Home office; son´s first day at school

Today I am working from home (perhaps half day) since my oldest boy has his first day at school today.

Blogpost in LifeScienceToday: "Biosemiotics: Making sense of nature"

Today a blogpost I have co-written with Alexei Sharov and Timo Maran as first author was published in Springer´s blog LifeScienceToday. Link and reference:

Tønnessen, Morten, Alexei Sharov and Timo Maran (2016). Biosemiotics: Making sense of nature. Published in Springer´s blog LifeScienceToday. URL: http://blogs.springer.com/lst/biosemiotics-making-sense-nature/.

Holiday?

I was on holiday last Friday, with my son (in Bergen, until Sunday). But worked all night.

"Culture and cognition" session partially attended

Today I have attended the last half of the “Cognitive Semiotics Meets Biosemiotics / Biosemiotics Meets Cognitive Semiotics” subsection "Culture and cognition" at the IX Conference of the Nordic Association for Semiotic Studies, aka this year´s Summer School in Semiotics. The whole session was in effect chaired by Lauri Linask.

See also:

Family-friendly chairing arrangements for NASS IX

Family-friendly chairing arrangements for NASS IX

For the second time, when attending NASS IX (Tartu August 17-20th) I will be travelling alone with my 2-3 year old son. Lauri Linask has agreed to be ready to step in for me as chair if and when necessary.

See also:

Cognitive semiotics and biosemiotics session scheduled for August 17th, 19th at NASS IX

Tartu conference plans

I have just arranged my trip to Tartu, Estonia, at the occasion of the 9the conference of the Nordic Association for Semiotic Studies (NASS). I will be going alone with my soon 3 year old son - the second time I try this.

End of second round of parental leave

My second round of parental leave (graded leave, 75%) at the occasion of the birth of a certain Matias Laurits da Silva-Tønnessen, my beloved son, ended yesterday, on March 13th. The next few months, however, my work routines will likely remain pretty much as they have been since New Year (he still needs being looked after, after all).

Graded parental leave, part 2

Starting today and lasting until March 14th, I'm on 75 % graded parental leave (combined with 25 % employment contract with University of Stavanger's Department of health studies - until June 30th; 10 % research contract starting March 15th).

Work and family life - a few new work routines

As a commuter, I am working much of the time from my home office, and I have to structure my workday - also since I am a father-of-one and my son is in kindergarten (only) 3 days a week (plus, my wife commutes too). After a "discussion" today, I've decided to make a few changes:

• After travelling on work trips, I'll work only 1 hour or so (checking email etc.) in daytime (plus work in the evening) the first day I am back home again - presupposing that my son is home this day. He is usually very eager to spend time with me once I have been gone (and I with him).
• In my daily planning, I'll start making room for 1 hour of "email and incidental tasks" in the morning and a further hour for the same task in the evening, in total 2 hours. With this I hope to remedy an all-too-common occurrence: Namely that quite often my daily work plan bursts since new, unexpected tasks that should be dealt with straight away appear. This then leads to working overtime and/or not getting done everything I have planned to get done.
• Trying to get things done well ahead of deadlines.

In sum this should make me more flexible, more relaxed and a more present father and husband.

See also:

Remaining parental leave; plans for spending time with my son 

Remaining parental leave; plans for spending time with my son

I have applied for taking what remains of my parental leave, after the birth of my son Matias Laurits October 10th 2012, January 1st - March 15th 2014, with 75% graded leave and 25% work for University of Stavanger. This amounts to 39 full days of parental leave.

Furthermore, my wife and I are making plans for the care for our son this next academic year. I want to have some time with him some weekdays at daytime as well, and will therefore alternately work on daytime and in the evening. The same goes for next Spring, both during my remaining parental leave and after. We are hoping to get a kindergarten to have him in its care for three days a week.

See also:

Another round with Norwegian bureaucracy

Reference to my contributions to Norwegian HAS anthology

The anthology Hvem er villest i landet her? Råskap mot dyr og natur i antropocen, menneskets tidsalder [Who is wildest in this country here? Brutality towards animals and nature in the Anthropocene, the age of Man] was published by Spartacus forlag/Scandinavian Academic Press on May 15th. Here I present a list of full references to the contributions I am involved in as an author.

Sollund, Ragnhild, Guri Larsen og Morten Tønnessen 2013. Forord [Preface]. In Sollund, Ragnhild, Morten Tønnessen og Guri Larsen (eds) 2013, Hvem er villest i landet her? Råskap mot dyr og natur i antropocen, menneskets tidsalder, Oslo: Spartacus Forlag/Scandinavian Academic Press, 7.  

Sollund, Ragnhild, Morten Tønnessen og Guri Larsen 2013. Introduksjon: Fra bruksdyr til dyreverd [Introduction: From animals of utility to animal dignity]. In Sollund, Ragnhild, Morten Tønnessen og Guri Larsen (eds) 2013, Hvem er villest i landet her? Råskap mot dyr og natur i antropocen, menneskets tidsalder, Oslo: Spartacus Forlag/Scandinavian Academic Press, 9-36.  

Tønnessen, Morten 2013. Menneskeveldet [The human empire]. In Sollund, Ragnhild, Morten Tønnessen og Guri Larsen (eds) 2013, Hvem er villest i landet her? Råskap mot dyr og natur i antropocen, menneskets tidsalder, Oslo: Spartacus Forlag/Scandinavian Academic Press, 37-56. 

Tønnessen, Morten 2013. Hvem er villest i landet her? Et ulveliv [Who is wildest in this country here? A wolf's life]. In Sollund, Ragnhild, Morten Tønnessen og Guri Larsen (eds) 2013, Hvem er villest i landet her? Råskap mot dyr og natur i antropocen, menneskets tidsalder, Oslo: Spartacus Forlag/Scandinavian Academic Press, 79-98. 

As detailed in the preface, the book is dedicated to the memory of Tinga [a bird], Singa [a dog], and Matias Laurits da Silva-Tønnessen, the latter being my son.

My bionote is on page 378.

January 1st: 20% position; 80% parental leave

I have updated my "Brief academic CV", amongst other things noting in point one that my position as Associate professor at University of Stavanger's Department of Health Studies 2012-2013 has been 25% (Spring 2012) > 100% (Autumn 2012) and is now 20% (Spring 2013). This semester I'll give the course Examen Philosophicum for the fourth time altogether (including once at University of Agder), and for the second time in the internet-based bachelor for nursing students.

Today, January 1st 2013, I further dwelve into a graded (80%) parental leave, to look after and spend time with my son Matias Laurits da Silva-Tønnessen (born October 10th 2012). My parental leave will last until June 24th.