Today I interviewed Dr. Dalton Conley, Professor of Sociology and Chair of the Sociology Department at NYU.  Dr. Conley is author of several books, most notably his memoir and social commentary, Honky. Dr. Conley and I sit down to talk about his new book, Elsewhere, U.S.A.: How We Got from the Company Man, Family Dinners, and the Affluent Society to the Home Office, BlackBerry Moms, and Economic Anxiety [Pantheon Books, New York 2008]. Please see my review of the book here.

Purplecar Podcast: Interview with Dalton Conley

File: mp3

Length: 26 minutes, 05 seconds

Size: about 12 Mb

Host: Christine Cavalier

Guest: Dalton Conley

Show notes:

Re-Captcha

Erving Goffman: Front Stage/Back Stage theory  Behavior in Public Places: Notes on the Social Organization of Gatherings

My Parents Joined Facebook

The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism by Max Weber

Tim Ferriss The Four-Hour Workweek

Dr. Conley’s book on birth order: The Pecking Order: A Bold New Look at How Family and Society Determine Who We Become

Dr. Conley’s Wikipedia.org page

Tags: behavior, behavioral economics, Dalton Conley, elsewhere, Interview, modern life, NYU, phantom anxiety, podcast, professor, social networking, sociology, u.s.a, web 2.0, what is an intravidual

So I’m a podcaster now. The craze that is taking over GenerationXers across the world has grabbed me in its ubiquitous talons. I will tell you the whole sordid tale so you may avoid the imminent danger and my suffering can take on some deeper meaning.

A few weeks ago I was Skyping with friends on a lonely Saturday night. My husband was out at one of his Texas Hold ‘em poker tournaments and I was surfing. Got on a voice Skype with JoeC, or maybe Banannie first – it’s all a kool-aid induced haze- then we conferenced in Starman and others. Interesting and frank conversation followed. Minutes turned into hours. We were sitting around a virtual kitchen table gabbing about social media and what this all means.

We made a date for the next Saturday. Let’s face it, we’re all well out of the “hot date on a Saturday night” phase (and those Xers out there who are still in it to win it, good luck). Starman, a famous-in-his-niche experienced podcaster suggested we tape ourselves and podcast it.

I said, “Ummm, ok.”

Notice this as the dreaded International Cue of Doom (ICoD: whenever anyone innocently shrugs, ‘Ummm, Ok”, in any movie, story, tale, or fish yarn, you can cue the looming music. Things will start happening from this moment onward.)

So we made a date. Some didn’t show. Those of us who did had another great conversation about the things we were following in the past week. Starman recorded and edited, and voila! Podcast. Be warned that Seesmic and Twitter are the entry drugs; use all social media with caution. Don’t let this happen to you. You may have fun and begrudgingly learn something in the process.

Check out PushMyFollow.com or iTunes for the podcast (I’m proud to say my pottie mouth, my one figurative fist of rebellion against that which controls us all, got us an Explicit Rating).

Enjoy listening to my downfall. It will entertain you.

Tags: Media, podcast, purplecar podcast, push my follow