So I didn't go to folk dancing tonight; I decided to stay and do homework. I felt kind of tired, still, after the paper-writing odyssey, anyway.
Except that, instead of doing homework, I made a fruit-fly trap (we've got a bunch of the buggers around and are not quite sure how they got here) and found/cropped/printed more friend pictures, then added them to the wall, which entailed rearranging all the existing pictures as well.
I am going to do some homework before I go to bed, seriously. Right now, in fact.
-Laurel
11.29.2007
Quick Mundanity
The away message from the previous entry actually ended up being mistaken: my printer pitched a big time-consuming fit before it would print my paper, such that I not only didn't get any other homework done, but actually missed the timely bus to campus and had to come into Diaspora on the next one, putting me there about ten minutes late and making me miss the beginning of a class presentation. I felt rude, but I did hand in the paper, which means that I am down to only regular responsibility until next week, though that still means I have to start research on Friday for my two other papers. Oh, and how 'bout I actually, finally, after a month, read the comments that everyone made on my mediocre creative-nonfiction draft? I've been trying to get up the nerve and fortitude, but I have a feeling that it's not going to happen until late Friday afternoon because that means I can console myself with dinner with Christina and Matt if things go particularly badly.
This is my fifth sentence, so I'll end with this: it's been a good day.
-Laurel
This is my fifth sentence, so I'll end with this: it's been a good day.
-Laurel
11.28.2007
Finish Line
I can't believe it's Wednesday. Threeish days of writing, three hours of class and three of Ninth Hour, at least three bowls of Raisin Nut Bran, several cookies, a handful of popcorn, a lot of water and bathroom breaks, and an average of maybe-five hours of sleep per night later, here is my current away message:
A fairly-solid argument executed. Five-and-a-half pages written in just over four hours, for a final count of just over twelve (not counting works-cited). And probably time enough to get my other homework done and get a shower and lunch. Only one class today, and I hardly even have to think in it, and I can take a long and glorious nap when it's done.
I am truly an object of God's limitless grace.
Two more papers over the next two weeks, and then my first graduate semester is over and done.
-Laurel
A fairly-solid argument executed. Five-and-a-half pages written in just over four hours, for a final count of just over twelve (not counting works-cited). And probably time enough to get my other homework done and get a shower and lunch. Only one class today, and I hardly even have to think in it, and I can take a long and glorious nap when it's done.
I am truly an object of God's limitless grace.
Two more papers over the next two weeks, and then my first graduate semester is over and done.
-Laurel
11.26.2007
Abbreviated Ramble (I cut out a lot of it)
It may be a good night to stay up late writing a paper. The Diaspora one isn't due until Wednesday afternoon, but it's supposed to be around twelve pages, and I've had so much trouble with the research and theory (this's my first theory-based paper, and despite what Dr. Keith tried to tell me for his own class, it is like learning a new style of writing) that right now I'm only on the second page, though I do have a partial formal outline, and am filling in the gaps passably well in my mind. So I've got my work cut out for me, to be sure, and I'm going to write as much as I can before I finally zonk out tonight.
I say it's a good night for it because it looks like some other Binghamtonians will be up for most of the night--two of the freshmen IVers have cited papers due tomorrow that they've yet to start. It's not the misery-loves-company aspect that attracts me, though, but the idea that other people will be up late with me. There's something about being the only one awake, late at night, that for years has mildly creeped me out.
Anyway, this paper, for good or ill, will be turned in on Wednesday afternoon; Diaspora will be my only class of the day, and it'll be a low-brainpower one, since I'll be watching a presentation. And Thursday night finally will allow me enough time to get to folk dancing; it'll be my first time since late September, and though the awkwardness of getting to re-know the Binghamton people makes me hesitate, I've decided not to miss it.
I know that a lot of things I've written lately, here and elsewhere, have been pretty heavy. Sorry. It's been a semester like that. But the break is coming, and it'll be a glorious six weeks long. When I'm done spending a couple of weeks with my family, I want to go on tour, as it were, and see everyone who wants to be seen. My parents seem pretty cool with the idea. You should all get a hold of me around late December; we'll hammer it out and I'll come sometime in January.
My energy's flagging already, which is a bad sign. I should get back to work.
-Laurel
I say it's a good night for it because it looks like some other Binghamtonians will be up for most of the night--two of the freshmen IVers have cited papers due tomorrow that they've yet to start. It's not the misery-loves-company aspect that attracts me, though, but the idea that other people will be up late with me. There's something about being the only one awake, late at night, that for years has mildly creeped me out.
Anyway, this paper, for good or ill, will be turned in on Wednesday afternoon; Diaspora will be my only class of the day, and it'll be a low-brainpower one, since I'll be watching a presentation. And Thursday night finally will allow me enough time to get to folk dancing; it'll be my first time since late September, and though the awkwardness of getting to re-know the Binghamton people makes me hesitate, I've decided not to miss it.
I know that a lot of things I've written lately, here and elsewhere, have been pretty heavy. Sorry. It's been a semester like that. But the break is coming, and it'll be a glorious six weeks long. When I'm done spending a couple of weeks with my family, I want to go on tour, as it were, and see everyone who wants to be seen. My parents seem pretty cool with the idea. You should all get a hold of me around late December; we'll hammer it out and I'll come sometime in January.
My energy's flagging already, which is a bad sign. I should get back to work.
-Laurel
11.24.2007
Oh, for the love of decency.
Dear Literary Theorists/Critics Everywhere,
I can understand putting slashes between opposing words ("and/or," etc.) when both uses work in the context of your sentence. But please stop putting them everywhere you just don't feel like typing out the proper conjunction. Nobody is amused by sentences like this one, which doesn't even end like an actual sentence:
"The fact that first interrogations into the 'content of the form' were undertaken under the auspices of border studies (Calderon and Saldivar 1991) gives credence to an attempt to see the form as occupying that slippery, interstitial position between reality/representation, public/private, traumatic/narrativized, form/content, literature/politics, written/oral" (Šesnic 2007: 241).
Also, please stop dancing around vocabulary problems by adding "-ize" and "-ism" to every existing verb and noun and calling them new terms; the admittedly-illustrious Arjun Appadurai, this means YOU.
Clearly, I've gotten so far on the actual writing part of my diaspora-class paper. I do have an outline, at least.
-Laurel
I can understand putting slashes between opposing words ("and/or," etc.) when both uses work in the context of your sentence. But please stop putting them everywhere you just don't feel like typing out the proper conjunction. Nobody is amused by sentences like this one, which doesn't even end like an actual sentence:
"The fact that first interrogations into the 'content of the form' were undertaken under the auspices of border studies (Calderon and Saldivar 1991) gives credence to an attempt to see the form as occupying that slippery, interstitial position between reality/representation, public/private, traumatic/narrativized, form/content, literature/politics, written/oral" (Šesnic 2007: 241).
Also, please stop dancing around vocabulary problems by adding "-ize" and "-ism" to every existing verb and noun and calling them new terms; the admittedly-illustrious Arjun Appadurai, this means YOU.
Clearly, I've gotten so far on the actual writing part of my diaspora-class paper. I do have an outline, at least.
-Laurel
11.21.2007
(serious)
I've been meaning to write this for the better part of a week, but work/procrastination/life have gotten severely in the way. This is largely a bad thing: I don't have the kind of coherency of memory and thought that I had on Friday. So this needs to be written, not only because it's been weighing on me, but because if I put it off any longer, it's going to subside into nothingness.
Last Friday we had a guy speak at IV who works for a counseling ministry in the Binghamton area, and he talked about his lifelong experience with being gay, and then not, and then gay again, and then not, and his present-day life married to a woman who also went through the same thing in her life. He talked about what that was like and his confusion about trying not to be same-sex-attracted and nothing changing for most of his life and lots of stuff thereconnected.
Clearly, that's quite a story. But what he wanted to focus on, really, was John 4:1-39 and 8:1-11 and Luke 7:36-50, and the way Jesus treated (treats) people (all female, here, but extending to everyone) who are emotionally and sexually broken (his term), and the kind of love and gentleness, if not behavioral acceptance, he invariably offered (offers). The guy went on to mention the Church's shortcomings on that sort of approach. With all this I would have agreed anyway.
But just agreeing is not enough. When Carrie wrapped things up, she charged those of us who didn't personally struggle with things like same-sex attraction or pornography addiction, or anything else that's so prevalent even within the Church itself, to be the kind of friend who's approachable in the eyes of those who are.
And please believe me when I say that I never set out not to be. But the fact remains that I have heard, a lot of times over the course of my college career, things that have made it obvious that non-Christian people and non-practicing Christians do not consider me approachable in such a way. I've had friends come out as bisexual and tell me that they hope I still want to associate with them. One of them, quite honestly, didn't even bother telling me, and my initial complicated reaction when I did find out would have made it, to any outsider, obvious as to why not. I've had a friend become pregnant and wait for months to tell me, telling my other friends that she was afraid I'd condemn her to hell (I don't even have the authority, let alone the desire, to do that) for sleeping with someone before she got married. In the way certain friends edit, when they talk to me, their accounts of what's going on in their lives, and I find out from other friends what they didn't want to tell me.
If I could belatedly clarify, for a moment, why there are many things that I do not do: it is not because following God is the same thing as obeying a set of rules. Just ask the Pharisees, who thought it was and turned into self-righteous lawkeepers who didn't even recognize their God when he finally arrived. They were looking, deep down, for someone to affirm their own ability to be good and righteous, to overcome through their own power the sin that so easily entangled those they saw as weak.
To follow God is instead, not to be cliched, a relationship. It's getting to know someone and finding that you're willing to do things out of admiration, the same way that there's so much I'm willing to do for a friend, for a boyfriend, for anyone who impresses me. It's like painting a picture (I know, I didn't make that up); you adjust it as you get a better idea of Him whom you're painting. So you end up doing something that looks like you're following a bunch of rules, but really, at heart, if you're doing what you're supposed to, what you're actually doing is trying to know God and follow Him the best way you can. While it does mean doing and not doing some very specific things, it's not really about a reward-punishment thing. It's about honoring and imitating someone.
But that doesn't mean that good Christians look like me. No, no. This semester, if nothing else, I have gotten a clear and painful sense of how incredibly frustrating a person I am. If you want to figure out what you're really like, put yourself in a place you don't want to be. Like a literary theory class. Like a Bible study full of people with less Biblical knowledge than you. Like an academic system that doesn't believe in disinterested love or objective good, that considers ingenuine the kindest people in your life, that considers unreal the realest things you've ever known. Have people inconvenience you. ...And in that situation, may you do better than I've done. Look at some of the things I've listed, how little deserving of pity they are, and how none of them make up for how I've acted. I've often treated Christians better than non-Christians, shying away from those who're hostile to my faith. I've treated many of those Christians little better, giving them impatience where I've gotten only gentleness. I've been angry and frightened--most of all frightened--and generally flawed. While my imperfection does not negate the truth of my faith, believe me, good Christians do not look like me.
I cannot promise to approve of your behavior if I do not think it's right. I can't even promise, though I can hope, not to feel frustrated about your having done it, since sometimes I can't get my emotions in line with my mental acknowledgement that I also do incorrect things. But I'm not in any position to make a statement about what kind of person you are.
Please believe me when I say that I'm not going to leave off being friends with you just for your doing something I can't get behind. I mean, say you slept with a guy and you're not necessarily sorry but now you're going to have a kid. Okay, so I'm going to think that sleeping with the guy was not a good idea, though I hope that that's not the first thing on my mind when you say so, and I hope that I'm not going to lecture you about it or something. But it would be my privilege to hold you and tell you you're going to get through it. It would be my privilege to help you in some practical way if I can. It isn't always present, but forgive any confusion of mine, any awkwardness; outside of writing, I've never had much in the way of grace. Give me a little time, and I hope I'll prove myself worthy of your trust.
People who're telling me about their lives are not coming to me as someone to fall at my feet and hope for absolution. You're there to love and be loved. That is something I understand, even if I've done a bad job heretofore at making it obvious.
That's really all I wanted to say. I'm sorry I'm not approachable; I'd like to be.
-Laurel
Last Friday we had a guy speak at IV who works for a counseling ministry in the Binghamton area, and he talked about his lifelong experience with being gay, and then not, and then gay again, and then not, and his present-day life married to a woman who also went through the same thing in her life. He talked about what that was like and his confusion about trying not to be same-sex-attracted and nothing changing for most of his life and lots of stuff thereconnected.
Clearly, that's quite a story. But what he wanted to focus on, really, was John 4:1-39 and 8:1-11 and Luke 7:36-50, and the way Jesus treated (treats) people (all female, here, but extending to everyone) who are emotionally and sexually broken (his term), and the kind of love and gentleness, if not behavioral acceptance, he invariably offered (offers). The guy went on to mention the Church's shortcomings on that sort of approach. With all this I would have agreed anyway.
But just agreeing is not enough. When Carrie wrapped things up, she charged those of us who didn't personally struggle with things like same-sex attraction or pornography addiction, or anything else that's so prevalent even within the Church itself, to be the kind of friend who's approachable in the eyes of those who are.
And please believe me when I say that I never set out not to be. But the fact remains that I have heard, a lot of times over the course of my college career, things that have made it obvious that non-Christian people and non-practicing Christians do not consider me approachable in such a way. I've had friends come out as bisexual and tell me that they hope I still want to associate with them. One of them, quite honestly, didn't even bother telling me, and my initial complicated reaction when I did find out would have made it, to any outsider, obvious as to why not. I've had a friend become pregnant and wait for months to tell me, telling my other friends that she was afraid I'd condemn her to hell (I don't even have the authority, let alone the desire, to do that) for sleeping with someone before she got married. In the way certain friends edit, when they talk to me, their accounts of what's going on in their lives, and I find out from other friends what they didn't want to tell me.
If I could belatedly clarify, for a moment, why there are many things that I do not do: it is not because following God is the same thing as obeying a set of rules. Just ask the Pharisees, who thought it was and turned into self-righteous lawkeepers who didn't even recognize their God when he finally arrived. They were looking, deep down, for someone to affirm their own ability to be good and righteous, to overcome through their own power the sin that so easily entangled those they saw as weak.
To follow God is instead, not to be cliched, a relationship. It's getting to know someone and finding that you're willing to do things out of admiration, the same way that there's so much I'm willing to do for a friend, for a boyfriend, for anyone who impresses me. It's like painting a picture (I know, I didn't make that up); you adjust it as you get a better idea of Him whom you're painting. So you end up doing something that looks like you're following a bunch of rules, but really, at heart, if you're doing what you're supposed to, what you're actually doing is trying to know God and follow Him the best way you can. While it does mean doing and not doing some very specific things, it's not really about a reward-punishment thing. It's about honoring and imitating someone.
But that doesn't mean that good Christians look like me. No, no. This semester, if nothing else, I have gotten a clear and painful sense of how incredibly frustrating a person I am. If you want to figure out what you're really like, put yourself in a place you don't want to be. Like a literary theory class. Like a Bible study full of people with less Biblical knowledge than you. Like an academic system that doesn't believe in disinterested love or objective good, that considers ingenuine the kindest people in your life, that considers unreal the realest things you've ever known. Have people inconvenience you. ...And in that situation, may you do better than I've done. Look at some of the things I've listed, how little deserving of pity they are, and how none of them make up for how I've acted. I've often treated Christians better than non-Christians, shying away from those who're hostile to my faith. I've treated many of those Christians little better, giving them impatience where I've gotten only gentleness. I've been angry and frightened--most of all frightened--and generally flawed. While my imperfection does not negate the truth of my faith, believe me, good Christians do not look like me.
I cannot promise to approve of your behavior if I do not think it's right. I can't even promise, though I can hope, not to feel frustrated about your having done it, since sometimes I can't get my emotions in line with my mental acknowledgement that I also do incorrect things. But I'm not in any position to make a statement about what kind of person you are.
Please believe me when I say that I'm not going to leave off being friends with you just for your doing something I can't get behind. I mean, say you slept with a guy and you're not necessarily sorry but now you're going to have a kid. Okay, so I'm going to think that sleeping with the guy was not a good idea, though I hope that that's not the first thing on my mind when you say so, and I hope that I'm not going to lecture you about it or something. But it would be my privilege to hold you and tell you you're going to get through it. It would be my privilege to help you in some practical way if I can. It isn't always present, but forgive any confusion of mine, any awkwardness; outside of writing, I've never had much in the way of grace. Give me a little time, and I hope I'll prove myself worthy of your trust.
People who're telling me about their lives are not coming to me as someone to fall at my feet and hope for absolution. You're there to love and be loved. That is something I understand, even if I've done a bad job heretofore at making it obvious.
That's really all I wanted to say. I'm sorry I'm not approachable; I'd like to be.
-Laurel
11.20.2007
Surname Fun
This isn't a more-important thing, either, but Matt (side-columned below) had this linked today, and I was surprised to discover, not that my last name made the list (no surprise), but that exactly one slot above it is my biological grandmother's surname. Whether, had my dad not been adopted, I would have ended up with that name or not, I'm not sure; I might have been a Coyle (which, for anything it's worth, is on the list, but farther down), though that's less likely, since my dad was given his mother's last name at birth, not his father's. It's all complicated, so I won't bother trying to describe it properly.
The other thing I thought was funny was that "Lewis" and "Clark" are also right next to each other.
-Laurel
The other thing I thought was funny was that "Lewis" and "Clark" are also right next to each other.
-Laurel
11.19.2007
Brevity
This isn't the "more serious" that I meant, but here are two things that seem somehow evocative of this semester:
1) Musing, as I ride the bus home at night, on the way the blue-tinted fluorescent lighting discolors certain shades of clothing and fabric. My gray hoodie simply has a blue cast over it--its original hue is obvious--but my bookbag, normally a sort of strawberry red, deepens to, not a red-plus-blue sort of purple, but more of a raspberry shade.
2) The way it feels to get off the bus back at the apartments, walk under the clock-tower thing, and smell Indian food. Of all the many small restaurants in this plaza, the Indian food always smells the strongest--not in a stale or unpleasant way, either, but like cooking meat and things fried in oil.
Those keep feeling significant somehow, not really a here is home, but more of a here I am and this is now.
-Laurel
1) Musing, as I ride the bus home at night, on the way the blue-tinted fluorescent lighting discolors certain shades of clothing and fabric. My gray hoodie simply has a blue cast over it--its original hue is obvious--but my bookbag, normally a sort of strawberry red, deepens to, not a red-plus-blue sort of purple, but more of a raspberry shade.
2) The way it feels to get off the bus back at the apartments, walk under the clock-tower thing, and smell Indian food. Of all the many small restaurants in this plaza, the Indian food always smells the strongest--not in a stale or unpleasant way, either, but like cooking meat and things fried in oil.
Those keep feeling significant somehow, not really a here is home, but more of a here I am and this is now.
-Laurel
11.16.2007
What I'm doing instead of my theory-class paper prospectus, which was supposed to be due today, except that I had a severely-unproductive day
In honor of my probably giving Christina this blog link soon, making her the first-ever Binghamtonian on here (well, except Joe, who technically lives here, though mostly he lives in Alfred), I have updated my side-column to actually include selected Binghamtonian people. I've been meaning to do that.
More soon, and more serious. But fear not: things go well.
-Laurel
More soon, and more serious. But fear not: things go well.
-Laurel
And, now that Blogger's doing photo uploads correctly, the pictures from Ross Park Zoo
Indian runner ducks; they don't waddle, they, well, run:
Bald eagle:
Leopard:
I should know what kind of bird this is, but I don't:
And some very cute penguins (I want to say they're African penguins):
You can click on any of them if you want to see them a little bigger.
The zoo here is a little rundown-looking, though I'm sure going in early November didn't help, and doesn't make a very efficient use of its space. Rosamond Gifford (the Syracuse zoo) it's not, and probably isn't Seneca Park Zoo in Rochester, either, given how warmly Aneya describes it post-remodeling. But the late-afternoon sun coming through the trees, gold-coating the leaves as they fell to join the carpet at our feet, was very nice. And I had a whole carload of people to share it with: Christina and Jon both responded to the invite e-mail I sent to everyone from Ninth Hour (I also invited everyone from small-group, but no one could make it), and then Christina invited Joe and Wes, also of IV. Things were funny (including trying to find the zoo and then its entrance, since, while we never got lost, the directions were incomplete) and pretty peaceful, and I was glad to be there and have them there with me.
-Laurel
Bald eagle:
Leopard:
I should know what kind of bird this is, but I don't:
And some very cute penguins (I want to say they're African penguins):
You can click on any of them if you want to see them a little bigger.
The zoo here is a little rundown-looking, though I'm sure going in early November didn't help, and doesn't make a very efficient use of its space. Rosamond Gifford (the Syracuse zoo) it's not, and probably isn't Seneca Park Zoo in Rochester, either, given how warmly Aneya describes it post-remodeling. But the late-afternoon sun coming through the trees, gold-coating the leaves as they fell to join the carpet at our feet, was very nice. And I had a whole carload of people to share it with: Christina and Jon both responded to the invite e-mail I sent to everyone from Ninth Hour (I also invited everyone from small-group, but no one could make it), and then Christina invited Joe and Wes, also of IV. Things were funny (including trying to find the zoo and then its entrance, since, while we never got lost, the directions were incomplete) and pretty peaceful, and I was glad to be there and have them there with me.
-Laurel
11.15.2007
Land of Plenty
Saw the documentary Lost Boys of Sudan tonight; it was really good. It struck a really generous balance between humor and seriousness. You all should watch it anyway, but be it known that I believe you'll be entertained as well as educated.
We read something for theory this week--why do things always get better right after I pitch fits about them?--about cosmopolitanism, by this guy with the last name Appiah. While not the end-all-be-all of theories, I mostly liked it--he actually began by laying out an argument for their being some universal, albeit complex, truths, then eventually talked about where nations' responsibilities in helping other countries should lie. I don't know how well his other-countries part works in real life, seeing how the world's eighty million causes essentially have to resort to capitalist principles to get our attention and, by extension, money. But I guess he wasn't quite saying they wouldn't.
Over the past couple of weeks, I've learned a little more about those around me, students and faculty alike. The Ph.D students here tend not to simply be people who've gotten done with the Master's program and are just now trying to publish or do things; they've done stuff. Jane (of the Diaspora-class incident) actually got her MFA at Cornell--they must not have a Ph.D in creative writing, or it sure beats me why she'd come here for it--and taught for a while at Ithaca College, but hasn't had much luck finding a tenure-track position at a four-year school, so she's getting the Ph.D, despite her MFA technically being a terminal degree in her field. She also apparently did something in South Africa connected to research she did about the country. (And, for what it's worth, it turns out her partner's patisserie, the one from which we had all the delicious food, is named after her; I wouldn't want something named after me, even a center of delectability, but cool that she's cool with it.) ...Andrei, who just led my group's presentation on Edwidge Danticat (the four of us gave it yesterday; it went well, but I'm glad I didn't know until tonight that Dr. Strehle's actually published an article about one of Danticat's stories; I think that would've made me a little nervous), currently teaches at Ithaca College himself and has a book of poetry out; he used to have a column in the Binghamton local newspaper. ...Noelle, another student, actually founded a voice studio when she wasn't busy racking up degrees. As for faculty, Dr. Keith was advised, while he was at Columbia getting his doctorate not many years ago, by Edward Said, who was one of the founding figures of postcolonial theory.
The Master's kids seem more normal, as it were, but I still appear to be the youngest, or, again, I just haven't found anyone my age. Sarah K., doctoral student (and I don't think she's new to the program), has gone out of her way this semester to be really nice to me, perhaps recognzing a lot sooner than I did how young and young-sounding I am, perhaps remembering her own MA days. Jose (doctoral but new; I mentioned him in one of the September entries) did a little of the same, though he was also more interested in being friends, not just acquaintences, with both Ryan (newbie MFAer) and me; whether he still is, I don't actually know.
How these doctoral students study and have jobs and families, I'm not entirely sure. I'm only a first-semester MA and feel like I perpetually manage my time badly, am forever under a deadline. I guess they do it the way my dad did it, but a little faster (he took seven years; these guys have only four). (Is it snotty of me to pity their families a little? It's not easy to have one member in a doctoral program--there're timing issues, considerable stress and patience issues.)
I'm the youngest MA I know, but the oldest IVer. It's interesting.
I can't see myself being a professor even for a two-year, but then, I can't see myself being anything, anywhere.
I've got to break this off here (just as well) and get to bed; it's later than the entry timestamp indicates.
-Laurel
We read something for theory this week--why do things always get better right after I pitch fits about them?--about cosmopolitanism, by this guy with the last name Appiah. While not the end-all-be-all of theories, I mostly liked it--he actually began by laying out an argument for their being some universal, albeit complex, truths, then eventually talked about where nations' responsibilities in helping other countries should lie. I don't know how well his other-countries part works in real life, seeing how the world's eighty million causes essentially have to resort to capitalist principles to get our attention and, by extension, money. But I guess he wasn't quite saying they wouldn't.
Over the past couple of weeks, I've learned a little more about those around me, students and faculty alike. The Ph.D students here tend not to simply be people who've gotten done with the Master's program and are just now trying to publish or do things; they've done stuff. Jane (of the Diaspora-class incident) actually got her MFA at Cornell--they must not have a Ph.D in creative writing, or it sure beats me why she'd come here for it--and taught for a while at Ithaca College, but hasn't had much luck finding a tenure-track position at a four-year school, so she's getting the Ph.D, despite her MFA technically being a terminal degree in her field. She also apparently did something in South Africa connected to research she did about the country. (And, for what it's worth, it turns out her partner's patisserie, the one from which we had all the delicious food, is named after her; I wouldn't want something named after me, even a center of delectability, but cool that she's cool with it.) ...Andrei, who just led my group's presentation on Edwidge Danticat (the four of us gave it yesterday; it went well, but I'm glad I didn't know until tonight that Dr. Strehle's actually published an article about one of Danticat's stories; I think that would've made me a little nervous), currently teaches at Ithaca College himself and has a book of poetry out; he used to have a column in the Binghamton local newspaper. ...Noelle, another student, actually founded a voice studio when she wasn't busy racking up degrees. As for faculty, Dr. Keith was advised, while he was at Columbia getting his doctorate not many years ago, by Edward Said, who was one of the founding figures of postcolonial theory.
The Master's kids seem more normal, as it were, but I still appear to be the youngest, or, again, I just haven't found anyone my age. Sarah K., doctoral student (and I don't think she's new to the program), has gone out of her way this semester to be really nice to me, perhaps recognzing a lot sooner than I did how young and young-sounding I am, perhaps remembering her own MA days. Jose (doctoral but new; I mentioned him in one of the September entries) did a little of the same, though he was also more interested in being friends, not just acquaintences, with both Ryan (newbie MFAer) and me; whether he still is, I don't actually know.
How these doctoral students study and have jobs and families, I'm not entirely sure. I'm only a first-semester MA and feel like I perpetually manage my time badly, am forever under a deadline. I guess they do it the way my dad did it, but a little faster (he took seven years; these guys have only four). (Is it snotty of me to pity their families a little? It's not easy to have one member in a doctoral program--there're timing issues, considerable stress and patience issues.)
I'm the youngest MA I know, but the oldest IVer. It's interesting.
I can't see myself being a professor even for a two-year, but then, I can't see myself being anything, anywhere.
I've got to break this off here (just as well) and get to bed; it's later than the entry timestamp indicates.
-Laurel
11.12.2007
Another potentially-ridiculous (for vanity's sake, I hope so) self-imposed rule, then a theory rant
Until further notice, any blog entries addressing the mundane, and not an actual topic, shall be limited to five sentences.
Literary theory continues to imply that my entire way of looking at the world is a sham, since it involves such wide-eyed naive things as objective (if complex) truth, not to mention logic. Ah, those tragically-ignorant Greeks, Romans, metaphysicians, and mathematicians; if only Derrida and Spivak had swooped down to save them from themselves.
How am I going to get eight pages out of a theory-based paper? Or, indeed, ten-to-fifteen out of a theory-based paper for Diaspora, due in only sixteen days?
-Laurel
Literary theory continues to imply that my entire way of looking at the world is a sham, since it involves such wide-eyed naive things as objective (if complex) truth, not to mention logic. Ah, those tragically-ignorant Greeks, Romans, metaphysicians, and mathematicians; if only Derrida and Spivak had swooped down to save them from themselves.
How am I going to get eight pages out of a theory-based paper? Or, indeed, ten-to-fifteen out of a theory-based paper for Diaspora, due in only sixteen days?
-Laurel
11.06.2007
Another Failed Attempt at Posting in Only Five Minutes (though I've actually kept the drafting stage to ten this time)
Thrown off in part by the change back to Eastern Standard Time, I went to bed at something like nine-thirty last night. I got up around six-twenty this morning, realizing that I actually felt rested. Have been up for four hours, spending much of it attempting, with varying degrees of success, to do homework items and a little bit of laundry. It feels good.
I lost track of the due date on my lone library loan, and owe sixty cents on a book I can't renew again and haven't even read.
But on the bright side, this has been, and will apparently continue to be, a big week for delicious food. Yesterday Jane brought in, as background for her group's presentation during Diaspora class (that is, because there's so much food in the book, they figured they could bring some food in for us), leftovers from her partner's patisserie--chocolate mousse and fruit tarts and small lovely oranges and who even knows what delectability. Tonight I'm making taco dip for prayer-ministry team as the most convenient way to use up some leftover ingredients I have (it still wasn't a convenient way per se, since I had to buy several other ingredients for it, but I've been wanting some for a while now anyway). And Wednesday, instead of having a regular Bible study, small group's going to celebrate Clarissa's birthday by going out for dessert.
And beginning on Friday, though maybe not for the whole weekend (still trying to decide how much work I can/should get done), I will be in Alfred. That's not food-oriented, but it will be filling anyway.
-Laurel
I lost track of the due date on my lone library loan, and owe sixty cents on a book I can't renew again and haven't even read.
But on the bright side, this has been, and will apparently continue to be, a big week for delicious food. Yesterday Jane brought in, as background for her group's presentation during Diaspora class (that is, because there's so much food in the book, they figured they could bring some food in for us), leftovers from her partner's patisserie--chocolate mousse and fruit tarts and small lovely oranges and who even knows what delectability. Tonight I'm making taco dip for prayer-ministry team as the most convenient way to use up some leftover ingredients I have (it still wasn't a convenient way per se, since I had to buy several other ingredients for it, but I've been wanting some for a while now anyway). And Wednesday, instead of having a regular Bible study, small group's going to celebrate Clarissa's birthday by going out for dessert.
And beginning on Friday, though maybe not for the whole weekend (still trying to decide how much work I can/should get done), I will be in Alfred. That's not food-oriented, but it will be filling anyway.
-Laurel
11.03.2007
Most of the time I don't like cynicism, but I find myself laughing at this anyway...
Speaking of, I do plan to put up pictures from the trip I made yesterday, with four other IV people, to the Ross Park Zoo here in Binghamton. But that entails finding my camera cord, and that entails cleaning this ruddy room. Funny thing, and predictable: I want most badly to clean things when I have other, less desirable work hanging over my head. So for most of October, while I did grad stuff all the time, I kept having to quell my desire to scrub things. Now that the immediate work has calmed down a little, I want less to tidy up, but need more urgently to do it.
So to responsibility.
-Laurel
11.01.2007
For those of you interested in what I'm taking next semester...
Course registration for next semester was this morning, at least for grad students and undergrads with a lot of credits. I don't think I've ever been blocked out of an overloaded online-reg page before, but then, a system serving several thousand students at once might get full around the 8 AM startup time, might'n't it? Anyway, I wasn't too concerned, which was just as well: when I got into the system at 8:05, none of the classes I wanted had even hit five registrants yet.
The other complication I'd had to overcome had been in course selection itself. Regardless of whether I end up switching into education or not (looking sort of unlikely--though, to be honest, it's not like I've had time to do any research into it yet), I've decided that Ph.Dness is not in my future, so I had fun trying to find interesting classes and avoid such hassles as seminar-style paper requirements (why learn them if I won't, thank heavens, be trying to present my work at academic conferences?), heavy emphasis on literary theory (I can't get around at least a light emphasis, but let's keep me as content as possible, right?), or 25-page research assignments with abstracts (ewwww).
However, I did actually find a course listed, and discover that I was eligible to take it, that's about how to teach English to college students. Like, whoa! And I got in. That's Rhetoric & Composition Theory and Practice, which looks difficult but hopefully useful.
Another of next semester's courses will be Studies in Shakespeare, which sounds shockingly semi-normal (a super-famous literary figure, taught without without bringing anything weird or provocative into it? I'm not sure I believed Binghamton would do that...I wonder whether I actually had a basis for wondering, or if I've just been being cynical), taught by the Dr. Whittier whom Josh-from-Creative-Nonfiction told me was the only professor in the department who didn't do theory. He was wrong:
Studies in Shakespeare: Course focus on shifting Early Modern strategizings of heroism and the warrior in the HENRIAD (especially HENRY V), JULIUS CAESAR, TROILUS AND CRESSIDA, ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA, and THE TEMPEST. Eclectic perspectives include feminist and evolutionary theory.
Well-ll, one could do worse than feminist and evolutionary theory. I guess this means I read the Henriad (was not aware that this was even a term, but hey) over Christmas break; I've never read any Shakespearean history plays, actually. (I should also get through Antony and Cleopatra if I can, as that's the other on that list which I've never read. ...Incidentally, I'm curious to see how quickly d'Artagnan's desire to comment on something to do with Shakespeare overpowers him, unless this parenthetical makes him decide to be intentionally perverse.)
Also, everyone's adjective of choice for describing Dr. Whittier seems to be "eccentric." I'm hoping that that's a good thing, à la Otto and Mayberry, and not à la Dr. Maiden.
The other class will be Visions of Reality in 19th-Century American Lit: Emphasizing philosophy and psychology, the course will investigate some 19th-century American writers' contrasting visions of reality, specifically their differing ontological assumptions and resolutions regarding identity and freedom.
Here is fervently hoping that real philosophy is better than literary theory's brand thereof. The texts look cool, though--some Hawthorne, for one--and I always have liked Am-Lit from around that time period. ...I really don't want it to be a course where we have to formulate and defend our own theory of reality, but you know something like that's probably coming, so-o there's nothing to do but get ready for it.
There, I hope that wasn't too dry.
-Laurel
The other complication I'd had to overcome had been in course selection itself. Regardless of whether I end up switching into education or not (looking sort of unlikely--though, to be honest, it's not like I've had time to do any research into it yet), I've decided that Ph.Dness is not in my future, so I had fun trying to find interesting classes and avoid such hassles as seminar-style paper requirements (why learn them if I won't, thank heavens, be trying to present my work at academic conferences?), heavy emphasis on literary theory (I can't get around at least a light emphasis, but let's keep me as content as possible, right?), or 25-page research assignments with abstracts (ewwww).
However, I did actually find a course listed, and discover that I was eligible to take it, that's about how to teach English to college students. Like, whoa! And I got in. That's Rhetoric & Composition Theory and Practice, which looks difficult but hopefully useful.
Another of next semester's courses will be Studies in Shakespeare, which sounds shockingly semi-normal (a super-famous literary figure, taught without without bringing anything weird or provocative into it? I'm not sure I believed Binghamton would do that...I wonder whether I actually had a basis for wondering, or if I've just been being cynical), taught by the Dr. Whittier whom Josh-from-Creative-Nonfiction told me was the only professor in the department who didn't do theory. He was wrong:
Studies in Shakespeare: Course focus on shifting Early Modern strategizings of heroism and the warrior in the HENRIAD (especially HENRY V), JULIUS CAESAR, TROILUS AND CRESSIDA, ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA, and THE TEMPEST. Eclectic perspectives include feminist and evolutionary theory.
Well-ll, one could do worse than feminist and evolutionary theory. I guess this means I read the Henriad (was not aware that this was even a term, but hey) over Christmas break; I've never read any Shakespearean history plays, actually. (I should also get through Antony and Cleopatra if I can, as that's the other on that list which I've never read. ...Incidentally, I'm curious to see how quickly d'Artagnan's desire to comment on something to do with Shakespeare overpowers him, unless this parenthetical makes him decide to be intentionally perverse.)
Also, everyone's adjective of choice for describing Dr. Whittier seems to be "eccentric." I'm hoping that that's a good thing, à la Otto and Mayberry, and not à la Dr. Maiden.
The other class will be Visions of Reality in 19th-Century American Lit: Emphasizing philosophy and psychology, the course will investigate some 19th-century American writers' contrasting visions of reality, specifically their differing ontological assumptions and resolutions regarding identity and freedom.
Here is fervently hoping that real philosophy is better than literary theory's brand thereof. The texts look cool, though--some Hawthorne, for one--and I always have liked Am-Lit from around that time period. ...I really don't want it to be a course where we have to formulate and defend our own theory of reality, but you know something like that's probably coming, so-o there's nothing to do but get ready for it.
There, I hope that wasn't too dry.
-Laurel