Before I was diagnosed with esophageal cancer a year and a half ago, I rather jauntily told the readers of my memoirs that when faced with extinction I wanted to be fully conscious and awake, in order to “do” death in the active and not the passive sense. And I do, still, try to nurture…
Correlation or Causation? – Businessweek. Similar:Watched "Apollo 11" at local library with my son today50 years ago today, three humans were on…CultureLies about history in Texas can be traced to the Lone Star State's own Big Lie: The AlamoYet many Texans feel they need …CultureSynchronous Online Classes: 10 Tips for Engaging StudentsEvery time I have taught an…
My sister used to send my wife and me videotapes full of Babylon 5 and Mystery Science Theater 3000, when I was a graduate student in Toronto. Since we often ended up watching six or seven B5 shows in a row, we got a good sense of the show as an overall story, rather than…
I finally committed “Twittercide” about a month ago. Some of my followers begged me to reconsider, and the flood of affection and good wishes felt a little like the end of “It’s a Wonderful Life.” But I knew it was time to return to mine. Do I still have the occasional urge to tweet? Do…
Touched up this handout on integrating quotations: If your college instructor wants you to cite every fact or opinion you find in an outside source, how do you make room for your own opinion? Paraphrase. You can introduce studies that agree with you (Smith 123; Jones and Chin 123) and those that disagree with you…
The value of this essay is not specifically in the nostalgia for ye goode ole days of bloggynge, but rather the combination of work-ethic angst and the recognition of the value of investing effort in long-term projects, as opposed to seeking immediate rewards for clear-cut, predetermined actions. The philosophical reflections of the shovel-wielding ditch-digger are…
[J]ournals ceased being a means of communication a long time ago – more than 20 years ago for sure. New research would be unveiled in seminars, circulated as NBER Working Papers, long before anything showed up in a journal. Whole literatures could flourish, mature, and grow decadent before the first article got properly published…. The…
My first semester as a freshman writing instructor, I jotted the word “redundant” several different places in the margins of a student’s paper, and gave her the opportunity to revise. She returned the paper, having faithfully inserted the word “redundant” wherever I had written it. Clearly, I should have first taught this student about the…
We want to impress, so we say “utilize” instead of “use” or “orientate” instead of “orient.” We mispronounce, so we say, “nuke-u-lar” instead of “nuclear.” We make up a word, such as “notary republic,” instead of “notary public.” These nuances can be charming, irritating or, if we are fortunate, unnoticeable. But they can be costly…
Winnie the Pooh is the very first book that Apple bundled with the iPad. It was a bold choice, and a reminder of what the iPad had that ebooks at the time did not–the ability to share those same charming illustrations that are now imprinted on our collective consciousness. The image of Winnie the Pooh…
I sense a made-for-TV-movie in the works. In an embarrassing about-face, federal prosecutors yesterday abruptly dropped criminal charges against an Indiana man who they accused of bugging his ex-wife’s automobile. The FBI last Friday arrested David Voelkert, 38, largely on the basis of messages the South Bend man recently exchanged with a purported 17-year-old Facebook friend…
The problem with the dash—as you may have noticed!—is that it discourages truly efficient writing. It also—and this might be its worst sin—disrupts the flow of a sentence. Don’t you find it annoying—and you can tell me if you do, I won’t be hurt—when a writer inserts a thought into the midst of another one…
Here’s a comment I left on the jacksonfish.com website. Hello. I’m a blogger who was surprised to find that your site, literacyintheclassroom.com, scrapes my RSS feed and republishes my content in order to serve up ads for astorybeforebed.com. At least three of the bloggers whose content appears on that site did not give you permission.…
The industrial age worked hard to separate “work” from “home.” Everything about the common or public schools started in the mid-nineteenth century reinforced that division: from the school bell ringing for each child at the same time of day, of each child entering school at age 6 whether they were ready or not, about sitting…
Mike Arnzen posted his weird and wonderful address to graduation seniors. “Scary Things”: An Address to the Class of 2011 — The Goreletter — Michael Arnzen. Similar:Emily Dickinson’s Singular Scrap PoetryThere’s never enough time to cover Emily…CultureWatching ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ with 18,000 teenagers was one of the most profound theate…The arts are vital to…
The other day I was asked if a letter should read: “Staff members at the Local Planning Council, with whom we’ve worked for over ten years” or “Staff members at the Local Planning Council, which we have worked with for over ten years.” My response was something people don’t want to hear. I said that…
The essential problem of man in a computerized age remains the same as it has always been. That problem is not solely how to be more productive, more comfortable, more content, but how to be more sensitive, more sensible, more proportionate, more alive. The computer makes possible a phenomenal leap in human proficiency; it demolishes…
A touching, nostalgic look at “Colossal Cave Adventure.” Books are words on a page, sure. We follow along and visualize our own version of things, as much as the author’s descriptions will allow us the freedom to do so. But even the movies can change those, though. Whether we like it or not. And long…
My first contribution to the Day of Digital Humanities was not really what I expected. On this Day of Digital Humanities, I ditched a database lesson in my morning writing course, and instead read a hand-written letter about a stack of books. A couple of weeks ago, a colleague handed me a letter sent from…
“Krusty Gets Kancelled” is one of the greatest of all “Simpsons” episodes, but if it were a poem, it would need to have nearly as many footnotes as “The Waste Land” — and the further away from its original air date we get, the truer that’s going to be. "Krusty Gets Kancelled" is one of the greatest…