From Short-Circuit Signs:
[I]t is hard not to notice how often standardized tests come up as examples of good, or at least acceptable, assessment – ironic because faculty are exhorted to take this stuff seriously on the grounds that doing otherwise will mean federally mandated testing. Sounds like a Foucauldian nightmare/farce, right? It gets worse when [...]
I have more or less finished Barbara Ehrenreich’s Fear of Falling and as I say, despite being somewhat dated - it came out in the late 1980s - this book really is worth reading, as it explains a great deal.
My early education was fraught with lessons about race and ethnicity. One needed fashions which would [...]
§ I am not one of those people who “loves” teaching or who became a professor so as to teach. As I always say, had it been my desire to teach, I could have stayed at home or chosen a place I wanted to live. Yet I experience a flash of longing when the zydeco [...]
I have a conference in San Diego just after the semester ends. Especially since the university will not pay for the trip, I want to combine it with a vacation in California - I am not sure how long a vacation. Now I am trying to decide how to plan just the conference part of [...]
To be discussed. See also this clip (”In a small town like this you have a choice between Hell and Jesus, and grief is better than nothing” 
and this one.
Meanwhile it is Carnaval time and Mardi Gras Day is almost upon us. It is very early this year and I am not paying attention, although [...]
Elizabeth David could really cook. I am not an accomplished cook, but sometimes I think I channel her. Here is something you can do with pork chops, thick ones without bones.
Rub them with salt and pepper, strew them with fresh chopped herbs, and douse with a small amount olive oil and fresh lime or orange [...]
A friend informs me that I am in utter rebellion against superficiality. It is interesting that she puts it that way; I would have only said I did not like superficiality. But it appears I am in utter rebellion against it.
Reeducation said I was unfeeling but, I now discern, only meant I was not suffering. [...]
Out of patriotism and in the spirit of my resolution to see more movies, I have been to Little Chenier. I found it melodramatic and stereotype driven, and the accents are very poorly done. Then again, it is apparently very hard to represent southern Louisiana without resorting to exoticist trope. I did like the beautiful [...]
One winter I was a visiting professor in the Midwest, where the snow falls. Before leaving here I had fleece-lined boots sent from Canada to my new home. It was January and the sky both here and there had the bleak purity of early winter.
Everyone saw my boots arrive because they were mailed to the [...]
We have been in school for one week. All of my students are above average, all of my classes are interesting, Hell has not broken loose, and we may even be able to hire. For some reason there is time to prepare classes and to write and to have a life. I am pinching myself. [...]
