The Long Road

Photo of the Paterno Statue, January 2012 Photo taken by Paterno Fellow Carolyn LaskyOriginally uploaded by LAUSatPSU Dear Liberal Arts Student Colleagues: Joe Paterno said that he wanted to be remembered as an educator who made Penn State a better place. However impressive his record as a football coach, his most lasting and meaningful legacy remains the contributions he has made to enrich the educational lives of our students. Nowhere has this legacy been more palpably felt or more deeply appreciated than in the College of the Liberal Arts. Joe, Sue, and the entire Paterno family have established scholarships... (read more)

Digital Dialogue 53 Originally uploaded by cplong11 On episode 53 for the Digital Dialogue, I am joined by Christopher Moore, Lecturer in Philosophy and Classics and Mediterranean Studies at Penn State.Christopher received his PhD from the University of Minnesota in 2008. His areas of specialization include: Ancient Philosophy, Socrates, Aesthetics and Democratic Theory. He has a number of articles in press and forthcoming, including: "Chaerephon, Telephus, and Cure in Plato's Gorgias," Arethusa (forthcoming May 2012)"The Myth of Theuth in the Phaedrus," in Status, Uses and Function of Plato's Myths, Catherine Collobert, Pierre Destrée, Francisco Gonzalez, edd. (Brill, forthcoming Spring... (read more)

361/365: South Carolina Marsh Originally uploaded by cplong11 LITCHFIELD, SC - Vacation can be a time for moments of insight and tenderness. One such moment came this week for me at a restaurant here in South Carolina called Studio Café. (You can see my Yelp! review here). The restaurant is also an art studio and the owner, Pat Ghannam, both shows here work there and serves tables when they are short staffed. She was serving us that day and she mentioned that the chef was her husband and a co-owner of the restaurant. At few minutes later, when other... (read more)

Long at HASTAC2011 Originally uploaded by cplong11 ANN ARBOR, MI - The story I told at the 2011 meeting of the Humanities, Arts, Science, and Technology Advanced Collaboratory (HASTAC) conference is rooted in my pedagogical practices of using digital media technology to cultivate communities of learning in the classroom. The story itself is told at a moment of intense transformation in education as we move from a culture of print scholarship to that of digital scholarship. The main thesis of the presentation is that by drawing on the best virtues of both print and digital scholarship a new educational... (read more)

the table is set...Happy Thanksgiving, a photo by mil8 on Flickr.LAUSDeanLong: Returning home is always fraught with complex emotions and feelings, for you return to a familiar place a changed person. I wonder how students are feeling about their return home for Thanksgiving this week in the wake of the complex emotional, intellectual and psychological experiences of the past two weeks. LaurenPerrotti: Some students have already made up their minds by posting facebook statuses warning friends not to bring up the Sanudsky case. Others plan to tell family and friends that it is their week off and they are taking... (read more)

STATE COLLEGE, PA - On November 17, 2011, Aryeh Kosman and Vincent Colapietro join me on campus here at Penn State to discuss my book, Aristotle on the Nature of Truth. The session is being streamed live on UStream, available below starting at 3:30pm EST. After the event, I intend to write a more comprehensive post about the panel and we will include a video of the event itself. In the meantime, you are invited to watch the UStream of the event and comment below. I will do my best to respond to comments left here.... (read more)

vigil_9113, a photo by pennstatelive on Flickr.LAUSDeanLong: Lauren, we have been talking in person over the last week or so about how to respond to the crisis at Penn State in the wake of the grand jury indictments in the Sandusky case. I have admired your leadership with students in trying to keep the focus on the more important elements of this experience: first, the abused children, then the question of an institutional culture and character that seems to have allowed abuse to continue. How are students processing all of this? Lauren Perrotti (Liberal Arts Undergraduate Council President): Thank you... (read more)

Chris and Herman B. Wells Originally uploaded by cplong11 Sometimes without looking, one finds a paradigm - an example that can serve as a model. Last week I visited Indiana University as a one of Penn State's Academic Leadership Fellows in the Committee on Institutional Cooperation's Academic Leadership Program. I went expecting to hear administrators from across the Big Ten speak about best administrative practices and about the role of the public research university in the 21st century. Although I received what I expected in that sense, I did not anticipate encountering a figure who embodied some of my... (read more)

287/365: Sparks Building, a photo by cplong11 on Flickr.Dear Liberal Arts Student Colleagues: As we process the events of the past week, it is difficult to grapple with what we and others are thinking and feeling. Each of us responds to these events from where we live, from our perspectives as individuals and as members of an educational community to which we have dedicated our time, our energy, our lives. As students in the liberal arts, you have many resources to bring to bear on these difficult experiences. As humanists, you know something of the finite nature of human existence,... (read more)

Digital Dialogue 52 Originally uploaded by cplong11 Episode 52 of the Digital Dialogue was recorded at the 50th Anniversary Meeting of the Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy. I was joined by Sara Brill, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Fairfield University and graduate from the Philosophy Department here at Penn State in 2004, where she wrote her dissertation with John Sallis entitled, Hygieia: Health and Medicine in Plato's Republic. Sara has appeared on the Digital Dialogue a number of times including episodes: Digital Dialogue 13: Psychology and PoliticsDigital Dialogue 17: Parmenides (with Rose Cherubin and Jill Gordon)Digital Dialogue 33:... (read more)

Facebook Originally uploaded by laikolosse A number of recent changes to the social media technologies I use daily force me again to reflect on the habits design decisions cultivate in us. The decisions made by Facebook, Google, Twitter and Apple are, of course, design decisions with a decidedly commercial interest. Even so, their willingness to make substantive changes to the way we interact with one another through their sites is teaching us all something about the habits we need to cultivate in the digital age. Facebook, of course, just implemented some fairly radical changes to its user interface, adding... (read more)