What does one do with a blog? Here are links to some of my favorite recent postings that highlight part of what I do with my blog.

Teaching

• Plagiarism Roundup
  In honor of Mike Arnzen’s unmasking of a plagiarist, here are a few recent blog entries on academic dishonesty.
• Circle Games and Cyberpunk
  In order to discuss some of the key concepts in the novel, I had to make sure that my “Intro to Literary Study” class (English majors, overwhelmingly freshmen) grasped some of the basics of network theory.

Language and Rhetoric

• Rant or Remark? Invective or Discussion?
  If it doesn’t make your blood boil, then it’s not doing its job. (An analysis of the Elizabeth Ito case.)
• Why people think they are above having to read instructions
  I am in the 7th grade. My project this year is attempting to prove that 99% of people fail to read the following directions after being told and read to do so.

Media

• Watch One Hour with Me… In the Lobby: Waiting for Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ”
  What do the marketing droids think the audience that comes to see Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ” will want to spend money on? What previews will I have to sit through?
• “The Passion” is the Medium
  Yes, I had to look away during the torture scenes — but no, not for the reason you probably suspect.
• Theory vs. Craft in Computer Game Studies
  While the computer game industry is, at bottom, driven by money, what might be called the “theory industry” is stacked with people who are very intelligent, who have been trained their whole career to think in abstract and theoretical terms, and who are completely mystified by things that computer gaming designers take for granted.

Personal

• ‘The Meatball: Not A Funny Rhyme’ says Peter Jerz, age 5-3/4; or, Child Traumatized by ‘On Top of Spaghetti’
  “I just can’t stop thinking and thinking about that poor meatball,” he says, tears rolling from his pinched, squinting eyes… “For who would want to eat it when it’s mush under a bush?… And another thing… they should close the front door.”
• Headless Heroes, Car-crash Residue, and Styrofoam Peanuts
  I ended up with a big trash bag on the highway outside St. Emma Monastery. What did I pick up?

Favorite Blog Entries: Journaling ModeJerz’s Literacy Weblog)

A weblog is a great tool for jotting down thoughts as they come to you. I find my students tend to use their blogs as a repository for their own thoughts, and don’t offer annotated links to offsite resources as frequently as I do. I’ve collected a set of my own blogs that follow the “journaling” model, so I’ll be able to point them to it easily in the future.