2010/01/23
My class on World Scriptures–Week 1
I’m teaching two sections of a class that I’ve named “Literary Aspects of World Scriptures.” Oddly, out of 60 students, none of them are listed as religion majors on my roster. Hmmm….
Thursday saw some good discussion about reading practices. We read the Abraham story on Tuesday, and on Thursday we compared it to the biography of Moses and to the Exodus/Passover narrative. Because we live in the Bible belt and because we were starting the course with Hebrew readings, I raised the question of how much we, as 21st-century readers in a Christianized American culture, are adding into the text, and how much we aren’t paying attention to.
My students picked up on the notion that we tend to spiritualize these stories (as the Christian church has always done) at the expense of some of their historical aspects. That is, we acknowledge the historicity of these events even as we wrestle with the fact that they are not OUR histories, except insofar as we graft ourselves into that history by faith.
My hope is that we can recognize how much our own context as readers influences how we read the texts. Once we leave behind the Judeo-Christian world in 2 weeks, we’re not going to be able to rely on what we’ve heard growing up!
2009/09/01
What my classes are doing…
It’s a new semester–huzzah!
My classes are having good discussions. My 101s have been reading excerpts from Crevecoeur and have been doing some very nice work with the text–I’m very pleased, and I look forward to seeing what they do with the rest of the readings from the semester. I think these kinds of texts (I’m using Ideas Across Time as the textbook) inspire them to think about important and interesting topics (in this case, notions of America and of egalitarian society). They have enjoyed debating the definition of Americans and wrestling with how his account of his encounter with the caged slave affects that definition. I’m curious to see what they’ll do with Tocqueville‘s distinction between equality and liberty. (Heck, I’m wondering what I’LL do with that distinction!)
My lit class had a great discussion–almost 60 minutes–on Lu Xun‘s “A Madman’s Diary.” I had to force them to move to the other short stories for the day (Premchand and Akutagawa). This week we read the fourth book of Swift‘s Gulliver’s Travels–I hope we can lay a good foundation in cultural contact for our later discussions of how travelers write about their encounters with other cultures. I surprised myself by making a connection between Gulliver’s “enlightenment” about European society and the madman’s “craziness” regarding the Chinese culture of his day.
2009/07/15
The Attractiveness Effect isn’t just about looks anymore….
Uh-oh. A new study re-confirms that physical attractiveness can boost a high school student’s GPA, but shows that even more significant boosts come from personality (for young women) and grooming (for young men).
Beauty before Brains: The links between physical attractiveness and grades (Newsweek)
- Physical attractiveness alone boosts GPA for both genders.
- Nevertheless, physical attractiveness was a weaker predictor of grades than grooming (for boys) and personality (for girls).
- That suggests that teacher bias plays a significant role in what grades students get. Teachers reward some physical and personality types and penalize others.
The author of the article, Sharon Begley, mentions an interesting possibility:
that years of extra attention and rewards from teachers made attractive people more confident, smarter (because they received lots of positive feedback, they studied more) and thus genuinely more capable? For now, all we can say is that attractiveness and a winning personality boost grades when you’re young, and may have an enduring effect once you enter the work force.
I used to grade everything anonymously in order to ensure that I wasn’t swayed by any personal reactions to my students. I wonder if I should go back to doing so….
Or at least mention this study on the first day and on the syllabus. I hope that their appearance won’t affect my grading, but it would be great to see a classroom full of well-dressed students every day!
2009/07/14
Culture Wars re-flare in TX
The Wall Street Journal has an article about new textbook battles in Texas: The Culture Wars’ New Front: U.S. History Classes in Texas. The good news is that several of the people asked to review the curriculum have made suggestions that we do more to acknowledge the role of Latinos/as, Native Americans, Blacks, etc.
However….
Three reviewers, appointed by social conservatives, have recommended revamping the K-12 curriculum to emphasize the roles of the Bible, the Christian faith and the civic virtue of religion in the study of American history. Two of them want to remove or de-emphasize references to several historical figures who have become liberal icons, such as César Chávez and Thurgood Marshall.
“We’re in an all-out moral and spiritual civil war for the soul of America, and the record of American history is right at the heart of it,” said Rev. Peter Marshall, a Christian minister and one of the reviewers appointed by the conservative camp.
Sigh.
I can agree that we’re in a moral and spiritual war for the soul of our nation, but it seems to me that in such a war, Chávez and Marshall are the good guys! They’re the people who represent the prophetic call on our nation to be a land of justice and equality for all people. Why should these two men, who have inspired so many to do wonderful things, be removed from the curriculum?
How’s the following for a non-sensical answer?
Reaching for examples of achievement by different racial and ethnic groups is divisive, Mr. Barton said, and distorts history.
Hunh? Showing minority achievement is divisive? Divisive for whom? For the latino/a and black children in the classroom? I can’t see how this is divisive to anyone–you’d have to feel threatened by the success of other social groups. (Of course, from my knowledge of Texas history, I’m not surprised by this….)
(Update: Beneath the article are more particular comments from each reviewer; you can see the full set of comments here. Here are the summaries of the comments about Marshall and Chávez:
Rev. Peter Marshall, a reviewer, calls Thurgood Marshall — who as a lawyer argued Brown v. Board of Education and later became the first black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court — a weak example.
At least he suggested Harriet Tubman, although he argues that there are “hundreds of others” who would be better for students than Justice Marshall. As for Chávez:
Two reviewers objected to citing Mr. Chávez, who led a strike and boycott to improve working conditions for immigrant farmhands, as an example of citizenship for fifth-graders. “He’s hardly the kind of role model that ought to be held up to our children as someone worthy of emulation,” Rev. Marshall wrote.
Rev. Marshall gives no explanation for Chávez’s unworthiness, other than claiming that it is “ludicrous” to place him next to Benjamin Franklin–but again, without giving any reason. Maybe it’s because Rev. Marshall doesn’t think that economics deserves its own module–he wants all discussion of the economic aspects of slavery reserved for the history module. Why are conservative Christians so unwilling to address economic issues?)
So, what do these folks want instead?
The curriculum, they say, should clearly present Christianity as an overall force for good — and a key reason for American exceptionalism, the notion that the country stands above and apart.
I can agree that the role of religion needs to be kept in the history books. But I also recognize the critics’ concerns that religion is often over-stressed in teaching the work of the founding fathers. (And again, what I know about Texas history makes their concern over our Christian foundation rather ironic. I would hardly look to the founders of Texas for spiritual role-models.)
More importantly, however, is the fact that as Christians we should not be teaching American exceptionalism at all! How is this kind of national arrogance compatible with the scriptures? Isn’t this the sort of attitude that raises all the red flags of the prophets?
If we are going to reclaim a usable past, we must do it with a spirit of humility and inclusiveness. Let us be thankful to God for the blessings we have, but let us also acknowledge both the many mistakes we made along the way and the many contributions made to our nation by people from every corner of the world: north, east, west and south.
2009/07/08
New study on plagiarism
Newsweek has an article about a new study that shows how easily people plagiarize without being aware of it–a phenomenon called cryptomnesia.
Is Unconscious Plagiarism a Real Phenomenon?
The study had some interesting explanations. Our memories can easily misattribute things we have picked up, e.g., political commercials during news broadcasts become confused in our memories with actual news items. Similarly, when we work together with others on projects, it becomes difficult for us to recall who made which contributions, so that we believe that we came up with ideas that our partners did. And sometimes we come up with facts without realizing that we’re using our memory, as when we’re primed with information that we later draw on without recalling being primed.
So this may seem to be a good thing for our students, no? It really is easy for them to forget what they got from their sources?
Not so fast. Studies also show that plagiarism is more likely to occur between people who are close to one another:
Cryptomnesia happens more frequently between those who trust one another, such as people in romantic relationships or close friendships, but less frequently between strangers—particularly when the one whose ideas or words might be plagiarized is present. And due to our innate skepticism, unconsciously copying a person one doesn’t know, or a source one doesn’t yet trust, is uncommon.
So it seems that students who plagiarize are more likely to be aware that they are borrowing other people’s work. When they claim they forgot they had read the info somewhere, we have reason to be skeptical.
