At the commencement of Bread Loaf School of English Summer 2007, the associate director gave a rather disconcerting speech surrounding the question, "Why do I go to Bread Loaf?" She pointed out that we are often hesitant to tell outsiders that we go to a place named after a common food item or to explain that we go there to study English literature (since, as English literature teachers, aren't we supposed to know it already?). She suggested that we respond cryptically, "I go because of the giraffe." Due to its obscure and arrogant literary reference, this would stave off further questions on the subject and make us seem appropriately random and haughty. She also suggested that she hoped we would not respond by saying, "I go because I want a master's degree."
But I *do* want a master's degree! Not only as a symbol of the study I've completed and the grades I've achieved, but as a ticket to places I want to go in the future. I don't see anything wrong with that, and it makes me tired that the academic community continues to insist on intellectual separatism (for what else does such a cryptic response induce?) and an unrealistic vision of study for study's sake. Of course I'm here because I love studying - but I would probably not be here, at least right now, if there were not the pragmatic aspect of it as well.
Anyway, I do usually say I'm going to study at Middlebury College, since Bread Loaf does lack some academic ooompf (though the Simpsons parodied it wonderfully in an episode when they go to study at "WordLoaf," and once you make the Simpsons...). Bread Loaf is the name of the mountain we can see as we walk to and from class, the shape reflecting the title, and it's a respectable institution that's been around for 88 years, Robert Frost, Willa Cather, Paul Muldoon, and other such notable writers and scholars spending their summers teaching in the mountains of Vermont. So there! :)
This year I'm rooming with my friend Sorina from Pennsylvania, next door to the girls from France, Aurelie and Patricia, and below the Kenyans -- all of them friends I made while studying in Oxford last summer. Though the academics on this campus are more rigorous than they were at Oxford, I miss Oxford as OXFORD! We are all a bit nostalgic, and take every opportunity to get in a car and drive to "downtown Middlebury," which is a contradiction in terms but definitely less isolated than this mountaintop retreat.
Classes have begun, and my first quandary was deciding whether to audit a third class and whether to drop out of Indian Prose to take a Theory and Criticism course - since the latter is a gap or hole in my understanding of literary criticism. By theory, I mean the categories under which critics organize themselves: Marxism, Feminism, Freudian - Psychoanalytical, New Historicism, Deconstructionism, Structuralism, and many more. No, I'm not certain what these all mean, but Indian Prose won out after all, even though the Professor dropped tons more reading in our laps on the first day!
Saturday, June 30, 2007
Friday, June 29, 2007
BOSTON 2007
What a clean, quiet, quaint little city in comparison to New York! So much smaller; trees down the streets; streets emptying out and quiet at night (except in a few choice areas). The town seems more like a collection of small towns than one big city, though there are the requisite tall buildings in the downtown area. But you'd hardly know it if you enter Boston Commons and walk down to the river, past stately brownstones and down nicely manicured paths.
Though I haven't seen Dara for two years - since leaving New York - it hardly seemed that long, and I got to spend some quality time with her cute doggy Tails, too. She passed her first year qualifying exams so she can get funding for the next year in her Economics doctoral program at BU. The first night there, I played Taboo into the wee hours of the morning with Dara, Louis, Jess, and Vivian. Possibly my favorite group game -- what a way to get to know the intricate workings of someone's mind when he or she is trying to get you to say "Stuart Little."
Then on Saturday Acovio took me out and about. I know this city hardly at all outside of Boston Commons, whereas I'm completely at home in New York. We walked through a blooming rose garden over to the Museum of Fine Arts to view the Edward Hopper exhibition, and I feel like I saw pretty much everything Hopper ever painted, water-colored, etched and sketched. It was very thorough. (Susannah, eat your heart out!) I spotted from across the room a painting that hangs in "Susannah's Museum" -- the U of Arizona Museum of Art in Tucson -- that Susannah had explicated for my creative writing students just the month before. Felt a little deja vu -- like paintings are following me around the country. Also saw paintings I've seen in the MET and in the London Tate Museum and the Louvre. Makes the world seem smaller.
Acovio, Dara, Jess - miss you guys already!
Dara and I also saw the recent Edith Piaf biographical film, La Vie En Rose. I knew relatively little about the '40s French cabaret singer, so the movie was enlightening for me. I loved it for its acting and singing alone, through Dara wasn't a fan -- she objected to the editing and the cliched biographical technique of "starting at the end of the person's life and flashing back and forth to give perspective." It's true, it did get heavy-handed, but it's an affecting movie and I hope the actress wins the Oscar, even if she is a Frenchy. :)
Though I haven't seen Dara for two years - since leaving New York - it hardly seemed that long, and I got to spend some quality time with her cute doggy Tails, too. She passed her first year qualifying exams so she can get funding for the next year in her Economics doctoral program at BU. The first night there, I played Taboo into the wee hours of the morning with Dara, Louis, Jess, and Vivian. Possibly my favorite group game -- what a way to get to know the intricate workings of someone's mind when he or she is trying to get you to say "Stuart Little."
Then on Saturday Acovio took me out and about. I know this city hardly at all outside of Boston Commons, whereas I'm completely at home in New York. We walked through a blooming rose garden over to the Museum of Fine Arts to view the Edward Hopper exhibition, and I feel like I saw pretty much everything Hopper ever painted, water-colored, etched and sketched. It was very thorough. (Susannah, eat your heart out!) I spotted from across the room a painting that hangs in "Susannah's Museum" -- the U of Arizona Museum of Art in Tucson -- that Susannah had explicated for my creative writing students just the month before. Felt a little deja vu -- like paintings are following me around the country. Also saw paintings I've seen in the MET and in the London Tate Museum and the Louvre. Makes the world seem smaller.
Acovio, Dara, Jess - miss you guys already!
Dara and I also saw the recent Edith Piaf biographical film, La Vie En Rose. I knew relatively little about the '40s French cabaret singer, so the movie was enlightening for me. I loved it for its acting and singing alone, through Dara wasn't a fan -- she objected to the editing and the cliched biographical technique of "starting at the end of the person's life and flashing back and forth to give perspective." It's true, it did get heavy-handed, but it's an affecting movie and I hope the actress wins the Oscar, even if she is a Frenchy. :)
Sunday, June 24, 2007
The Journey to Boston
This is getting posted a little late (again) ... am now at Middlebury, after a weekend jaunt to Boston to visit Dara and Acovio.
When I travel, I indulge in all the food vices I eschew the rest of the year: white bread, doughnuts, pop tarts, pizza, ice cream shakes. Normally the aberration in my diet, these become my staples, mostly because there is no other choice. McDonald's. Dunkin' Donuts, and Sbarros are the names I associate with bus station fare. But partly there is the abandonment of the tourist: just this once, just today.
Today I am eating a cinnamon sugar pop tart aboard a Greyhound bus traveling from Port Authority in Manhattan to South Station in Boston. I am freezing in the gray rain, just after adjusting to the heat in NYC; I am reading The Shadow Lines and, as this four hour ride just became a five hour ride due to traffic, have almost finished, happily, so that I can cross off another novel from my lengthy list. This is the third novel I've read since school ended, after Midnight's Children and The Inheritance of Loss. Still, I feel under-prepared for Bread Loaf, having hoped to finish all of my reading ahead of time, partly to be ahead of the game and partly to spend my time reading critics. I want to put my finger on the pulse of criticism today, and see what I make of it. Am I ready to become such a critic myself?
When I travel, I indulge in all the food vices I eschew the rest of the year: white bread, doughnuts, pop tarts, pizza, ice cream shakes. Normally the aberration in my diet, these become my staples, mostly because there is no other choice. McDonald's. Dunkin' Donuts, and Sbarros are the names I associate with bus station fare. But partly there is the abandonment of the tourist: just this once, just today.
Today I am eating a cinnamon sugar pop tart aboard a Greyhound bus traveling from Port Authority in Manhattan to South Station in Boston. I am freezing in the gray rain, just after adjusting to the heat in NYC; I am reading The Shadow Lines and, as this four hour ride just became a five hour ride due to traffic, have almost finished, happily, so that I can cross off another novel from my lengthy list. This is the third novel I've read since school ended, after Midnight's Children and The Inheritance of Loss. Still, I feel under-prepared for Bread Loaf, having hoped to finish all of my reading ahead of time, partly to be ahead of the game and partly to spend my time reading critics. I want to put my finger on the pulse of criticism today, and see what I make of it. Am I ready to become such a critic myself?
Friday, June 22, 2007
NYC 2: The MET and the Opera
The MET. Always overwhelming, though today it struck me as particularly dark, the paintings bleeding into one another. I was happy to escape the crucified christs of the medieval rooms and move into the modern art section to be enlivened by light and color. Today I spent time contemplating Renoirs, Hoppers, and Matisses in the Clark Collection. After the museum closed, I spent some time sitting on the steps and watching the street show below, probably my fourth street show in two days: three African Americans doing a street dance and some jumping hijinx as well as a comedy routine: "We're professionals. That's why we work on the streets."
This trip I've taken much more time to stop and observe, to talk to strangers. The first day, I started in Battery Park and moved up to 14th street - Union Square, then walked over to Washington Square Park in west Greenwich Village. There I was called over by a bongo player, Terry, who showed me how to keep rhythm on the bongo while his friend Kevin played me a song on his guitar: Allman Brothers. We talked for some time. I met a girl on the corner of Columbus Circle, near where I used to live, and we discussed New York in the summer, when it is somehow more relaxed though overrun by tourists.
In the evening I returned to Ben's apartment in Bed-Sty, Brooklyn. The neighborhood is not great - across the street is a giant laundry factory - but it is surprisingly quiet. The neighbors behind his building have a giant garden, and the apartments on his street have been lovingly renovated. The wood flooring is new, the kitchenware new, and each of the five members of the two-floor apartment have their own rooms. I was not expecting anything nearly so spacious! One roommate works in television, helping to arrange sets (as I understand), and the apartment held the abandoned leftovers from various commercials and TV shows: new mattresses, hanging plants, a dressmaker's doll, a giant wooden daisy, numerous melonballers and paring knives.
Tuesday night I attended the opera in Prospect Park with Ben and Vik (guys, please feel free to add your thoughts on the show). I missed the English translations from the opera house, which led to guessing games as to which act we were in, but the evening was gorgeous and the voices stunning. Vik asked me why I liked the opera when I was not so keen on musicals - they both have cheesy and improbably story lines - and I think it is because the voices are incredible - they send shivers down my spine. That the human body can produce such sounds!
This trip I've taken much more time to stop and observe, to talk to strangers. The first day, I started in Battery Park and moved up to 14th street - Union Square, then walked over to Washington Square Park in west Greenwich Village. There I was called over by a bongo player, Terry, who showed me how to keep rhythm on the bongo while his friend Kevin played me a song on his guitar: Allman Brothers. We talked for some time. I met a girl on the corner of Columbus Circle, near where I used to live, and we discussed New York in the summer, when it is somehow more relaxed though overrun by tourists.
In the evening I returned to Ben's apartment in Bed-Sty, Brooklyn. The neighborhood is not great - across the street is a giant laundry factory - but it is surprisingly quiet. The neighbors behind his building have a giant garden, and the apartments on his street have been lovingly renovated. The wood flooring is new, the kitchenware new, and each of the five members of the two-floor apartment have their own rooms. I was not expecting anything nearly so spacious! One roommate works in television, helping to arrange sets (as I understand), and the apartment held the abandoned leftovers from various commercials and TV shows: new mattresses, hanging plants, a dressmaker's doll, a giant wooden daisy, numerous melonballers and paring knives.
Tuesday night I attended the opera in Prospect Park with Ben and Vik (guys, please feel free to add your thoughts on the show). I missed the English translations from the opera house, which led to guessing games as to which act we were in, but the evening was gorgeous and the voices stunning. Vik asked me why I liked the opera when I was not so keen on musicals - they both have cheesy and improbably story lines - and I think it is because the voices are incredible - they send shivers down my spine. That the human body can produce such sounds!
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
NYC Summer 2007
I have been continuing a great love affair with this city. Every corner I turn, something falls into place -- a little haven of trees, chairs, and falling water, surrounded by skyscrapers, so I can eat my hasty lunch in relative peace. The entrance of the MOMA blinking at me in welcome as I cross the street, wondering if I am going in the right direction. Babies running through a fountain in Battery Park on the south tip of Manhattan, escaping their nannies, sticking their heads into the water and screaming at the unexpected force of the stream.
Lights change as soon as I reach a corner, so I can walk quickly from block to block, admiring the window displays and the rapidly changing crowds -- office workers on their lunch breaks, tourists, street hawkers. I stop at Lincoln Center to check out the operas and ballets playing this week (perhaps my Middlebury student ID will come in handy) and discover that the MET Opera is conducting their free "Opera in the Park" series; Faust will be playing at Prospect Park in Brooklyn on Tuesday night. Andrea arranges for Ben and I to attend a dramatic performace for free. I love being a tourist in New York!
I realize the city is not revolving around me, but it is nice to luxuriate in such a thought -- as when I stepped into the Klimt-Kandinsky-Chagall-Kirchner room at the Museum of Modern Art and felt the stars align. In Tucson, I had selected my favorite artists to place together in my classroom, and here again they were, arranged by the best curators in the world: Gustav, Wassily, and Marc, winking at me with love.
It struck me as I wandered how much of a modern art buff I am, as other favorites appeared: Cezanne, Picasso, Matisse. I love the old school modern art, not the new Minimalism and Post-Structuralism, that allows artists to paint canvasses black or leave them untouched and call it a revolution.
The new MOMA building has open, white walls ending in floor to ceiling windows; these open out onto the city to let in reams of white light, the space of the place as much art as the works themselves.
Lights change as soon as I reach a corner, so I can walk quickly from block to block, admiring the window displays and the rapidly changing crowds -- office workers on their lunch breaks, tourists, street hawkers. I stop at Lincoln Center to check out the operas and ballets playing this week (perhaps my Middlebury student ID will come in handy) and discover that the MET Opera is conducting their free "Opera in the Park" series; Faust will be playing at Prospect Park in Brooklyn on Tuesday night. Andrea arranges for Ben and I to attend a dramatic performace for free. I love being a tourist in New York!
I realize the city is not revolving around me, but it is nice to luxuriate in such a thought -- as when I stepped into the Klimt-Kandinsky-Chagall-Kirchner room at the Museum of Modern Art and felt the stars align. In Tucson, I had selected my favorite artists to place together in my classroom, and here again they were, arranged by the best curators in the world: Gustav, Wassily, and Marc, winking at me with love.
It struck me as I wandered how much of a modern art buff I am, as other favorites appeared: Cezanne, Picasso, Matisse. I love the old school modern art, not the new Minimalism and Post-Structuralism, that allows artists to paint canvasses black or leave them untouched and call it a revolution.
The new MOMA building has open, white walls ending in floor to ceiling windows; these open out onto the city to let in reams of white light, the space of the place as much art as the works themselves.
Saturday, June 16, 2007
Dartmouth 2002 Five-Year Reunion
Celebrity Sighting Report: The first day, Friday, I arrived extremely early - the Wilsons dropped me off in front of the dorm, Topliff, and so I spent the morning wandering casually around. Waiting in line at the Hopkins Center for a blitz computer, a current student turned to me and asked when Clinton was arriving. That's how I discovered that Hillary Clinton was speaking at Dartmouth that afternoon, and how I managed to be in the garden outside the Hop when she addressed us on the topic of stem cell research, which she supports and hopes to get federal funding for. Interesting. Her main point was that she believed that science, reason and logic were being abandoned in the government and she is the one to bring it back.
Reunion was a pleasant surprise. I guess I went just hoping to hang out on the green again and see a few people I'd lost touch of; I hadn't expected there to be as many people as there were (nearly half of our graduating class, i.e. 500 grads plus various significant others) and so many of them old friends. It was overwhelming - moving from moments of intense social interaction at meals that went something like this: meet one friend, try to encompass five years of experience in a five minute conversation, then see another over his/her shoulder, run off to greet and hug that friend, repeat action until stumble off into corner to reflect.
I felt as though four years of self-searching were collapsed in this two-day retreat, since each group of friends -- distinctly cohesive -- represented a different year or different term in my college career, a different stage in my life or in my self-identification. At reunion, I was a satellite to these groups, floating between them and feeling both part of and apart from each. I used to be somewhat proud of not belonging to any one "group," but there's something to be said for feeling fully part of a group, which is what I have here at Bread Loaf and is what keeps me stable in the midst of this chaotic summer.
I loved seeing everyone again and luckily got to spend more time with a few friends in New York and Boston after the condensed weekend. Pictures below!
Teresa and Acovio the first morning
With Acovio and Vikram at the final dinner
With Sabeen, Aly and his wife ... Zaileen?
With Vik, Barbara and her husband Leon, the latter two visiting from the Netherlands. Barbara's new last name (from de Kruijf) is de Barbarason, so yes, that makes her Barbara de Barbarason. It was meant to be!
Relaxing on the Green in front of Sanborn Library on a steamy afternoon: Me, Sabeen, Robert, Dara and Jen
Reunion was a pleasant surprise. I guess I went just hoping to hang out on the green again and see a few people I'd lost touch of; I hadn't expected there to be as many people as there were (nearly half of our graduating class, i.e. 500 grads plus various significant others) and so many of them old friends. It was overwhelming - moving from moments of intense social interaction at meals that went something like this: meet one friend, try to encompass five years of experience in a five minute conversation, then see another over his/her shoulder, run off to greet and hug that friend, repeat action until stumble off into corner to reflect.
I felt as though four years of self-searching were collapsed in this two-day retreat, since each group of friends -- distinctly cohesive -- represented a different year or different term in my college career, a different stage in my life or in my self-identification. At reunion, I was a satellite to these groups, floating between them and feeling both part of and apart from each. I used to be somewhat proud of not belonging to any one "group," but there's something to be said for feeling fully part of a group, which is what I have here at Bread Loaf and is what keeps me stable in the midst of this chaotic summer.
I loved seeing everyone again and luckily got to spend more time with a few friends in New York and Boston after the condensed weekend. Pictures below!
Teresa and Acovio the first morning
With Acovio and Vikram at the final dinner
With Sabeen, Aly and his wife ... Zaileen?
With Vik, Barbara and her husband Leon, the latter two visiting from the Netherlands. Barbara's new last name (from de Kruijf) is de Barbarason, so yes, that makes her Barbara de Barbarason. It was meant to be!
Relaxing on the Green in front of Sanborn Library on a steamy afternoon: Me, Sabeen, Robert, Dara and Jen
Friday, June 15, 2007
Haying
I helped the Wilsons gather two truckloads of hay today from their own hayfields--fields being a relative term here, as they are perched on the side of a mountain--and unload them into their barn. Piddling amount of hay compared to their normal work day and overall season, only about one hundred forty-pound bales. I can't say I wish I was around to chuck more into the barn, though I am glad to give the Wilsons an extra hand; it is extremely hard work. I haven't figured out the best way to stack the bales so they don't tumble off the truck, and I don't have the back and arm strength to toss them ten feet over my head, so I did a pushy-shove thing that resulted in a spray of hay in my face. I got hay everywhere and found it to be a rather gritty and painful exfoliant, and not too tasty (don't tell the sheep).
There is always an enormous amount of work to be done on the farm, including weeding the massive organic gardens, feeding the sheep, and basic household duties; I always feel I'm quite the lazy one when I arrive. The Wilsons were a second family to me when I attended Dartmouth, and since then I've spent several summers helping hay (though the mystique has worn off!) and knitting and playing with their children Aurora, Dave, Grace and Justice. They are often kind enough to drive me up to Middlebury, a college that's impossible to get to without an automobile, as no trains or bus services connect to it. Argh.
For those not in the know, I will be spending my third of five summers at Middlebury College in the wilds of upstate Vermont this summer, working on my master's degree in English literature. Technically, of course, I am taking classes through the Bread Loaf School of English (so named because a nearby mountain top is shaped like a perfect rectangular loaf). Bread Loaf is a spin-off campus that is located on the top of a mountain several miles from the actual town of Middlebury. Not being one to plan all the details, I did not discover until my arrival that not only is it impossible to reach this little eden without a car, but also there are absolutely no stores or kiosks there at which one can purchase such necessities as toothpaste, granola bars, or sheets for one's bed. No tvs, no cell phones, and no snacks between meals seems to be the rule, and although I can abide by the first two, I'm definitely not sticking to the third! (I never go five hours without at least a snack - I mean, I've got to keep that metabolism up!)
I am much better prepared this year and looking forward to taking my courses on British Romanticism (Keats, Coleridge, Blake, Wordsworth, Byron, Shelley, plus some lesser-known, non-canonised poets) and Varieties of Modern Indian Prose. Am happy to report that I finished Rushdie's Midnight's Children, which got interesting around page 250 and won me over by the end. It could alternatively be titled "A Brief, Self-indulgent History of India Since Partition" in 1947. Worth it once I got used to the highly stylized, repetitive, self-pitying narrative voice.
In other news, my AP syllabus was approved by the College Board and I am now officially allowed to teach my AP course in the fall! Very good news.
There is always an enormous amount of work to be done on the farm, including weeding the massive organic gardens, feeding the sheep, and basic household duties; I always feel I'm quite the lazy one when I arrive. The Wilsons were a second family to me when I attended Dartmouth, and since then I've spent several summers helping hay (though the mystique has worn off!) and knitting and playing with their children Aurora, Dave, Grace and Justice. They are often kind enough to drive me up to Middlebury, a college that's impossible to get to without an automobile, as no trains or bus services connect to it. Argh.
For those not in the know, I will be spending my third of five summers at Middlebury College in the wilds of upstate Vermont this summer, working on my master's degree in English literature. Technically, of course, I am taking classes through the Bread Loaf School of English (so named because a nearby mountain top is shaped like a perfect rectangular loaf). Bread Loaf is a spin-off campus that is located on the top of a mountain several miles from the actual town of Middlebury. Not being one to plan all the details, I did not discover until my arrival that not only is it impossible to reach this little eden without a car, but also there are absolutely no stores or kiosks there at which one can purchase such necessities as toothpaste, granola bars, or sheets for one's bed. No tvs, no cell phones, and no snacks between meals seems to be the rule, and although I can abide by the first two, I'm definitely not sticking to the third! (I never go five hours without at least a snack - I mean, I've got to keep that metabolism up!)
I am much better prepared this year and looking forward to taking my courses on British Romanticism (Keats, Coleridge, Blake, Wordsworth, Byron, Shelley, plus some lesser-known, non-canonised poets) and Varieties of Modern Indian Prose. Am happy to report that I finished Rushdie's Midnight's Children, which got interesting around page 250 and won me over by the end. It could alternatively be titled "A Brief, Self-indulgent History of India Since Partition" in 1947. Worth it once I got used to the highly stylized, repetitive, self-pitying narrative voice.
In other news, my AP syllabus was approved by the College Board and I am now officially allowed to teach my AP course in the fall! Very good news.
The Liberal Arts
I am tired of hearing people denigrate the liberal arts - including my chosen field, English Literature - without knowing anything about it. I am tired of hearing - as I did just yesterday - that all liberal arts professors could be dumped in the ocean and "nothing would change" in our world; in fact, our world may even be a better place because those artsy-fartsy people with such high esteem for themselves and yes, with liberal politics as well as liberal arts, would be gone, and we would be free to live in a word where no opinion need be challenged.
Below I am listing my main three points on the issue of liberal arts as a field of study (avoiding the political issue for the moment, though I don't suppose it can entirely be separated), and I would like to hear more comments about this.
1) I submit that the ultimate goal of teaching is to encourage critical thinking, and that to reach a higher level of thinking in our chosen subjects, we need to provide the basic tools of our subject. Those would be the seemingly useless facts and figures. To be able to have any sort of idea what a scientist does in a lab, we need to work with the formulas, and to be able to use the formulas, we need to understand the basics. This can be applied to the humanities as well - it bothers me that the skills necessary for science and math are seen as separate from English. English, like those subjects, is a discipline. You need certain skills and facts to be comfortable working in this discipline. Scientists look for patterns in nature; the literati look for patterns in novels and poetry.
And while we're at it,
2) People who claim that they will never "use" the information they learn in high school - like Calculus equations and the language of literary analysis - cannot predict the future. I have plenty of friends who thought they'd never need high school or college chemistry but later discovered a desire to practice medicine. I have friends who thought they hated a subject until they took it with a teacher who inspired them. Who knows when (or if) that knowledge will be needed - and if not the knowledge itself, the way of thinking and imagining that the acquisition of that knowledge required you to learn. In Calculus, I had to learn to work with a line that never ended; multidimensional planes; imaginary numbers. In Literature I had to break down complex sentences, formulate arguments based only on a text in front of me and with a time constraint, find evidence for my arguments, recognize ways an author was trying to manipulate my emotions or my ideas. Are these not "useful" skills?
And finally,
3) Do the people who constantly look for a "purpose" to everything dislike sunsets? In other words, do I have to have a reason for admiring a rainbow, or a poem, or a perfectly balanced equation? My friend Dru, a theoretical (as opposed to experimental) physicist, is often asked what his work is "for," or what practical purpose the equations he works on can be put to. He can speculate, but the honest answer is that he does not know. But he is still discovering - patterns, puzzle pieces. And perhaps one day these patterns will have a purpose, but for now, they are just beautiful.
Please add your own comments on this subject!
Below I am listing my main three points on the issue of liberal arts as a field of study (avoiding the political issue for the moment, though I don't suppose it can entirely be separated), and I would like to hear more comments about this.
1) I submit that the ultimate goal of teaching is to encourage critical thinking, and that to reach a higher level of thinking in our chosen subjects, we need to provide the basic tools of our subject. Those would be the seemingly useless facts and figures. To be able to have any sort of idea what a scientist does in a lab, we need to work with the formulas, and to be able to use the formulas, we need to understand the basics. This can be applied to the humanities as well - it bothers me that the skills necessary for science and math are seen as separate from English. English, like those subjects, is a discipline. You need certain skills and facts to be comfortable working in this discipline. Scientists look for patterns in nature; the literati look for patterns in novels and poetry.
And while we're at it,
2) People who claim that they will never "use" the information they learn in high school - like Calculus equations and the language of literary analysis - cannot predict the future. I have plenty of friends who thought they'd never need high school or college chemistry but later discovered a desire to practice medicine. I have friends who thought they hated a subject until they took it with a teacher who inspired them. Who knows when (or if) that knowledge will be needed - and if not the knowledge itself, the way of thinking and imagining that the acquisition of that knowledge required you to learn. In Calculus, I had to learn to work with a line that never ended; multidimensional planes; imaginary numbers. In Literature I had to break down complex sentences, formulate arguments based only on a text in front of me and with a time constraint, find evidence for my arguments, recognize ways an author was trying to manipulate my emotions or my ideas. Are these not "useful" skills?
And finally,
3) Do the people who constantly look for a "purpose" to everything dislike sunsets? In other words, do I have to have a reason for admiring a rainbow, or a poem, or a perfectly balanced equation? My friend Dru, a theoretical (as opposed to experimental) physicist, is often asked what his work is "for," or what practical purpose the equations he works on can be put to. He can speculate, but the honest answer is that he does not know. But he is still discovering - patterns, puzzle pieces. And perhaps one day these patterns will have a purpose, but for now, they are just beautiful.
Please add your own comments on this subject!
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Somewhere in Vermont
East Topsham,
Baskets and baskets of yarn. Sharp manure smell. Crunch of stick, leaf, and stone beneath my boots.
May I always forget the superlative beauty of northern
This morning we drove down dirt roads past rippling creeks and spied a fawn, less than a week old, by the side of the road ahead. Instead of running, the little deer hunkered down right next to the road, so close that I could have opened my door and touched its white spots. It stayed very, very still, and finally we moved along, afraid to shoo it away lest its mother smell our human smell, but hoping it would run and hide from the road.
This evening, after a pot luck, we stopped the car to stare at the sunset falling behind the mountains, and to disperse with our breath the mist that had settled over the fields. Ahead, on the mountain side, sat a small farmhouse and a barn; in the yard two black horses chewed thoughtfully, then frolicked along a fence. Below them, the mist shielded the ground, so it looked like they danced on clouds.
I flew into
It is hot, cold, warm, then cold here again. I confess . . . I miss sunny skies. Yesterday, Justice (Aurora's 9 year old brother) asked when summer would come; he's homeschooled and doesn't mark the date by the last day of school. We had just gone swimming in the lake (dipped into the cold water and out) and gotten ice cream at the Pink Shack homemade ice cream stand. Swimming and ice cream are two other ways to mark the turn of the season if you can't tell by the weather.
I’m connected with the internet again after a welcome week’s hiatus, down at
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Midnight's Children's Soporific Powers
School ended (finally) on June 1st. For such a busy, stressful year, school always peters out on a long, anti-climactic note. Regular instruction ends the last week of April, when all non-AP classes have finals; we head into AP review weeks, which allowed me plenty of time to quiz and drill and chill with the sophomore AP Lit kids; then the students take their APs and we move into "Projects," which this year was two weeks long.
I don't know the reason for Projects week(s) at the end of school, and though I've been told that it's a time to reward the students for having studied hard all year with fun, hands-on activities, I suspect it has something to do with state-mandated number of school days. Since our calendar revolves around the AP schedule, we try to get all instruction done before that time, and the remaining days are left for play.
Misha's projects are clever and relaxing (once she's figured out the logistics, which take her hours upon hours in the last weeks of school) arts and crafts. Ali does something with either musicals or electronics. And I have done the AmeriCorps Volunteer Project for two years now.
For AmeriCorps, I partner up with the Volunteer Center of Arizona and hoodwinkle some poor young AmeriCorps volunteer into contacting all the agencies and organizing the dates. My job is to coordinate drivers ... which is rather agonizing and impossible. This year I was responsible for shuttling 36 students around Tucson for 8 days, including up a mountain and back, and making sure they did not throw cans at each other at the Food Bank, poke out an eye while clearing brush on the mountain, or sand-off a finger with the electric sander at the cat shelter.
The two most exciting events of those weeks were the day when little Anthony--a 6th grader--pulled out a tooth while at the cat shelter and asked permission (!) to go use the bathroom to clean the blood off and out of his mouth. He returned to tell me that there was a giant cat in the sink and he couldn't get to the water. The second event was when Carolyn -- who had generously loaned me her SUV that seats 8 - called on Saturday to ask me who had vomited in her car. Apparently somebody had gotten sick on the way up or down Mount Lemmon and neglected to mention it.
I love that AmeriCorps gets the kids out and volunteering -- I think it is one of the most important things for me to introduce to the kids. At the same time, they are still kids and need a fair amount of supervision.
So school's over and I'm still in recovery mode, so tired I take naps every day and can barely see through the fog in my head. Maybe it's not school stress recovery; maybe it's the Valley Fever (a fungus whose spores I apparently inhaled) or maybe it's that I am also doggedly plodding through the 500-plus pages of Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children, which has sent me to sleep so many times that Misha's lost count. I would have given up on this wandering monsterous book a long time ago if I hadn't had to finish it for my summer course, Varieties of Modern Indian Prose.
I don't know the reason for Projects week(s) at the end of school, and though I've been told that it's a time to reward the students for having studied hard all year with fun, hands-on activities, I suspect it has something to do with state-mandated number of school days. Since our calendar revolves around the AP schedule, we try to get all instruction done before that time, and the remaining days are left for play.
Misha's projects are clever and relaxing (once she's figured out the logistics, which take her hours upon hours in the last weeks of school) arts and crafts. Ali does something with either musicals or electronics. And I have done the AmeriCorps Volunteer Project for two years now.
For AmeriCorps, I partner up with the Volunteer Center of Arizona and hoodwinkle some poor young AmeriCorps volunteer into contacting all the agencies and organizing the dates. My job is to coordinate drivers ... which is rather agonizing and impossible. This year I was responsible for shuttling 36 students around Tucson for 8 days, including up a mountain and back, and making sure they did not throw cans at each other at the Food Bank, poke out an eye while clearing brush on the mountain, or sand-off a finger with the electric sander at the cat shelter.
The two most exciting events of those weeks were the day when little Anthony--a 6th grader--pulled out a tooth while at the cat shelter and asked permission (!) to go use the bathroom to clean the blood off and out of his mouth. He returned to tell me that there was a giant cat in the sink and he couldn't get to the water. The second event was when Carolyn -- who had generously loaned me her SUV that seats 8 - called on Saturday to ask me who had vomited in her car. Apparently somebody had gotten sick on the way up or down Mount Lemmon and neglected to mention it.
I love that AmeriCorps gets the kids out and volunteering -- I think it is one of the most important things for me to introduce to the kids. At the same time, they are still kids and need a fair amount of supervision.
So school's over and I'm still in recovery mode, so tired I take naps every day and can barely see through the fog in my head. Maybe it's not school stress recovery; maybe it's the Valley Fever (a fungus whose spores I apparently inhaled) or maybe it's that I am also doggedly plodding through the 500-plus pages of Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children, which has sent me to sleep so many times that Misha's lost count. I would have given up on this wandering monsterous book a long time ago if I hadn't had to finish it for my summer course, Varieties of Modern Indian Prose.
Sunday, June 03, 2007
Quotes that make you go "aw"
Ali (the physics teacher and my friend) tells a story that I love for a multitude of reasons. J. one day told her that he'd seen another student wearing a button that said "Jesus is the reason for the season." Ali beams with pride when she relates that J. told them that actually it was "the tilt of the earth."
***
This winter, a few students ran up to me excitedly. "Oh my gosh, Ms. Harings! Last week we didn't even know who Tennyson was, then we read 'The Lady of Shalott' and 'Ulysses,' and Tennyson was quoted on Boston Legal last night! He really is famous!"
***
Some yearbook messages (If you'll indulge - these are too wonderful not to share):
"Ms. Harings, your class was always fun because I could relate everything to Frankenstein. Thanks for preparing me for the AP. love, A. p.s. I will miss you."
"Ms. H - Well, I may not be the best orator ... or writer ... or reader ... or have any sort of comprehensive ability whatsoever, but I still think you're one of the hardest working teachers I've ever known. I'll miss you very much and ... thanks for listening." - B.
"I really loved being in both your classes. I was having a hard time for a while and then you would say something and cheer it up. I will really miss having you next year." - M.
"I really enjoyed your class. I think this is the first time I've actually enjoyed literature! love, S."
"Although it may have not seemed that I enjoyed your class, I really did. Hope to see you next year for another wonderful (crazy) yearbook season" - M.
"You have been one of the best English teachers I've ever had. Every class period was an enjoyable and eye-opening experience. I look forward to the years ahead. I will always use the valuable lessons you have taught me." - K.
"I'm looking forward to seeing how hard AP lit is going to be." - X.
"I'm really going to miss having you next year. I really like you more than the other teachers. And I really didn't like A Passage to India...Have a fantabulistic summer! - C. (your #1 large word abuser)"
***
This winter, a few students ran up to me excitedly. "Oh my gosh, Ms. Harings! Last week we didn't even know who Tennyson was, then we read 'The Lady of Shalott' and 'Ulysses,' and Tennyson was quoted on Boston Legal last night! He really is famous!"
***
Some yearbook messages (If you'll indulge - these are too wonderful not to share):
"Ms. Harings, your class was always fun because I could relate everything to Frankenstein. Thanks for preparing me for the AP. love, A. p.s. I will miss you."
"Ms. H - Well, I may not be the best orator ... or writer ... or reader ... or have any sort of comprehensive ability whatsoever, but I still think you're one of the hardest working teachers I've ever known. I'll miss you very much and ... thanks for listening." - B.
"I really loved being in both your classes. I was having a hard time for a while and then you would say something and cheer it up. I will really miss having you next year." - M.
"I really enjoyed your class. I think this is the first time I've actually enjoyed literature! love, S."
"Although it may have not seemed that I enjoyed your class, I really did. Hope to see you next year for another wonderful (crazy) yearbook season" - M.
"You have been one of the best English teachers I've ever had. Every class period was an enjoyable and eye-opening experience. I look forward to the years ahead. I will always use the valuable lessons you have taught me." - K.
"I'm looking forward to seeing how hard AP lit is going to be." - X.
"I'm really going to miss having you next year. I really like you more than the other teachers. And I really didn't like A Passage to India...Have a fantabulistic summer! - C. (your #1 large word abuser)"
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