Tuesday, September 2, 2008

girl, you better work it

blurring boundaries where they need to be blurred and containing them where they need to be contained...

just now as i was creating my account and signing in for my first blog post, i made a selection about which email account i would use for this blog. i chose my clemson.edu account after saying to myself, "self, this is a part of your professionalization at clemson, so you better use your professional domain address -- just to be safe." i started to use my netzero account, which is my general email address, but decided against it because of my hesitation to invite the professional so fully into my personal. alas, any such separation is but a pipedream because in the interest of saving time and energy (thus increasing my opportunities for liesure pursuit), i always end up having all my clemson email forwarded to my personal netzero account anyway.

in reality, what is this thing i'm calling leisure anyway? i can't remember the last time i had any meaningful social interaction that didn't involve some professional connection for me or the other person. for instance,the last half dozen or so parties i've attended were all given by professional acquaintances. i first met my significant other while he was at the court house practicing law. my best friend and i first set up our connection during the last call at my favorite restaurant after he finished waiting tables for the night.

basically, my questions involve the authenticity and effectiveness of professional boundaries. do they work? should they? and is there any safety in these constructions? why must i percieve danger through these blurrings? moreover, i can't figure out if my impulse to devise these walls emanate from my carefully cultivated social epistemic approach or whether or not they are the remnants of a deeply internalized indoctrination into the protestant work ethic. or maybe it's something else.

well i guess i'll devote this semester (and i'm sure many subsequent ones) to working out this and many other problems.

p.s. the manifesto i incorrectly cited in class as the "maker's manifesto" is actually called the "owner's manifesto."

1 comment:

Curtis said...

Nicole- Seems like one of life's greatest battles--defining boundaries for ourselves. Aside from the debate in which play theorists engage about the intersection of work and leisure (and the heated professionals who absolutely abhor the idea), I would have to argue that the only "true" (I must be careful with that word) boundaries are those we internalize within ourselves. Not some superficial boundary our employers or theorists establish. This, of course, means we need to understand ourselves, our limits, our expectations, and what we consider leisure. If your professional life is leisure-esque to you, I would wonder if your definition of leisure would be blurred within your personal definition of work. For me, I HAVE to separate the two. That's not to say I don't have fun at school or that I don't work away from school, but there must be distinct separation for me.

This brings up an interesting question, though, about the boundaries that exist in every aspect of our lives--how much does family, religion, leisure, and work overlap, and where and when are the boundaries crossed?