Curriculum ideas

Some thoughts I'm tossing around in regards to eventually teaching composition, despite my lack of classroom experience.

Open class by reading selections from or all of Persepolis. Use this to introduce cultural difference and power structures.

• Marjane feels confined in Iran, but liberated in France. Yet, in France she has to give up part of herself.
• Anzuldua and Borderlands
  
• Have students brainstorm, freewrite, explore their own borderlands (perhaps journal?)
• Have students create a project (any kind, writing, comic, find some good genres)

Evaluation of sources

• Choose some controversial social issues and have students research perspectives on these issues.
• What do these perspectives leave out? How can their ideas be better developed?
• What points of view are valued, which are undervalued?
• "Blaming the victim" selections

Application

• research a local issue (Marshall, Huntington, own hometown)
• gather perspectives from news sources, community leaders, and individuals
• global research: does this issue occur elsewhere? why/why not? How have other communities dealt with this
• How might "borderlands" be at play in this issue?
• write a "white paper" on findings and conclusions

Creative reinterpretation

• another open-genre project: explore the issue from your white paper and apply it to your personal experience
• perhaps project should reflect a solution or why a solution is unattainable?
• alternate areas of exploration?
  

A Simple Request

I'm really really really really happy that my brother is my roommate. But, by convincing him to live with me, I've robbed him of that all-important college ritual of dorm life. Thus, he doesn't have many "guy" friends. So, if you're male, and not annoying, will you be friends with my brother?

Note: Older brother and Baby not included, but Army uniform is free at no extra cost!

Complaining

It has been a relatively eventful week at work. The number 2 employee (whose attendance and timeliness is lackluster to begin with) is off for the next 4 weeks. The supervisor has been out yesterday and today, and will be gone Thursday and Friday next week as well. Normally, having 2 people out shouldn't be a big deal, especially for me, the one with the least seniority and the least amount of responsibility. Of course, all of that is just speculation.

Yesterday, which marked a week of no air-conditioning in the office, the computer that houses the accounting software crashed, and it was up to me, the part-time student worker, to solve the problem because I'm the only person literate enough to use the computer. Still, no problem. I'm an industrious woman, I rose to the challenge, made some great decisions and multi-tasked us back to productivity. Today is a different story. The computer is back up and running, thankfully, as we have had 4 times the usually amount of mail needing postage today. Despite this, I spent my first hour at work (after everyone else had been here for 2) getting things organized and proving to the senior employee that the software was, in fact, functioning properly. I'm finished with rising to the occasion.

It's ridiculously hot in here; Huntington is a sauna and living here without air-conditioning is enough to make someone sick, which I've been for three days. Why should it be my responsibility to manage these things? Why am I the only one here thinking clearly and willing to work? This mail room was totally my haven, and the people here used to be nice and conscientious. That doesn't happen anymore. I'm counting down, 3 weeks and I'm finished.

Blantant Referral

Linda Holmes of NPR's "Monkey See" Blog has this brilliant post about/to Pixar.

This is the post.

Read and enjoy.

The Women of Sherlock Holmes get the Victorian Treatment

This, my friends, is the freshly released trailer for Guy Ritchie's adaptation of Sir Author Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes:



And a link for those of you reading via email.

I like Robert Downey, Jr. as Holmes, and his portrayal will certainly make the character more accessible than Holmes was in any of Doyle's stories. However, I am a bit perturbed to see most of the women acting as eye candy and humor fodder for the leading man. Not to say that Doyle himself was particularly progressive with his women, but at least they were more realistic than the females seem to be in this film. After all, the first Holmes case that Doyle published involved Irene Adler, one of the few able to foil the world class sleuth.

Now, I'm not saying that I expect ground-breaking feminist manifestos in so-called blockbusters, all I ask for is simple courtesy. For instance, Wolverine is both a good story and a great action flick, and no where along the way are bosoms bursting from dresses nor are meek maids flurrying off to preserve their innocence. In fact, Wolverine's love interest, Kayla Silverfox, aside from her strange name, is a well-rounded self-respecting character with complicated motivations and emotions.

In the past 50 years Hollywood has overcome racism, homophobia, and a number of social injustices. Isn't it time women had better treatment in films?

Reminder

Sometime after finals, I'm going to come back and relate, in detail, all the reasons why Stepbrothers is one of my favorite comedies. For now, a good scene (warning, contains strong language and flatuence:



And a hyperlink for those of you who read this via email: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UT-j_LSWM_A

Happier

While my post title corresponds to an ironically-named Guster song about a biddy being a biddy, I sincerely feel great this week.

Going to the Guster concert on Sunday put a lot of things into perspective for me, as did a phone conversation with my mom, during which she observed that I had been under an uncharacteristically high level of stress this semester. So, yeah, I've been stressed, only I haven't realized it until recently, and now that I have, I actually feel better.

It probably helps that summer will be here in just a few weeks, and that comprehensive exams may soon be nonexistent in Marshall's English department (fingers crossed).

As far as that silly party contemplation is concerned, I'm kind of over that, and, again, must apologize for being rather melodramatic. That stuff too, is certainly in perspective now, and to quote another singer "I'm just happy being me," and it is quite a relief.

Baseball is fun

The National League central division is off to an exciting start.

Rivals St. Louis Cardinals and Chicago Cubs (my fave) are tied for first place.

Longtime trailers, the Cincinnati Reds, with the youngest roster in the division, have won their past two series against the typically strong Brewers and Astros, respectively.

As a habitual Cubs fan and a geographic Reds fan, I'm looking forward to this summer :).

...not that any of you understand much of my baseball lingo.

What it's like to have Social Anxiety

You get dressed up for a party and feel great about it, have talked yourself into giddy excitement, prepared clever anecdotes, and remain poised and confident all day. Then you get to the party and become afraid that no one likes you, that no one wants to speak with you, and that those seemingly inane whispers are really about how no one wants you at the party.

Yes, I try to talk myself out of such illusions. I, in fact, was heartily invited to a party, was talked to throughout the party, had a drink, and tried to look happy and engaged. But, having social anxiety erases all my logic, all my poise, and all of my confidence. It's like a big furry monster stands in front of me the entire time I'm in public. I can't every get around him (thankfully, he smells like vanilla spice, though), and no one can see around him to look at me.

I am aware that I am not an alien. I am aware that I am accomplished, knowledgeable, classy, pretty (maybe?), and funny as all get out, but when I try to project any of these admirable traits, this furry, vacuum monster keeps it all to himself. Then I get anxious, then I get agitated, then I convince myself that I am so anxious that I'm making everyone else anxious, so I start to berate myself for being anxious, but I don't know how not to be anxious, which makes me even angrier with myself, and the cycle continues.

After a few hours into the ordeal, I've fought with myself and this crazy furry monster so much, that I'm tired and cranky, and I fell more than anything else, guilty.

But now, I'm back in my hovel, wishing that I had performed better (for me, it is a performance). I'm calculating and examining the different, clever things I should have said, the different people I should have talked to, the different person I should have been.

It's not as if I don't like who I am, I do, I just assume no one else likes who I am. I always hold part of myself back. I don't know why. Well, in certain instances I do. Sometimes it's a matter of not wanting to hurt someone else, and sometimes it's classic fear of rejection.

What's really unfair about this whole anxiety thing though, what I really don't get is that as everyone else gets better at socializing, networking, friendships, cocktail parties, victory speeches, I get worse, or, at best stand still. There's no handbook for this, no text or novel to teach me how to move forward, no etiquette book on how to be human. And, since I'm a person who loves learning, that prospect is scary.

I think, for serious, that I need a therapist. I tried the prescription drugs, and that didn't work, I ended up being depressed all the time, and it was scary. I can't do that again. I shouldn't be punished for something I can't control.

Of course, I know that I have friends and family who love me. I know this, but this is not a battle I can fight with comrades, this monster keeps me from talking to you about it, from asking for help. But I know you're there for me when I'm ready :).

This illuminating Educause interview with Michael Wesch takes "celebrity" to town. If you haven't seen/heard/read about Wesch's work before, you should definitely check it out. He has a youtube account, a blog, and all sorts of cool stuff.

Why You Won't Hear From Me Next Week

Graduate school is not so considerate with the "Spring Break" thing. Here's the assignment/reading rundown. I have included page amounts to induce sympathy:

Literary Criticism

• Read Revolutionary Road 335 pp. *
  
• Prep for research paper *
  
• Write short paper (2 pp.) *
  

18th Cent. Restoration Lit

• Read Evelina 337 pp. *
  
• Read Sam Johnson selections in Norton 117 pp. *
  
• Prep for/design presentation
• Write short paper (1 p.) *
  

English Writers

• Read Turbott Wolfe ~100 pp.
• Read Orwell and Guha essays ~30 pp.
  
• Answer Discussion questions
• Read The Heat of the Day 372 pp.

Totals

• Pages to Read: 1,291
  
• Novels to Read: 4
  
• Essays/Selections to Read: 3
  

*And because Dad always asks, I have noted the assignments that were not on the syllabi, or have had due dates changed.

I honestly love school work, but an assignment list this extensive is a bit much for a week, and indeed, is much more than I typically have to do even when classes are in session. I guess it's a good thing that there's not much at home to distract me, well, except for my nephew :-D.

In Re: "Facebook is Academic"

Hmmm, users are about ready to have more control over the news feed:

NYTimes Bits Blog

I particularly like Zuckerberg's quasi-philosophical mission:

We are going to converge people and public figures to having the same kind of presence on the site.

Socialism may never make it to the White House, but it will make it to Facebook. Take that Adam Smith!

A Brief Observation

Extroverts will always be an enigma to me. Or should that say, "Extroverts will always be enigmas to me"?

Awake

I'm trying to wind down for bedtime by watching King of the Hill, as usual. The accents may be Texan, but somehow they remind me of that Greenbrier County twang. Anyway, in this particular episode, 13-year-old Bobby joins the Quiz Bowl team as the pop culture expert. Of course, the other kids on the team are uptight nerds who are accompanied by Stanford-pushing, pageant parents who view losing as a sign of academic desolation. In my Quiz Bowl days, my parents were supportive enough to break out the mini-van at 4 a.m., but thankfully stopped short of pushing Mountain Dew and caffeine pills.

In fact, while any other similarities between Bobby's Quiz Bowl team and mine of years past are nil, the episode nonetheless remind me of competitive trivia tournaments. Even though I was never the best answer-er, I loved the thrill of the chase, the honest-to-goodness adrenaline rush each time a new round began. And I definitely loved knowing the answers to those literature questions, not to mention that one time I answered a math question correctly before any of the kids from P. South reached for their buzzers. Of course those victories are overshadowed by a memorable incident in which I confused Stephen Douglas with Kirk Douglas and shouted, "Spartcus!" in response to an American history question.

Now, much of the skills and facts I learned from quiz bowl are obsolete, save my Jeopardy! battles with Dad or Lacie. I wish there was a way of harnessing the energy I had back then, just the pure enjoyment of competition. Perhaps when I finally get to the dissertation stage(s) of my degrees, the feeling will be similar, but I still miss sitting at a long table with the guys, and fixating on red or green buzzers, which usually rang in fifths (intervals, that is).

Anyone else have cool/interesting/quixotic/random memories to share?

Facebook is Academic

I recently subscribed to Twitter, and I'm a bit addicted. I enjoy the fast-paced news updates and snarky remarks NPR commentators post. However, I've realized that some take Twitter very seriously, and continuously update their daily activities. "How self-absorbed!" I initially thought. But then, I considered the ways in which the internet, social networking sites in particular, have become a hub for self-expression. Yet, this self expression is often confined to a strict, unofficial set of parameters, so is this method of self expression enough of a release for us?

The modernists are known for tweaking old forms or calling those forms into question. Sometimes they even created entirely new ways of writing (i.e. Stream of Consciousness). They also were groundbreaking crusaders of the notion that everyday people mattered, and their identities were important. In the digital age, we sometimes feel like each of us has a venue for expressing her identity, but the most popular methods of this expression are constraining and at times anti-individualism.

Ergo...

I have this brilliant idea for a research paper:

Online social networks and Identity formation. I'm thinking of tying it to Ulysses and maybe some other modernist stuff. I have a neat list of connections, etc. that I wrote during class, but it's in the other room in my backpack.

In the interest of Curriculum Vitae-building I need to submit stuff to conferences soon. There's a strong composition/rhetoric trend in the field lately, as well as discussions on integrating new technology in the classroom, so this idea is fitting for those things. Although, I'd rather act like an old codger and only read literature and criticism, boring my students with novels they will never see as relevant to their daily lives.

I may use some of the research Dr. Michael Wesch is doing via his Digital Ethnography course at Kansas State U. That particular project both gathers important research from the field and itself is one of Wesch's pedagogical experiments in integrating digital technology into the classroom.

Thesis Idea

Tristram Shandy meets Ulysses.

I've found this article wherein the critic claims Tristram Shandy, an 18th century narrative filled with digressions and witty allusions and references, is an allegory for Ireland's seeking independence from Britain. There's no end to symbolism, allegory, and allusions in Ulysses, which is about a scholar trying to get out of Ireland, but never making it.

Also, both are types of epics, TS is about Tristram trying to tell his story, the storytelling is the story. Ulysses is both about Stephen, the main character, trying to find a "home" and about Joyce trying to find out how to tell this complicated story.

A lot of the time, I forget how much I love literature, or even why I'm trying to be a scholar. Then, a literary enigma comes along, and I fall in love all over again...maybe that's why I'm still single...

Anyway, Irish lit may turn out to be my thing. Yay!

Finally, A Saturday in Hermitude

This is nothing against my friends or family, but I love just to be alone sometimes. It's very rejuvinating and calming. Some days I just need to get away from all you people and just focus on me. I promise, by Monday I'll be lonely as all get out and will start planning dinners and movie-goings like crazy :).

In re my last post, I think I am an INTJ, that just seems to fit me better. The fact that I am set on deciding a type kind of indicates that I am a judger. I know that it can seem a silly thing to contemplate my Myers-Brigg type, but it's not like I'm fixated or anything. I'm not using this blog to contemplate the meaning of life or to expound upon the depth of work I do for literary studies. Nope, this place is mostly for fun. If it seems to get a little too serious, it's because I've run out of academic work to do (ha!) and need a mental exercise to keep in shape.

That said, I'm jumping into research this weekend because I have two upcoming presentations, and I'm going home-home in a couple of weeks to welcome back Jeremiah. It's hard to believe that the little bro is finished with all of his training. I've become used to intermittent communication from him, so finally having him back in WV is like an extra-special gift. Still, the longer he is gone, the more I appreciate/understand the work he is dedicated to doing.

Anyway, this research, I love it. It is a blessing to read these articles and see how the pieces connect. More importantly, I dig reading other scholars' work and using that to come up with an original idea. It's like the ultimate problem solving adventure; there's no denying that literary studies is the place I should be.

On another note, my anxiety is acting up a little this week. I'll find myself clenching my teeth or sitting real tense-like. I can't really pinpoint the locis original of the anxiety, so I can't make it go away. At this point, thankfully, it's nothing to worry about, and that I'm catching it before it gets out of control is always a plus. Still, maybe it's time to break out the Tai-Chi DVDs again.

Identity Crisis: The Myers-Briggs Edition

I may be an INTP instead of an INTJ...

The difference between being a "P," or perceiver, and a "J," a judger is basically decision-making. Both types analyze the world and look at it similarly, usually as a collection of systems that need to be understood and analyzed. Judgers usually need to find an efficient end and applicable solution to their discoveries. Also, judgers work toward a final solution that is logical. Perceivers, however, don't necessarily need to come to a conclusion or make a significant decision. For instance, let us say there really is more than one way to skin a cat, Way A and Way B. Both the perceiver and the judger will note the pro's and cons of each method. The Judger, however will need to conclusively choose a method, while the perceiver is content to admit that both methods could be equally effective.

I'm more laid back than most in that I can readily see others' perspectives and see no need to change them. Then again, because other perspectives are readily plausible, I constantly question my own point of view. Still, I'm interested in the end result

So, the things about an INTJ that I totally get (source material here):

• value intelligence, knowledge, and competence, and typically have high standards in these regards, which they continuously strive to fulfill.
• constantly gathers information and makes associations about it
• The internal form of the INTJ's thoughts and concepts is highly individualized, and is not readily translatable into a form that others will understand.
• are natural leaders, although they usually choose to remain in the background until they see a real need to take over the lead.
• They are the supreme strategists - always scanning available ideas and concepts and weighing them against their current strategy, to plan for every conceivable contingency.
• INTJs spend a lot of time inside their own minds, and may have little interest in the other people's thoughts or feelings (this one seems a little rude, and I have to admit that it's true, but I work to overcome this apathy :))
  

And the things about an INTP that I totally get (source material here):

• "absent-minded professors", who highly value intelligence and the ability to apply logic to theories to find solutions
• minds are constantly working to generate new theories, or to prove or disprove existing theories.
• likely to be very shy when it comes to meeting new people.
• very self-confident and gregarious around people they know well, or when discussing theories which they fully understand.
• has no understanding or value for decisions made on the basis of personal subjectivity or feelings. (double tap on this one)
  
• it is extremely important that ideas and facts are expressed correctly and succinctly.
• are likely to express themselves in what they believe to be absolute truths
• may be prone to abandoning a project once they have figured it out, moving on to the next thing.
• A major concern for INTPs is the haunting sense of impending failure. They spend considerable time second-guessing themselves. The open-endedness (from Perceiving) conjoined with the need for competence (intuitive thinking) is expressed in a sense that one's conclusion may well be met by an equally plausible alternative solution, and that, after all, one may very well have overlooked some critical bit of data. (from Typelogic)