I was at a conference out of town recently, sitting with two people

who had previously lived in the nation’s capital, where I’ve resided

for a dozen years. They said that they like "DC," but they

don’t like "Washington." I agreed. For those who live elsewhere,

this is the distinction (as I see it):

As

far as I can tell, there are only two other full-fledged faculty bloggers at the

University of Maryland. However, maybe others will come forward, since a Google

search for "University Maryland faculty blog" should now turn up my

site. The others are:

• Matthew

  G. Kirschenbaum’s blog, which comes from an English professor whose dissertation

  (in 1999) was one of the first in any English department to be completely electronic.

  He "specializes in digital studies, applied humanities computing, visual

  culture, and postmodern literature." His blog is a sophisticated source of

  news and ideas at the intersection of aesthetics, cultural studies, and digital

  technology.

• Walter

  Hutchens’ blog, the work of a Business School professor who specializes in

  Chinese security markets and related laws (a huge issue, once you think about

  it). His blog was blocked in China when he hosted it at blogspot.com, so he moved

  it to the University’s server.

I’m en route to Indianapolis for

the summer retreat of the Kettering Foundation.

Here

is a completely unrelated and pedantic issue, but I have to get it off my chest.

There is (or should be) no such word as "syllabi." "Syllabus"

is a fourth declension Latin noun, so its plural is not "syllabi" but

"syllabûs" (pronounced "syllaboos"). Since handing out

the "syllaboos" on the first day of class would make anyone look like

the world’s most extreme nerd, I use "syllabuses"—perfectly good

English.

For exactly the same reason, there are no "octopi." "Agendae"

is another Latin-sounding word that isn’t grammatically valid. The word "agenda"

is already plural, meaning "the things that need to be done." If we

want to make it plural, then "agendas" will do. I haven’t heard "agendae"

much, but Google finds 2,760 uses of it.

While we’re at it, "hoi

polloi" means "the people," so "the hoi polloi"

means "the the people." Which is kind of like saying "the La Brea

tar pits" (literally translated as "the The Tar tar pits.")

There,

I’ve said my piece.

It’s looking increasingly likely that I will write a short,

commissioned book between now and mid-September: an introduction to issues and

ideologies for first-time voters. Getting it done by then will be a sprint, but

I think it will be worthwhile. We may give away some of the content on a free

public website—both as a modest public service and also as a way to generate

interest in the book.

In the past, I couldn’t

blog about an activity that’s taken a lot of my time over the last six months:

namely, fundraising for CIRCLE.

Now that the grants have been approved and announced, I’m happy to say that The

Pew Charitable Trusts and Carnegie Corporation

of New York have come through for us, generously giving CIRCLE a budget of

almost $4 million for the 2003-5 period.

Meanwhile, for those who are doing

civic work with youth and the Internet, here’s a great

discussion forum on the ContentBank website.