An Interesting Conversation
One of the students in the back of the room shouts out, "what if we never have interesting conversations." The other women in the class, which is the entire class because it is a women's college, agree either vocally or through nods of their heads. They are vehement about this. One of these women, a girl from the streets who has made it into college on a scholarship based on her merit (I imagine) peers out from beneath her kerchief and hooded sweater to say, "shit, me and my friends only talk about sex and drugs." A women in the front of the room, a friend of the kerchiefed women makes a face like this is the Def Comedy Jam or Rikki Lake. I expect her to shout out, 'oh no you din't,' but she doesn't. The kerchiefed woman shouts back, "she know what I'm talking about." Hilarity ensues.
I do not believe that the kerchiefed women would appreciate being called the kerchiefed woman. Clearly, she is not trying to look like an old Russian grandmother, the kind one imagines inventing fairy tales for the brothers Grimm--the mean ones where children are decapitated and hot stones are fed to reluctant fathers--but that's exactly what she does look like: an old Russian grandmother. I try to imagine her with a college diploma, one day thanking me from whatever electric chair the future holds for her.
Some of the women in the back of the classroom are obviously outraged that they have to be in the same classroom as Kerchief, and I'm outraged as well. One writes at an eighth grade level and can't get a comma to work to save her life, she has no idea that there is a difference between the words "weather" and "whether," and in her previous essay she decided to talk about metal detectors, school councilors, the grade schools of her grandparents, the expectations of teachers, the laziness of students, her home town, her parents, home life, various psychological theories about raising children, etc.. It was a raucous page and a half. The essay was supposed to be three pages. One wonders why she couldn't have typed the thing in sixteen point font...like everyone else.
Kerchief can write. That's probably how she got the scholarship, I imagine.
I tell her that maybe she should do her paper on the legalizing of drugs.
The fact that she's doing the Arsinio "whoop" suggests immediately to me that she likes the idea. I say, "interviews! You need to ask a crack head what he or she thinks about legalizing drugs."
"I have to...," hesitancy, "ask a crack head."
No sense of humor in these people. Her friend in the front, mad that I've derailed the conversation before she can get her "swerve on"-esque comment in. Shouts out, "field work!"
Actually, she doesn't shout out "field work." That's something I'm saying now, trying to remember what dumb-assed thing she actually did say, but the effect is the same. I've asked them to do a homework assignment, they're talking about smoking pot. The rest of the class is sort of embarrassed, but mainly because they're upper crust morons, and not these poor schleps in here on a scholarship who only barely avoided getting pregnant at 16. Well, well, well. Don't think that I have any extra love for the people silently feeling above all this in that class, after all they agreed when Kerchief mentioned that she didn't have interesting conversations.
"What do you mean, you don't have interesting conversations?"
"We don't."
"We go to school, we don't want to talk about it."
The idea for the assignment is, by the way, simple. They are to write a research paper on anything they please as long as they're is an argument involved, and as long as they take a side in the argument. That shouldn't be too hard.
Of course, the whole thing is a sort of existentialist dilemma, right? I mean, with that much choice, how do you choose. The same is true here: if you attempt to sift through your experiences to find something of interest to you, it will prove elusive. Thus, I've built up a few questions to help center the process.
My theory is this: if you are angry about something, you will enjoy writing about it. Writing comes from passion. Thus, all that needs to be done is to remind the writer of a time when they were passionate about something...anything.
I ask, "when was the last time you heard someone say something that a lot of people agreed with and that you knew was wrong?"
But that's question three. That's a high level amount of interest or outrage. You have to believe that someone is disseminating false information. It follows question two which is, "what is one thing that you are good at that other people might like to know about?" Again, kind of high level....or higher at any rate. Question one is very simple: what was the last interesting conversation you had. Answer it for yourself right now, if you like. It should take you all of about a minute.
No one in the class has had an interesting conversation--maybe ever. A colleague of mine used to take these moments to become the dark English professor that every under grad English major remembers. He'd say, "You're playing stupid because you figure if you don't think too hard, you'll never have to realize that you're going to die one day, but let me tell you that this little act, it's too much. It says everything about the terror you're trying to avoid. You're not fooling anyone."
I'd give that speech. I made him repeat it when he told me about it just in case it would ever come in handy for me. So far, no luck.
This is not that situation for two reasons. First of all, the women in the class (or one of them, who knows which) has already complained to my boss's boss about my giving a huge lecture on the unacceptable mistakes in the class's grammar, sentence structure, writing style, etc.. They had sentences like: "When the dogs are popes barking in town, and that's why parents should raise children's test scores." Wait...no comma. These sentences would pepper essays--essays with main arguments like going to school is necessary for good grades.
One can only think of the thesis of Martin Luther for such unrivaled risk taking involving the written word.
The other reason, I don't give the speech is that it's a lie. These women are not avoiding some fear of their own mortality as they hide behind their masks of abject stupidity--they really are that stupid. I have no trouble at all believing that they've never had an interesting conversation. Earlier this semester, one of them asked me, "how do I have an opinion?" Ponder that question. Not, "how do I confirm my opinion," "how do I explore my opinion?": "how do I have an opinion."
In my dreams, I prime alarm clocks next to their ears and scream, "WAKE UP!" What other answer is there.
I do not believe that the kerchiefed women would appreciate being called the kerchiefed woman. Clearly, she is not trying to look like an old Russian grandmother, the kind one imagines inventing fairy tales for the brothers Grimm--the mean ones where children are decapitated and hot stones are fed to reluctant fathers--but that's exactly what she does look like: an old Russian grandmother. I try to imagine her with a college diploma, one day thanking me from whatever electric chair the future holds for her.
Some of the women in the back of the classroom are obviously outraged that they have to be in the same classroom as Kerchief, and I'm outraged as well. One writes at an eighth grade level and can't get a comma to work to save her life, she has no idea that there is a difference between the words "weather" and "whether," and in her previous essay she decided to talk about metal detectors, school councilors, the grade schools of her grandparents, the expectations of teachers, the laziness of students, her home town, her parents, home life, various psychological theories about raising children, etc.. It was a raucous page and a half. The essay was supposed to be three pages. One wonders why she couldn't have typed the thing in sixteen point font...like everyone else.
Kerchief can write. That's probably how she got the scholarship, I imagine.
I tell her that maybe she should do her paper on the legalizing of drugs.
The fact that she's doing the Arsinio "whoop" suggests immediately to me that she likes the idea. I say, "interviews! You need to ask a crack head what he or she thinks about legalizing drugs."
"I have to...," hesitancy, "ask a crack head."
No sense of humor in these people. Her friend in the front, mad that I've derailed the conversation before she can get her "swerve on"-esque comment in. Shouts out, "field work!"
Actually, she doesn't shout out "field work." That's something I'm saying now, trying to remember what dumb-assed thing she actually did say, but the effect is the same. I've asked them to do a homework assignment, they're talking about smoking pot. The rest of the class is sort of embarrassed, but mainly because they're upper crust morons, and not these poor schleps in here on a scholarship who only barely avoided getting pregnant at 16. Well, well, well. Don't think that I have any extra love for the people silently feeling above all this in that class, after all they agreed when Kerchief mentioned that she didn't have interesting conversations.
"What do you mean, you don't have interesting conversations?"
"We don't."
"We go to school, we don't want to talk about it."
The idea for the assignment is, by the way, simple. They are to write a research paper on anything they please as long as they're is an argument involved, and as long as they take a side in the argument. That shouldn't be too hard.
Of course, the whole thing is a sort of existentialist dilemma, right? I mean, with that much choice, how do you choose. The same is true here: if you attempt to sift through your experiences to find something of interest to you, it will prove elusive. Thus, I've built up a few questions to help center the process.
My theory is this: if you are angry about something, you will enjoy writing about it. Writing comes from passion. Thus, all that needs to be done is to remind the writer of a time when they were passionate about something...anything.
I ask, "when was the last time you heard someone say something that a lot of people agreed with and that you knew was wrong?"
But that's question three. That's a high level amount of interest or outrage. You have to believe that someone is disseminating false information. It follows question two which is, "what is one thing that you are good at that other people might like to know about?" Again, kind of high level....or higher at any rate. Question one is very simple: what was the last interesting conversation you had. Answer it for yourself right now, if you like. It should take you all of about a minute.
No one in the class has had an interesting conversation--maybe ever. A colleague of mine used to take these moments to become the dark English professor that every under grad English major remembers. He'd say, "You're playing stupid because you figure if you don't think too hard, you'll never have to realize that you're going to die one day, but let me tell you that this little act, it's too much. It says everything about the terror you're trying to avoid. You're not fooling anyone."
I'd give that speech. I made him repeat it when he told me about it just in case it would ever come in handy for me. So far, no luck.
This is not that situation for two reasons. First of all, the women in the class (or one of them, who knows which) has already complained to my boss's boss about my giving a huge lecture on the unacceptable mistakes in the class's grammar, sentence structure, writing style, etc.. They had sentences like: "When the dogs are popes barking in town, and that's why parents should raise children's test scores." Wait...no comma. These sentences would pepper essays--essays with main arguments like going to school is necessary for good grades.
One can only think of the thesis of Martin Luther for such unrivaled risk taking involving the written word.
The other reason, I don't give the speech is that it's a lie. These women are not avoiding some fear of their own mortality as they hide behind their masks of abject stupidity--they really are that stupid. I have no trouble at all believing that they've never had an interesting conversation. Earlier this semester, one of them asked me, "how do I have an opinion?" Ponder that question. Not, "how do I confirm my opinion," "how do I explore my opinion?": "how do I have an opinion."
In my dreams, I prime alarm clocks next to their ears and scream, "WAKE UP!" What other answer is there.
posted by Monstro D. Whale at
8:25 PM
2 Comments:
Way back when, before grad school, I wanted nothing more than to beome an English professor. But my vision was nothing at all like what you describe. It was me having a huge office in one of the converted early-1900s mansions on some small, Eastern liberal arts school campus (beautiful woodwork, stained glass windows, and even a non-functional fireplace). I'd teach mid-level writing classes, contemporary fiction, and maybe even an odd modern American poetry class. I'd be well paid and have a regular sabbatical every so often. I'd also have an officemate -- another professor perhaps a little older than me. He'd smoke a pipe sometimes & we'd both be novelists. We'd joke around a lot, but we'd also work our asses off, producing actual literary prose. We get together with our wives and those other professor friends of ours from the physics department and the sociology department; all of us would go out occasionally for dinners with visiting writers or philosophers, all on expense accounts. Undergrad assistants would help us with various things via a work/study program. And, the kids would be consistently literate and interested. They'd pay attention and ask tough, thoughtful questions. Every three or four years, one of them would impress us so greatly that we'd be certain he or she would go on to greatness, and we'd hear back from them years later as they'd send us their published work. After many, many years, the built-in shelves next to that non-fuctional fireplace would hold no more of these treasures, and we'd start to think about retirement. It's almost exactly the opposite of what you described. But, at least you get good blogging from it. And, it can't be any worse than any of my dumb-ass marketing stories.
I grew up in North Texas, and went to a small high school that had very low academic qualities but "When the dogs are popes barking in town, and that's why parents should raise children's test scores."? How could someone write that down on a piece of paper and not for a second think, Wow this is kind of awkward looking, hmm I might need to alter it. I did however go to a private college that had strict academic requirements and I was able to prosper, so maybe it is not the lack of education but the lack of want to get educated. Just a thought.
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