Essays: May 2004 Archive Page

Here?s the dilemma and confusion. Asking students to conform to a print based logic in an electronic world is not teaching anyone to think on one?s own. Indeed, this kind of pedagogy translates into a continual academic stubbornness, a refusal to recognize the communication shifts we have experienced and are experiencing currently. Telling students to write according to the logic of print (whether the writing is on paper or not ? I am talking about the logic not the medium) is to force students to reject the communicative practices around them: IM, the Web, Film, TV, music, etc.
The other serious problem here is that the refusal to recognize the remix is also a refusal to recognize the nature of texts we often value and admire in English Studies (and the university in general). The Wasteland? Remixed. Shakespeare? So remixed. Las Meninas? Remixed Velasquez. Pick a Medieval text at random. It will be a remix. Newspaper stories? Always remixed (I remember my own newspaper experience at several publications? we would go through other papers looking for ideas). Literature reflects a Borges universe where every story is remixed and mixed. Spun around on a literate turntable and wondered over. --JRice --Remix etc. (Yellow Dog)

It's true that one's own ideas only come after one has filtered through many other ideas. I think the problem I see in the classroom is that students find it difficult to trace details back to the source. It's one thing to read Shakespeare, and then write a creative work that riffs on Shakespeare. It takes perhaps a bit more skill to read, say, The Jew of Malta alongside The Merchant of Venice, or any of a number of standard revenge tragedies alongside Hamlet, and note what elements of a common story Shakespeare kept, and where his artistry made the common story into his own dramatic work. It's something else entirely to be shown a creative work, or a marketing pitch, or a political speech, and -- without an authority figure telling you what sources the author consulted -- independently seek out the influences that were remixed and remediated in order to produce the new result.

So students who can only remix don't get practice thinking critically about culture -- and it's certainly possible to recognize remix culture and design assignments that ask them to think critically about it, without rejecting it out of hand as plagiarism.

One problem with remix culture is that the products of remixing are meant almost exclusively for audiences that are familiar with the sources. I had a roommate who sometimes wrote poetry or short stories that quoted long passages from popular songs. Since I usually hadn't heard of those songs, they didn't have the emotonal effect my roommate wanted them to have, so they fell flat for me and I wasn't really able to get the full impact he wanted his creative writing to have. Since he was mostly writing for himself, he didn't need to cite and explain every cultural reference, but if he were giving a speech to a local city council meeting or writing a proposal for a scholarship, it would be his responsibility to make sure that his audience understood all his references. One way to do that is to identify the source of those references.

I don't know much about music, but I have heard on NPR references to composers who "quote" each other. You can't interrupt a symphony to identify the source of a certain passage, so I recognize that some media are better suited to the kinds of explicit citation that college composition courses require.

In the early 90s, Johnny Carson did a comedy bit about psyops campaign against American troops, where the troops were warned that back home, their wives were being seduced by movie stars like Homer Simpson. A serviceman overseas must have heard about or watched that show, but changed the name to "Bart Simpson," and passed the story on to a reporter. A legend was born.

I don't expect students to arrive at college knowing everything they need to know -- if they did, none of us would have jobs.

Remixing is one thing when it comes to the creation of cultural artifacts -- but when it comes to examining facts about the world, and making decisions that may affect people's livelihoods or even their lives, the culture of the remix is sloppy and dangerous.

I certainly don't feel that students should never, ever remix -- but if we graduate students who can ONLY remix, and have never been forced to trace an idea back to its source and critique its validity, but instead settle for riffing on it and referencing "www.somehomepage.com" as one of a handful of "Works Consulted," then we are doing them -- and our culture at large -- a great disservice.

I listen in part because I am intrigued and seduced by what I don't know: by the Greek tragedies I will never have time to read, by the symphonies I will never have time to appreciate, by the questions I will never have enough philosophical training to ask or understand in their richest contexts.

Like many of my colleagues, I often dream about sitting in on courses that spark my curiosity. Just about every semester I toy with the idea of taking an introductory piano course, or brushing up on my Spanish or French. I have even spoken idly of shedding my responsibilities and pursuing whole new degrees, maybe in zoology or art history or anthropology. --James M. Lang
--The Benefits of Eavesdropping (Chronicle)

It's not so much the content of this essay that moved me to blog it. It's also really, really good writing... and as I see the light at the end of the grading tunnel, and contemplate my plans for next term, I really appreciate this reminder of how exciting teaching can be.

I remember people saying that I would miss high school so much when I left. They were wrong in my case. I don't miss it.

I didn't belong there--I never did, but I can say that I belong at Seton Hill. I have loved every moment, learning not only from books and blogs, but from people--faculty and friends alike. Somewhere along the way, I discovered that my place is here. The squirrels, planners, disks, Diamond Age "discussions", blogging, heart-to-hearts with pals, hugs that you desperately need, laughing until your sides ache and your eyes get drippy--adding one more line to Karissa's list of funny quotes, comments that make your blood pressure rise in anger at the Paul, Michael or Puff that wants to see you get spitting mad. Every day was an adventure. I wanted to come. I didn't want to miss class (even when I accidentally did). --Amanda Reflects on Year One at Seton Hill (New Media Journalism @ Seton Hill University)

Wow... it sure looks like we are doing something right here at SHU! Since I still have stacks of papers to grade, I'm not quite into the sentimental memories of my first year yet, but when I get there, I'll certainly re-read this entry.

And while I'm feeling warm fuzzies about the success of blogging at SHU, I'd welcome your thoughts about taking the good with the bad and ugly. (The student's blogging is fine -- it's the juvenile, offensive language in the comments I'm talking about.)