Saturday, December 20, 2003
(9:15 AM) | Robb Schuneman:
Everybody Wanders in the Wilderness...
Whoo. It's good to be back. I just flew in from Dubuque and boy are my...
Yeah you get it..been gone..I'm back. And what better way to return than with the greatest story of all time? That's right kids, gather round, get real close, but not too close as I smell slightly of peppermint. Not the good peppermint smell either.
Yes, there's a bad peppermint smell.
It all started back in the day, we're going all the way back to 3rd grade for this one. This, if I haven't mentioned it before, is my ideal age. If I were ever to teach elementary, I'd definitely want 3rd grade..there is still enough innocence that they can sit on your lap, or hold your hand, girls still have cooties, being outside is still the most fun thing in the world..and yet the beginnings of independence are there as well.
Well, for the purposes of this story, that independence suddenly flared up and became akin to teenage rebellion.
Gym class. Not just any gym class, Mrs. Godra's "little gym" class. The little gym at Randel's was insider code for "the ripped out former library" or, "the suckiest gym in the world, due to it's 10 foot by 12 foot size". Seriously..the year or two we had to play in that crap was the worst time in my entire life. We couldn't play games like "tag" or "race", much less full fledged sports because..it was literally about 15 feet from corner to corner..if you used any sort of speed you'd be running head first into walls. Instead, we played stupid games like "The Invisible Chair Olympics" where we all crouched against the wall like we were sitting, and the one who did so the longest won a ribbon. For the record, I was locked in stiff comptetion with Jay Hall on that one, until I was (seriously) unable to walk to go to school on the third day of competition and he won by default. Other favorites included stuff like dancing in place to the Footloose theme song, which would have been horribly uncool for 3rd graders, except Mrs. Godra called it "Michael Jackson Time" which lended it some street cred (This was before all the latest shenanigans, remember..the world loved Michael Jackson). Sometimes, on a rare friday we got out those little 4 wheeled seat-scooter things that you could wheel around on..5-6 of us got to scoot around the floor on those at a time.
So, obviously gym sucked. Mrs. Godra was an insane old girl, but she was nothing if not a realist. She knew this sucked - I mean, throwing the word "olympics" behind all sorts of inane little competitions like "The Who Can Be Quiet The Longest Olympics" or "The Hopping On One-Leg Olympics" or my favorite, besides the invisible chair, "The Yelling Real Loud For The Longest Time Without Taking A Breath Olympics" lost its novelty after a while. So, she was faced with a choice - continue in outdated methods with inadequate resources, like every other teacher, or strike out on her own doing something new. From this desire came THE TRIP TO THE WOODS.
(I don't think that simulated music is from anything..it was just sort of what ran through my head when I thought of scary music. Try singing it out loud. It will brighten your day like a maglite.)
Yes, one fateful day we came into gym and were told to go back to our class and gather up our coats, mittens (gloves for the boys...except those who needed Mittens for better tetherball playing), and galoshes...we were heading out into the world. Mrs. Godra told us this story of how she'd been wandering aimlessly through the woods behind the school the other day and had found a MAGICAL WORLD. A world...popularized by each of the Disney characters! Due to how, again, crazy this woman was..this story was completely believable.
But, the point remains, you get Disney involved, and you pretty much have a hit with anyone under 12. Look at the popularity of that game "Kingdom Hearts" amongst the youth (For the uninitiated, that's a role-playing game like Final Fantasy..except here you can like..call Bambi out of thin air to run over the octo-lady from The Little Mermaid..coolest.thing.ever). You throw disney characters in to every day situations, and suddenly, they easily become the coolest thing in the world. Imagine how much mowing the lawn sucks. Okay, now imagine mowing the lawn with Pluto running ahead and barking at the motor. Cool, right? I mean, I never have exercised much, at least not with that express intent..but you throw on Mickey Mousercise and I'm still gonna be doing the motions all day, especially to that one great Beagle Boys song. (You know.."get the money..we gotta get the money..get the money..Uncle Scrooge's money!")
It seemed simple enough, a voyage into the woods behind the school to see certain segments supposedly resembling the various lands of Disney folklore. And everyone was pretty geeked at first. So we headed out across Brobeck Street to the great unknown. Mrs. Godra, however, like I said, was completely crazy, for all of her originality. Unfortunately this led to the combination of bad slotting of the various lands, and an ignorance of the fact that the natives were growing restless. We started out with something akin to Little Mermaid Land, on to The Domain Of Sleeping Beauty, and then further we'd go to Cinderella's Brothel. We didn't know what a brothel was yet, we just knew that this was all girly. Without exception we'd been led out expecting pirates, evil, and perhaps even a glimpse of that hilarious Genie. But no, we were stuck in the middle of girly lands. This quickly combined with the fact that each land was exactly the same..The whole difference consisted in Mrs. Godra pointing to a branch lying funny and say "look..there's Thumper!" one time, and then 10 minutes later leading us in a circle before pointing to the same stick and saying "Look...there's the three mice from that one movie! Maybe they'll sing their Cinder-elli song for us!"
Yeah, she was that crazy.
We caught on, we were third graders, not dope fiends. Instead of the promised "trip to a place like Disney Land!" all we ended up with was extreme cold and the knowledge that we had been used. As guys, we should have been getting used to this..and all probably would have been okay, except for the endless barage of girly sites..Not only did this continuously suck while we were out there..we were gonna here it from the older classes for being caught in Snow White's Forest for at least a good week. We were at the breaking point. We started throwing rocks and sticks at each other, saying things to make the girls cry, acting rowdy. To counteract this, Mrs. Godra did the worst possible thing she could do. She said "Hang on guys..Peter Pan land is right over there to the right..we'll get there right after we go through Belle's Rose Garden and The Crazy Hippos From Fantasia's Dance Studio. The hippo thing might have been enough to catch our attention..except..she mentioned PIRATES! And she pointed to where the Pirates were. We walked a few more paces before the entire back half of the line, the guys who had slowly migrated away for better stick throwing possibilities, suddenly realized that there was a possibility of cannons and guns and...and..bandanas over our heads. Slowly, pretty much one by one, the entire male population left the well beaten path and started out through the trees for this mythical pirate land. I, however, was well practiced in the art of sucking as a person, even then, and stayed with the group cause I didn't want to get in trouble. It took Mrs. Godra about ten minutes to turn around and realize she only had 11 girls and 1 guy hanging out beside her, but when she did, all heck broke loose.
Out of nowhere, she just turned and started yelling..undistinguishable at first, but then slowly forming into threats towards the various kids who'd wandered off. Stuff like "ED HARRIS!!! I'M CALLING YOUR PARENTS RIGHT NOW! YOU ARE IN BIG TROUBLE WHEN YOU COME BACK!" of course, for those in the woods, this simply meant "okay...I'm in big trouble if I go back, thus, I shant go back..I shall live with the pirates for the rest of my days."
You'd think Mrs. Godra might lead a brave Fellowship Of The Lost to rescue the freaking 3rd grade kids who she was 30-40 years older than, but instead she just kept screaming people's names and other crap, and walked off. The rest of us could hear some of our classmates yelling for help...the reality that they were thouroughly lost had finally set in. Even as the only person who had any clue how to get back home left, myself and a large group of girls mustered up our courage and set off to help our brethren. Eventually we all got seperated, and the woods were literally filled with people yelling names or the occasional "HELP!"
I think this may have been the scariest thing to ever happen in my life. I was all by myself, with no clue how to get home, and only the sound of screaming as company. Finally, I managed to somehow come to a clearing I recognized as "Minnie's Dress Shop'" From here I somehow made it back towards the school, and was so filled with joy I literally started crying for the first time all day. It was like that scene from Shawshank Redemption, except it wasn't raining, but I did smell like sewage.. It was the greatest feeling of freedom I'd ever felt. And then, to confirm that I was indeed going towards school, I saw a sight previously thought impossible - Mrs. Godra! And many kids behind her! I thought my class had been reunited and was coming to look for me. In this belief, I wandered up towards them with a big goofy grin on my face, expecting embraces and pats on the back. But this wasn't my class..this was one of those strange "non-multi-age" classes..dear lord! I'd heard rumors of what being in a class with only one age group could do to people! What's worse, I got within 5 feet or so, and suddenly Mrs. Godra burst into the worst screaming fit I'd heard yet that day, which was quite a feat. Before I knew what was going on, she was yelling at me for having ran away, and telling how my parents were waiting at the school and I could expect all sorts of beatings and heck once I got back..so I better keep marching! (Again..her psychology wasn't the greatest).
I was still in shock that this woman could simply leave 25 third graders in the middle of the woods and walk back. What's more, she somehow got up the nerve to lead another class out there! While people were still screaming for help! Did I mention this woman was crazy? I got back to the room finally at about 2:00, we'd left around 10. Some people didn't make it back until 4 or 5pm. Mrs. Nancy, my teacher, reassured us that in fact, Mrs. Godra had been in the wrong and we weren't in too big trouble. Sure, we shouldn't have wandered off, but Godra had just walked back to the school and didn't tell anyone what had happened until Mrs. Nancy went an hour later to find out where in the heck her class was.
The fallout was thus: No more trips to the woods. And Mrs. Godra got moved to the high school. I guess they figured if they gave her a really big gym and kids who weren't entirely helpless and at her whim, she wouldn't insist on getting people lost. Ironically, it was this same Mrs. Godra who later became co-sponsor for my founding of The Intramural Badminton Association. She was also the same teacher who continually didn't show and locked all the badminton equipment up after the first 2 weeks..while insisting that it was I who hadn't shown up that week. This really sucked because miraculously I'd gotten 20-35 people to show up each time.
Oh, yeah, she also was the one who failed 3 of my good friends on their GYM FINAL senior year because one of their book bags was close by, though zipped up. Close by..as in..a good 25 feet away..at least two sections of bleachers down. There was no way anyone could have seen anything, had the book bag even been open, without binoculars. Apparently she was afraid people were really looking to break her GYM FINAL code. GYM FINAL!
That day in the woods I learned a lot about myself. First: I was too much of a goody-goody..instead of the initial joy of setting off for Pirate land, I stayed behind because that was the right thing to do, and I still got in as much trouble as everyone else, even though I got no joy whatsoever out of the experience, but only pants-wetting fear.
Secondly: Mrs. Godra really was that crazy. I didn't know her daughter was incredibly hot yet either, so there was no qualifier whatsoever..the woman was loonier than Canadian currency. This taught me for the first time that authority figures have nothing on you, and are often times much stupider than you, even if you are in third grade.
The ironic fact is that this all probably took place in a nice quarter-mile area. Yet, we were little, it seemed like we were stuck in the middle of the Klondike for all we knew. I'd eventually end up living a matter of feet from the scene of that horrible crime, and taking walks in the wood pretty regularly through high school. So, I guess I somehow learned to cope with the memories.
Like Jesus emerging from his fast in the woods, I became a new person from that day forward. Transformed into the bitter, self-loathing, other-loathing beast that I am today.
All because I wanted to see some freaking Pirates!
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Friday, December 19, 2003
(12:56 PM) | Adam Kotsko:
Christmas Time is Here. Happiness and Cheer...
I am sorry to be away from my blog for so many days (two). At this time of year, when Jesus Christ is so relentlessly commercialized away, the insightful critical commentary that only blogs can provide is more necessary than ever.
I have two posts planned: one book review and one on Christmas carols. This will be the one on Christmas carols. The book review might have to wait until Monday, but it will be more than worth the wait once you see what book I'm reviewing.
At work, we have been listening to Christmas music for the last few weeks. Normally, I would be annoyed about it (as the doctor is), but this year I'm listening differently. I'm asking, as I listen, how it came to be that we have such a small set of Christmas carols. Beyond that, I wonder why it is that so few new Christmas songs are successful -- have we lost the ability to write new Christmas carols?
This question seems to me to be related to canon formation, at least in the Judeo-Christian tradition (in traditions where the entire canon falls from the sky, such as Islam or Mormonism, this doesn't seem to apply). There was some classical era of the Christmas carol when most of our current carols came out -- I don't know when this is historically, but it seems like it was probably in the modern period. Some of the older ones are now incomprehensible to us, such as "12 Days of Christmas" or "Here We Go A-Wassalling (sp.)," but we keep them because they have been grouped in with the other Christmas carols. More ancient ones seem to be more "authentic," and they are more universally popular -- "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel" (technically an Advent song, but just go with it) and "Greensleeves" are the best examples of this phenomenon.
Some carols just barely sqeaked in, and there is some debate about whether they are really Christmas "carols" at all. These are primarily the ones surrounding Santa Claus, and many of them were either written for or popularized by television specials. They are relatively late, and they do not have a lot to do with the main tradition of Christmas carols (namely, talking about Jesus), but they are still grouped together in the popular mind, even if they don't appear in hymnals. Other songs, such as those that talk primarily about the weather or about bells or some such thing, are also more peripherally related to the main tradition of Christmas carols, but they are still part of the main group in the popular mind.
This process seems to be more closely related to the formation of the Hebrew Scriptures than the New Testament, since Judaism is a combination of an ethnic tradition and a religious tradition in a way that early Christianity wasn't, and in a way that contemporary Christianity is. The "writings" section of the Hebrew Bible corresponds to the more marginal Christmas songs, in that many rabbis have wondered whether, for example, Song of Solomon really belongs in the Bible, just as many might wonder why we're singing about how the weather outside is frightful on a day celebrating the birth of Christ. But since we generally celebrate the birth of Christ during the winter, it's related to the main tradition of Christmas music, albeit indirectly -- the Santa tradition, too, is related primarily through the time of year when Santa Claus was supposed to have given his gifts, although now obviously it's taken on a life of its own and produced such other characters as Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.
Since Christmas carols aren't very important, no one has ever sat down and written out a canon of carols, but it took a long time before anyone wrote down a canon of Scripture, too. I don't think people think nearly enough about how we came to have the Bible -- they assume it just fell out of the air -- and thinking about how we came to have a priveleged group of "Christmas songs," many of which are not directly related to Jesus at all, might help us understand at least how the Hebrew Bible came about, in general terms.
The New Testament probably requires a different model, since strictly theological concerns seem to have been more prominent, given that early Christianity, in contrast with rabbinic Judaism, represented a decisive break with all extant cultural traditions. We might ask, however, how so many spurious attributions came to be believable -- might the Pastorals (attributed to Paul, but almost certainly not written by him) have been included in the canon because it reflected the general Roman morality that many Christian thinkers had consciously or unconsciously come to think of as "Christian"? Since the Hebrew Bible is understood as a group of concentric circles, with Torah at the center, Prophets (the Deuteronomistic history and what Christians call prophets) outside of that providing commentary, and the Writings (miscellaneous category) being even more marginal, maybe we can understand the New Testament in the same way -- the Gospels are at the center, the authentic Paul provides the privileged interpretation, and the remaining materials in the New Testament (Acts, other letters, Revelation) provide more marginal, perhaps "optional" perspectives.
Yes, I came to these conclusions from thinking about Christmas carols. In addition, I think that this is more of a question for a theologian rather than a biblical scholar, because I still don't think that Christians really know what to do with the Bible -- the dominant evangelical model, whereby we are supposed to "base" things on the Bible, is logically incoherent and, I would argue impossible.
I will follow up on these thoughts in my book review. I'll try to include more humorous materials in my next post. Well, here's a little something to reward those who made it this far: BOOBS!
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(3:25 AM) | Anthony Paul Smith:
They do like me
So my birthday is over. The crazy 21st was, in true Anthony Smith form, not crazy at all. I had band practice to get ready for our show in Peoria today and then I hung out with the elusive Ryan Hansen until Hayley came home with my Get Fuzzy book and then we headed to the kind Mr. Adam Kotsko's house.
We all sat around drinking apple cider and eating cheap Aldi's pizza talking intellectual bullshit and it felt really good. Later on Jessie Bridges, the sometimes contributor to the comments section and constant good times fellow appeared, followed closely by my good friend Paul Anderson (who has one of the best beards I have ever seen). It was a nice masculine night, the only thing missing was football but I hate football so I didn’t mind. It really lifted my spirit and hopefully I will be able to come out of this nearly 8-month depression after this night and the coming weekend that will be filled with even more good friends.
We really do need each other. At least I need other people.
I find it very interesting that for all his disdain of God and those who "follow" God Nietzsche had a faith just as absurd; faith in other human beings. It's moments like tonight that are our little glimpses of the coming kingdom of Christ or the Overman, whoever we just need a savior.
I hope Robb and Adam post soon, my babble is getting hard to handle.
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Wednesday, December 17, 2003
(11:50 PM) | Anthony Paul Smith:
They don't like me
I have been planning, against my better judgment, to study in Paris over Spring semester with Dr. Naas, a noted philosopher but mainly noted for his extensive translations of Derrida's work. I found out about the trip later than would have been desired but there were still some options for financial aid. I applied for a Gilman and even though I knew hundreds of others from around the country also applied I still felt I could make a strong case. I spent about forty dollars applying after transcripts and fees but since the grant was for five-thousand it seemed worth it.
That was in October, before Hayley and I found ourselves in the dire financial situation we are in now. I found out on the 15th of December that the Gilman committee decided that I was not one of the top applicants and being the person I am I took this very hard.
It worries me what I am going to do to myself when I start applying for graduate schools. Still, nothing else I want to do so we will press on.
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Tuesday, December 16, 2003
(12:09 PM) | Adam Kotsko:
On not reading books
Via Invisible Adjunct, which is fast becoming one of my favorite blogs, I find that Crooked Timber's Kieran Healy has a post about the best books that she did not read this year. My personal favorite is #9:
Athenian Democracy by A.H.M. Jones. I picked up a copy of this in Melbourne and read two of the essays, so you may think it doesn’t qualify. But the book — a marvel of compact, lucid prose and judicious use of the sources, by a mid-20th century giant in the field — deserves its place here. It is so well-written and approachable that you can read pages and pages of careful commentary on the social structure of Athenian society before remembering that you have no real idea who any of the historical figures are, what the relevant sequence of events is, or which century is presently under discussion. Athenian Democracy is that rare sort of book, in other words, which you can have read and still effectively have not read at all.
In the comments to the Crooked Timber post, I also found a link to a Slate story that asks famous literary critics what they haven't read. I was relieved to find that I'm not the only one who hasn't gotten all the way through A la Recherche du Temps Perdu [In Search of Lost Time] -- Louis Menand hasn't, either, although he tries to make up for it by citing the title in French.
On an unrelated note, I always enjoy CalPundit's weekly Survivor post -- here's his last one for the season. The main thing, of course, is the comments, and there are always trolls who mock us Survivor fans for watching TV. This comment thread includes a preemptive strike against such trolls, but I'd like to add that I like Survivor because I watch it with all my friends and because it's fun to talk about what's going to happen next and to analyze the missteps everyone made the week before. I never would have watched it if Tara hadn't forced it upon all of us, and I realize that I could probably be using that time to write sonnets or read the Critique of Pure Reason, but still -- come on. How is trolling comment sections complaining about people watching Survivor any less loserly than actually watching it yourself?
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Monday, December 15, 2003
(12:00 AM) | Adam Kotsko:
Internet Connection Difficulties
Due to Richard moving out and the incredible bureaucratic inefficiency of Comcast High-Speed Internet, my internet access will be sporadic for the next week. This applies not only to blog posting, but also to e-mail -- whereas normally I can be relied upon to receive e-mail within a couple hours, that will not be the case next week. I do, however, have a phone that will continue working throughout this difficult time.
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Sunday, December 14, 2003
(3:08 PM) | Adam Kotsko:
To Criticize the Critics
In Critical Inquiry, I read this excerpt of a forthcoming article by Bruno Latour, musing on the increasing irrelevance of "postmodern" academic critiques:
While we spent years trying to detect the real prejudices hidden behind the appearance of objective statements, do we have now to reveal the real objective and incontrovertible facts hidden behind the illusion of prejudices? And yet entire Ph.D programs are still running to make sure that good American kids are learning the hard way that facts are made up, that there is no such thing as natural, unmediated, unbiased access to truth, that we are always the prisoner of language, that we always speak from one standpoint, and so on, while dangerous extremists are using the very same argument of social construction to destroy hard-won evidence that could save our lives. Was I wrong to participate in the invention of this field known as science studies? Is it enough to say that we did not really mean what we meant? Why does it burn my tongue to say that global warming is a fact whether you like it or not? Why can't I simply say that the argument is closed for good?
[...]
What has become of critique when there is a whole industry denying that the Apollo program landed on the Moon? What has become of critique when DARPA uses for its Total Information Awareness project the Baconian slogan Scientia est potentia? Have I not read that somewhere in Michel Foucault? Has Knowledge-slash-Power been co-opted of late by the National Security Agency? Has Discipline and Punish become the bedside reading of Mr. Ridge?
Most telling is his account of the ways in which Republicans, in trying to avoid environmental regulation, "make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue" (the quote comes from the mouth of the Republican himself, not from Latour). After citing that, Latour asks:
Do you see why I am worried? I myself have spent sometimes in the past trying to show the "lack of scientific certainty" inherent in the construction of facts. I too made it a "primary issue." But I did not exactly aim at fooling the public by obscuring the certainty of a closed argument–or did I? After all, I have been accused of just that sin. Still, I'd like to believe that, on the contrary, I intended to emancipate the public from a prematurely naturalized objectified fact. Was I foolishly mistaken? Have things changed so fast?
I'm sure that he answers all these questions and decisively changes the direction of cultural criticism in the sections you have to pay to read.
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(11:48 AM) | Anthony Paul Smith:
Justice will not be served
I am going to be the unrepentant, pissy nay-sayer of the current Iraq War by saying true justice will not be served when they send Saddam to trial. Presumably, he won't get a trial by an international court instead it will be an "Iraqi" which of course means American court. Second, he had a lot of help and those people won't be brought to the trial I am sure (Rumsfeld for one, Bush the First for two).
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(9:14 AM) | Adam Kotsko:
Paul Krugman Will Be So Upset
They found Saddam. Now, maybe he can tell us where his good buddy Osama bin Laden is.
UPDATE: Most comments ever? My gentle readers need to work on producing those kinds of numbers.
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