Alternative Student Projects

Lately I have grown oh so tired of my customary methods of assessment: quizzes, exams, reaction papers, etc. For my culture and civ class I am pondering having students create a 5-10 minute video of some kind (a dramatization of an historical event, dramatize a scene from a comedia, a quasi-journalistic report on a current affair , etc. ). I figured it could be cool to have them upload the videos to YouTube for sharing purposes. Have any of you tried such an assignment? Any pointers, warnings you want to pass along?

Or have you fruitfully experimented with other forms of media for purposes of student projects?

Editions of DQ

A teaching question: what are the best editions of Don Quixote for students? I'm looking for something with sufficient yet not overwhelming notes. Does not have to be translated; if it's abridged, that's okay.

I'm wondering because I'm teaching an upper division Golden Age class. I've decided to title it "Lovers, Knaves, Fools and Saints", and to basically conduct the course thematically, with units oriented around enduring archetypes and their creation within a historical framework. Is this lame? Does this kind of course dodge your complaints about thematic approaches, Mike? Basically, the four units will include Garcilaso and Tirso de Molina (Lovers), San Juan and Santa Teresa (Saints), the Lazarillo and the Buscón (Knaves), and DQ (Fools).

In fact, I haven't quite decided on the Buscón. Any suggestions on short picaresque pieces that might work better with students? Selections from Guzmán de Alfarache? One of the Novelas Ejemplares? What is the title of the first book with a female pícara?

Dave Barry's Year in Review

Gentlemen, this is not, technically, related to academia, but I am pleased to announce that Dave Barry's Year in Review is up and available for reading.

Feliz Navidad

The periodo navideño is associated with looking back on the good things throughout the year, and I wanted to take this oppurtunity to marvel at the fact that we who post here have been friends for a decade now, and though we are spread all over the country, our friendship has found ways to endure. For me that has probably been the greatest reward of the graduate school process and one of the things I am giving thanks for this year.

Un fuerte abrazo a todos.

More fun with students

A student turned a paper in that was obviously far above her ability, so I googled a phrase, and it took me directly to an article on Cervantes Virtual. Word for word, gentlemen. Word for word. Maybe she felt that by rearranging a few things she was doing her own work. Sheesh.

Literary Studies

The Chronicle has an interesting piece on literary studies.

Memorable student errors

I have just been informed by a student that one of the poets of the generation of '98 is Antonio Manchado.

My eminence

It’s nice to have my “eminent medievalist” status recognized by this elite group. Perhaps when I go up for tenure, you can all write letters to that effect. It would help if you would all gratuitously cite me in your papers. It might be tricky for Kent to include my exemplary insights in his work on Peruvian poetry, but I'm sure it could be done with a little effort.

Grumpy Librarians

Why is it that research libraries seem to be a haven for cranky types? I've worked in archives and special collections in the U.S., Europe and Mexico, but my experience at the Sutro Library in San Francisco today topped them all in terms of librarian abrasiveness. I thought of you, Mike.

surrealism teaching resources

Might anyone have a syllabus on surrealism that he would like to share? Otherwise, might anyone know of some good teaching resources on the subject? I (probably foolishly) am toying with the idea of teaching a class on it this coming summer. Other than being a fan of Buñuel (and occasionally Dalí) I really have no experience in that field.

Harvard's endowment

An article in the Huffington Post notes that in the past four months Harvard's endowment has lost $8 billion--which represents a slim 22% of the total they've got socked away in their mattresses. My question is, how does that compare to the entire annual budget of the Cal State system, with its 23 campuses, 450,000 students and 47,000 faculty (among which number several participants in this blog). If I'm reading it right, 7.6 billion is what we're getting for next year.

Anyone coming to MLA?

I'm not on the market, but I'll be going to MLA anyway, since I'm on a search committee (plus I, you know, work here, so it's hard to avoid it). I know Traductor's giving a paper; is anyone else planning to come to SF for the convention? We should plan to get together.

Citing yourself

You know how when you send an article out for review, you're supposed to remove references to yourself as author in order to preserve anonymity, right? What do you do when you cite yourself? I cite my diss in a couple of places in an article I'm working on. Any thoughts on how to do that and still preserve anonymity? When I do it in the third person (... as Hammer notes...) it seems clunky and, to me, patently obvious that I'm citing myself.