Yes, for the pedants in the crowd, it's build a better Frankenstein's Monster. But that felt like too far a departure from the "Build a Better Mousetrap" allusion I was going for, so here we are.
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Showing posts with label teaching. Show all posts
Friday, May 8, 2015
Saturday, February 14, 2015
Feminism and Rhetoric
I've been teaching an online first year rhetoric course this term. And what that means for our university in particular is that all the readings have been chosen beforehand, all the lectures recorded before I was ever assigned the course, and all the assignments planned ahead of time (but I still get to write the final, which.... thanks, I guess?). And as you'd imagine, not all of the texts have been ones that I would have chosen. They're all wonderful texts for a rhetoric class, just not the particular texts I would picked; it's a matter of personal preference, more than any other consideration.
In particular, I was uncertain of this week's reading, a section from Hélène Cixous' Laugh of the Medusa. It's a good read, but not what I personally would have picked out as the singular example of rhetoric and feminism. (That the course has only a single text on rhetoric and feminism is a different issue.) It is, I thought, too complicated, too complex in its use of language, too steeped in psychoanalytical discussions about the phallus. I braced myself for a reading response set that suggested the class had listened to the lectures and skipped the reading (a fairly common occurrence, given some of the responses although I also have a large number of really good responses on any given week, and I do my best to encourage such responses).
As you can probably guess from my own rhetoric, I was wrong. The reading has led to more thoughtful, engaged responses than anything we've done so far. Yes, there have been some half-hearted engagements, as always, but most of the class has responded with above average engagement, especially some of the women, who have mentioned that the essay speaks to them on a personal level. I'm drawing three conclusions from this. First, it has been a humbling reminder that my students are better and smarter than I've been giving them credit for. Second, it attests to the power of Cixous' writing, that it still resonates. And third, it suggests that, sadly, a lot of her critique still applies, that women today still feel pressured to write in a voice not their own.
It's been an eye-opening course, in more ways than I was expecting going in.
Later Days.
In particular, I was uncertain of this week's reading, a section from Hélène Cixous' Laugh of the Medusa. It's a good read, but not what I personally would have picked out as the singular example of rhetoric and feminism. (That the course has only a single text on rhetoric and feminism is a different issue.) It is, I thought, too complicated, too complex in its use of language, too steeped in psychoanalytical discussions about the phallus. I braced myself for a reading response set that suggested the class had listened to the lectures and skipped the reading (a fairly common occurrence, given some of the responses although I also have a large number of really good responses on any given week, and I do my best to encourage such responses).
As you can probably guess from my own rhetoric, I was wrong. The reading has led to more thoughtful, engaged responses than anything we've done so far. Yes, there have been some half-hearted engagements, as always, but most of the class has responded with above average engagement, especially some of the women, who have mentioned that the essay speaks to them on a personal level. I'm drawing three conclusions from this. First, it has been a humbling reminder that my students are better and smarter than I've been giving them credit for. Second, it attests to the power of Cixous' writing, that it still resonates. And third, it suggests that, sadly, a lot of her critique still applies, that women today still feel pressured to write in a voice not their own.
It's been an eye-opening course, in more ways than I was expecting going in.
Later Days.
Sunday, January 5, 2014
Digital Butterflies? Bugs in the System! hahhaha...never mind.
I'm teaching the first day of a new course tomorrow--it's a first year course on online identities. And while I am not a praying man by nature, I am entreating any interested deities to make it a snow day. I am, in other words, nervous about it. And I'm not sure why. Granted, I've been more prepared for courses in the past, but that lack of preparation has largely been endless fiddling with the object texts in the syllabus. This course is essentially my subject area; I know this material, and I know it well. Nor is it the first time I've taught in this area; I taught a second year course on the same subject about two years ago, and if anything, that should have been the nerve-wracking one, given that the students were prepared to face much more difficult material. Perhaps it's some vestigial guilt over how that course went; the final projects were excellent, but even at the time, I wish I had pushed myself a little more to do some hands-on digital creation in the classroom. I don't think that hands-on stuff is appropriate in a first year course, not in the same way--it's an English course, and you need to establish basic writing and analysis skills before jumping into the more fun digital creation stuff. But we'll be doing a Twine workshop late in March, which should scratch that itch.
I suppose it's just nerves. I should calm down, relax, and put on some soothing music. ...Maybe one more pass over the material for week 4....
Later Days.
I suppose it's just nerves. I should calm down, relax, and put on some soothing music. ...Maybe one more pass over the material for week 4....
Later Days.
Sunday, July 28, 2013
Bibliophile: Yesterday is Here Again
"A great book should leave you with many experiences, and slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading.” --William Styron
Note: I went to make this week's Bibliophile, when I realized I never got around to posting *last* week's Bibliophile. Which, in turn, was a Bibliophile that I had never finished for the week before that. Punctuality is hard. But it makes the title I originally intended even more apropos, so it all comes out in the wash.
This week, Bibliophile is on the road once more, with a short discussion of some new books at Brock University. Brock U has a lovely new book list, conveniently sorted by call number. And we will plunge its depths. After the break.
(I'll level with you--this is actually last week's Bibliophile. I started it, but there just weren't enough hours in the day, or at least that particular day, to bring it to the end. But today, I'm stuck at home. I forgot to refill my inhaler prescription, so any activity as strenuous as leaving the house is probably beyond my ability. So we've got plenty of time to wrap things up here.)
Note: I went to make this week's Bibliophile, when I realized I never got around to posting *last* week's Bibliophile. Which, in turn, was a Bibliophile that I had never finished for the week before that. Punctuality is hard. But it makes the title I originally intended even more apropos, so it all comes out in the wash.
This week, Bibliophile is on the road once more, with a short discussion of some new books at Brock University. Brock U has a lovely new book list, conveniently sorted by call number. And we will plunge its depths. After the break.
(I'll level with you--this is actually last week's Bibliophile. I started it, but there just weren't enough hours in the day, or at least that particular day, to bring it to the end. But today, I'm stuck at home. I forgot to refill my inhaler prescription, so any activity as strenuous as leaving the house is probably beyond my ability. So we've got plenty of time to wrap things up here.)
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Those Things What Happen To Me
Random Things:
(Imagine this part is narrated by Albert Brooks using that voice he uses on the Simpsons) I got to campus today about 2 pm. I hadn't eaten yet that day (busy morning), and so I was hoping at least to snag a muffin. But I got to the library coffee shop and they were OUT OF MUFFINS! How can you be out of muffins? Who eats that many muffins? Where do the muffins go? Well, fine. I went with my second choice, and decided to get a chocolate bar from the vending machine. Only I hit the wrong number, and I got a Turkish Delight. That is the WORST possible chocolate bar you can get. What a day!
I gave a guest lecture this week on, among other things, personal video games and Anna Anthropy's Dys4ia. And honestly, it wasn't the best lecture I've given. The students just weren't responding like I was hoping they would. I think it's the subject matter more than anything. Not Anthropy's games, but trying to teach games at all in the lecture format. Given that I only had them for an hour, it was basically the only way to do things, but if I had more resources and time, I'd rather have taught it the way Samantha Allen describes here, taking students to a lab, having them play through it, and discussing it with them as they play, one-on-one or in small groups. There's something about actually playing the game that encourages an engagement that's a lot different from the lecture format. Now, some day, when I teach a videogame course, things'll be different. Some day...
On top of the afternoon muffin incident, I had to get groceries today, and I was half way to the store before I realize that I had forgotten my bookbag. Now, I don't have a problem with buying bags once, but the trick was that I was on my bike. Biking with grocery bags is tricky--the simplest thing to do is to let them ride on the handle bars, but whether that works at all depends on the shape of the bike. And on top of that, you've got to be careful in terms of balance. The best case is to get two bags and distribute them evenly. It'll still make the turns somewhat different, but it's fairly easy to do. Actually, it reminded me of the videogame Scribblenauts. In the game, you type in words, and whatever you type appears as something the avatar can interact with, provided it's in the dictionary. You type "cat," you'll get a cat. Type "cap" and you'll get a cap. And type "Zombie Abe Lincoln," you'll get... well, you get the idea. As the zombie example indicates, it does adjectives. And that's handy for levels where you have to reach something high. Winged boots works, as does winged shirt, and winged hat. But where the game's controls really shine is that the control is slightly different for each, because your center is moved from the usual center of the avatar to the center of whatever winged object you're wearing. It's still your avatar you're controlling, but your focus shifts a little. And that's what biking with grocery bags on your handle bars is like--the same, but with a shifted focus.
That was a lot of words describing something complicated to explain something simple. I think I need to lay down.
Later Days.
(Imagine this part is narrated by Albert Brooks using that voice he uses on the Simpsons) I got to campus today about 2 pm. I hadn't eaten yet that day (busy morning), and so I was hoping at least to snag a muffin. But I got to the library coffee shop and they were OUT OF MUFFINS! How can you be out of muffins? Who eats that many muffins? Where do the muffins go? Well, fine. I went with my second choice, and decided to get a chocolate bar from the vending machine. Only I hit the wrong number, and I got a Turkish Delight. That is the WORST possible chocolate bar you can get. What a day!
I gave a guest lecture this week on, among other things, personal video games and Anna Anthropy's Dys4ia. And honestly, it wasn't the best lecture I've given. The students just weren't responding like I was hoping they would. I think it's the subject matter more than anything. Not Anthropy's games, but trying to teach games at all in the lecture format. Given that I only had them for an hour, it was basically the only way to do things, but if I had more resources and time, I'd rather have taught it the way Samantha Allen describes here, taking students to a lab, having them play through it, and discussing it with them as they play, one-on-one or in small groups. There's something about actually playing the game that encourages an engagement that's a lot different from the lecture format. Now, some day, when I teach a videogame course, things'll be different. Some day...
On top of the afternoon muffin incident, I had to get groceries today, and I was half way to the store before I realize that I had forgotten my bookbag. Now, I don't have a problem with buying bags once, but the trick was that I was on my bike. Biking with grocery bags is tricky--the simplest thing to do is to let them ride on the handle bars, but whether that works at all depends on the shape of the bike. And on top of that, you've got to be careful in terms of balance. The best case is to get two bags and distribute them evenly. It'll still make the turns somewhat different, but it's fairly easy to do. Actually, it reminded me of the videogame Scribblenauts. In the game, you type in words, and whatever you type appears as something the avatar can interact with, provided it's in the dictionary. You type "cat," you'll get a cat. Type "cap" and you'll get a cap. And type "Zombie Abe Lincoln," you'll get... well, you get the idea. As the zombie example indicates, it does adjectives. And that's handy for levels where you have to reach something high. Winged boots works, as does winged shirt, and winged hat. But where the game's controls really shine is that the control is slightly different for each, because your center is moved from the usual center of the avatar to the center of whatever winged object you're wearing. It's still your avatar you're controlling, but your focus shifts a little. And that's what biking with grocery bags on your handle bars is like--the same, but with a shifted focus.
That was a lot of words describing something complicated to explain something simple. I think I need to lay down.
Later Days.
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
Blog Odssey Day Two: Those who can't teach, blog.
Man, it's almost midnight, and I just about forgot I said I'd try the daily blogging thing. But remember I did, and here we are! The most significant thing that happened to me today is that I taught my Engl 109 course--and that's probably going to be the most significant thing that happens to me on a Wednesday for the immediate future, until the class is over at least. In previous terms, I've had a lot of trouble adjusting a course from a Monday/Wednesday/Friday schedule to a Tuesday/Thursday. It required a firm idea of what elements of a lesson plan to expand on, what to contract, and what to jettison entirely for something new. It wasn't quite as time-consuming as coming up with the course from scratch, but just making the switch was a bit stressful.
Well, we're three weeks into the 3 hour/ once a week schedule, and I yearn for those simpler times.
Designing a three hour course is rough going. This was actually the first time I kept my students for the full class, and I think that may not have worked in my favor, especially since some of them were clearly starting to anticipate an early release as a regular thing. Their expectations aside, the big problem was that there was a definite point of diminishing returns around the two hour mark. Can't say I blame them to be honest--hour two is usually when I start to fade out in a seminar myself. Hitting the happy medium between letting them out too earlier and keeping them past their best before date is a tricky target.
That said, we probably came closer today than we have previously. I divided the time into three rough time slots. First, we spent forty-five minutes discussing a selection from their readers ("Abuses of the English Language" by George Orwell) and this guy's youtube rant. And it was a pretty good discussion. One of the students caught me up in an error on Nineteen Eightyfour--the essay was published originally in 1946, which is before 1984's 1949 publication, not after, like I said--for which she gains a marked measure of respect. And other surprised me with a very thorough summary of the essay. (Granted, my instructions for the readings were that every student should come prepared to give a summary if called upon, but it was another thing to actually see them DO it.) I was uncertain about the discussion part of the classes, since it's been a long time since I've lead discussions on individual articles and pieces rather than abstract rhetorical methods, but it's shaping up nicely, I think.
Then there was the lecture portion, which was me giving a very long speech about the value of sentence clauses. I'm a firm believer that writing works best if you understand the basic units and build up, and so I usually spend a bit of time on the difference between complex, compound, complex-compound, and simple sentences. Granted, it usually bores AND confuses the students, but I still think it's worth knowing. This time, to reinforce the knowledge, I had them break into groups and construct two of each type, then turn in the result to me. I think that worked okay; like any group assignment, it took longer than if they had constructed it separately, but it gives them a chance to talk out what they've learned. My second point concerning learning these sentence types is that it helps you analyze individual authors, and I drove that home by having them go through the passages of two writers with highly stylized methods. First, we went through a passage by Cormick McCarthy from The Road. McCarthy writes most of the novel in sentence fragments, simple sentences, and compound sentences: "The ash from the fire burned. Bright and hot. The boy took the ash and spread it and made it into a shape and the man gathered up their meager supplies and they huddled together under the blanket and they kept warm for the night." The other passage was from Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time. It's a horrible book to inflict on first year undergraduates in ANY capacity, but the sentence structure is particularly nasty: Proust has a habit of constructing a single sentence the size of a paragraph. I'll cite the exact passage:
“I gazed at her, at first with that gaze which is not merely a messenger from the eyes, but in whose window all the senses assemble and lean out, petrified and anxious, that gaze which would fain reach, touch, capture, bear off in triumph the body at which it is aimed, and the soul with the body; then (so frightened was I lest at any moment my grandfather and father, catching sight of the girl, might tear me away from her, by making me run on in front of them) with another, an unconsciously appealing look, whose object was to force her to pay attention to me, to see me, to know me.”
Dense, right? And it's a single sentence. I had them guess at the number of clauses, and then I guessed too, and we worked through it together. We found nine. How many can YOU spot?
Later Days.
Well, we're three weeks into the 3 hour/ once a week schedule, and I yearn for those simpler times.
Designing a three hour course is rough going. This was actually the first time I kept my students for the full class, and I think that may not have worked in my favor, especially since some of them were clearly starting to anticipate an early release as a regular thing. Their expectations aside, the big problem was that there was a definite point of diminishing returns around the two hour mark. Can't say I blame them to be honest--hour two is usually when I start to fade out in a seminar myself. Hitting the happy medium between letting them out too earlier and keeping them past their best before date is a tricky target.
That said, we probably came closer today than we have previously. I divided the time into three rough time slots. First, we spent forty-five minutes discussing a selection from their readers ("Abuses of the English Language" by George Orwell) and this guy's youtube rant. And it was a pretty good discussion. One of the students caught me up in an error on Nineteen Eightyfour--the essay was published originally in 1946, which is before 1984's 1949 publication, not after, like I said--for which she gains a marked measure of respect. And other surprised me with a very thorough summary of the essay. (Granted, my instructions for the readings were that every student should come prepared to give a summary if called upon, but it was another thing to actually see them DO it.) I was uncertain about the discussion part of the classes, since it's been a long time since I've lead discussions on individual articles and pieces rather than abstract rhetorical methods, but it's shaping up nicely, I think.
Then there was the lecture portion, which was me giving a very long speech about the value of sentence clauses. I'm a firm believer that writing works best if you understand the basic units and build up, and so I usually spend a bit of time on the difference between complex, compound, complex-compound, and simple sentences. Granted, it usually bores AND confuses the students, but I still think it's worth knowing. This time, to reinforce the knowledge, I had them break into groups and construct two of each type, then turn in the result to me. I think that worked okay; like any group assignment, it took longer than if they had constructed it separately, but it gives them a chance to talk out what they've learned. My second point concerning learning these sentence types is that it helps you analyze individual authors, and I drove that home by having them go through the passages of two writers with highly stylized methods. First, we went through a passage by Cormick McCarthy from The Road. McCarthy writes most of the novel in sentence fragments, simple sentences, and compound sentences: "The ash from the fire burned. Bright and hot. The boy took the ash and spread it and made it into a shape and the man gathered up their meager supplies and they huddled together under the blanket and they kept warm for the night." The other passage was from Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time. It's a horrible book to inflict on first year undergraduates in ANY capacity, but the sentence structure is particularly nasty: Proust has a habit of constructing a single sentence the size of a paragraph. I'll cite the exact passage:
“I gazed at her, at first with that gaze which is not merely a messenger from the eyes, but in whose window all the senses assemble and lean out, petrified and anxious, that gaze which would fain reach, touch, capture, bear off in triumph the body at which it is aimed, and the soul with the body; then (so frightened was I lest at any moment my grandfather and father, catching sight of the girl, might tear me away from her, by making me run on in front of them) with another, an unconsciously appealing look, whose object was to force her to pay attention to me, to see me, to know me.”
Dense, right? And it's a single sentence. I had them guess at the number of clauses, and then I guessed too, and we worked through it together. We found nine. How many can YOU spot?
Later Days.
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Now, if only someone would invite me on other blogs to do a guest post. HINT HINT.
I gave a guest lecture for an introductory class on popular culture today. The subject, as longtime readers may have guessed, was video games. More specifically, it was game studies; I went through the general history of the field and the important approaches As I See Them. That meant starting with narratology and ludology, then moving into platform studies, paratextual studies, procedural rhetoric, ethnography, and gender studies. And since I basically know nothing about gender studies, that mostly consisted of me explaining how misogynist a lot of gamers are, and a lot of people in the industry. I started things off with a video of an EVE Online super battle that happened a few days ago, to demonstrate both how involved games can be (the fight cost over thousand players approximately $20 000 worth of damage, and destroyed months of work for many of them) but also to demonstrate how difficult it is to study games in an authoritative way; to get the point where you'd be able to say you're an expert scholar studying EVE Online, you'd have to spend literally hundreds of hours embedding yourself in the community and mastering the system. Other highlights included a compare and contrast between early NES commercials and Wii commercials; a very long, rambling story about It Came From the Desert and the struggles of small town geologists; and more examples than I cared to think about concerning how a lot of videogame players are pretty miserable human beings.
I've interacted with the introductory pop culture class a few times, with different sets of students, and it's always a bit of a crapshoot. Sometimes, you get students who are really thrilled to have a chance to talk about the things they watch and play everyday; sometimes, you get students from every discipline except the humanities, and they're there because they assumed it'd be an easy course, and they're not going to talk without a figurative gun to their head. There's nothing wrong with their critical skills, I hasten to add; some of the best students I've ever had the pleasure of teaching come from other critical disciplines. I think the problem is that the discussion format that the humanities try to encourage is a very different mindset than the more lecture-based class, and sometimes the adjustment from one to the other doesn't go smoothly. This group didn't talk a lot, but I got a few responses, when I waited long enough.
The other problem as far communication goes, much as I'm loathe to admit it, is the subject area. I'm so immersed in game studies and video game culture that I sometimes forget there are people were really don't care about videogames at all. For some students, they're not engaging because it's a subject matter that, right off the bat, just doesn't interest them. Games--or at least certain kinds of games--are niche. But that's the good thing about doing these lectures; it reminds me that there are more points of view than the ones I'm situated in. That's one of the big advantages of teaching undergraduate classes that have such a wide range of students--there's a chance, even if it's just a sliver, that you'll learn something too. ....That's a pretty sappy note to go out on. Still true, though.
Later Days.
I've interacted with the introductory pop culture class a few times, with different sets of students, and it's always a bit of a crapshoot. Sometimes, you get students who are really thrilled to have a chance to talk about the things they watch and play everyday; sometimes, you get students from every discipline except the humanities, and they're there because they assumed it'd be an easy course, and they're not going to talk without a figurative gun to their head. There's nothing wrong with their critical skills, I hasten to add; some of the best students I've ever had the pleasure of teaching come from other critical disciplines. I think the problem is that the discussion format that the humanities try to encourage is a very different mindset than the more lecture-based class, and sometimes the adjustment from one to the other doesn't go smoothly. This group didn't talk a lot, but I got a few responses, when I waited long enough.
The other problem as far communication goes, much as I'm loathe to admit it, is the subject area. I'm so immersed in game studies and video game culture that I sometimes forget there are people were really don't care about videogames at all. For some students, they're not engaging because it's a subject matter that, right off the bat, just doesn't interest them. Games--or at least certain kinds of games--are niche. But that's the good thing about doing these lectures; it reminds me that there are more points of view than the ones I'm situated in. That's one of the big advantages of teaching undergraduate classes that have such a wide range of students--there's a chance, even if it's just a sliver, that you'll learn something too. ....That's a pretty sappy note to go out on. Still true, though.
Later Days.
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
It's Always Something in Philadelphia
I'm teaching a pop culture course this term. I've taught the course before, so I decided to shake things up a bit this time, in terms of the artifacts. We've studied Bill Hick's stand-up, 1940s Disney cartoons featuring Nazis, and 1950s government films on what to do in case of a nuclear strike. Today, though, we watched an episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and it was the first time I really wondered if I went too far.
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia is a show whose basic premise is easy to sum up. The core plot is 5 people running a bar: Dennis, the owner who is also a conceited narcissist; Mac, the second-in-command who's played by a guy who ate himself overweight because he thought it would make his character funnier (it did, but wow, that's commitment); Dee, Dennis' sister who is desperately insecure; Charlie, who's on the borderline between kind of dumb and outright insane; and Frank, played by Danny DeVito, who is rich, disgusting, and insane. And from the start, it's been a show that's prized itself in finding humor in disgusting situations. See, for example, Season 4's "Who Pooped the Bed?" or the Season 7 episode where they host a child beauty pageant.
At the same time, though, there's a definite difference from the early and late seasons. I remember watching the first season in two or three sittings, and ending it feeling like I had been made a worse person for watching. And then I stopped feeling that way. I've joked that it was because some part of my moral sense had died, but, going back to the earlier episodes for my class, I think the show itself changed. It started with the introduction of Danny DeVito to the cast, but even his character underwent some changes. He started as a disciplinarian, tough-love father wanting to indulge himself (reminiscent of the father from Titus, actually, another dark comedy) then gradually veered away from that until the Christmas episode a few seasons later where he emerges naked from inside a couch during a party, and unselfconsciously plods his way out of the room.
Don't think that I'm complaining about the new direction, though. It was when the show got "wackier" that I started to really like it. I love the scenes with Charlie's kitten mittens, and his dream journal. I still sing bits from the musical episode. Chardee MacDennis is probably the closest thing on television that I've seen to Calvinball, in terms of absurdist rules. And even though I'm a vegetarian, I am fascinated with the idea of the rum ham. But I have to admit, the show had a lot more edge in the beginning. Look at the topics from the first season: racism, abortion, sex with minors/underage drinking, cancer, gun control, molestation. We are talking about a lot of topics that are taboo for comedy. And the episodes aren't entirely without heart, either; it's pretty clear, for example, in the "Underage Drinking" episode, that the Gang is just dealing with their own issues from high school rather than deliberately wanting to make out with high school kids, and as a 28 year old, I can relate to still carrying around that kind of baggage (just the first part. Not the second. Don't relate to that. At all.).
I don't really have a conclusion here, except the most wishy-washy one ever. I think the show made the right choice by going in a more absurdist direction; the pure dark comedy was pretty depressing, and certainly not sustainable over 8 seasons. At the same time, though, when I was looking for an episode that was interesting in its own right for a class discussion, it was the early stuff I looked at--those are the episodes that really deal with the issues.
Friday, we're watching an episode of Louie, starring the comedian Louie C. K. It's maybe the only example of a show that I can think of that's pulling off the balance between biting, sometimes dark, social commentary and humor.
Later Days
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia is a show whose basic premise is easy to sum up. The core plot is 5 people running a bar: Dennis, the owner who is also a conceited narcissist; Mac, the second-in-command who's played by a guy who ate himself overweight because he thought it would make his character funnier (it did, but wow, that's commitment); Dee, Dennis' sister who is desperately insecure; Charlie, who's on the borderline between kind of dumb and outright insane; and Frank, played by Danny DeVito, who is rich, disgusting, and insane. And from the start, it's been a show that's prized itself in finding humor in disgusting situations. See, for example, Season 4's "Who Pooped the Bed?" or the Season 7 episode where they host a child beauty pageant.
At the same time, though, there's a definite difference from the early and late seasons. I remember watching the first season in two or three sittings, and ending it feeling like I had been made a worse person for watching. And then I stopped feeling that way. I've joked that it was because some part of my moral sense had died, but, going back to the earlier episodes for my class, I think the show itself changed. It started with the introduction of Danny DeVito to the cast, but even his character underwent some changes. He started as a disciplinarian, tough-love father wanting to indulge himself (reminiscent of the father from Titus, actually, another dark comedy) then gradually veered away from that until the Christmas episode a few seasons later where he emerges naked from inside a couch during a party, and unselfconsciously plods his way out of the room.
Don't think that I'm complaining about the new direction, though. It was when the show got "wackier" that I started to really like it. I love the scenes with Charlie's kitten mittens, and his dream journal. I still sing bits from the musical episode. Chardee MacDennis is probably the closest thing on television that I've seen to Calvinball, in terms of absurdist rules. And even though I'm a vegetarian, I am fascinated with the idea of the rum ham. But I have to admit, the show had a lot more edge in the beginning. Look at the topics from the first season: racism, abortion, sex with minors/underage drinking, cancer, gun control, molestation. We are talking about a lot of topics that are taboo for comedy. And the episodes aren't entirely without heart, either; it's pretty clear, for example, in the "Underage Drinking" episode, that the Gang is just dealing with their own issues from high school rather than deliberately wanting to make out with high school kids, and as a 28 year old, I can relate to still carrying around that kind of baggage (just the first part. Not the second. Don't relate to that. At all.).
I don't really have a conclusion here, except the most wishy-washy one ever. I think the show made the right choice by going in a more absurdist direction; the pure dark comedy was pretty depressing, and certainly not sustainable over 8 seasons. At the same time, though, when I was looking for an episode that was interesting in its own right for a class discussion, it was the early stuff I looked at--those are the episodes that really deal with the issues.
Friday, we're watching an episode of Louie, starring the comedian Louie C. K. It's maybe the only example of a show that I can think of that's pulling off the balance between biting, sometimes dark, social commentary and humor.
Later Days
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
Here We Go Again
Given that the new course I'm teaching starts tomorrow, I came to the conclusion that I should probably start planning what I'm going to actually teach. That's not quite as "by the seat of my pants" as it sounds; it's course I've taught before, so a majority of the legwork has already been done by past PoC. (It's about time that guy pulled his own weight.) Most of the actual changes are cosmetic; I permutate the examples I used, I update the syllabus to include the new course dates, and I set up the university course page. Same old, same old.
But there are two significant changes, beyond the cosmetic uplifts. One: The first time I taught this course, I acquiesced to student requests that I post the class notes online. The result was a term of dismal, dismal attendance. This time, I'm both refusing to post the notes and taking attendance for marks--and if that doesn't put butts in seats, I'll start giving away free candy, or something. That might seem like a pretty small change, but it means a rather extensive revamp of my course notes. If you're creating slides students can refer back to at any point, you're free to be rather expansive, but if you're expecting them to furiously write (or type, these days) down the essentials, then you have to stick to the essentials, and leave the extraneous explanatory stuff for verbal espousal or blackboard writing. (Yes, I said espousal--going into teaching mode does horribly pedantic things to my vocabulary.) It'll mean a streamlining of my lectures, which is probably something my original notes could have used anyway.
Second, taking away the reading responses and replacing them with a blog component. For the last course I taught (a digital media thing), I had my students contribute weekly to a blog, posting and replying to each others' posts. Whether the blog had an overall positive impact is a matter up for debate. For some students, it served as a place for discussion, and granted them a voice they didn't--or couldn't, for whatever reason--exercise in class. Others tended to ignore it, and the skipped posts became this weight that dragged down their grades. Overall, though, I think the blog is a lot more in tune with the pop culture focus than the reading responses, so we'll try that out. (It's also a lot easier to point to as "innovative" in a job talk--though I'm totally just thinking about the students, of course.)
The trick to the blog approach, if you're thinking of trying it, is that it's a lot of work. Students are constantly making posts and comments, and you need to keep up with them. I'll admit, I fell behind a few times last semester. And that was with under a dozen students--now, I've got a full roster of 35. I'll probably have to keep up a regular daily check just to keep afloat.
But don't worry, blog. Just because I'm going to be doing some blog action on the side doesn't mean that I don't love you any more. I just want to do other blogs on the side. You understand, I'm sure.
Later Days.
But there are two significant changes, beyond the cosmetic uplifts. One: The first time I taught this course, I acquiesced to student requests that I post the class notes online. The result was a term of dismal, dismal attendance. This time, I'm both refusing to post the notes and taking attendance for marks--and if that doesn't put butts in seats, I'll start giving away free candy, or something. That might seem like a pretty small change, but it means a rather extensive revamp of my course notes. If you're creating slides students can refer back to at any point, you're free to be rather expansive, but if you're expecting them to furiously write (or type, these days) down the essentials, then you have to stick to the essentials, and leave the extraneous explanatory stuff for verbal espousal or blackboard writing. (Yes, I said espousal--going into teaching mode does horribly pedantic things to my vocabulary.) It'll mean a streamlining of my lectures, which is probably something my original notes could have used anyway.
Second, taking away the reading responses and replacing them with a blog component. For the last course I taught (a digital media thing), I had my students contribute weekly to a blog, posting and replying to each others' posts. Whether the blog had an overall positive impact is a matter up for debate. For some students, it served as a place for discussion, and granted them a voice they didn't--or couldn't, for whatever reason--exercise in class. Others tended to ignore it, and the skipped posts became this weight that dragged down their grades. Overall, though, I think the blog is a lot more in tune with the pop culture focus than the reading responses, so we'll try that out. (It's also a lot easier to point to as "innovative" in a job talk--though I'm totally just thinking about the students, of course.)
The trick to the blog approach, if you're thinking of trying it, is that it's a lot of work. Students are constantly making posts and comments, and you need to keep up with them. I'll admit, I fell behind a few times last semester. And that was with under a dozen students--now, I've got a full roster of 35. I'll probably have to keep up a regular daily check just to keep afloat.
But don't worry, blog. Just because I'm going to be doing some blog action on the side doesn't mean that I don't love you any more. I just want to do other blogs on the side. You understand, I'm sure.
Later Days.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
And miles to go before I... something... something... good night, folks.
Some bullet points conveying my current status:
--Sweet llama of the Bahamas, I'm tired. This one's important, because it flavors what follows. In preparation for the class I start teaching next week, I'm taking steps this week to slowly adjust my sleeping schedule. The first two days went tolerably, but right now, I'm somewhere between "dozing while awake" and "near comatose." The only thing that's granting me any satisfaction is the knowledge that doing this next week would be much, much worse.
--Happy Birthday, Mom! Well, actually, yesterday was my mother's birthday. I phoned her up and we chatted for a bit. Without getting into details, it reminded me how lucky I am to have the family I do and how I should talk to them more.
--No, student, YOU are it! I was torn on what to do for my first class next week. I like to do some sort of meeting exercise in the first class, but I also wanted to relate it to the course's actual subject, digital media studies. I think I stumbled on a way today. I've been reading Richard Coyne's book, The Tuning of Place, which, among other things, joins spatiality with pervasive media using the metaphor of tuning. I'm going to borrow his discussion of tagging to get the students to create "tags" for each other. The details need a little hammering out, but I feel like the core idea is here now.
--Here comes the new group, same as the old group.Sometimes, in all the hustle of undergraduate Frosh Week, we forget that it's Frosh Week for graduate students too. Specifically, after orientation today, the new grad students in our department are herded into a bar with the promise of bonding and social mixing. I went briefly today to get to know them, met a few, and went home. I meant to stay till the end, but honestly, I am so exhausted I couldn't do it. It's strange; this is my fourth "orientation" point, and I remember them being anxiety-ridden. The first time around, it was the "stranger in a strange land" thing, where I didn't know anybody. The next time, it was the awkwardness of how to present myself after I'd just spent a year getting comfortable with the people I knew. This time--it was just something I did. I met a bunch of people who seem perfectly nice, I may or may not get to know them better, and I left with a tired but pleasant glow. Maybe I've become jaded, and no longer put forth the same effort to get to know the newbies. Maybe I've become more socially broadened, and grown more efficient at breaking the ice and subsequent small talk. Or maybe I was just too tired to care one way or other.
Actually, it's probably that last one. They still seem like good people, though.
Later Days!
--Sweet llama of the Bahamas, I'm tired. This one's important, because it flavors what follows. In preparation for the class I start teaching next week, I'm taking steps this week to slowly adjust my sleeping schedule. The first two days went tolerably, but right now, I'm somewhere between "dozing while awake" and "near comatose." The only thing that's granting me any satisfaction is the knowledge that doing this next week would be much, much worse.
--Happy Birthday, Mom! Well, actually, yesterday was my mother's birthday. I phoned her up and we chatted for a bit. Without getting into details, it reminded me how lucky I am to have the family I do and how I should talk to them more.
--No, student, YOU are it! I was torn on what to do for my first class next week. I like to do some sort of meeting exercise in the first class, but I also wanted to relate it to the course's actual subject, digital media studies. I think I stumbled on a way today. I've been reading Richard Coyne's book, The Tuning of Place, which, among other things, joins spatiality with pervasive media using the metaphor of tuning. I'm going to borrow his discussion of tagging to get the students to create "tags" for each other. The details need a little hammering out, but I feel like the core idea is here now.
--Here comes the new group, same as the old group.Sometimes, in all the hustle of undergraduate Frosh Week, we forget that it's Frosh Week for graduate students too. Specifically, after orientation today, the new grad students in our department are herded into a bar with the promise of bonding and social mixing. I went briefly today to get to know them, met a few, and went home. I meant to stay till the end, but honestly, I am so exhausted I couldn't do it. It's strange; this is my fourth "orientation" point, and I remember them being anxiety-ridden. The first time around, it was the "stranger in a strange land" thing, where I didn't know anybody. The next time, it was the awkwardness of how to present myself after I'd just spent a year getting comfortable with the people I knew. This time--it was just something I did. I met a bunch of people who seem perfectly nice, I may or may not get to know them better, and I left with a tired but pleasant glow. Maybe I've become jaded, and no longer put forth the same effort to get to know the newbies. Maybe I've become more socially broadened, and grown more efficient at breaking the ice and subsequent small talk. Or maybe I was just too tired to care one way or other.
Actually, it's probably that last one. They still seem like good people, though.
Later Days!
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Academic Thoughts III: The Classroom
I was putting the finishing touches on the syllabus for my fall course today--an introduction class on digital media that starts in (blinks in a way that's meant to show catatonic terror) less than two weeks. And that process means I'm about as ready as I'll ever be to start the next post in my Academic Thoughts series. We've talked about the blog, we've talked about the conference, and now it's time to talk about teaching classes.
Now, the interesting thing about classes in terms of the CV is that it can help you get a job--but it's more likely to get you a non-tenure track position than a tenure-track one. The sad truth is that while prospective employers may look a little askance at a candidate who's never known the podium side of the classroom, extensive teaching experience is a nice frill in comparison to other factors: a track record of grants and scholarships, a web of connections, and, as I'll discuss in the next post, a history of being published in the right places. That all sounds very jaded, but honestly, the biggest factor is simply being in the right place at the right time: that you're looking for a job at the exact moment a professor is scheduled to retire and they're looking for a 17th century Bacon scholar. (Or something. My 17th century knowledge is vague.) So if you'd prefer, the process isn't so much a series of Machiavellian manipulations as it is the random strings of pure chance.
No, that doesn't make me feel better either.
Research grants, especially on the humanities side of things, aren't really growing very quickly, so the need for the tenure-tracked positions goes slow. But the number of students attending university is still on the rise, which means the demand for sessional lecturers is increasing, or at least increasing at a faster rate. Pushed to excess, this difference becomes a complete imbalance. The sessionals are overworked with little chance of ever transitioning into tenure-track, as they don't have time for original research. The tenure-track are become increasingly isolated and bureaucratically driven. And the students suffer as well, because of the extra barrier placed between them and the top level research they want to be a part of. (Assuming they want to be a part of it, of course, and are there for more than rubber-stamp certification. The commodification and commercialization of the college degree is a related, but different, issue.)
And it's a shame, because teaching can be a lot of fun.
I was talking to a professor recently, and he mentioned that he makes a point of teaching our first year course on basic academic writing at least once every couple of years. Now, this class is arguably one of the most thankless tasks you can be assigned in our department, teaching-wise. Most of the students are from other disciplines, and are just there for their aforementioned rubber-stamped English credit. Worse, the course is counted for the equivalent of an ESL language test, so you get a number of ESL students who are here because they failed the normal test. So basically, you have a room overflowing of uninterested, bored students who in some cases can barely grasp what you are talking about. But even considering all that, I could understand why the professor did it. Teaching a class, even that class, is like being the conductor for a mass orchestra. For that rare moment when everything's in sync, when you can tell that the room is genuinely interested in what's going on and in participating, there's a feeling of communal thought that goes beyond the mundane everyday into something transcendental.
Plus, it's a huge ego boost to speak in front of a captive audience twice a week.
It works better for courses that the instructor is genuinely interested in, but the classroom is a great place to try out ideas. It exposes the ideas to new people outside the closed academic circle, and offers a perpetually renewing source of perspective. (In fact, that's the advantage it has over the conference, which tends to be full of people who think the same way. Or occasionally, think almost the same way, with a slight difference that's just enough to turn a convivial conversation into a screaming match.) Both of parents were teachers, and they'll both tell you the same thing: teaching is an incredibly draining, but incredibly rewarding experience.
That's a best case scenario, of course. In reality, you get students who don't bother to show up, students who think they know better than you, students that derail class discussions and leave you rolling your eyes. There's essays to be marked, grades to be assigned, and rosters to fill. We've come a long way since the days of the Socratic method (for example, we admit that women are people now; not all change is bad), and the bureaucratic side of the classroom isn't any better than that side of academia at large. But my point is, teaching is a valuable learning tool, for the instructor as well as the students. It's also a skill, and those that choose to develop it and hone it deserve nothing, in my opinion, but the highest level of respect.
Too bad it doesn't count more for the CV. It should, but it doesn't.
Later Days.
Now, the interesting thing about classes in terms of the CV is that it can help you get a job--but it's more likely to get you a non-tenure track position than a tenure-track one. The sad truth is that while prospective employers may look a little askance at a candidate who's never known the podium side of the classroom, extensive teaching experience is a nice frill in comparison to other factors: a track record of grants and scholarships, a web of connections, and, as I'll discuss in the next post, a history of being published in the right places. That all sounds very jaded, but honestly, the biggest factor is simply being in the right place at the right time: that you're looking for a job at the exact moment a professor is scheduled to retire and they're looking for a 17th century Bacon scholar. (Or something. My 17th century knowledge is vague.) So if you'd prefer, the process isn't so much a series of Machiavellian manipulations as it is the random strings of pure chance.
No, that doesn't make me feel better either.
Research grants, especially on the humanities side of things, aren't really growing very quickly, so the need for the tenure-tracked positions goes slow. But the number of students attending university is still on the rise, which means the demand for sessional lecturers is increasing, or at least increasing at a faster rate. Pushed to excess, this difference becomes a complete imbalance. The sessionals are overworked with little chance of ever transitioning into tenure-track, as they don't have time for original research. The tenure-track are become increasingly isolated and bureaucratically driven. And the students suffer as well, because of the extra barrier placed between them and the top level research they want to be a part of. (Assuming they want to be a part of it, of course, and are there for more than rubber-stamp certification. The commodification and commercialization of the college degree is a related, but different, issue.)
And it's a shame, because teaching can be a lot of fun.
I was talking to a professor recently, and he mentioned that he makes a point of teaching our first year course on basic academic writing at least once every couple of years. Now, this class is arguably one of the most thankless tasks you can be assigned in our department, teaching-wise. Most of the students are from other disciplines, and are just there for their aforementioned rubber-stamped English credit. Worse, the course is counted for the equivalent of an ESL language test, so you get a number of ESL students who are here because they failed the normal test. So basically, you have a room overflowing of uninterested, bored students who in some cases can barely grasp what you are talking about. But even considering all that, I could understand why the professor did it. Teaching a class, even that class, is like being the conductor for a mass orchestra. For that rare moment when everything's in sync, when you can tell that the room is genuinely interested in what's going on and in participating, there's a feeling of communal thought that goes beyond the mundane everyday into something transcendental.
Plus, it's a huge ego boost to speak in front of a captive audience twice a week.
It works better for courses that the instructor is genuinely interested in, but the classroom is a great place to try out ideas. It exposes the ideas to new people outside the closed academic circle, and offers a perpetually renewing source of perspective. (In fact, that's the advantage it has over the conference, which tends to be full of people who think the same way. Or occasionally, think almost the same way, with a slight difference that's just enough to turn a convivial conversation into a screaming match.) Both of parents were teachers, and they'll both tell you the same thing: teaching is an incredibly draining, but incredibly rewarding experience.
That's a best case scenario, of course. In reality, you get students who don't bother to show up, students who think they know better than you, students that derail class discussions and leave you rolling your eyes. There's essays to be marked, grades to be assigned, and rosters to fill. We've come a long way since the days of the Socratic method (for example, we admit that women are people now; not all change is bad), and the bureaucratic side of the classroom isn't any better than that side of academia at large. But my point is, teaching is a valuable learning tool, for the instructor as well as the students. It's also a skill, and those that choose to develop it and hone it deserve nothing, in my opinion, but the highest level of respect.
Too bad it doesn't count more for the CV. It should, but it doesn't.
Later Days.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
General Upkeep
I'll do a nice long post tomorrow, but for now, I'm going to try the "brevity is the soul of wit" approach and go for a 500 word limit.
--I’m teaching my first solo course this semester. It seems to be going all right so far—the students are very enthusiastic. Okay, that’s a bit much. They’re interested. Mildly interested. All right, one guy showed up for class and immediately slept for the next hour and a half. It’s a new class. They’ll learn. I won’t be discussing the class in any great detail here, though, for the same reason that I don’t blog about my research—it lacks a sort of professionalism, y’know? At the same time, I’m not going to pretend that this blog is particularly well hidden; if a student knows it exists and looks for it, he/she/it stands a good chance at being able to find it. So let’s make things interesting. To my students: the first of you to find this site, and email the word “hedgemuffin” to my university email account gets one bonus mark on the midterm test. First come, first serve.
--As part of the whole “I’m a real instructor now” theme of 2011, I’ve upped my wardrobe and my sleeping schedule. On the clothes front, I’ve always wanted to generally dress nicer, but there have been certain things holding me back: general cheapness; a intense, passionate hatred of trying on clothes in stores; utter and complete lack of style. But I’ve got my new X-Mas gear as outfit, a lovely grown-up winter coat with buttons and everything, and I think the new glasses really add some vim to the whole number. Excelsior! ...Sorry, I’ve been reading old Stan Lee press releases. They kind of seep into your brain. Anyway, I’ve also been getting up early—for a total of two days in a row. Considering I was averaging a wake-up time of around noon for most of last semester, it’s a big step. I really like early morning work at the university. It’s so much easier to work when those student things aren’t around.
--Random pop culture thing: I just purchased the DS game Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey. The plot is classic sci-fi/horror: after years of pollution, humankind has ravaged the earth. The worst devastation is a strange, expanding hole that’s appeared in the Antarctic, that’s destroying everything in its path. I play a UN commando sent in as part of a large force to investigate. Things then go horribly wrong... The game follows the typical Shin Megami Tensei template (it’s a big series in Japan). You recruit demons, and unleash them in battle to fight for you. The difference between this game and others in the series, such as Shin Megami Tensei Persona 3, is that rather than play characters that unleash demons, you recruit the demons and they fight directly alongside you. The shift supports the game’s story directly, which is all about uneasy truces with Earth’s new demonic residents. It’s long, yet you can still play it while watching TV, which is, sadly, one of the big things I look for in a DS game.
That’s it. Later Days.
--I’m teaching my first solo course this semester. It seems to be going all right so far—the students are very enthusiastic. Okay, that’s a bit much. They’re interested. Mildly interested. All right, one guy showed up for class and immediately slept for the next hour and a half. It’s a new class. They’ll learn. I won’t be discussing the class in any great detail here, though, for the same reason that I don’t blog about my research—it lacks a sort of professionalism, y’know? At the same time, I’m not going to pretend that this blog is particularly well hidden; if a student knows it exists and looks for it, he/she/it stands a good chance at being able to find it. So let’s make things interesting. To my students: the first of you to find this site, and email the word “hedgemuffin” to my university email account gets one bonus mark on the midterm test. First come, first serve.
--As part of the whole “I’m a real instructor now” theme of 2011, I’ve upped my wardrobe and my sleeping schedule. On the clothes front, I’ve always wanted to generally dress nicer, but there have been certain things holding me back: general cheapness; a intense, passionate hatred of trying on clothes in stores; utter and complete lack of style. But I’ve got my new X-Mas gear as outfit, a lovely grown-up winter coat with buttons and everything, and I think the new glasses really add some vim to the whole number. Excelsior! ...Sorry, I’ve been reading old Stan Lee press releases. They kind of seep into your brain. Anyway, I’ve also been getting up early—for a total of two days in a row. Considering I was averaging a wake-up time of around noon for most of last semester, it’s a big step. I really like early morning work at the university. It’s so much easier to work when those student things aren’t around.
--Random pop culture thing: I just purchased the DS game Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey. The plot is classic sci-fi/horror: after years of pollution, humankind has ravaged the earth. The worst devastation is a strange, expanding hole that’s appeared in the Antarctic, that’s destroying everything in its path. I play a UN commando sent in as part of a large force to investigate. Things then go horribly wrong... The game follows the typical Shin Megami Tensei template (it’s a big series in Japan). You recruit demons, and unleash them in battle to fight for you. The difference between this game and others in the series, such as Shin Megami Tensei Persona 3, is that rather than play characters that unleash demons, you recruit the demons and they fight directly alongside you. The shift supports the game’s story directly, which is all about uneasy truces with Earth’s new demonic residents. It’s long, yet you can still play it while watching TV, which is, sadly, one of the big things I look for in a DS game.
That’s it. Later Days.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
He Also Teaches
I'm taking notes on a book I'm reading right now (and more on the book later). The current heading is "Making Visible the Invisible," but I typed it "Making the Visible Invisible," thus reversing the meaning. And it struck me that the error might make a good lesson in a first year grammar-based discussion to illustrate the importance of clarity (and articles), and the use of nouns and adjectives. Something to remember for next term if I'm stuck teaching the non-English based English courses again.
*EDIT: fixed the second statement by switching the visible/invisible order.
Later Days.
*EDIT: fixed the second statement by switching the visible/invisible order.
Later Days.
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