Czech Yourself

I'M GOING TO PRAGUE! In September, with an awesome friend.

I'm so excited!

How excited am I? Am I excited enough to make a folder called "Prague Rock" for all of my travel items? Yup. I'm THAT excited.

And nerdy. But Prague doesn't have to know that.

Bagels: A Love Story

What

In God's Name

Is

THIS???

I'll tell you what it is. It's the lady at the New System bakery two blocks from my house not giving a shit. That's what it is. My reaction upon opening the tin foil was, "WhaaaaaaAAAAAAAAATT?" -- each "a" ascending by an octave and the "t" breathily puffed out with disbelief.

Is this how you treat a bagel? Non-toasted with a block slab of cold cream cheese in the center? Sacrilege, I say!

As for New System bakery - I'm not going to make some libelous statement against them over this offense. Truth be told, they make a cheap breakfast sandwich that blows my mind and incites enough pleasure within me to last for days...so I'll forgive them.

However, it is insane how many people abuse the bagel. I'm not saying that everyone needs to lovingly caress a finely toasted bagel with the smoothest room-temperature cream cheese. Though, if it's between that and the actions taken in the picture above - please use the former. Perhaps I am too sensitive about this issue. The bagel is, after all, my preferred daily breakfast. It combines two foods of the gods: bread and cheese. The combinations are endless. It's portable. It's warm. It's filling. I needn't go on.

Not everyone agrees with me on this, however. The ladies at the Dunkin Donuts in Rosedale, for instance, couldn't give a proverbial fig about my bagel. They've burned it, not toasted it, given me the wrong kind, etc. Worst of all, they continue to give me a little cup of cream cheese and a plastic knife so that I have to administer the topping myself. This is wrong to me on two accounts:
1) By making me spread the cream cheese onto the bagel myself, these ladies have negated the bagel's number one asset - its portability.
2) Remember when you were little and your mom poured your cereal or made you a peanut butter and jelly sandwich? Then you got a little older and you could do these things yourself, but they never ended up tasting quite like Mom's concoctions? Maybe Mom's estimated ratio was better or something, but there was this je ne sais pas that was (and always will be) missing from yours? That's how I feel when the ladies hand me my separate cream cheese. The fact that I've spent $3 and change on a bagel should GUARANTEE that I open it up to find already applied cream cheese.

I just thank the sweet Lord that the above did not happen with an onion bagel. The onion bagel is too sacred to mess with. If that had happened, I would've shoved that block of dairy up a place a block of dairy should never be shoved.

Invasion of the Bee Girls

Watched "Invasion of the Bee Girls" today while I was sick. I forgot how much I love 1970's sci-fi trash. A short inventory of weird and wonderful things about the movie:
Sexy Librarian - check
Sexy Librarian who tells a federal agent, "We balled*, and balled, and balled...and then it happened." - check
Federal Agent, answering a very serious and official phone call with "Yello?" - check
A rape scene, which does nothing for the plot, other than showcase the protagonist's fighting moves - check
Boobs - check
A woman whose one boob is noticeably higher and smaller than its twin - check
Completely black eyes (a la "Stepford Wives") - check
Random sex scenes or nudity by people who have nothing whatsoever to do with the rest of the storyline - check. And check. And check again.

Thank you, "Invasion of the Bee Girls" for your funkadelic soundtrack, your polyblend costumes, your lipgloss, your wood-paneled walls, and your public domain status - which made you available for me to view on my cable provider's Free Movie channel.
My immune system just got a little stronger.

*"Balled" or "balling" was used plenty of times in the dialogue to refer to sex. Is this shit my parents said in the 1970's? Can you dig it? Because I sure as hell cannot.
I cannot dig it.

Me Heat You Long Time

Got a new space heater at work. Looks like this:

Those aren't my legs. Nor is that my faux oriental rug or my desk that looks like it doesn't exist in any realm other than a Sims furniture catalog.

But it is frickin' cold in this office, so I'm pleased to get this heat machine. I'm also a fan of the design. I like things that were made by someone in the 1970's who thought, "This looks so space-agey!"

The best thing about my space heater is what came with it. Inside the box were some velcro strips (to questionably mount somewhere - velcro doesn't seem like it'd hold this thing up) and some disinfectant wipes labeled "Alcohol Prep." The wipes are covered with Chinese symbols and the brand name is OYEAH.

Oh, yeeeeeaaaaaahhhhh. Reminds me of this oldie but goodie.

This blog was brought to you by ethnocentrism and Cozy Legs.™

'ey! Yo! It'sa tha Mozzarella witha tha Tomato!

Look at that beaut!
The two tomatoes are from my friend Vanessa and her boyfriend's incredibly fertile and generous vegetable garden. The rest of it is
8 oz of mozzarella
8 leaves of basil, torn up
2 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp of balsamic vinegar
1/4 salt
1/4 ground black pepper

It was pretty awesome walking up to the Giant knowing exactly what I was going to get. I had a mutha-fuckin' spring in my step and everything. I ended up eating only half of the salad, but that was alright because I wanted room for this guy:

Oh yeeeeaaaah. Greek yogurt, granola, dried cranberries, honey. The dessert was a little overload with the cranberries, but other than that, I could've eaten it all the livelong day.

I started to kind of annoy myself in the kitchen because I was using an Italian accent when I spoke outloud to myself. It also occured to me that my Italian accent is dangerously close to sounding like Yogi the Bear.

It goes without saying that I'm still terrified of the stove.

Erin Grows Up: The Greek Salad Edition

I made a Greek Salad this past Sunday. It took me all day and I had to read the recipe an embarrassing amount of times, but I did it. I made the lemon dressing, too. Outside of scrambling eggs once two years ago, this was my proudest kitchen-related moment.
The salad looked kind of like this:

Actually, mine looked better because I was looking at it through a glass Pyrex bowl. Alas, my camera is still at my parents' house. So, I pilfered this image from the Betty Crocker website.
Next stop - Quiche City. I don't know if I'm ready, but what this little expedition has taught me over everything is that I need to be more of a risk taker.

You know, cooking with heat and shit.

Favorite-ish

I've crossed three things off of my work "to-do" list today, so that tells me it's time to start wasting time.


At lunch, I couldn't handle the thought of eating another Smart Ones meal at my desk, so I went out into the branch and started getting nostalgic over the children's picture books. I found my childhood favorite and took some time out to re-read it. It's Goggles by Ezra Jack Keats.

The Library of Congress' cataloging summary says, "Two boys must outsmart the neighborhood bullies before they can enjoy their new treasure, a pair of lensless motorcycle glasses."

Re-reading the book today, I've got to admit I have no idea why this was my absolute favorite book when I was growing up. There I was, an Irish-Catholic, strawberry blonde white girl from Carroll County, MD whose days were filled with horse-riding, tree-climbing, rolling down hills, and eating ice-cream cones. I'm not kidding. My childhood was the stuff of dreams. (I'm terrified my luck is going to run out any day now.) Yet I loved the shit out of this book, and what's more is that I was completely jealous of these kids, that dog, those goggles, and the junked up urban landscape.

Thinking about it now, I think it's just a credit to Keats' fine writing and gritty-but-charming illustrations.

Another "favorite" I recently revisited is the 1976 movie, "Network." I wouldn't say it's my absolute favorite (that spot is reserved for "The Odd Couple"), but it inspired me to write the review of which I'm most proud. It wasn't even a review for Verbicide, the magazine for which I used to concoct crappy little book reviews. It was just an email to my friend Zeno, but I think the fact that I wrote it only a couple of minutes after seeing the movie for the first time, the review is filled with the emotion and excitement from which I was still reeling.
Here goes:

"Father Christmas,
I came home from work tonight and settled down to my desk to work on Terry (Vanessa's brother)'s Christmas gift. The synopsis for "Let the Rivers Run" by Carly Simon is as follows: David Brent in smoky karaoke bar, questioning his life's status over a pint of lager. Coquettishly smiles at a bunch of female university students who wave him over for a try at the mic. Unsure of himself but willing to give it a shot, Brent starts to sing Simon's song. The bar's patrons slowly begin to gather around him, curious to the song's effects. Cut to an uproarious belting of the anthem with patrons joining in on the tune's life-affirming message. Not sure of ending but will include a side glance and head-toss from Brent.
Anyway, instead of working on the thing I saw that tempting little red envelope from you-know-where. It was "Network," that Sidney Lumet film. I finished watching it literally minutes ago. I had to get on here and write something about it or I would burst. Normally, I would write about it in my sad little diary but that would keep me from recommending it to someone with the full blush of excitement that I have in me right now. It may be one of the best films that has ever been made and it is certainly one of the best films I have ever seen. It was nominated for the best picture Oscar in 1976. Why it did not win is a complete mystery to me. Do you know what won that year? "Rocky" Believe it. I actually like "Rocky"…I'm not going to lie…but its appeal as a parable for masculine achievement and the whole "laying everything on the line" moral evades me. Maybe I'm heartless.
So, "Network." Man, I wish I could just say this stuff rather than write it because I don't think you can understand how affected I have just been by this. First off, Lumet directed. I really can't think of a good movie he's done since "Network," but I'm not really thinking too hard about it. Obviously he did"12 Angry Men," which the adjective "phenomenal" maybe too paltry for. Same thing goes for "Dog Day Afternoon." My God, those are good. In "Network," Lumet has these amazing shots of the Titans of Broadcasting buildings such as ABC, NBC, CBS, etc. I love his shots of actors doing their monologues. If I were an actor on his set and he said, "Um, I don't know. Just pace. A lot." I'd probably question his taste. But this shit works! Beatrice Straight, who I had really never heard of before or after but I've never been good with names, deserved her Oscar for best supporting actress like I don't know what. Saying all of this, I realize it sounds like "Network" is an actor's picture. It's not. The writing is insane. Do you know why I like Henry Miller so much? I always tell people he's my favorite writer but I just realized I've never told anyone why I like him. He has this incomparable way of writing EPIC TRUTHS as if they're as easy to find as tripping over your own shoelace. I'm trying to form what I want to say about it and I'm also trying to go to bed but sometimes writing is like shitting or giving birth and I don't know which one this is but it's the relief of release. Miller puts these age-old human battles in the everyday context, you know? Paying the rent or squabbling with the grocer becomes this ideological warfare. (Hamsun's a little like that too, that's probably what got me into him.) It's so Romantic, though! Things still mean something. Little things mean something. A handshake means something. A stare. An idea, even if it's just an idea. I'm not going to start listing because this is already way too long and it's going to be going for a while so just strap in, cowboy. You can end it now and click it into your environmentally friendly recycle bin, but you're going to be missing out on this expulsion of artistic sentiment and discovery in real-time. Moving on…there are a handful of writers that capture Miller's spirit and I've never seen one of them write for a film.
The fellow's name is Paddy Chayefsky. You can tell this old chap has internal struggle essentialized within him from the get-go. Even his name is an ambiguous ethnic quarrel. The fact that he wrote this for the screen does not lessen the script's impact. Ridiculous. You must see it.
Okay, performances. Peter Finch is famously remembered for his performance in this when he appears at the TV studio, soaked through with rain and muttering like some zealot. And then, there he is. Sitting behind his little wooden desk, in front of those arbitrary clocks, pathetically wearing his pajamas and a trench coat.
"So I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window. Open it, and stick your head out, and yell 'I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!'"And there IT is. Everything I had ever known about this movie was in that little moment that you see when 20th Century Fox is extolling the virtues of its last 25 years as a tour de force in movie-making. And Finch is good, don't get me wrong. Better than good. But no one ever told me about Ned Beatty's equallypowerful speech and abso-fuckin-lutely scary presence. No one told me that Beatrice Straight would break my heart and earn my respect in her decidedly short appearance on film.
I can't stand William Holden. I don't know why, but I never have. I can't defend myself on this point, so I won't even try. His performance was good. Not great. Granted, he did get some of the best protagonist's lines I've ever heard. Whatever.
Dunaway was Dunaway. Maybe if I was a better film-lover, I could tell her role in this apart from her other roles. To me, she always plays the same character. Headstrong woman, beautifully seductive, desperately pleading eyes. Her character's relationship with Holden is creepy to the point of uncomfortableness and during their love scenes when her character is supposed to be annoying and his character is supposed to be thinking "Let's just get this over with," I don't think they were acting. Duvall is great.
This movie is hilarious, Zeno. I'm writing your name because I really want you to know I'm still with you in this essay, man. I haven't just gone off and started ranting for the sake of ranting. Also, surprisingly enough, I'm not drunk. Not even a drop tonight. I did have Mountain Dew, which I haven't had in months which may account for my slight headache.
Back on track now – hilarity. Satire. Comedy. Comedy in the sense that you laugh to keep yourself from crying. I'm not going to say you're going to laugh out loud. I didn't. I didn't cry either. You do both, inside yourself, because it's so hard to know what to make of the absurdity that takes place. Not just absurdity, but known absurdity. Absurdity we are all involved with and aware of but can't stop the production of.
I'm pretty spent at this point. I don't know what else to say other than you have to watch it. HAVE to. I want to talk about it with someone.
-Baby New Year"

Pretty flippin' long. The moral is to read Ezra Keats and see "Network."

As soon as possible.

7 Minutes with 6 fingers and the Big Guy

I had the most absurd visit to Dunkin' Donuts the other day.

I go in and order a plain bagel with plain cream cheese and a large latte. Ordinarily I would get a black coffee, but I had just received news that I was hired for this position I really wanted, so...actually, I don't know why I'm explaining my need to treat myself.
Anyway, apparently you cannot simply get a plain latte. You must choose out of 70 plus flavors and then specifically ask for it to be "hot" instead of iced or cold or whichever other temperature they use for coffee these days.
Yes, I know that part was annoying, but it had to preface this:
While the man behind the counter is endlessly listing espresso flavors, this guy behind me begins to sigh really loudly and continues to bemoan and for the 30 second wait through which he must suffer. I was perfectly content with hearing him obnoxiously mutter, "Come on!" until he says, "Don't you know what kind of latte you want? It's really not that hard! Jesus!"
Color me PISSED.
Without turning around, I retorted, "Take it easy, big guy. You'll get your coffee!" As I turned around to complete my response with an icy glare, I saw my main offender. I was right, he was a big guy. A big guy. Huge. I felt terrible. I call people "big guy" "man" "dude" "champ"...any number of things. I've never had it backfire on me like that before.
I turned back around with my mouth open only to realize that the guy handing me my bagel had six fingers. He had a smaller thumb attached to his regular thumb. The small thumb even had a nail. My mouth opened wider.
Two things make this situation more absurd than it already was to begin with:
1.) My librarian friends and I always joke with each other if one of us is dressed as or behaving like a stereotypical librarian. Well, folks, that day I looked like no one other than your local prudish librarian. Which may or may not make what I did on my way out even more ridiculous -
2.) I stuck out my tongue. As I was leaving, the "big guy" gave me this horrible sneer and narrowed his eyes at me. So, I behaved as any other middle-class, educated, decent human being would. I stuck out my tongue at him. It was like instinct. I still have no idea why I did it, but the toddler in me seemed to have a quicker reaction time than whatever etiquette I've been taught. Ultimately, I don't regret doing it, but it's just curious to me how I did it without really thinking.

I think what pisses me off most about the situation is that I pride myself in being a really accommodating customer. I've never sent food back, I tip really well, I don't complain about waiting, I (usually) don't even think twice about picking hairs out of food and continuing on. Seriously, when it comes to serving me: I'm a dreamboat. So when someone else displays absolutely asinine behavior for no reason at all other than the customer in front of them is listening to their choices, I see red.

In a perfect world, I would've just gotten a black coffee. Then again, in a perfect world, the guy serving me wouldn't have had three thumbs.

On ABBA

I finally watched "Mamma Mia!" last week. It made me realize (or just rediscover) a few things:

1.) Meryl Streep might just be the funniest woman on the planet. And she really is gorgeous.

2.) Pierce Brosnan's voice is mediocre-on-toast. How, you ask, did the producers work around that? Why, simply by removing any buttons on his shirt that would impede his chest hair from flowing out, over, and into the minds of all the middle-aged women of the audience. Seriously, it was ridiculous. It made me think of the only Garfield comic strip I can quote, where Jon Arbuckle's grandmother (or elderly aunt, or whatever) is asked what she wants for Christmas. Bawdy broad that she is, she answers, "Oh, just a nice throw pillow. Stuffed with John Travolta's CHEST HAIR!"
I'm telling you right now...Brosnan's glistening curls could be knitted into a nice afghan big enough to cover all of this blog's readers. Namely, me.

3.) On a similar note, I'm completely convinced that the producers found any excuse to get Colin Firth's shirt off throughout the movie. I'll be the first to admit that Firth gets me a little hot under the collar...but my attraction is entirely not torso-related. I suppose what I realized here was that some women maybe are into Colin Firth's chest and stomach. Women who are attracted to him for his physical appearance, and not for his mumbling, awkward, slightly insecure British behaviors. Weird.

4.) Listening to ABBA is as close to a celestial experience as I'll ever have. The movie didn't make me realize this but I made sure to loop ABBA while commuting all last week...so I've had a lot of time to deconstruct my feelings about them.
I've called them a guilty pleasure before, but I'm taking that back right now.


The thing about the Northern Europeans is that they seem to have found the formula for beauty in art a long time ago and now they're just building upon that. Obviously I cannot spell out this formula, for I have no Northern European blood in me.
Take, for instance, Gustav Klimt's "The Virgins":

If you just look at the female figures, their forms are fantastic! Even the turn of the back of the one in the lower left corner is near-perfection. What does he do to improve upon a probably already awesome sketch? Adds all of these crazy patterns and shapes and beautifully outlandish colors. That for me, is a visual summary of what ABBA does with their music. I truly believe that a lot of their songs can stand on their own, with just the lyrics and the melody. But they chose to build upon that with guitar riffs, piano hooks, and all-around decadence. It's the musical equivalent to a naturally pretty woman fixing up her hair and getting dressed to the nines.

I'll end this by offering up a small anecdote that articulates how emotional and excited I get about ABBA. A few years ago, while walking around the Towson Festival, I stopped at a used book booth. As I was browsing, I heard this flute being played and I looked up. Across the booth there sat this little old man, playing that flute. The song he was playing was "Chiquitita" and as soon as I realized what it was, my eyes filled up with tears. Partly because it was ABBA, and hearing that man play that song made me realize how universally good that song is...but more importantly because before I realized what song he was playing I just assumed it was some ancient folk tune. That song sounded as timeless to me as anything. I really could've knelt down and wept right there. From fuckin' ABBA! It was like right there, at that moment, I had a glimpse of what humans are capable of creating.

Damn Swedes.

UMBC've come a long way, baby!

UMBC is like a ghost town tonight. I'm not too shocked by this, though, because it perfectly illustrates how foreign I will come to feel on this campus from now on.
I'm kind of sad about the fact that I'm done with this place...so, to mourn my losses and celebrate this university's impact on me I will now thank UMBC for what it's given me:

O dusty toilet seat in my secret stall, nestled within my secret bathroom in the AoK library. I used you for the last time today, my friend. Was that a sob you choked back as I stood up? Or my thighs bemoaning their last hunch-squat over you? You've been true blue.

O old lady in the Administration building's cafe. It was you that first introduced me to the wonder that was (and is, but no longer for me) the frequent coffee drinkers' card. When I had one more punch to go before my free coffee, you said, "Make it a large one!" And I did, Doris (or Bea, or Ruth, or Sylvia...greatness like yours needs no name). I did make it a large one.

O Atrium, located in the front of the library. Not until my last semester was I aware that you were called an Atrium because, well, you don't really have any traits that I thought an "atrium" would have to possess to be called as such. I had my first Thai peanut salad in you...and my last one. Turns out, too many peanuts in a salad is not always a good thing.

O 88 steps outside of the Fine Arts building. My friend Sarah took a nasty spill on you YEARS ago and still has bruises. And yes, because of you, I joined the short-lived facebook group titled "I've got 99 problems and 88 of them are the steps outside the Fine Arts building."

O smoking section to the left of the FA building, where all of the English students would smoke. I had many an interesting chat with comrades, professors, janitors, etc. right there with you. I was also standing near you when someone told me they overheard my love, Larry David Professor Falco say that I was a force of nature. Nay, I say it is you, smoking section, who is any number of forces of nature. Of course, when I say force of nature, I mean a light drizzle, or humid evening, or pollen season. But I say it lovingly.

O Math/Psych building. I had countless English classes within you and will never be able to understand why that was. They should've added another slash to you if they were so keen to use you for subjects for which you were clearly not meant to be used.

O UMBC, with your hideous bauhausian late 1960's architecture and your swampy, swampy pond. You with your buildings that smell like chalk and b.o. I really will miss you. No longer will I walk down Academic Alley (which isn't actually the technical name for the main row of academic buildings, but I heard it during my first semester there and thought it was pure gold). No longer will I puzzle over why we have one of the least-terrifying mascots in the nation...the Retrievers. Never again will I buy over-priced, but surprisingly good! sushi from your cafe in the commons. Never again will I have to do the weird jog/walk/hike up bookbag trot across campus when I'm late for class.

Thanks for everything, pal.

Stay tuned, citizens!

The following blogs pertain to a senior seminar for English/Teacher Education. Read on, if you like, but they might just bore you to tears.
I'll have something me-related up here soon. Don't worry about holding your collective breath...I already know you are.

You've Gotta Fight...

Brannon & Knoblauch: I'll start out with a quote this time around: "The more we know about a writer's skill, the more we have read of that individual's work or heard of his or her reputation, the greater the claim to authority. This claim can be so powerful that we will tolerate writing from that author which appears to be unusually difficult, even obscure or down-right confusing." (p 157) I agree with this completely. This explains why I forced myself through Orlando by Virginia Woolf. I hated it immediately but kept trudging through, just because it was Woolfie. What a waste.
I have to admit that I'm glad I read this before I started teaching. It's true that even when I peer review, I don't attribute much authority to the text of my peer and so I probably go in there with the preconceived notion that there are mistakes to be unrooted, problems to be solved. I would say that the descriptions of the Paternalistic teacher who swings to the conservative or the liberal is shockingly similar to the differing views that Bartholomae and Elbow have of student work. I would be so frustrated if a teacher gave me a bad grade and then told me that I really meant to say this or the other. I remember speaking to an unnamed student who had an unnamed professor who actually made a vocabulary change on the student's rough draft. It was something like changing the word "work" to "toil" or something as ridiculous. When things like that happen, the whole work stops being the student's.
The Lindbergh Ideal Text thing was crazy, but I can see people reading something like what that student wrote and making those comments. It's nuts, but it's happened before. What is profound to some is absurd to others.
I guess the answer to finding some sort of middle ground between the conservative paternal teacher and the liberal paternal teacher is really just that...take the middle road. Negotiate with the student. Talk to them about their work or better yet, ask them about it. Don't assume it's wrong if it doesn't neatly fit predetermined conventionality, but don't assume it's groundbreaking and has some sort of artistic agenda behind it.

Someone used the phrase, "Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater" the other day and I thought of the Lindbergh baby. Maybe that's what really happened to him.

Attention: Suppression!

Lauren: I thought this was great. It reminded me of when I was in high school and my crazy nutso World History teacher would give us sets of 50-70 identifications to do each night for homework. She wanted us to go through our antiquated history book and define whatever names or terms she had as identifications. I would do them for an hour and then start making stuff up. I remember I described Lloyd George (the Prime Minister of England right after WWI) as being the androgynous lead singer of the 1980's band, Culture Club. I did this with a ton of the identifications, as well as writing hidden messages such as "Tabatsko, I'm going to kill all of your ferns before the semester is out." I received an A on all of my identifications.
Anyway, yeah. this thing that Lauren did reminded me of how some teachers just look at format and the very basic clues as to what makes a good paper (1 inch margin, title, cited sources, topic sentences for each paragraph, etc.). I thought the whole thing really spoke to a teacher's awareness of student writing and maybe their attention focus on individual papers.
I did have a problem with the poorly graded paper. One of the teacher's comments was "Yuck" about a transition. Absolutely, the particular transition the student makes is not a great one, but I would be destroyed if a teacher wrote "Yuck" on my paper. Maybe I'm touchy on this because I have notably terrible transitions. I could just be overly-sensitive in this arena.

Bartholomae eats Elbow pasta for lunch.

It's been a considerable amount of time since I've read this...I fell off the good blogging wagon. :(
Bartholomae: I like this fellow. I suppose I don't really get what's so wrong about teaching academic writing. If it "passes as currency in the academy," (p 62) then teachers would be wrong to pass out Confederate dolla dolla bills (y'all) in lieu of skills that hold value in a community that students will be a part of for at least the next four years. Like it or not, academic writing is something that has proven itself to be useful to students in the past. Is everyone excited about it? Heck no. I happen to kind of like writing academically and even I don't respond "I get to write a thesis statement and support it with reliable, documented sources? Color me PUMPED!" I think Bartholomae is sort of arguing against the "tricking" of students into thinking what they are doing is not academic writing. Kind of like the vitamin pill in the twinkie, so to speak.
I have to agree with what he says about the work of Jane Tompkins and Mina Shaughnessy in that they are advocating (maybe?) that the work their students are doing is more authentic than academic writing. "The danger is assuming that one genre is more real than the other ( a detailed, loving account of the discourse on domesticity found in 19th century American women's magazines) - in assuming that one is real writing and the other is only a kind of game academics play."(69). Word, St. Bartholomae. "True" that. One time in class, Shipka was reading a list about what some people considered qualities of good writing. One that kept popping up was "honesty." Like, "I felt they were writing from the heart." or "Their writing was so completely honest." What does that mean? Does that speak to the authenticity of the piece? Who is writing inauthentic texts that we need to be so concerned with how "honest" something is? I'm confused by this whole idea, I guess. (I feel like I've blogged about this issue before, but I don't feel like going back and checking. You'll have to deal with my repetition.) Last word on Bartholomae: "You have to learn to write like E. B. White before you can learn to write like Gertrude Stein. Picasso couldn't have been a cubist if he hadn't learned to draw figures." (70) Yeah, totally. That's what I've been saying!

Elbow: Is Peter Elbow adorable? I just have a feeling he is. (Shipka, if you know the answer to this...don't tell me. Let a girl dream.)
Why is there a conflict between the role of the writer and the role of the academic? What defines an academic? Constraints of assignments or goals? Need for focus? How is that different from the definition of a writer? To me, even writers are working under the constraints of many things...language, background knowledge, audience, maybe publishability (who knows?). I guess I don't get why there has to be a stark contrast between these two roles or why they have to conflict at all. I feel like Bartholomae and Elbow really want to have them not conflict, and yet they insist they do. Elbow has a good point about approaching texts "We must try to come at these strong important texts: - no matter how good or hallowed they may be - as much as possible as fellow writers - as fully eligible members of the conversation: not treat them as sacred: not worry about "doing justice" to them or getting them dirty." (74) Point well taken. I agree with the "conversation" metaphor as well, and I think that academic writing can accomplish this.
I'm going to conclude this, because I don't know what else to say that hasn't already been addressed in other blogs. It looks like Bartholomae wants to tell his students to understand that they are just a small drop of water in the big, wide literature ocean. You know, be aware of your own ineffectuality. Elbow insists that students should believe themselves to be the next T.S. Eliot or something, that everything they write should be with the notion that it is utterly groundbreaking. My thoughts about student writing fall somewhere in between. Somewhere waaaay in between.
P.S. I found a note I wrote to myself when I first read this back in March. I was reading it at my local pub and I was overhearing conversations all night from the people around me. Here goes:
"Since when did the phrase 'Being real' replace 'Being yourself?'" If anyone can answer this, I'd be grateful.

This is sort of related...

I'm doing observations for my education class and during my last observation there was a period of boredom while students were quietly working on a worksheet. I took this opportunity to look at the textbook they had been using in the classroom, so here are my notes:

The book is Adventures in American Literature, Pegasus Edition. It is broken up into time periods and literary movements. At the end of the book, in Modern Nonfiction, there is an essay from James Baldwin on "The Creative Process" and William Faulkner's Nobel Prize acceptance speech. The end of the nonfiction pieces feature study and discussion questions, as well as prompts for further research. Also, at the end of the book is a section titled "Reading and Writing about Literature." The first objective of this section is for the student to "develop skills in critical thinking." The students are guided through a close reading with the story "A Game of Catch" by Richard Wilbur. Following this is a piece titled "Guidelines for Reading a Short Story." There is also a guided close reading of a poem by Elinor Wylie with "guidelines for reading a poem." The same occurs with a play. After all of this is a section called "Writing about Literature: The Writing Process." The section seems to be geared towards answering exam questions and answering an essay question. Evaluating and revising papers are also covered here. (Just looked on Amazon.com to get an image...the text is from 1989! Can't get an image...you can find it here: http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/P/0153348542.01._BO2,204,203 )

So there it is. It's not much, but I was thinking of this class as I was looking over the book and I didn't put these notes in my paper, so I thought I'd just go ahead and post them here. I also thought it would be interesting to see an actual textbook that is actually being used in a school this semester. The school is Dulaney High School in Timonium.
P.S. I have an inner ear infection that has given me severe vertigo. I am officially Liza Minnelli on "Arrested Development."
Love,
Lucille 2

Pomo Blues w/ a splash of nonfat, zing of honey, and no lid

It's so depressing to sit down to the computer again. For some reason, I thought I already responded to this, but I then realized that I was rereading my blog about Connors, not Carroll. Hup, two, three, four:
Carroll: Man, I hate to talk about postmodernism when it's been so nice outside, but I suppose it must be done. The fact that all writing assignments can be placed under a handful of categories is a little disheartening, but pretty accurate. I was sort of agreeing with Carroll all along until the story about Alex and the "true meaning of Christmas" came up. She presents Alex's two versions of the story and then says "neither version of Alex's story is necessarily more authentic" (922). Yeah, I guess, but if Alex volunteers that the "mood" the one narrative contains is closer to his actual feelings of the event, isn't that one more authentic? Was it Runciman that pointed out the pleasure one gets from finding exactly accurate phrasing to say what one wanted to say? Doesn't that make that particular piece (or at least sentence) more authentic than other ways of saying it would be? Obviously, there is a problem with what is "authentic writing." I forget what Shipka was reading in class the one time, but it was something about judging good writing and that it was based on how "honest" the writer was. I mean, that's a doozy, right? How is that something that can be either slated "yes, honest" or "no, complete bull crap"? Sorry, moving on...
Aha, here we go: "the best essay is not the 'truest'; it is the one that rings most true for the readers" (924). Okay, so there we encounter another problem with authenticity...the reader's perspective. Holy Geez, Pomo is such a headache sometimes.
Overall, I thought the essay was well done in it's application of postmodernism onto freshman composition writing assignments. The student yelling "IT'S ALL TRUE!" at the end of the piece seemed like an easy out to me, but I suppose she was right. Also, it's pretty appropriate in keeping with the theme of postmodernism being something that everyone can be blamed for, but no one can help.

The Jumping Dog and the Room Full of Clowns

I'm pet/housesitting for a few of my cousins while they're in Florida this week. You know what just occured to me? I don't know if I'm getting paid for these gigs. Oh man, I better be.

Alright, so today was the first day of my "checking in" on Mr. Peabody, my cousin's very small, very jumpy dog. I went after work tonight (around 9:30 p.m.) and was greeted by what appeared to be the Olympian high-jumping dog of the century. Right away, I took Peabody out which was kind of a treat because my cousins live in a development with lighted sidewalks and neatly paved streets. This is a stark contrast from my curvy wurvy road that leads to my family's giant hill, complete with barn (thankyouverymuch). Right, so I'm walking. Peabody's walking. We're having a grand ol' time. He does his busin-nasty and I clean it up. Homewards we go.

Clearly, I must feed this dog. I find the note my cousin Christy leaves on the counter for me, detailing the rigorous procedure I must follow in order to adhere to Mr. Peabody's needs. The note says brilliant and enlightened things like "Food in food dish." and "Give him water." Amazed at my cousin's innovative approaches to canine caretaking, I wander around the house to look for the aforementioned food dish. I can't find it. I even call my mother (who literally hasn't been able to walk for weeks due to some horrible knee problems. Needless to say that she hasn't been over their house in quite some time) to see if maybe she has any insight at all as to the location of Mr. Peabody's shite (not literally shite...I saw where that was. Outside, thank Jesus). You can all guess that my mother had no idea. Correct assumption, folks.

I should probably mention this before I go any further...I have a phobia. I have no problems with bugs, snakes, mice, or closed-in spaces. I am afraid of clowns. DEATHLY afraid of them. There is no logic to it, really no reason at all. Bottom line is that even as I typed the "c" word (twice!), my stomach did a dip. Shudder. Okay, on with the story:

At this point, I'm thinking Peabody's food and water could be anywhere. Christy told me that he likes to sleep in her room, so I thought it would make sense if she kept his stuff in there. The room was completely dark and I remembered that Christy told me to turn on her light by the lamp on her dresser (across the room) and not the lightswitch on the wall. Easy enough.

For all of my bright ideas and helpful memories of Christy's room and Peabody's sleeping preferences, I forgot the one thing that I have known about my cousin since childhood. THE WOMAN VOLUNTARILY COLLECTS CLOWN FIGURINES.

I want you all to take a moment and think about my thumb and forefinger clicking on that lamp. Okay, you can now visualize all of the blood draining out of my face and my inability to move my entire body.

They were everywhere!! On her bed, on her dresser, on her television, on her side table, on the clock, knitted on a throw pillow...and God knows where else. Because once my fear subsided enough for me to regain standing consciousness, I got the Unholy Hell out of Dodge.

Here's the best (or most ironic) part: I was supposed to sleep there, you know, as a part of the housesitting perks. Christy told me she put new sheets on her bed for me. Looks like she's going to have fresh sheets when she gets home because I'm safe in my office at home now. She's out of her Goddamn mind if she thinks I'm sleeping within a three-mile radius of that house.

So, where were the dishes for the dog? About three feet away from Christy's note, under the kitchen table. I'm an idiot.

I'm Bridwell-Bowles[ed] over. (Someone stop me with these titles...please)

Bridwell-Bowles: I cannot stress how much I liked this reading. I think I may be getting into a good frame of mind for this class now...I hope I'm not psyching myself out.
Right, well. I'll admit that I'm that student who is afraid to go outside of conventionality when it comes to writing "academic" papers. For the record, this class has made me feel like I have to put everything in quotation marks - as if what I'm saying may not really mean what I want it to mean (such as "creative" or "voice"). I don't know if I can respond to this reading in any short manner (and I want to be short because I want to get to bed). I highlighted/underlined a lot of stuff. A lot of gems to be found in this reading, comrades!
Funny - Donald Murray came up again. Fancy that. Here's what Bridwell-Bowles has to say about him: "he argues for a distinction between 'academic voice' and 'personal voice.' They are clearly separate for him" (351). Chaka what now?? Um, isn't this the bloke that said ALL WRITING IS AUTOBIOGRAPHY. ALLLLLL WRITING! I don't know what to think.
What else? Oh, I liked Gearhart's comments about writing being like a "matrix" instead of an assault via argumentation. Incorporating, presenting, questioning, connecting...webby and good. I agreed with Carolyn Heibrun's assertion that "most women's stories about themselves are facades...artifices built of what the culture expects of them, including acquired modesty and humility" (356). That might be able to be stated for anyone of a status or social category that doesn't neatly fit within the public discourse. No one wants to be essentialized as whatever boxes they check off on their legal forms (gender, class, marital status, race, age, etc.) I don't think many people want to be a token for whatever category society has decided to put them in. This is evidenced by Bridwell-Bowles' section on "Sexual Orientation" where she says, "The topic is not safe enough obviously; while gay and lesbian students in my classes have written about the connection between their sexual orientation and their writing, they chose not to give me permission to include samples of their writing in this essay" (360). I thought about maybe why that is. Is it because they feel like they will be held apart as "the voice of the lesbian essayist" or something similar? It's the whole identity thing. Sometimes it's just easier to write "academically" or at least attempting some level of objectivity, even if only because it makes your personal choices/circumstances more anonymous. It's sad, but I can understand why people would prefer their papers to be read that way.

Blaaah. I think I'm going to add more to this later, but right now I'm tired and should get to bed because I've consumed 2 Yuenglings and will get approximately 5 hours of sleep. If I go now. No...now. NOW.

Personal Writing Assignments Response

Connors: The historical outline before the meat of Connors essay helped me out a lot. It was a good review for me, especially since I've been having trouble with these readings and the practice of teaching composition as a whole. Knowing where we've come from (in the most ancient sense) really gives me an idea of where we're going.
The "novelty" portion of Connors' address to personalism stuck out the most to me. Maybe that's what separates personal writing from academic writing, if any separation can be made at all. I don't know, I guess you can write for an academic purpose and make it new, at the same time. Hm, debatable.
It seems like we established in class the fact that there is no clear distinction to be made between the personal and the academic in writing. Writing can be glaringly one or the other, but will always contain elements of its opposite. Opposite is maybe not an appropriate term. Alternative...there we go. I agreed with Connors' conclusion: "...as teachers, we always have to encourage, even demand attempts at the next step - to go beyond merely personal accounts, either outside into encompassing the world in discourse, or inside into shaping our personal observations into the touching, deeply empathetic and finally metapersonal stuff of which the greatest writing is made" (181). AMEN! There can be a marriage of the two. Those kooky kids - Personal and Academic. They only think they don't belong together. We English teachers will be the high priests and priestesses that bring these star-crossed lovers together. High-five, Connors!
Okay, re-reading those last few sentences...it is clear that I have felt the full effects of losing one hour of sleep. Righto, nighto.

Planning Strategies and the Womanly Autobiography

I know it's taken me a while to respond. My time usually reserved for homework and posting has been taken up by me house-sitting and pet-sitting…this last week and upcoming week were/are impossibly busy.

Berkenkotter: This was a good idea for both Berkenkotter and Murray. I liked how she broke up her essay into the "methodology" and "results," along with other parts and then finally summarized. I'm going back and re-reading the transcription of Murray's thoughts/writing as I'm writing this…and, I don't know this man, but I like him better in this piece than I do in his own "writing is autobiography" piece. He really thinks of the audience, and I know that's something that I have difficulty with. I don't ask myself enough questions when I write, I think. I know these readings are meant to help us out with teaching writing, but this one (and a handful of others) kind of make me think about my own writing. I guess my one "note" to make about this piece is that…I don't know, maybe I'm alone on this, but I think that Murray's letter about death to the 11 year old was maybe his comment that Berkenkotter didn't give him a prompt he thought worthwhile. No? I could be wrong.

Flynn: "If women and men differ in their relational capacities and in their moral and intellectual development, we would expect to find manifestations of these differences in the student papers we encounter in our first-year composition courses" (182). Not necessarily. Not if what students are producing at that stage are slightly varied imitations of Lambert's (is it Lambert?) freshman "canned essay." Can that ancient model be gendered? I guess if it is, it's probably leaning towards the male persuasion. I did like Flynn's essay. There is a difference between women and men when it comes to writing…and Culler's right about the reading part, too. I think a lot of essays can be written similarly to this one. What about age? And socioeconomic class?
Hm. I wasn't a big fan of Flynn's examples. I think her arguments for anxiety, connection to nature, and individualism can be made for both sides.

Murray: In class, it seemed like people either really liked this piece or really hated it. I didn't dislike it, but I certainly didn't think it was all that great. A lot of the items Murray included in his essay seemed to be there to simply showcase his range and wit. Especially the previously unpublished poem that he just happened to include here (and thus, getting it inadvertently published). I agree with him to a degree. Essentially, yes, all writing that comes from an individual is through some sort of lens or filter and is, in that sense, autobiographical. But things like technical writing and ghost-writing (as Shipka pointed out) are anything but autobiographical. Wouldn't a better argument be "All writing is subjective?"...but that's probably too broad of an argument to make.