Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Enigmatic

Full text of my lecture notes for this morning's class:

1. ergonomic pirates
2. electronic reserves
3. Baudrillard

Q: What was the class? What was the topic? What was the point?

2 comments:

Jessica said...

I'm taking a wild guess here.
The class: Senior Capstone
The topic: how to get required readings that are on electronic reserve and something about International Talk Like a Pirate Day
The point: you like pirates?

Bev said...

Good guess! It was the postcolonial survey class and we were getting ready to start talking about Caribbean literature, and I wanted students to think about where we get our ideas about places we've never actually visited. Naturally, the pirate movies came up, and since it was Talk Like a Pirate Day, I showed them the Ergonomic Pirate Keyboard (go to Language Log and scroll down until you see it). Then we talked about early explorers and settlers and where they got their ideas about places they'd never seen: travel narratives, imaginative literature, and maps. So we looked at a few early maps, which led to a few comments about the way maps both reflect and shape our perceptions about a place, which led us to our old pal Baudrillard. And then, yes, I did have to show students how to use our new electronic reserve system so they can read more about this topic.