Why ALEXEVASION?
My name is Alexander Brian Goldman. In my opinion (not my parent's), this name has some problems... it isn't catchy, it doesn't flow, and for some reason, I inevitably slur the whole thing together in speech situations. Finally, Goldman, perhaps more so than any other name, denotes Judiasm. I generally like to avoid social profiling and since I am not really Jewish in the racial or religious sense, it creates some confusion. My mother's maiden name is Awagain (pronounced ah-way-xian). That is a bastardized form of the common Armenian surname "Ayvazian". I would have greatly preferred this name, but alas, American immigration follies and patrilineal traditions conspired against such an outcome. Anyhow, I decided on "alexevasion" as my online alias in 2000 when I was reading a popular zine called "Evasion". This auto ethnography chronicles the American adventures of a clever acetic outlaw (read: traveling punk) finding ways to live an exciting life on less than a dollar a day. As tribute to a lifestyle I loved but could not at that time lead, I decided to wed this man's stylized namesake to my own past. I acknowledge that I may have unfairly appropriated it, but given that the original Evasion remains an mostly anonymous figure, I doubt I'll be getting complaints. Still, out of respect, let me plug his work by providing this link to the book he eventually produced. Finally, I recognize the irony of operating a shamelessly self-promoting site under this banner adjective. Rest assured that people who know me have confirmed that I am quite evasive, mostly in ways passing strangers can scarcely perceive. For further explanation, follow this link
Did you design this website?
Yes, but barely. This site runs on Drupal, an open-source content management system. This means that I wrote no html, php, or mysql, though I do know a bit of all of them. For the most part, Drupal takes care of all that for me and I merely play with different modular functions and add content. The theme is called Meta and serves my purposes well. I hope you have an enjoyable experience on this site and it encourages you to experiment with similar systems for your own purposes. Still, when you find things that don't work, keep in mind that I don't do this for a living.
What do you hope to gain from it?
I hope it will do different things for different people, including myself, of course. People who are encountering me for the first time are the primary audience. I hope it will keep me from incessantly re-describing myself on dozens of social networking sites. I think of this site as the best way for interested parties to get a handle on who I am before we actually meet. I revel in the art of banter, but detest small talk of the general biographical sort. Perhaps potential collaborators will use it to assess my competence or general fit for a particular project. My family might like to occasionally check in to see what I am up to. Finally, I need to have a place where I am public ally accountable for my life and my work.
What are you doing with your life these days?
That requires a constantly shifting set of answers. I think I am always somewhere between phases in my life. I lived, worked, and studied in Gainesville, FL from , but then decided to go looking for something more. I spent some time doing adventure travel in the Appalachians, hiking, mountain biking, and rock climbing my way to the Canadian border. Then I worked for the Couchsurfing Project for a few of months in Montreal, drove across North America to Burning Man, and ended up in San Francisco for a month designing websites and helping out a disabled friend who housed me. I took off to Asia for six months for research, work, and intrigue and returned from India in the Spring of 2007. I spent a month in LA, then took a month visiting the SW national parks, and then spent another month in Denver/Boulder. I then visited Yellowstone and Glacier and checked out cities in the Pacific Northwest. I met great people in almost all the places I went, but ended up coming back to FL in September to help out my relatives here and work more on my dissertation.
How can I find/contact you?
Send an email to alexevasion@gmail.com. You can also call me at when I am in the US. If you would like to know where I am geographically, where I have been, and who vouches for my strong moral fiber, check out my CouchSurfing profile.
