Friday 09 December 2011: Readings in Pearce, Latour and Mauss. Admittedly concentration is not all it could be. In effort to regain focus am adopting a ‘new system’ for organisation of notes. Took a moment to respond to a friend’s request for help/advice on writing a museums-related project proposal--happy to do it but worried that I may have hindered more than helped. I woke up to find that my Twitter layout is ‘new’ and was at first worried that it was still hacked but have since discovered that admin seems to be automatically placing some of the accounts on the new profile style.
Thursday 08 December 2011: Polishing and publication of write-up to ‘The Attic’ of journal report for Dr. Albeti’s seminar visit. My Twitter and Facebook accounts seem to have been secured.
Wednesday 07 December 2011: Was informed today of paternal grandmother’s death at 4AM this morning. Attended Brown Bag Seminar with Dr. Sam Alberti on the subject of medical museums. Drafted the report for 'The Attic' about the seminar and sent the draft to certify some of the facts with Dr. Alberti. In addition to all other complications, online Twitter account appears to have been hacked; Twitter administration is ‘sorting’ the situation.
Tuesday 06 December 2011: Found possible angle/avenue for support of thesis of ‘gift’ as inherent to certain types of objects.
Monday 05 December 2011: Readings in Pearce, Latour and Mauss. Descriptive diagramming of possible convergence of spatial contingency and cultural interpretation towards the agency of objects (or again, perceived agency of objects . . . though am attempting to show that there is inherent agency within some objects; mono-mythic, objects-of-agency condition blended with popular media, resulting in the creation of a sort of ‘meta museum object’). Am allowing this problem ‘to rest’ while I return to the main subject of display dynamics as gift exchange.
Weekend: Research at home--review of online resources. Scheduling for monitor readings. On Saturday a number of us from research went on a ‘Museum Crawl’ hosted by Dr. Amy Barnes. After an invigorating day, we adjourned to a lovely dinner at Shivalli’s to ‘debrief’. This was absolutely essential to the well-being of the more sensitive among the PhD candidates after having discovered the infamous ‘Tiger Snuffbox’.
