Blog Assignment, Monday, April 30

Hello Group,

Your reading assignments due on Monday, April 30 are Chapters 4 and 5 in Buruma
and Wouters and Beaulieu article (see course syllabus for link).

Let's continue with the Irony theme and also consider Dutch pragmatic tolerance (or "regulated tolerance", now that sounds ironic...). Please post a short response to both readings considering these quotes:

"Irony ...is such an essential part of the Dutch make-up. I really notice this
after Theo's death. It's so much part of our tradition" Irony can be a healthy antidote to dogmatism, but also an escape from any blame" (Buruma, 112).

"It is as though religious attire is often worn as a fashion statement, or an
assertion of difference, as much as a sign of devotion" (Buruma, 123).

"Rappers play at being murderers. Perhaps they were Dutch enough to have adopted the national penchant for vicious irony" (143).

Extra points for those who find connections between the Buruma and Wouters readings. Some thoughts from a shamelessly biased interdisciplinary humanities researcher:
Wouters and Beaulieu discuss intervention as a means to rethink knowledge
production and research practice. The applications of e-research can potentially create new modes of knowledge production which will influence our questions and our approach to the topics. In other words, the methods, i.e. tools, influence the research, i.e. the concept. How then will the messiness of bringing in multiple disciplines to the practice of e-science, which changes then to E-RESEARCH, influence how we process and focus knowledge gathering. Intervention and self reflexiveness will result in a rethinking of knowledge production and research practices in the digital world(s). However, too much knowledge limits knowledge, ah the irony. Knowledge needs accountability or researchers are just ESCAPE(ing) FROM ANY BLAME.
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Here's another random thought as I was reading...lots of things we could discuss from the reading....
2nd generation immigrants who are born in the Netherlands, speak Dutch and also speak the language of their parents, can feel alienated. They don't fit in with their parents generation nor do they fit in with the Dutch population. So the danger is isolation which can produce extreme alliances and extreme actions. (Buruma's theory)