From General to Specific

Today my students started working on their final projects, where they will design media literacy lessons for actual high school students. Their first task was to come up with a topic, so I put them into groups based on their interests and gave them a few minutes to brainstorm. Before long, one group signalled to me that they had a topic, so I said "Great! What is it?" Their response:

"Different media have different effects on different people."

I tried hard to disguise my sinking feeling. Had they not been paying attention when I gave them that lecture on pointless vague statements and how they are pointless and vague?

I entered salvage mode, asking "Can you be more specific?"

His classmate piped up with "What he means is that we're going to compare written, audio and video versions of the same story and have the students discuss how differences in media lead you to different interpretations."

Phew.

Fear of Little People

I'm doing some grading-for-pay like I did last summer. So far the papers have not been as hilarious as usual, but one stands out from the others. The prompt was something like "Discuss something that frightened you as a child, but you find humorous as an adult". This person's response: Little People. The author refers to them as Small People, but you get the idea.


"My biggest fear when I was younger was small people, the really short adults like on The Wizard of Oz. The reason I was afraid of small people were that they could get in my hamper, they could fit in my trunk, and my mom was scared of them.
Small people can fit practically anywhere. Every time I went to the bathroom in my house, there would always be a hamper. The hamper was a perfect spot for a small person to fit into, and I was always scared he or she would jump out of the hamper while I was using the bathroom. It would be so easy for small people to jump out of hampers and kill people.
It would be simple for a small person to hide in the trunk of my car while my family are heading down the road, and I am dead by that person choking me or shooting me."

Jeffrey Express

As a grad student, I didn’t have a car, so I learned to navigate Chicago on public transportation. I spent many hours on the #6 bus, the Jeffrey Express, which connected three very different zones of the city: the working-class black neighbourhood of the South Side, Hyde Park and the University of Chicago, and the downtown, with its shiny skyscrapers. Chicago is still a segregated city, and riding the Jeffrey Express tended to place these divisions in stark relief. The correlation between urban geography and race, class, and education was unmistakable, and it was always clear to me that this bus was one of the few public spaces where these separated spheres would mix. One day in 2003 I was taking the Jeffrey downtown, no doubt to watch movies at the Art Institute, when some middle-aged ladies climbed aboard and started talking to people about a candidate for the Senate. They handed out modest brochures, and they sat and chatted with cleaning ladies and grad students alike about a man they believed in, and who promised to bring real change. I remarked that it was a clever move to campaign on the Jeffrey, a bus line that sliced through demographic divisions. Still, I had my doubts that their candidate would have much of a chance, what with the strange and politically unlikely name of “Barack Obama.”

Political Pumpkin

Enjoy the glow from my Barack Obama pumpkin.  I got the stencil here.

Haunted House

A friend of mine suggested that since Halloween is approaching, we should visit a haunted house.  There are a number of these places around Atlanta, where people take over part of a mall and turn it into a maze full of vampires and smoke machines.  We found the address, next to a discount furniture outlet, and we knew we were in the right place when we saw various monsters wandering around the parking lot, making menacing gestures at squealing teenagers. The lizardy alien with glowing red eyes chased us to the ticket booth.  There were two paths to choose from, one called "Mangler", the other "Carnivore."  We went for the latter, and I noted that you'll never hear of a horror attraction called "Vegetarian".  

Upon entry, the first thing you see is a TV attached to a night-vision security camera - a novel way of reassuring the visitor that they won't get lost in the dark, and also dissuading anyone with funny ideas.  After the safety briefing about not smoking or eating, you walk through a labyrinth of corridors and chambers, each filled with a different variety of scary stuff, including actors who ham it up to great effect.  There was no unifying theme or logic to the place other than "BOO!", so the werewolves hung out in the mad scientist's laboratory, while a chainsaw maniac was guarding the occult temple of skulls.  Whatever.  Even though I kept repeating "It's only a theme park", we were a couple of nervous nellies, and I think I annoyed the group of teenagers in front of us with my screaming.  Still, I reserve the right to scream when an axe-wielding clown jumps out of the shadows at me.  I had read the website before we went, and one of the FAQs was "can you get lost?".  The answer is no, since it is not a maze, and while there are areas where you are meant to get disoriented, staff members will appear to direct you to the exit if you get turned around.  I required re-orientation in the hall of mirrors.  After a few minutes of running around in circles and screaming at my own reflection (yes, really), a helpful zombie lady shuffled in and stuck out her arm to show me the door.  

An Honest Day's Work

Last weekend I volunteered to help build a Habitat for Humanity house.  My church organized the work group, and it was quite amazing to see how much we did in a day.  I loved meeting the future owner - a woman who works as a doula, and who specializes in teen mothers.  She's building the house for her and her kids, plus she is raising her sister's children, all of whom came out to work on the house.  The crew from the previous weekend had put up the exterior walls and the interior studs, and we did the whole roof, installed the windows, and started the back deck.  I was on roof duty, and I successfully navigated the struts and nailed the plywood pieces into place.  When I say I was "successful" I mean "I did not fall off the roof".  It is a strange experience to work on a roof when the house is full of people hammering nails - the echoes change every time you install another piece, and the vibrations can be unnerving.  After a lunch that reminded me of why everyone in America has type-2 diabetes, I started working on window installation, which involved yet more hammering.  I did so much hammering, sometimes I did it with my left hand just to keep things interesting.  Being an academic and unaccustomed to manual labour, I found that by the time I got home I had to take a tylenol and put my right arm in ice to recover.  This made me feel a bit lame, so to speak.  

Let Your Fingers Do the Walking

I am on the job market, as usual, so I spend a lot of my time reading academic job ads.  They rarely make interesting reading, except that they sometimes reveal levels of confusion within a given department, like the ad that said they were looking for an expert in "silent and sound cinema".  My understanding of film history is that "silent and sound" is the same as "everything".   I am used to this type of vagueness, but a recent ad takes specificity to a new level.  It starts out normally, but then it descends into absurdity, with some mystifying details about the successful applicant they have in mind:

"Presents classroom lectures that are logical and coherent".  Well, ok, but it's sad that you have to state this.

"Treats others with respect and consideration regardless of their status or position; Accepts responsibility for own actions; Follows through on commitments."   Everything I need to be a professor I learned in kindergarten.  

"Ability to read and interpret documents such as research studies, administrative policies, and journals, newspapers, etc."  I should note that the first requirement for this position is that you have a PhD.  Ability to read?  Newspapers?  I should mention in my letter that I, like Governor Palin, have read "all" the newspapers?

There is an entire section entitled "Reasoning Ability", which includes such gems as: "Ability to apply logic as appropriate."  When is it not appropriate?  "Ability to interpret instructions furnished in written, oral, diagram, or schedule form."  I refuse to read schedules!

The physical requirements are truly bizarre:

"Vision requirements include ability to read student assignments and grade appropriately."  May I remind my reader that this is a film studies job.  And which body part do we watch movies with?

"The employee is required...occasionally to use hands, fingers, and frequently to talk or hear."  Only occasionally to use hands?  It makes me want to get this job and then push this point, i.e. "I totally used my fingers ten minutes ago, so I'm not doing it again until tomorrow."    Or, "My contract says I have to talk OR hear, not both."

"The noise level in the work environment is usually moderate.  Noise could include interaction with students, faculty, staff, and the public; other noise may be generated by telephones, computers, or instructional equipment."  I feel compelled to get this job just so I can run out of the room screaming when the telephone rings.  I might even wave my fingers around.

My question is, what kind of lunatic did they have to fire to make the lawyers write up this ad? One of my colleagues said that it sounds like a job ad written for aliens who are unfamiliar with life on planet Earth.  I hope I at least get an interview so I can find out what happened.