Issue #167 - The Spaces in Between
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Issue #167 - The Spaces in Between
Summer Micro Edition #3 - Purple Rain
I’m in Minneapolis, Minnesota, one of the more northerly places that I’ve visited. I imagine it is cold and snowy during winter and in summer months it blooms, the sidewalks are green and the sun is out. I’ve been in shorts and t-shirt all week, it is glorious.
I’m attending the CALICO conference, the annual meet for members of the Computer-Assisted Language Instruction Consortium. It is a small and friendly conference, possibly one of the best that I’ve attended in my field of technology-enhanced language learning. On Tuesday and Wednesday I enjoyed half-day workshops, and Thursday lots of talks and plenary sessions. The big theme unsurprisingly is AI, but there’s also lots on Immersive Tech, Multimodal Learning, and Multiliteracies. People are super-friendly and easy to talk to, I’m already looking forward to catching up with a few of them next year when we’ll be hosting CALICO in Pittsburgh. I presented work from the past year, providing a rationale for our new Minor in Immersive Technologies. You can have a look at my slides if you want. Certainly, I’m keen to share lots of ideas with you, and hopefully with our department, where I’d like to encourage little more engagement with CALL.
Minneapolis is a great city, flat and lots of bikes (you know I like cycling around new cities). There are cycle paths everywhere, and everything is easy to get to. The campus where I’m staying is enormous, its beautiful, there’s plenty of interesting architecture, old and new styles, sit side by side.
I made a mistake with my lodging though, thinking halls might be a fun option, having stayed in some lovely rooms over the years, this one is more akin to a prison cell, perhaps just one half-level up from camping. There are two bunks, a desk and chair, and some linen was left on the mattress so that I could make my bed. There weren’t even any hangers in the wardrobe, so I laid out my shirt on the mattress I wasn’t sleeping on. The accommodation block is enormous, it must house thousands of students, so the walk from the elevator takes several minutes, walking down empty corridors, half-expecting the twins from The Shining to appear around the next corner. The communal bathroom is dirty and the water isn’t hot enough. I know how this is sounding, and I haven’t minded too much. At least I was able to borrow a second pillow for my head, and the AC works pretty good.
On the first evening I cycled to the downtown area, across the Stone Arch Bridge and past St.Anthony Falls, an enormous lock and sluice gate with a clear sheen of white water spilling through. The river is, amazingly the Mississippi, I had no idea it even started this far up, in fact it starts even further in the Northern Lakes of Minnesota and flows all the way south, over 2,300 miles to the Gulf of Mexico. The river joins the twin cities Minneapolis and St.Paul, that are so close that they become a conurbation, neighbors that have almost merged into one place.
This is city wear Prince was born, and Terry Gilliam, and where Babes in Toyland were formed and played (I saw them at the Town and Country Club in Camden around 1993 and they were terrific). This is also the city where terribly, George Floyd was murdered by police in May 2020. It’s hard to imagine what a terrible shock this would have been to people here.
Minneapolis seems like an open and friendly place, with people from many cultures, groups and ethnicities. There are folks from everywhere, I’ve enjoyed Japanese, Greek, and Ethiopian food, the last of which, delicious lamb curry which I mopped up with injera, a sort of pancake-like flatbread, and washed down with a beer. Wonderful.
This morning I’m in the Whittier neighborhood, in a little coffee shot called the Spyhouse sitting at the window looking out on the street. It’s just around the corner from the Minneapolis Institute of Art which I’ve decided to visit before I catch a bus the airport and fly home, later this afternoon.
So I know that this isn’t the usual summer micro edition, I just thought that you’d like to know what I’ve been up to. I’m heading out this afternoon and tomorrow we’re flying to the UK, my suitcase is already packed and waiting for me in Pittsburgh. I’m looking forward to heading home and catching up with everyone.
Okay, just a few things for you…
Read this amazing exposé on the plane, all about Ghana’s pollution problem, caused by bundles of donated clothes from the UK and US.
We have our fingers crossed that the smoke from Canada’s wildfires is moving away, this week planes have been grounded and people in NY have had to shelter inside.
My friend and incredible colleague Mame-Fatou Niang’s new exhibition in Paris as part of her residency.
Okay, just one AI link for you. Pickaxe will make AI apps that you can embed on your website.
Good list if you’re looking for a summer podcast refresh.
Thank You
See you next week, take care.