is a webmaster. He promised me to prepare a website related to my research and teach me how to update it... I think this will be easier than starting to learn how to design a website:)
Last night all children of the nuclear family headed by me went to see a movie: G.O.R.A. In 90 years of turkish cinema, this film is the most expensively produced one: 5 million dollars. It is a teaser movie of popular science fiction movies like Matrix, Star Wars and Fifth Element.
just to have a look [the site has english pages]:
http://www.gorafilm.com/
I am satisfied with this movie but I believe most of the humor is based on Turkish language. We had to find more than an hour to find a good seat, and while we were waiting we insisted on Hakan, my brother, to admit that he has a girl-friend. He did not admit but we are all suspicious about his constant text-messaging with a girl called Esra...

Ana, don't worry about your grammar mistakes. I feel sorry for all of you for being exposed to my English:(

November 14, 2004

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Gypsy boys-Truffaut movie etc

While I was waiting for the shuttle to go to the Dolapdere campus from the Kustepe campus, I happened [�happen to� is my favorite verb today] to eavesdrop chatting among the gypsy parking �employees�. They communicate through soccer. Soccer is a language for basic communication. Why no one studies soccer as a cultural practice in Turkey? I know there is a growing interest for soccer among intellectuals but I don�t think there is still a good ethnographic work on the role of soccer in Turkey. With my growing interest in the subject, I see that I have an expanding ability to produce immediate communication with more people from different backgrounds.. I know, I know this is a clich� topic and I do my own contribution to the clich� production.

We have screened Truffaut�s Fahrenheit 451 in the MED 101 class- first year Introduction to the Mass Media class- today. It is a disaster. Students were bored to death and I happen to face student unrest. This class is taught in 4 sections with 3 professors and 4 TAs. I am one of the TAs. While we were discussing what to screen, I objected to screen this movie but I was part of the minority. In fact, I was the only one to object. I like Truffaut and I see a joy of life in most of his films. But I find his attempts to deal with science fiction (oh the Alphaville case) helpless� We could easily find another movie which would have an easy narrative and which would not have a caricaturized TV bashing. But this is all about student-bashing. I begin to believe that most of my colleagues choose to underline their difference, to prove their intellectual superiority through making life hell for students (and then claiming how stupid they are) or through blind criticism of mass media products. I believe there is a relation between these two processes.

A columnist from Sabah, Emre Akoz castigated this attitude in a TV forum recently. I mean, how intellectuals position themselves through a constant non-constructive TV criticism. I think he was quiet successful in the polemic against 3 scholars, one of which happens to be the professor I am TAing for:)

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