“I put all my shoes in front of me and polished them”, “I cleaned my curtains”, “My house was never as clean as it was when I had to write my dissertation”. These were the most interesting revelations by a panel on surviving the dissertation that was organised as a part of a course I audited recently. The tendency to putt-off writing is just incredible. I never feel prepared enough, and when I do get to writing, I never quite feel as if I’ve done a job good enough. Every now and then I do a reasonable outline but never […]
Vivek Srinivasan
The Princess Bride Year: 1987 Writer: William Goldman Length: 98 Category: Children’s Rating: 1 out of 5 I was in a mood for a romantic comedy and chose this highly rated movie from rotten tomatoes. I am not sure if the movie was aimed at children, at any rate it completely failed to convince me. I almost lost some friends when I told them that I did not like it. Two of them almost started rattling off all the dialogues in the movie! Obviously, it seems to be a hit with some people. I should confess though that I liked […]
Princess Bride by Rob Reiner: A popular movie I did ...
This documentary by Jan Madhyam Productions gives a very good introduction to the right to information campaign in India and on how RTI is used with social audits to combat corruption. In case you have trouble viewing it, please go to the permanalink by clicking the title above, or here http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3238128636848285898
Documentary on MKSS and right to information campaign
Many talks and interviews with well known people are now available online. I’ve put together a series of them that I have specially enjoyed. To see the rest, click here This is a wonderful lecture by Edward Said on Samuel Huntington’s idea about “Clash of civilizations”. In this lecture Edward Said analyses in detail the arguments of Samuel Huntington in his paper on Clash of civilizations (with a question mark) that ultimately became his book (this time without a question mark!). Edward Said incisively analyzes Huntington’s notion that differences in culture between the ‘West’ and ‘Islam’ will lead to conflicts […]
Edward Said’s talk on ‘Clash of Civilizations’ by Samuel Huntington
Visualising ones ideas is a great way to think through complex issues or arguments. Here are three free utilities to put our ideas into neat pictures Last year I used a mind-mapping software called FreeMind productively. Mind maps start with a simple core from which one can have multiple nodes that lead to multiple nodes and so on. Free mind allows the user to link different nodes, make comments on certain nodes, link them to files, insert a number of images, etc. Last year I did a course on Social Movement Theory. Towards the end of the semester a friend […]
Visualise ideas with Mind Maps, Concept Maps and Diagraming tools
Hi: I am Vivek. If you insist, I am S. Vivek and I don’t have a surname. If you wish to be formal, you can call me Mr. Vivek, which in my culture is quite appropriate. My identity cards in the US specify my name as Vivek Srinivasan and I get quite a few polite letters calling me Mr. Srinivasan; which happens to be my father. Much as I like him, I find it odd that he gets the credit for things I do. For example, a local newspaper reported a talk I gave at Syracuse as ‘Srinivasan said this […]
Look, I don’t have a surname
I recently tried using an online utility to find a suitable date for all students in my programme to meet. Normally, this is a hugely time consuming affaire. This time around, I tried an online utility called MeetingWizard.com and it turned out to be fantastic. It’s a simple utility that works like a poll. The organizer can choose an initial list of times and send invitations to chosen people. The invitees just have to click a link and choose merely click on the times that suit them. The site offers a lot of other useful features too. For example, apart […]
Online tool to schedule meetings among many participants
Todo sobre mi madre Year: 1999 Director: Almodovar Length: 101 minutes Category: Drama Rating: 5 out of 5 Almodovar continues to dazzle. After her son dies in a road accident Manuela starts looking at his diary and discovers his thoughts about his father whom he has never met. With this she begins her search for the father whom she had left behind when the child was born 17 years ago. The story then develops into a maze of relationships starting with Manuela’s friend who’s a transexual prostitute, later joined by a young Nun who is pregnant. I will not go […]
All about my mom
My efforts to set priorities and work by a schedule were constantly defeated – often leading to a sense of desperation. But funnily, each time I reviewed my priorities for the year, I was more or less working along the lines though I scarcely met my targets day-to-day. I have been thinking of it for a while but started taking it seriously only after talking to a friend who had a similar problem: in the long run, we seem to keep up to a plan, but are erratic in the short run. I guess this is perhaps because of my […]
Time Management for an undisciplined fellow!
A rather surprising feature about Google calendar is that it does not have a task manager. I recently changed my time management technique from being ‘calendar based’ to ‘list based’ management. In my search for a task management system, I discovered www.rememberthemilk.com – an incredibly well designed utility. It’s online, capable of creating multiple lists, one can specify due dates, estimated time, associate with multiple tags (that are across lists), specify location, and do an assortment of other things. It’s highly keyboard friendly and has a terrific search facility. Oh, I forgot to mention that one can specify status of […]
Google Calendar integrates with Remember the Milk
It’s easy to import citations from Google Scholar into Refworks. In order to do this go to “scholar preferences”, a link you will find next to the search box and at the bottom of that page you will find an entry called “Bibliography Manager”. In this, select Refworks (I often end-up choosing a similar sounding thing called “Refman”, take care). Once you save the perferences, you will find a link called “import to refworks” below each search result. The rest is one click away. This though is not entirely trouble free since logging into Refworks should be done only through […]
Using Refworks with Google Scholar
Refworks Rating: 4 out of 5 Manage citations, create bibliographies quick & easy in any format you want (MLA, APA, Chicago, etc.) and keep references organised Note: There is an easier way to cite and it’s free. Check out my note on Zotero citation tool. I have been using Refworks since six months with great satisfaction. It is perhaps one of the most useful and time saving utilities for graduate students working on research papers. The software has two broad components: (1) Database of our references to organise and manage references (2) Utility for easily adding citations to papers that […]
Manage citations and bibliography with Refworks
The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists’ Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics Rating: 3 out of 5 Author: William Easterly Year: 2002 Category: Economics, Development, Growth theories, Institutional Economics Publisher: MIT Press The review has been shifted to my academic blog. Sorry for the inconvenience, please click here to read the review.
Review of Easterly’s Elusive quest for growth
I was looking for some of the most common terms that people search for online. Not surprisingly cinema and glamour made it right to the top followed closely by sports (see lists below). What did surprise me was “NDTV” was one of the ten most searched words by Indians. There were also a couple of entries for airline websites including Air Deccan and Go Air. Since this is a monthly list, I’d have expected some non-entertainment issues such as Jessica Lal’s murder trial or Noida serial killings to make it to the top – but that’s not the case. It’s […]
What Indians search for
The variable notion of time has been doing rounds in the social sciences for some time now. Chronologically a minute is a minute for all of us – but under circumstances the minute may seem like a long time. In fact, I did not realise how long a minute is until I started using the microwave. Waiting for the lift door to reach, the microwave to heat my coffee and my mail to open in a lousy web cafe have taught me the worth of the minute. It is under the frustration of waiting for the microwave to heat my […]
Microwave and time management
I had a prolonged debate on school feeding with a friend recently. I pointed out that India’s school feeding does not have any ‘means testing’ and covers all children. If India with its resource base and a large school population can do it, most other countries afford it. He on the other hand pointed out that USA (read the richest nation in the world) uses means testing to filter children out since it would be infeasible to feed all children (read no other country can then afford it). Is it feasible since India does it? Or is it not feasible […]
Resource Constraint
Life at Syracuse has been fun all thru. This year it’s become even better. The batch that joined after me in the Social Sciences programme is totally fun-loving. Many of them live around J street, where one of my batchmates lives as well. J street has since become a venue for parties. Here are a couple of snaps from the Haloween party at J street.
Party Gals of J Street
My cousin had left Pepsi – a lab and Spicey – a pup of mix breed with me for a few weeks. I started noticing that the two of them watched every move I made carefully. They were always watching me and monitoring me. I had just read discipline and punish by Foucault and I promptly objected to being monitored. I told Pepsi and Spicey that they surveillance gives them undue power over me and I object to it. But Spicey seems to disagree and I am unable to convince her. She tells me that surveillance does not give her […]
Puppy surveillance
Haircuts are expensive in the US. The shops near the university charge 16 USD each time – that’s almost half a month’s rent I paid in Delhi! But I guess with some looking around, there’s always a way out. I found a way to have a four dollar haircut. A hairstyling school near the university needs volunteers for their students to do some hands on training, and they offer haircuts at one-fourth the normal price. After the students work on you, the teacher comes to give the finishing touch and I was told that the overall experience is satisfactory. Last […]
Four Dollar Hair-cut
There are at least two movies made of Charlotte Bronte’s famous novel Jane Eyre. I decided to watch the more modern version first directed by Dilbert Mann. Being based on a powerful story as Jane Eyre, it had to be good. The movie was a constant reminder of what a difficult task it is to convert a rich book or a rich life into a movie for it was in brief episodes that were linked, but not seamlessly. While I enjoyed the movie immensely, I wished that the music were more subtle. A story as beautiful as that could have […]
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