Share Spotlight: Ditch the Resolutions: Make SMART Goals Instead

This week's Share Spotlight comes from Verily Magazine:
Ditch the Resolutions: Make SMART Goals Instead

New Year's Resolutions never seem to turn out the way we plan, and, quite frankly, I've given up making them. Instead, I follow something very close to the guidelines outlined by Verily Magazine.

I start a new goal whenever I feel that I have the others I've made down to a habit. I'm learning new languages, doing yoga, and keeping up with the news (via Twitter, but still).

In the next year, I want to keep up with all of that and find a part time job. Which means I need to start making goals to get me there.

What do you want to accomplish this coming year? Do you have any other tips for sticking to those plans?



I also would like to ask for recommendations. Is there a gap in the kinds of posts I share on the Share Spotlight? Recommend a blog for me to follow!

Protests in Ukraine

Protests have gone on in Kiev for the last month, hoping to reverse the government's decision to move away from the EU.

I don't know if you've heard, but there have been massive protests in Ukraine's capital city, Kiev. After moving toward friendlier relations with the European Union, Ukraine's president, Viktor Yanukovych, announced in late November that Ukraine would not sign the agreement with the EU. Protests began almost immediately.

From Wikipedia

Called Euromaidan, protesters have taken up residence in Independence Square, calling for the resignation of the President and generally decrying the corruption of the government. Riot police made an attempt on November 30 to remove the protesters, but the resulting violence only strengthened national and international support for the protestors.

Protesters in Independence Square, by Nwssa Gnatoush via Wikipedia

The protestors have blockaded Independence Square and two rallies have gathered over 200,000 protesters. The protests have been going strong for over a month now and have garnered support from many of the countries of the EU, the US, and numerous organizations in Ukraine, including some state run museums.

Have you heard about these protests? What do you think should happen next?

For some more information, check out:
Q&A: Stand-off in Ukraine over EU Agreement from BBC News
"Our History Museums will Include the Events of These Days" from The Uncataloged Museum

Share Spotlight: Life Isn't Always Like a Christmas Movie

This week's Share Spotlight comes from the Busted Halo blog:
Life Isn't Always Like a Christmas Movie

The Holiday Season is wonderful, but it can also be bit difficult, particularly if you are far from home or the only single girl left in your family.

Luckily for me, neither of these things are true this year, but this list from Busted Halo is a great reminder that you are in charge of your attitude during the holidays. The holidays often mean an incredible amount of stress, but how we respond to that stress can make the difference for ourselves and those around us. You can make the line at the Post Office fun or miserable, sit at the side of the party or join in.

How do you make sure that you keep an upbeat attitude during the holidays or other sometimes difficult times?

Christmas Time in Scandinavia

So, Tuesday you got a Share Spotlight about Las Posadas. Today, you get post about Christmas in another part of the world!

Ever since reading about it in the American Girl book Kirsten's Surprise (yes, that was a long time ago and yes, I do want to read it again every Christmas) I've loved the celebrations of Saint Lucia that happens in Scandinavia.

Saint Lucia of Syracuse (St. Lucy to most of the rest of the world) was an early Christian martyr. Her name means light and, with her feast day the 13th of December, she came to be associated with midwinter celebrations of the return of longer days.

In many Scandinavian countries, a girl dresses in a white robe with a red sash and wears a wreath of candles on her head (though these days the candles are most likely to be electric, thank goodness). She often distributes "St. Lucia buns" or other baked goods. Usually, a traditional song is sung, with lyrics about how St. Lucia overcame the darkness.

St. Lucia celebration, from Wikipedia Commons.

In Sweden, it is common for the eldest girl in the family to play this role while other Scandinavian countries tend to have a single girl play St. Lucia for the town or region. To be picked to be St. Lucia is considered a great honor.

In Italy, she is celebrated as the patron saint of Syracuse in Sicily, and her day is National Day on the island of St. Lucia in the Caribbean. Italian and Scandinavian immigrants also brought the tradition to the United States and celebrations can be found particularly in the Midwest.

Wherever her day is celebrated, she stands for the triumph of light over darkness.


"But you know happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, when one only remembers to turn on the light." --Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Share Spotlight: Celebrating Las Posadas

 This week's Share Spotlight comes from the Busted Halo blog:
Celebrating Las Posadas: "Enter Pilgrims; I Did Not Recognize You."

I've been wanting to do a post about Christmas traditions around the world, but with my busy schedule, I just haven't had time to do the research.

Luckily for me, Busted Halo is ready with some information on Las Posadas. Las Posadas is a custom in Mexico, and with some Mexican Americans, in the weeks leading up to Christmas. I'm most familiar with it from the movie, The Three Caballeros, (yeah, the one starring Donal Duck from the forties), but I've always loved the tradition.

People dress up as Mary and Joseph and travel from house to house, knocking on doors and singing, until finally, they arrive back at the first house and are let inside. It's a great show of community and of faith.

What traditions do you have for this time of year, Christian or otherwise? Are there any traditions you've heard of that you'd like me to look up and write about?

Imagine What You'll Know Tomorrow

I'm swamped with end of semester work, so this week, y'all get a post about... my homework.

Today, my 12 to 14 page paper is due. It's the last major project of the semester and, Praise be to God, it's written. I still need to edit it before four o'clock, but at least I have something to turn in.

This paper has been a long and bumpy road for me. I have an anthropology background and I'm writing for a history professor. I've learned that we don't always think the same way and communication has been a consistent problem (seems to be a theme this semester, in fact).

There are some good things, though. I love my topic.

I'm writing on how archaeologists (and historians, and museums) look at how people got to the Americas. That theory you learned in school? That people walked across the Beringia Land Bridge roughly 14,000 years ago and then came down the ice free corridor into lower North American and eventually all the way to Tierra del Fuego?

Yeah, it's wrong.

Turns out people have been in the Americas for a lot longer than that and the archeological community can no longer deny the mounting evidence.

But what's really fascinating is what's happening now. The Beringia theory has been around for more than fifty years with virtually no opposition. That means that archaeologists are working almost from scratch to create new theories and widening their net to collect new evidence. It's the scientific theory in progress!

Sorry, minor geek out there. I find it fascinating.

If you want to learn about these new theories, I would suggest 1491 by Charles C. Mann for a good general Pre-Columbian history of the Americas. Mann is a personable writer that has pretty much made his living interpreting science history for the public.

If you are a little braver, try Across Atlantic Ice by Dennis Stanford and Bruce Bradley. It's a good bit more technical, though they do attempt to explain their terms, and really meant for archaeology students. However, their theory is fascinating and well worth the investigation.

Find any other neat books or theories? Let me know!

"Fifteen hundred years ago everybody knew the Earth was the center of the universe. Five hundred years ago, everybody knew the Earth was flat, and fifteen minutes ago, you knew that humans were alone on this planet. Imagine what you'll know tomorrow." --Kay, Men in Black

Share Spotlight: Museum Marathon

This week's share spotlight comes from a UK blog, Mad Cap Science:
Museum Marathon....16 Miles, 26 Museums and One Suffragette

On December 7th, a group of intrepid individuals participated in a Museum Marathon in London. They ran/walked 16 miles and visited 26 (or 27) museums over the course of a day to raise money for guide dogs.

I love this event on two levels.

First, it's a charity event, much like other marathons are. They allow people to give their time to help a great cause.

Second, what a great way to introduce people to new museums! Only been to the Science Museum? Come in and try the Natural History Museum! Love the V&A? Check out the Sir John Soane's Museum!

Where can you see this working in the US? I think New York City is a great candidate, but where else might people be able to take a whirlwind tour of the city museums?

Share Spotlight: Accessibility to Inclusion: The Next Step

This week's Share Spotlight comes from Museum Matters, the official blog of my Intro to Museums class:

Accessibility to Inclusion: The Next Step

This week's topic in my Intro to Museum Studies class was inclusion: how do we make sure everyone can enjoy our museum? 

It's an important question.

Inclusion can mean a lot of different things because it can refer to a number of different groups. If you want to include an ethnic group, you'll do different things than if you want to include a group of people who are sight-impaired.

But whatever you do, it's important that it's sustainable. A special exhibit smacks of tokenism. While it may draw visitors in once, is it really likely to keep them coming back?

Do you have any suggestions? What programs or infrastructure do different groups need to feel comfortable in a museum? What have other fields done to promote inclusion?

November Book Roundup

Books, books, and more books! Okay, there are only three, but here are the recommendations for the month.

Since I just can't run a blog without talking about books, at the end of every month, I'll give you what books I've been reading and what I've thought about them. This month has been a little slow, with school kicking into high gear, so I only have three books for you.

Amaryllis by Jayne Castle

            An early book of Jayne Castle’s (who also writes as Jayne Ann Krentz and Amanda Quick), this is a quick sci-fi romance. I can tell that it’s a bit less polished than her more recent romance novels, but it still contains all the suspense and, well, romance, that I love from her other books. This is the first in a trilogy about strong psychic talents and the female prisms they need to focus those talents.

The Lost Hero by Rick Riordan

            Man do I ever love YA, and Rick Riordan is one of the best. The first in the Heroes of Olympus Series, the sequel to the much loved Percy Jackson and the Olympians, The Lost Hero exhibits all of Rick Riordan’s amazing wit. A whole new cast of characters joins the series in this book, along with some old favorites. This is my second time reading this book and it is just as great. Knowing what I do now, it’s amazing to see how things are set up for the following books.

The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker

            I must admit that this book took me a while to get into. The premise is very interesting, but the action seems a bit disconnected. However, Wecker ties everything up nicely in the end, weaving in seemingly unimportant characters and events. The ending is a bit ambiguous, but just enough so that the reader can decide some of the details for herself without feeling like there was no proper resolution. All in all, a good read.

What have you been reading? Tell me in the comments! I'm always on the lookout for new books!

A New Way to Follow!

Follow my blog with Bloglovin

In my other post today, I mentioned that I use the Bloglovin app to keep on top of the many blogs I follow. Well, now you can follow me there, too!

Share Spotlight: Partners in Conservation

November is Native American Heritage month and the US Fish and Wildlife Service honors the impact of the tribes who work with them.

---
This week's share spotlight comes from the US Fish and Wildlife Service Pacific Region:
Partners in Conservation--Native American Tribes Contribute Essential Data to Elwha Watershed Restoration

I kind of grew up in the US Fish and Wildlife Service, the arm of the Department of the Interior that runs Wildlife Refuges, the places that are more for the animals than the people, as opposed to the National Parks, which tend to be more for the people than the animals.

This week's share spotlight showcases something that the USF&WS is getting increasingly awesome at: partnering with the community to make a difference. They know that conservation only works when the whole community is behind it, and the best way to get them there is to involve them, let them participate, learn, and see the results of their actions.

In this case, the major partner is a Native American tribe in the Pacific Northwest. Tribe members are essential to recording the data necessary for the USF&WS to monitor changes in the area.

Where have you seen Native Americans (or anyone) making a difference in conservation? Have you been to your local Wildlife Refuge? Odds are good there is one nearby.

The Holocaust Memorial Museum: Some Connection Required

After a visit to the Holocaust Memorial Museum, I came out feeling that I was missing something essential: a human connection.

A few weeks ago, I went to DC on a field trip for my Master’s program. One of the focal points of the trip was the Holocaust Memorial Museum. We had spent one class talking about articles and books about the museum and learning its history so that we would be prepared to study the museum as museum professionals. Quite frankly, I was not looking forward to this part of our trip to begin with, and the reading did not make me any more optimistic.

I am sorry to say that my expectations were realized.

Perhaps one of the problems was the crowds. We got there about ten minutes before the museum opened and there was already a line halfway around the block. Add the school groups to the tourists, and the crowds grew to the point of claustrophobia. This was only exacerbated by the way the museum was designed. The first exhibit space is a long narrow hallway with exhibits on both sides. It created a bottleneck and endless frustration as people stopped to look at exhibits and held up everyone behind them. Maybe I would have had a different experience if I had gone on a day with fewer people, and, if you go, I encourage you to find an off day.

But even the removal of the crowds could not have fixed what I found to be the fundamental problem with the museum: a lack of humanity.

For a museum completely about a people’s erasure of identity, it did a very poor job establishing that identity in the first place. Visitors are taken up an elevator and dumped into Hitler’s rise to power. There is no celebration of Jewish life before the war, no way to connect to these people as people. Without that visceral connection to the victims of the Holocaust, the museum becomes a horror show, or, if you can get past the horrors, a history lesson.

There were only three places in the entire museum that I felt something like that connection. The first was the Tower of Faces, photographs from the Eishishok Shetl (the name for a Jewish village). The exhibit lines a three story tower, looking like an album plastered to the walls, and ends with a startling message: Today, there are no Jews in Eishishok.

The second place was on the two glass bridges over the main hall. The first is etched with the first names of people who died in the Holocaust while the second is etched with the names of villages that were destroyed by the Holocaust. These are easy to connect to: “That could be my name up there,” or maybe “My name is up there” and “That could be my town on this wall.”

Finally, the Identity Cards. Visitors receive a card when they enter the museum, picking from piles sorted into Male and Female. It tells the story of the person in the card as you move through the museum. The cards are often criticized because they wind up in the trash as soon as the visitor leaves the museum, but for me, the card was where I connected most; I spent most of my time in the museum wondering if the person whose life I held in my hand had survived and her presence became a constant companion through the museum.

If you get the chance, go to the Holocaust Memorial Museum. Everyone should go once. But bring the personal connections with you. Learn about these people before you go. Maybe then, you won’t get wrapped up in the horrors, but rather the loss—of people, of culture, of serenity. And then you can walk out of the museum feeling the truth of their motto: Never Again.

Share Spotlight: Do You Ever Feel Like Wonder Woman?

 From When You Work At a Museum:
The opening reception for the new exhibition starts in 10 minutes, you’re wearing a dress and high heels, and you have to climb a 16 ft. ladder to rehang an installation. What do you do?

 As an "emerging museum professional" (at least that's what they called me at the conference I went to a few weeks ago) I am still learning the ins and outs of the field. For me, one of the big ones has been professional dress. In Texas, nice blue jeans and a pretty blouse are considered "business casual." Not so in New York (or anywhere else, for that matter), and so I have to sympathize with the occasional absurdity of women's fancy wear.

But! Every once in a while, you do get to feel like Wonder Woman.

I am distinctly reminded of a quote I once saw:
"Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, except backwards and in high heels."

What do you think? When have you felt like Wonder Woman lately?
Bonus points if the story involves fancy dress. :)

Share Spotlight: Surprised in Rome: Bravo Palazzo Massimo!

I've really gotten interested in blogs recently and currently follow 17 blogs of various types, from fashion and lifestyle to Catholic to comics to museums to Spanish language. I've got some wide interests. :) But I thought that it would be neat if I picked a post each week to highlight. I'll start with a link to the blog post, then tell you what I think of it.


 This week's share spotlight comes from The Uncataloged Museum.

Surprised in Rome: Bravo Palazzo Massimo!

I love museums (obviously, I'm in a Museum Studies Program) and I love to travel, but the two don't always come together as often as I'd like. This post was a vicarious way for me to travel to Italy, but was also a bit more than that.

As a budding museum professional, how a museum is presented to the public is incredibly important. As museums have shifted to an educational focus, the public becomes the primary audience, and if they aren't getting anything out of the museum, the museum isn't doing its job.

Imagine my surprise to read that Italy, the Mecca for art museum lovers, was so poorly interpreted! But Linda Norris, the author of The Uncataloged Museum blog, has found a gem. Palazzo Massimo sounds like a wonderful visit, whether you are a museum professional or not.

What do you think? If you've been abroad, how do foreign museums differ from American museums in interpretation? What about museums in the US? What museum have you been to that struck you as a gem?

Senior Thesis

How can I have more than 35 pages of combined writing, outlines, and sources and still feel as if I might not make my draft deadline next week?

Welcome to senior thesis.

Whereas the rest of the country is on Spring Break, I have just retreated into the Thesis Hermitage, where all I do is research, write, and edit. Why? Because, to quote the dean of my college, “Your Spring Break will suck and mine won’t.”

Want to know what writing a thesis is like? Check out this Tumblr. It’s pretty darn accurate.

My thesis is on a topic near and dear to my heart: how the museum experience is affected by the physical structure of a museum. And now you see the problem inherent in theses. They are, by and large, boring to the majority of the population. Which means that roommates, classmates, and random strangers all begin to get glassy eyes after about 2 minutes of conversation on a thesis topic. Theses are long, in depth, well researched bodies of literature. At least they are for liberal arts majors. Other disciplines have creative theses that take other forms, but for me and most of the people I know, it comes as a long, long, paper. 40 pages is pretty average. And that’s just the writing, not the sources, miscellaneous direction pages, or figures, tables, and graphs. It’s a lot. And it will tear you down and remake you.

Thesis writing goes something like this:

1. You begin in the excited stage where you love your topic and are convinced that everything that you write is amazing.

2. Then you calm yourself into the working stage where you know that what you write is going to need editing, but is still basically good (this is the ideal stage).

3. Next, you find yourself falling into the pessimistic stage where you are writing because you know you need to, but you’re sure you’re going to have to scrap just about everything and write it over.

4. This is followed by the denial stage where you don’t know why you are writing a thesis because obviously you don’t know how to write and this topic is stupid anyway (this is the bottom of the barrel).

5. At the bottom of the barrel is the pity stage where you know that, despite hating your topic and your thesis, you know you’ll still have to write it (this stage often involves tears).

6. Then begins the upswing stage where you start to talk to someone about your topic and get animated again because you remember why you chose this topic in the first place (this stage often involves a breakthrough overcoming a major brain block).

7. Which brings us back to the excited stage where you remember why you wanted to write a thesis in the first place, and begins the cycle all over again.

The run time of this cycle varies from person to person, but I’ve found I tend to run about a week and half. Which means I have one weekend of serious work where I get tons done and then a week where I can’t hardly get anything done because my topic doesn’t even really make sense to me anymore.

It’s vicious and not for the faint of heart.

However, should you attempt it, here is some advice my advisor gave me that is still the best advice on thesis writing I’ve ever heard: 

“There are two types of theses. Good ones, and finished ones.”