Category: History
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Many New Ideas are Quite Old
Now that I’ve finished my dissertation, I finally feel free to turn my attention to other scholarly pursuits. I feel an obligation to bring closure to the historical work I began a few years ago so I will be spending the next several months working with primary sources and reworking old drafts into publishable articles. …
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Dorm vs. Residence Hall: A Silly Debate Nearly 100 Years Old
In most professions, there are certain words or phrases that are used to mark oneself as a member, someone who is “in.” Many student affairs professionals doggedly avoid referring to on-campus housing units as “dorms,” even going so far as to take offense at the term and trying to correct those who use the hated…
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Ongoing Research Into Student Affairs Technology History
I’ve written a few times about historical research I’ve done looking into how U.S. student affairs professionals have used and viewed technology throughout the 20th century. Although I don’t know where my current job search will take me, I feel a responsibility to bring some closure to this research and then ensure it is somehow…
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EFF Publishes a Bit of ResNet History
The EFF, one of my favorite organizations, has announced a report describing a security vulnerability in Impulse Point’s SafeConnect product. I don’t have any new insight to add regarding the security flaw or SafeConnect. But the announcement is a quick read with a nice little history of Network Access Control (NAC) technology and its important…
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Automated Technology Used by a Fraternity…in 1935
As I was procrastinating and avoiding working on my dissertation proposal, I came across the 1935 Columbia University Press book . One (short) chapter describes how punched cards were used to analyze data from a survey of Phi Delta Kappa members in the early 1930s. I know that PDK is not the kind of social…
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Framework for Understanding Historical View of Housing Technology
(This is largely a note for myself. I had an epiphany while showering this morning and I don’t want to forget it!) I haven’t touched it for a while but for a few years I’ve been working on historical research focused on entertainment and communications technologies in American college and university residence halls. As is…
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Response to Student Affairs On-Line Letter to the Editor
In the current issue of Student Affairs On-Line, Frank Christ wrote a Letter to the Editor responding to my Summer 2008 article “Exploding a Myth: Student Affairs’ Historical Relationship with Technology.” I’m writing my response here rather than printing it in Student Affairs On-Line as (a) such a response would take many months to be…
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Responding to and Expanding on “Exploding a Myth” StudentAffairs.com article
In the current issue of Student Affairs Online, I have an article titled “Exploding a Myth: Student Affairs’ Historical Relationship with Technology.” The contents and premise of the article should not be a surprise to anyone who is reading this blog. I’m very appreciative to Stu Brown, StudentAffairs.com’s head honcho, for inviting me to publish…
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Collecting Historical Evidence
I’m doing at least three things with this blog post: Participating in the NASPA Tech Tools program that asks participants to try out Flickr by creating an account and uploading a photo. Discussing my current research. Providing some hard-to-find information about the use of a digital camera and a copy stand to copy historical documents.…
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Resident Students’ Communications and Entertainment Technologies: From Communal to Personal (And Back Again?)
My biggest project during my first semester at Indiana University’s Higher Education and Student Affairs PhD program was a research project focusing on the history of student-used communications and entertainment technologies in the IU residence halls throughout the 20th century. I relied almost exclusively on archived historical materials, including memos to and from various administrators,…