Before proceeding, the reader should fully understand that, within the University, esteem is defined in a special way. If something in held in high esteem, that thing has been judged likely to improve the University’s rank in the greatly feared annual college survey published by US News & World Report. This rank is, of course,…
One jarring aspect of proposals to reform scholarly publishing is that, all too often, they implicitly consider ‘journals’ as a single homogenous entity, to which one universal publishing model can be applied. On the contrary, diversity is everywhere. In any discipline, journals range from high quality ‘must reads’ with high rejection rates — which in…
In an online world where bloggers’ frenzied mutual promotion seems increasingly the norm, the Wiki emerges as an oasis of dignified restraint. It was invented in 1995 by Ward Cunningham, who now works for Microsoft. But the underlying idea of the Wiki – a Web page that anyone can edit or even delete – could…
I’d like to propose a little exercise, so I beseech you, the readers of this blog, my teachers and friends, to think of a cliche` and provide an alternate solution to it. —Neha —Thinking Outside the Box (Wanderlust) I have the image in my head of a chameleon trying to hide on a TV set that’s…
A new development in composition appears and those interested in that development use CCCC as a place to find each other, to learn just how much interest exists in the new development. Often the SIG tries to map the field, figuring out what’s in and what’s not, trying to locate the work in relation to…
Gonzalo: That‘sbetter. Now, let me tell you something: narratology is a sham. It‘sfor losers who can’t get laid. You know what I‘m saying? Narratologists can go suck it, as far as I‘m concerned. Kiss my sweet ass, Vladimir Propp! You?re not going to put that in the transcript, are you? Walter: Of course not. Well,…
Gelotology-(root word, gelos (gr) meaning “laughter”) is the psychological study of laughter. More and more, scientists are beginning to realize the value of laughter on a physiological level. For instance, laughter reduces levels of certain stress hormones and contributes to overall strengthening of the immune system. As the field of gelotology grows, practicing “laughter clubs”…
Maybe PowerPoint is soo powerful that the mounting of critiques creates some kind of karmic vacuum–PowerPoint skepticism met cosmically by a surge of colorfully-themed shows rushed to the doubter’s inbox. Two shows were sent my way in the past week. One was a self-evaluation for whether or not you (dear reader) would be a fit…
Crutches, Pills, Insomnia, and OversleepingJerz’s Literacy Weblog) I had every intention of getting up this morning to attend several presentations at the writing center conference that took place here at Seton Hill this weekend. My wife called me at the office last night… (she’s in Texas visiting her parents). It turns out my son is…
After looking at my teaching evals from last term and talking with the boss, I can see I need to spend more time discussing my assignment expectations. I’m teaching mostly freshmen, which means they are perhaps more needy than the students in the upper-level tech writing classes I used to teach every term. But I’m a freshman too.…
Many advocates of computer-mediated distance education emphasize its positive aspects and understate the kind of work that it requires for students and faculty. This article presents a qualitative case study of a Web-based distance education course at a major U.S. university. The case data reveal a taboo topic: students’ persistent frustrations in Web-based distance education.…
Prometheus, who stole the secret of fire and shared it with man, is often represented as a thinker; his name means ?forethought,? and is credited both with founding civilization and inciting Zeus to curse mankind with the necessity of labor. In 1929 Eugene O?Neill examined the power of both religion and technology in his expressionistic…
Small academic organizations looking for publicity but lacking the funds for a web designer, teachers interested in exposing their students to feedback from real-world audiences, and individuals who simply like to write may all find weblogs valuable, even outside the setting of a composition classroom. We already see barefoot and pajama-clad students in the classroom;…
Web loggers, or bloggers for short, are that new breed of armchair documentarian, chronicling the day’s events — politics, sports, music, arts, family, dating life, anything — on Web sites that are updated daily, or several times a week. But unlike a newspaper Web site, which brings a new front page with new stories each…
—IF Quake (Loonyboi) I wonder whether everyone who claims to have downloaded it and played it is in on a grand April Fool’s joke, so I’ll just let you decide for yourself. Similar:What are 'Judeo-Christian values'? Analyzing a divisive termblock of American society. But for crit…AcademiaMaking a villain's lair in #Blender3D (this weekend's relaxation)AestheticsI just installed…
Hand over hand, he slid it up past the sinus that sphinctered and wheezed wetly around the plastic, and Jimmy grinned when the jug fogged with his breath, proving he’d made a tight seal. This egged him on as the tube caught for a moment against the back wall of his sinuses — a dull…
The text adventure lives on as a result of a network of websites and Usenet groups, and each year this small community gathers to hold the IF competition, in which amateur entries are subject to peer review. Dennis Jerz, associate professor in English and new media journalism at Seton Hill University, Pennsylvania, says interactive fiction…
People use these devices [i.e. remotes] while watching movies or TV shows at home. Given this, two key elements of the user’s situation are likely to be: Wearing glasses for distance viewing, rather than reading Low levels of lighting Of course, a young designer whose vision hasn’t yet started to deteriorate wouldn’t have the first…
“[T]he world’s first consumer application of an electronic paper display module in Sony’s new e-Book reader, Librié, [is] scheduled to go on sale in Japan in late April. This ‘first ever’ […] display utilizes E Ink’s revolutionary electronic ink technology which offers a truly paper-like reading experience with contrast that is the same as newsprint.”…
I look at my students: some barefoot, others wearing hats and dressed in clothes they could easily have slept in, and I think how the college classroom has become an adjunct of the dorm bedchamber. Sometimes, when I begin classes, I get the impression that the students resent my interrupting their conversations. Few of them…