While preparing for a 6-pg. paper, I have had to look up the following terms on Wikipedia and/or the Grove Dictionary of Music:

Adorno
Africa
Bartok
Beethoven
Cantata
Debussy
Chavez
Coryphaeus
Hegel
Kant
Modernism
Nationalism
Ode to Joy
Orientalism
Primitivism
Prometheus Unbound
The Rite of Spring
Schiller
Stravinsky
Sublime
Symphony
Symphony No. 9 (Beethoven)
Threnody

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I love this photo (from today's NYTimes).


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Two days ago was the best of grad school and the worst of grad school. In the early afternoon, I went to a critical race theory symposium at the law school to hear David L. Eng speak. Eng has been one of my theoretical heroes since I read his book Racial Castration last year, which is about the feminization of Asian American masculinity. (I'm ( Read more... )

me: so ryan gave everyone a "pop quiz" today

amy: oh fun

me: he has threatened 2 of them over the course of the quarter
  and they are both worth 10% each
  so if you miss lecture, you are screwed

amy: is this number two?

me: yes
  so this was the question
  "i am a genius because i attended comp lit 2bw today and that is why i deserve an A on this quiz"

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me: i finally saw dogma today and now i am reading the paradise lost vs dogma papers

amy: haha
  was the seeing dogma fun times?

me: it is so very pleasing to read these two as equals
  yeah, i was impressed

amy: haha
  good!

me: there were a LOT of sex jokes i did not get when i first saw it in hs
  and as theologically unsound as a humanist reading of ( Read more... )

me: you know what is disappointing about these papers
  they are all 10 pgs long
  i always wrote 8.5 pages for 10-pg assignments
  what is up with these children

amy: haha
  maybe they figured it was quantity over quality

me: as if i would penalize them for having to read less of their terrible writing
  stupid children

amy: haha
  they are young, they don ( Read more... )

me: so i offered the kids an extra credit assignment
  comparing an aspect of paradise lost with dogma
  and like half of the class was like, what is dogma
  and i was like MAN I'M OLD!
  that movie came out when i was in high school!
  and then i was like, you guys have to earn the extra credit, don't just write, "dude, ben affleck is awesome, bro!"
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The Good News: I do not have to teach The Canterbury Tales, one of my least favorite texts of the English Literary Tradition, this coming quarter (I got assigned to TA the "Medieval Ages to the 17th Century" survey course -- hideous, oui?).

The Bad News: I will have to teach Paradise Lost, a text that riles such waves of fear, loathing, and boredom ( Read more... )

정사 ("jungsa") means death in sex. My bemused, slightly scandalized mother could not tell me whether it signifies death during sex or after.