I like to use writing to figure out the way I feel about something. I think the reason that college students sometimes write crappy research papers is that they weren’t genuinely curious. The way a research paper should work is that there is an urgent need to figure out something you don’t know. You begin with a question, separating what you do know from what you want to/need to know. Then, using the tools at your disposal, you find the information you seek, and place it into a form that’s most appropriate for your audience.
I don’t think it’s entirely possible in the first-year writing class to create a genuine research situation. Due to the nature of school and grading, it’s always going to be kind of faux. But I believe we can create research paper topics that genuinely interest students. But what would interest a random group of 20-year-olds? What confuses them? What do they want to know more about but do not yet have sufficient information?
Relationships. It seems to me that at the beginning of college students are leaving the high school mode of transient relationships. They’re less hormonal. They ‘re even beginning to think about the future, long-term relationships, even marriage. Though they’re processing all these possibilities, they don’t have it quite figured out yet. This is the perfect occasion for a research question. (Plus, I’m confused about relationships too, so we can all learn together. William Perry shows that students move to higher levels of intellectual development when the teacher is seen as “in the same boat”)
I’m thinking the class could even follow an arc of a relationship.
1. How do you find/create a relationship? How to pick up people, where to meet people. This could also include discussions of phenomena like online dating (rhetorical analysis of a match.com profile?), and of course, the awkwardness of first dates, dating etiquette. (Possible texts: online dating profiles, The Game, that scene from Magnolia where Tom Cruise plays the pickup artist, books that tell you how to pick up women/men, how to find a husband/wife )
2. How do you nurture a relationship? Transitioning from someone you’re “dating” to someone you’re “with” – In fact, think of how much terminology and wordplay factor into this phase. The first time your partner refers to the two of you as “us,” the first “I love you.” (Possible texts: Sex and the City, those self-help books that talk about how to get your boyfriend to propose to you)
3. How do you end a relationship? This is, of course, all a matter of words. How do you break up with someone? What do you say? (Possible texts: He’s Just Not That Into You/It’s Called A Breakup Because It’s Broken, that episode of Seinfeld about “It’s not you, it’s me” – in fact, any number of Seinfeld episodes would work, we could also analyze breakup songs)
4. How do you maintain a relationship? Marriage would be a topic here, obviously, and gay marriage and civil unions (I would have to make sure the class wasn’t too focused on the heterosexual). It might even be neat at this point to have students interview someone whose relationship they admire and ask for advice. (Possible texts: Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus)
I’ve been looking up relationship books on Amazon, and they all have comic names like Why Men Love Bitches, and I Used to Miss Him But My Aim is Improving.
Does anyone have any suggestions for other texts I could use?
Monday, July 23, 2007
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Why I'll Miss You
I have written in this blog previously that I wanted to be little parts of different things; specifically, I wanted to glob together a bunch of religions and make them all my religion. I have since come to consider this further and maybe I think the integrity of each religion is a good thing. In fact, maybe I think each religion should just fully strive to be what it is, instead of making concessions to other religions and therefore diluting itself.
But I have decided that when you leave people (as I will be doing in just under two weeks), you can keep little parts of them. You can keep the story they told you and tell it as an anecdote at a party when you’re getting to know someone else. You can remember the way they handled themselves in a tough situation, and when faced with one yourself, you can draw on what you saw them do. You can treat people the way they treated them. You can remember one of their clever observations and use it to view the world. You can adopt their sense of humor, their taste in movies, their delights in simple things. You can tell stories with the certain inflection they always used. In a class this last semester, we talked about the plagiarism hysteria currently sweeping the country, and leading to phenomenon like turnitin.com, which victimizes students and polices the outcomes of plagiarisms without examining its underlying causes. But I think that when you’ve really gotten to know someone, really spent time with them, you plagiarize them. Little bits of them become all of you, and in this way, it’s like they never left.
So this is why, if you’re a person I’m leaving behind, I’ll miss you because I won’t be able to cheat off you anymore; because there won’t be any more stories or movies or observations to challenge me and shape me. I’m recording here some things I’m going to plagiarize from some of my good friends who won’t be in Arizona. In short, these are things that I admire about you, and I hope that in some small way I have learned from you.
Kristin: The way you feel comfortable in any group or setting, how you laugh
JR: Your ability to make people feel comfortable, to tell a good story (usually with impressions and hand gestures)
Jennifer: Your serenity, how it seems like nothing ever fazes you
Catherine: Your ability to accept things as they come (Daoism, I think it’s called)
Emily: How you embrace, unapologetically, your “dorkiness”
Dustin: Your humility and graciousness
Elizabeth: How you always rave about others, your loyalty
Angela: Your friendliness (and neighborliness)
Aaron: Your ability to BS
Reify: How you adapt to any situation (including hordes of English graduate students)
Juliette: How you always have a smile for everyone, no matter what their story
And the list goes on! I was just going through my Facebook friends list to create this, and I only included people who I thought wouldn't mind making an appearance here. In fact, it reminds me of my favorite goodbye line, from The Last Battle, the final book in the Chronicles of Narnia:
And as He spoke He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.
But I have decided that when you leave people (as I will be doing in just under two weeks), you can keep little parts of them. You can keep the story they told you and tell it as an anecdote at a party when you’re getting to know someone else. You can remember the way they handled themselves in a tough situation, and when faced with one yourself, you can draw on what you saw them do. You can treat people the way they treated them. You can remember one of their clever observations and use it to view the world. You can adopt their sense of humor, their taste in movies, their delights in simple things. You can tell stories with the certain inflection they always used. In a class this last semester, we talked about the plagiarism hysteria currently sweeping the country, and leading to phenomenon like turnitin.com, which victimizes students and polices the outcomes of plagiarisms without examining its underlying causes. But I think that when you’ve really gotten to know someone, really spent time with them, you plagiarize them. Little bits of them become all of you, and in this way, it’s like they never left.
So this is why, if you’re a person I’m leaving behind, I’ll miss you because I won’t be able to cheat off you anymore; because there won’t be any more stories or movies or observations to challenge me and shape me. I’m recording here some things I’m going to plagiarize from some of my good friends who won’t be in Arizona. In short, these are things that I admire about you, and I hope that in some small way I have learned from you.
Kristin: The way you feel comfortable in any group or setting, how you laugh
JR: Your ability to make people feel comfortable, to tell a good story (usually with impressions and hand gestures)
Jennifer: Your serenity, how it seems like nothing ever fazes you
Catherine: Your ability to accept things as they come (Daoism, I think it’s called)
Emily: How you embrace, unapologetically, your “dorkiness”
Dustin: Your humility and graciousness
Elizabeth: How you always rave about others, your loyalty
Angela: Your friendliness (and neighborliness)
Aaron: Your ability to BS
Reify: How you adapt to any situation (including hordes of English graduate students)
Juliette: How you always have a smile for everyone, no matter what their story
And the list goes on! I was just going through my Facebook friends list to create this, and I only included people who I thought wouldn't mind making an appearance here. In fact, it reminds me of my favorite goodbye line, from The Last Battle, the final book in the Chronicles of Narnia:
And as He spoke He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.
Friday, July 6, 2007
Why I Will Never Be Judged By the Content of my Character
I suppose it’s no big secret that American culture holds a double standard for men and women. I am reminded of this, depressingly, while reading the headlines of women’s magazines in line at the grocery story. “Your best summer hair EVER!” proclaims Marie Claire. “Hot Moves to Drive Him Wild” promises Cosmo. Thin and beautiful women grace their covers. Turn to Esquire, and you see, well, more thin and beautiful women. But Esquire also boasts articles about the president and the war, and cultural commentary and essays by David Sedaris and Chuck Klostermann (two of my favorite writers). Okay, there’s also articles about how to score chicks, but even these are very well-written, whereas I’m pretty sure Marie Claire just reguirgitates the same articles every month while slapping a younger, thinner model on the cover. Overall, Esquire is written for a person who is reflective and intelligent – not just about their hip size, but about the state of their world.
Let’s relate this perception of men and women to the plight of Kirstie Alley. Alley was slender in her early career – her Cheers days – but last year sometime started grabbing tabloid covers (or to be specific, enlarged photos of her hiner started grabbing said covers). Alley got a spokeswoman deal with Jenny Craig, and a TV show called Fat Actress. Very publicly, she lost 50 pounds and showed up on Oprah in a bikini.
While spending the night in a hotel a couple weeks ago, I channel flipped to Pulp Fiction on cable TV (which, in case you’re wondering, is still pretty engaging sans swearing and bloodshed). Quentin Tarantino is traditionally credited with saving John Travolta’s career by casting him in Pulp Fiction. The early 1990’s found Travolta doing dreck like Look Who’s Talking/Too/Now, co-starring Kristie Alley. In 1994’s Pulp Fiction, he played a swaggering bad-ass assassin, and won an Oscar nomination. Travolta’s career has been up and down since then. Though finding success with movies like Face/Off and Ladder 49, he was panned widely for Battlefield Earth, based on the novel of L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology. (Incidentally, my friend Rob is the only person I know who’s seen Battlefield Earth, and he was only able to stomach 20 minutes, which is something because I’ve seen Rob stomach mass quantities of Jager). Travolta was also criticized recently in the press for saying psychotic drugs caused the Virginia Tech shootings (cringe).
Anyway, I’m watching Pulp Fiction, and one of the commercials is for a re-run of Grease on Nick at Nite. Holy Cow! I thought, John Travolta got enormous between 1978 and 1994! See a comparison here. Then, Google as I might, I could not find a single criticism of Travolta ginormosity, save for the article above which doesn’t even actively criticize Travolta, because his wife Kelly “finds his fuller figure attractive!”
What damaged Kirstie Alley’s career? Being overweight. What revived it? Losing weight. What damaged Travolta’s career? A combination of bad movie choices and a belief in scientology. What revived it? Great acting, great movies. Alley rises and falls on her expanding and contracting waistline; Travolta falls because of his beliefs, his thoughts, his actions. What kills me about this is that Kristie Alley is a scientologist; I didn’t know this until I started researching her career for this post. Do you see women scientologists (Alley, Travolta’s wife Kelly Preston) in the news for their beliefs nearly as much as you do their male counterparts (Travolta, Tom Cruise)?
Female stars are much more likely to end up in the gossip columns for appearance – rumors of eating disorders, weight loss/gain, pregnancy, flashing nether regions, plastic surgery speculations. Male stars end up in the tabloids for what they do or say – Tom Cruise for his heinous behavior on Oprah, Danny DeVito appearing drunk on The View, Isaiah Washington using the word “faggot” on the set of Grey’s Anatomy, Mel Gibson's anti-semitic rant, the time Russell Crowe threw a phone at that bellhop. Just last night I saw Tucker Carlson laughing at presidential candidate John Edwards for this video, where he spends several minutes zhushing his hair before a TV interview. When a man is concerned about his appearance, it is an occasion for hilarity! Yet when Kristie Alley stays at home with her kids and drinks 14 bottles of grape soda per day, suddenly it’s a “health crisis” and she desperately needs help. (As far as I know, Travolta’s grape soda consumption has never been reported in a major news outlet.)
Why should I care? I’m not (yet) planning on being a movie star, but I am planning on making a career out of what I do and say. In fact, the career I’ve chosen for myself will rise and fall on teaching and publishing, and though I like to think that academia is more forgiving than Hollywood, something in me doubts that people are willing to switch gears so quickly. Part of the reason I write about pop culture despite its seeming triviality is that I honestly believe it is a reflection of society and that it has the power to influence people. Though publishing allows for physical anonymity, what I achieve as a professor will also depend on the way I appear to others: teaching, job talks, presenting at conferences, and it feels naïve to believe that people will hold me to Travolta standards instead of Alley standards. What does this double standard mean for the way women should present themselves professionally? Is the solution to embrace the beauty standard, work out and buy the latest fashions? Or do I deny the standard, let myself go, and dress ultra-conservatively? Isn’t it wildly unfair that I have to ask such questions in the first place?
Let’s relate this perception of men and women to the plight of Kirstie Alley. Alley was slender in her early career – her Cheers days – but last year sometime started grabbing tabloid covers (or to be specific, enlarged photos of her hiner started grabbing said covers). Alley got a spokeswoman deal with Jenny Craig, and a TV show called Fat Actress. Very publicly, she lost 50 pounds and showed up on Oprah in a bikini.
While spending the night in a hotel a couple weeks ago, I channel flipped to Pulp Fiction on cable TV (which, in case you’re wondering, is still pretty engaging sans swearing and bloodshed). Quentin Tarantino is traditionally credited with saving John Travolta’s career by casting him in Pulp Fiction. The early 1990’s found Travolta doing dreck like Look Who’s Talking/Too/Now, co-starring Kristie Alley. In 1994’s Pulp Fiction, he played a swaggering bad-ass assassin, and won an Oscar nomination. Travolta’s career has been up and down since then. Though finding success with movies like Face/Off and Ladder 49, he was panned widely for Battlefield Earth, based on the novel of L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology. (Incidentally, my friend Rob is the only person I know who’s seen Battlefield Earth, and he was only able to stomach 20 minutes, which is something because I’ve seen Rob stomach mass quantities of Jager). Travolta was also criticized recently in the press for saying psychotic drugs caused the Virginia Tech shootings (cringe).
Anyway, I’m watching Pulp Fiction, and one of the commercials is for a re-run of Grease on Nick at Nite. Holy Cow! I thought, John Travolta got enormous between 1978 and 1994! See a comparison here. Then, Google as I might, I could not find a single criticism of Travolta ginormosity, save for the article above which doesn’t even actively criticize Travolta, because his wife Kelly “finds his fuller figure attractive!”
What damaged Kirstie Alley’s career? Being overweight. What revived it? Losing weight. What damaged Travolta’s career? A combination of bad movie choices and a belief in scientology. What revived it? Great acting, great movies. Alley rises and falls on her expanding and contracting waistline; Travolta falls because of his beliefs, his thoughts, his actions. What kills me about this is that Kristie Alley is a scientologist; I didn’t know this until I started researching her career for this post. Do you see women scientologists (Alley, Travolta’s wife Kelly Preston) in the news for their beliefs nearly as much as you do their male counterparts (Travolta, Tom Cruise)?
Female stars are much more likely to end up in the gossip columns for appearance – rumors of eating disorders, weight loss/gain, pregnancy, flashing nether regions, plastic surgery speculations. Male stars end up in the tabloids for what they do or say – Tom Cruise for his heinous behavior on Oprah, Danny DeVito appearing drunk on The View, Isaiah Washington using the word “faggot” on the set of Grey’s Anatomy, Mel Gibson's anti-semitic rant, the time Russell Crowe threw a phone at that bellhop. Just last night I saw Tucker Carlson laughing at presidential candidate John Edwards for this video, where he spends several minutes zhushing his hair before a TV interview. When a man is concerned about his appearance, it is an occasion for hilarity! Yet when Kristie Alley stays at home with her kids and drinks 14 bottles of grape soda per day, suddenly it’s a “health crisis” and she desperately needs help. (As far as I know, Travolta’s grape soda consumption has never been reported in a major news outlet.)
Why should I care? I’m not (yet) planning on being a movie star, but I am planning on making a career out of what I do and say. In fact, the career I’ve chosen for myself will rise and fall on teaching and publishing, and though I like to think that academia is more forgiving than Hollywood, something in me doubts that people are willing to switch gears so quickly. Part of the reason I write about pop culture despite its seeming triviality is that I honestly believe it is a reflection of society and that it has the power to influence people. Though publishing allows for physical anonymity, what I achieve as a professor will also depend on the way I appear to others: teaching, job talks, presenting at conferences, and it feels naïve to believe that people will hold me to Travolta standards instead of Alley standards. What does this double standard mean for the way women should present themselves professionally? Is the solution to embrace the beauty standard, work out and buy the latest fashions? Or do I deny the standard, let myself go, and dress ultra-conservatively? Isn’t it wildly unfair that I have to ask such questions in the first place?
Monday, July 2, 2007
Why I’m Now Titling My Posts Like This
Recently, I’ve been compulsively reading Slate.com, a compendium of news and opinion pieces mostly about contemporary culture. I find that when I’m presented with a page from Slate, I am compelled to click on at least four or five articles and end up not only finding out something new but something that I didn’t even know I was interested in. Why? Because their titles are question-posing, typically using words like How and Why. For example:
“Why There Are So Many Movies About Rats”
“Why Does Starbucks Sell Music So Well?”
“How John McCain’s Struggling Campaign Could Recover”
From Slate, we learn the importance not of thorough research, not of creating an all-encompassing outline, not in careful revision, but the absolute necessity of creating a good and interesting question. This is not only important for producing the impetus to write, but for our readers to be engaged. So I’m going to try to use such titles more from now on.
ALSO (randomly)
How excited am I about this book?
And I will be posting a list of my simple things. I’m just coagulating them all for one post.
“Why There Are So Many Movies About Rats”
“Why Does Starbucks Sell Music So Well?”
“How John McCain’s Struggling Campaign Could Recover”
From Slate, we learn the importance not of thorough research, not of creating an all-encompassing outline, not in careful revision, but the absolute necessity of creating a good and interesting question. This is not only important for producing the impetus to write, but for our readers to be engaged. So I’m going to try to use such titles more from now on.
ALSO (randomly)
How excited am I about this book?
And I will be posting a list of my simple things. I’m just coagulating them all for one post.
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