anarchy in 21st century - david graeber

Mon Oct 24 06:27:25 PDT 2005

hi everyone.

are others familiar with david graeber? his story is in a prominent place in 
today's local newspaper in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, a small and pretty 
conservative city.

he's being published everywhere and apparently is considered by academic's 
in high places to be among the "most promising young anthropologists."

and, Yale University has just denied him tenure.

here's a link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Graeber

for me, he's pointing to open space and the ideas that come with it. his 
"Anarchy in the 21st Century" is particularly interesting.

john

http://circlesofchange.com participatory learning & leadership in Haiti
http://johnengle.net Open Space facilitation

email: john at johnengle.net
telephone: 202-236-6532

P.O. Box 337
Hershey, PA 17033

>From: Zelle Nelson <zelle at knowplacelikehome.com>
>Reply-To: OSLIST <OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU>
>To: OSLIST at LISTSERV.BOISESTATE.EDU
>Subject: Re: academic conferences?
>Date: Sat, 22 Oct 2005 20:35:45 -0400
>
>Hi Ted,
>
>We've done two different modifications/additions to Open Space to provide 
>opportunities to those who wish to present information (primarily one-way 
>communication) at an Open Space meeting or conference (which thrives in 
>two-way or multiple person communication).
>
>One is invite one-way communication in conjunction with regular Open Space 
>topics and provide designated topic postings labeled as one-way 
>communication sessions or idea presentation topics or storytelling topics. 
>These topics are posted like any other Open Space topic, but we used a 
>different shaped Post-it note (it looked like a flower) to indicate to the 
>marketplace that topics with the special post-it indicated one-way 
>communication. People who needed special equipment to give their 
>presentation made arrangements before the meeting to have the necessary 
>equipment available. We also set aside a specific breakout room to 
>accommodate any equipment needs. What happened during most of the one-way 
>communication topics, was that the speaker would talk for half the session 
>and then open the topic up for discussion that continued on like most Open 
>Space topics do. Another phenomenon was that when speakers did not allow 
>for discussion, most people used there two feet and left after it was clear 
>that there would be no discussion forthcoming.
>
>Another way we set things up was an Open Space for a corporate client in 
>which Open Space was used to hold their semi-annual meeting which 
>traditionally included an outside supplier providing content for review. 
>Prior to the group experiencing Open Space, the supplier would give Power 
>Point presentations - most including over 100 slides of data.
>
>The Open Space was a two day event with the first day dedicated to 
>interacting with the supplier. The second day was to focus on team 
>interaction and communication. Our clients and the suppliers were free to 
>post any topic during any session just as in regular OS. We asked the 3 
>suppliers attending the meeting each to post their topic (planned as a 
>one-way communication session) multiple times during the Open Space. We 
>arranged the multiple sessions on the same topic to ensure that each member 
>of our client's team would have an opportunity to listen to the crucial 
>information provided by the suppliers, while still having the freedom of 
>the Law of Two Feet.
>
>The day before the Open Space began we learned that one of the suppliers 
>scheduled to attend the meeting could not make it. He did however arrange a 
>time to call into our meeting, go over his Power Point slides by phone, 
>with our client contact taking care of advancing each slide as the supplier 
>finished what he wanted to say. The only time the supplier could call in 
>was after we were to open the space.
>
>So on the day, we didn't really know what would happen. We opened the space 
>as usual, had time for one session and then took a break from Open Space so 
>that the whole 40 person client team, along with the supplier's two 
>colleagues could experience the 100+ slide Power Point presentation. The 
>supplier began his presentation and slowly people began to leave the room. 
>The law of two feet had been introduced and people used it. The suppliers 
>always gave copies of their presentations to our client's team members, so 
>sitting through the actual presentation was not as valuable as informal 
>conversations, using the time to check voicemail and email, or just taking 
>a break. By the time the presentation was over there were about 10 people 
>still in the room. As always the supplier encouraged questions throughout, 
>and again asked for questions at the end. There were a few along the way 
>and one or two questions at the end.
>
>We then moved back into OS sessions. After seeing what had happened to 
>their colleague, the two suppliers who were on site did something they had 
>not ever done with the limited time they had in front of their client. They 
>sat down and talked with them, answered questions and really got to know 
>for the first time who their clients really were. The same happened for our 
>client's team members. One of the suppliers extended his trip to stay for 
>the second day to experience more Open Space.
>
>At the end of most every Open Space we ask in the closing circle, "What 
>worked? What didn't? and How could we improve for next time?"
>
>Most everyone rated the meeting a 10 out of 10 and those that didn't rated 
>it a 9 out of 10 because of the power point presentation they had sat 
>through. Both our client and the suppliers remarked at how much they had 
>gained from sitting down and really talking. One woman on our client's team 
>said, "I wouldn't do half the job I do without the data you (the suppliers) 
>provide in your Power Point deck. It's like a Bible for me. But, the depth 
>of information and the level of questions I could ask being in Open Space 
>made the data so much more valuable. I really got a chance to ask the 
>questions I wanted to ask, and I felt like I wasn't taking up other's time. 
>It was fantastic!"
>
>The two ways we created to allow for one-way communication to be present 
>during Open Space really worked well.
>
>Hope this helps.
>
>with grace and love,
>
>Zelle
>
>************
>Zelle Nelson
>Engaging the Soul at Work/Know Place Like Home/State of Grace Document
>
>www.stateofgracedocument.com
>
>zelle at maureenandzelle.com
>
>office - 001.828.693.0802
>mobile - 001.847.951.7030
>
>Isle of Skye
>2021 Greenville Hwy
>Flat Rock, NC 28731
>USA
>
>
>Ted Ernst wrote:
>
>>So I've posted a bit about my travels in the WikiVan to WikiSym.  Don't 
>>remember if I talked about my plan to be in open space at a non-open space 
>>conference.  We've now finished a day and a half and I've realized that 
>>there's a function to conferences that I wasn't aware of, the academic 
>>conference with juried paper presentations.  In this case the wiki 
>>community can be definied as including both academics and non-academics 
>>(free software developers, corportate developers, community organizer 
>>administrators, etc).  I find open space to be fantastic for 
>>collaboratoion, wihch is what wiki is so good at, so open space would seem 
>>to be a great fit.  Pure open space doesn't give you that scheduled paper 
>>talk from a selectifly chosen paper.  And this is seen as important for 
>>academic careers (I think).  Anyone had any experience with this type of 
>>situation/mixture/requirements of academics?
>>
>>I had a great conversation today with the chair of the program committee.  
>>I didn't seek him out but have been very open with my thoughts on the 
>>conference wiki and he came to see me.  I found him extremely supportive 
>>of the idea of opening more space.  The Birds of a Feather times 
>>(evenings) are really open space by another name, and this evening people 
>>are going like gangbusters, hours after the official program ended.  Very 
>>cool.  Anyway, he's very open to working out a way that non-corporate, 
>>non-academics can get a much reduced rate (this conf is $450 for me!) and 
>>he's open to having more open space, in some fashion at least.  Would be 
>>great to pass on some stories to him from this list (or point me to the 
>>archives or website if stuff is already there).
>>
>>Thanks!
>>peace,
>>ted
>>
>>--
>>Humanize the Earth!  http://tedernst.com * * 
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>
>--
>ÐÏà¡±á
>
>
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