Not in 2010

In recent years the International Olympic Committee has been making a push for gender equity in the sports in their program. Their ultimate goal, it appeared, was to make comparable male and female events for virtually all sports. (Even I’m realistic. There’s no way we’ll be seeing male synchronized swimming anytime soon.)

Yesterday the IOC made their decisions about what event to add to the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. They had seven events to choose from and only added one: skicross.

Anyone that saw this past February’s Olympics from Torino saw the introduction of an exciting new snowboarding event, snowboard cross. It’s a high speed event with lot of action that seemed to capture a lot of people’s interest and earned high television ratings here in the United States. Skicross is much the same event except on skis instead of on snowboards.

What didn’t get approval is what surprised me. The IOC has the chance to build on their pledge of gender equity by adding women’s ski jumping, but they passed. A representative of the committee said that the sport of women’s ski jumping is still too early in its development and would be considered again for the 2014 Winter Olympics to be held in either PyeongChang, South Korea, Salzburg, Austria, or Sochi, Russia.

In addition to passing on women’s ski jumping the IOC also passed on a few mixed events where men and women would compete on the same teams in biathlon and curling. (Also rejected were team events in Alpine skiing, luge, skeleton, and bobsleigh.)

It almost seems hollow to me for the International Olympic Committee to want to achieve gender equity but then does not add the sports to its program that would help get them there. Would the addition of a sport to the Olympic program help it move its development along in leaps and bounds? And why not include more events where men and women can compete together?

If the IOC wants gender equity, maybe they should be making the necessary moves to achieve it.

Dissertation Update

For those out there interested:

4 participants run through the dissertation experiment yesterday

65 more scheduled this semester

80 wanted (40 male, 40 female) in total

I Thought I Was Busy Before....

As I've detailed in this blog over the past few months, teaching a new class really takes up a lot of time. I never realized how little time I would have for other things, such as getting my dissertation ready or even just posting in this forum.

However, this week tops all weeks that have come before it this semester.

I still have my class to get ready for this week. In addition I am starting to run the experiment for my dissertation tomorrow morning. Add to that the fact that I have a telephone interview for a possible faculty position in the fall (and a position that I believe I really want), and who has times for anything else.

I just happened to find five minutes to post this before I go to recruit participants for my experiment.

Think happy thoughts for me this week, because I think by Friday I'll need them. And maybe a beer too!

Another Step Forward

Yesterday I was able to successfully defend my proposal for my dissertation.

All members of my committee seemed to like the idea and made some very valuable suggestions about how to improve it.

Now I just have to finish preparing all of my video and audio files, write the program used to operate the physiology equipment, and set-up all the necessary hardware needed to run my study. I've still got a lot to do, but at least I now have the permission of my committee to proceed.

I Haven't Forgotten

I just wanted to check in since I haven't posted here in a while.

I thought I was having a busy semester, but the past couple of weeks since I got back from Vancouver have been unreal.

Just preparing my class and getting my dissertation ready to run is sucking up all of my time.

Though I must admit that I did have some time for a little fun last weekend. And I must now recommend that everyone go see Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. It was without a doubt one of the funniest films that I've seen in a long, long time.

I hope to post something substantial here very soon.

Kick in the Face

It’s time to check in again and let you know what I’ve been up to.

I got back this past Sunday from a great trip to Vancouver for the annual conference of the Society for Psychophysiological Research. When I got back I had to prepare for my class, get submissions ready for the upcoming annual conference for the International Communication Association, and today I had some out patient surgery on my ears.

And on top of all that, today was my 33rd birthday!

It’s been a long couple of days, but I thought I should relate an interesting story from my time in Vancouver.

On Saturday a group of us decided to visit Granville Island. It was an interesting area with shops and restaurants. In addition we ran into a street performer.

He was a young juggler who got my attention because he was juggling fire batons. However, I somehow got sucked into the act.

Once I was chosen the juggler asked me where I was from. When I told him Indiana he said he wanted to make me feel more at home. At this point he frisked me like he was a police officer.







The street performer had me and another victim to hold a plank on a metal roll while he leapt onto it. It seems easy enough, but he seemed to be nothing but a big goof with a weird sense of humor.


When he leapt on he decided to lie on the plank. Unfortunately his crotch seemed to be positioned right on top of my hand. It was definitely an odd position for both of us to be in.







Then the performer tried to get up to a standing position on the plank. In doing so he nearly sat on my head….









….and kicked me in the jaw. At this point I was hoping he would fall.

He didn’t fall, though he actually begged for donations at the end. I had never heard such begging from a street performer. I was actually surprised by what he said, and I think it turned a lot of people off.

How do I now go about telling people about my trip to Vancouver when the most interesting part of it was my being kicked in the face by a street juggler?