Dear friends, Help! The third edition of my textbook is coming out in a few weeks and they held the presses just so I could write the final paragraphs on the election. It’s due at noon. Here’s what I’ve got. Help me with suggestions! ________________The campaign was filled with frustration and anger, reflecting the sullied…
To report back on just one part of the brilliance of my co-blogger (a full report would be quite lengthy): The other day I was teaching how to write an essay, a normal topic I’ve gone over a hundred times. This time, I used an analogy first proffered in this space by Ed. He once…
I’m currently teaching an upper-division course on post-Civil War American history, on the various contestations over American national identity since 1865. It’s called, “Who are we?” We debate “the melting pot” versus “multiculturalism,” we explore Malcolm X versus MLK, we examine how things like the Great Depression and World War II and the Vietnam War…
Seeing as conversation has already begun in the comments section below “Little Boxes,” thought I’d alert our readers that our very own Ed Blum is featured as the lead Op-Ed in today’s New York Times. The link is here. Oh, and if you hadn’t heard yet, Ed published a book recently…what’s it called again?
Because Ed asked what music we use in class, and because this is the catchiest song this side of “Call Me Maybe,” and because this guy does a great job representing our profession, I thought I’d give you this “Friday Funny” on Wednesday. And for those of us who teach on Mondays and Wednesday, and…
Being a teacher in Chicago (at a public school no less!) is an interesting task these days. I sit in my office at the University of Illinois at Chicago and look down (literally, not figuratively) at all the teachers on the street, dressed in red, demanding a new contract. I’m struck by their perseverance, the…
In honor of my summer anthem…
Ah, August… Time to remember that we actually have to teach in this profession. Time to reflect on all those things we said we’d get done this summer, and are feverishly writing blog entries instead… Ah, August…. But we also get to write syllabi. My five favorite things about it: Choosing a font. Garamond again? …
I’m pretty sympathetic with Bruce Shulman’s argument from The Seventies, that if we really want to locate the origins of our own current times, we could hardly do better than look at the transitions, left and right, that took place in what I call in my lecture on the subject “the most embarrassing decade.” But…
I’ve been watching The Newsroom during its first three weeks of life and, much as many felt The West Wing was Aaron Sorkin’s tonic during the George W. Bush years, The Newsroom is his tonic for today’s news-as-rating’s-driven-entertainment culture. Why report on important things like the economy when stories about Snooki’s most recent nip slip…
