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Places in Motion: The Fluid Identities of Temples, Images, and Pilgrims by Jacob N. Kinnard. Thoughts on Chapters 1-3 The thing which struck me most from these chapters was actually where Kinnard discusses the blurred identities of the Buddha/Vishnu footprints around Bodhgaya and Gaya. I was especially intrigued by the part on page 78 where he mentions asking Bodhgaya pilgrims over the course of years regarding the origin of the footprints. He explained that when asked whether they were the footprints of Vishnu the pilgrims would answer ‘yes’, but they would do the same if asked if they were Buddha’s footprints. Kinnard noted the same person looking at the same image would see “two interwoven or overlapping identities.” As if to say that the footprints were, for those pilgrims, holy (and meaningful) regardless of their origin. And, in fact, they might even be doubly holy if attributable to both figures. Or as Kinnard wrote, “[w]hy limit oneself to one or the other when one can hav

After my last post things got even worse in the form of a fire which destroyed the house where my parents were living and killed three of our dogs. Since then I've been back on Zoloft, my mom has been in the hospital (and a nursing home) trying to heal a broken femur, and my dad moved in here. It's been one of those moments when the entire boat of your life capsizes, leaving you treading water and unsure of how you even ended up in that situation.     That's about all I can manage to say about these past four months right now - I'm not a person who processes feelings contemporaneously - I shut down and go into survival mode (resorting to whatever coping mechanism carries the day). This house here has been coming along, slowly but surely, and I started my final undergrad semester last month - it consists of a required public speaking course and the capstone course. The capstone is covering sacred spaces and places of pilgrimage (instructor's choice) so anticipate (or

Well, that was a way longer hiatus than I ever intended. Things got chaotic at the end of the Fall semester (as usual), but "thanks" to Covid it ended early (before Thanksgiving!). So, I had the entirety of December off from school, and I think I slept, watched TV, and ate for most of the month, lol. But Spring semester started up in January and by Feb I was flattened by a flare up of my probable Rheumatoid Arthritis (didn't make it into a Rheumatologist for the official diagnosis before Covid made that an impossibility - currently waiting for my new referral to come through). I am still in the throws of whatever this is, though it is improving slightly and slowly with the meds I've been on for almost a month now. Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels Spring was not kind. It included putting two of our dogs to sleep (old age). Because I was a wreck all the way around, I dropped down from 4 classes to 2 (bumping my graduation from May to Dec in the process), and

Q: After reviewing the course materials for Weeks 6 and 7, discuss the concepts of moral equality and moral recognition. How do they impact the treatment of animals and people? What are the ethics of keeping animals in captivity and killing animals? How do animals become meat? How does the consumption of meat establish borders between classes, races and genders? What are some of the ethical questions surrounding the consumption of animals?  Photo by Christopher Carson on Unsplash A: Moral equality is the principle that all people have equal human rights – or that at least is the way it should be; the ideal. Moral recognition is the acknowledgement that there are differences between various groups of people (different genders, races, beliefs, behaviors, levels of intelligence, etc.), but the ideal of equality should still be applied; the differences should not merit different treatment.  However, this idealized equality – which we still struggle to apply to all people – is most defin

Photo by Nick Morrison on Unsplash   I saw a tweet the other day that said: Ask 10 writers how to write, and you’ll get 13 different answers. As much as that did produce a chuckle from me, it’s also the truth. In fact, that might be an understatement. The amount of writing produced about writing is almost insane. Write every day, inspiration is for amateurs. Have a set word-count goal. Treat it like a 9–5 job. Churn out content like a machine. You can’t edit a blank page. Plot every syllable. Go with the flow, follow your muse. Pantsing is just as valid as plotting. It’s OK to write one great novel and then retire. Take 15 years to write a pamphlet, slow and steady wins the race. You do you. Be a reclusive artiste . Get out there in the real world. Write what you know. Don’t write about your real life, be creative. This famous writer wrote first thing in the morning on a laptop, with a huge amount of caffeine at hand. That famous writer wrote in the middle of the night by cand

I've decided to make/sell all the introvert, writer, bookworm, museum nerd, dog mom, Sagittarius, INFJ, and generally smartassy merch I would like to buy myself. I've only started uploading to RedBubble and threadless, and only a few designs are up on the new sub site as of yet. But keep an eye out, more will be coming ASAP. https://merch.kaytludi.com/

Q: How has the question of humanness/what it means to be human changed over time in human thought? What roles do animals play in human thought? Why is it important to look at animals according to Berger? Why is important that animals cannot “look” back at us in the same way? How do you see Banksy’s installation The Village Pet Shop and Charcoal Grill and/or Sirens of the Lambs challenging the way we use and socially construct animals? How does the installations question the way we may look at animals in our daily lives? A: The concept of humanness is nothing more than a social construct. And where a living being falls on the scale of perceived humanness has always been determined by those with the power to do so (mostly white European men, historically). While the definition has broadened over time it has not necessarily deepened. True, it now includes women and non-white ethnicities most of the time , though obviously animal terms are hurled towards these groups as slurs even to this