Shopping: Chill edition
A super chill and relaxed day! And apologies for my recent horrible apostrophe habits. I should proofread better if I'm going to write publicly after such exhausting days.
Summary
First class started: 8:30 AM
Left last class: 4:00 PM
Total classes shopped: 7
Approx hours in class: 5.5
Details
AB hour (8:30-9:50 AM)
McGarvey's Burden of Disease deserves its excellent reputation. McGarvey speaks clearly and to the point, and while his class demands a lot of its students, it does so in a managable way. Numerous guest speakers bring their expertise to this interdisciplinary study of global health, but I decided there were others more eager than I am to take the course capped at 70 students, and that it's really early for my schedule. So I gave up my preregistered spot and moved on. Even so, I stayed for the duration of the first day lecture and skipped Imagining Other, Constructing Self - since I've already found literature classes I'm super excited about, I decided not to rush to explore ones I was ambivalent about to begin with.
Out: BC 107, CO 81-5
C hour (10-10:50 AM)
Hooray for North American Environmental History! Jacoby was visibly nervous and on edge today (and his technology wasn't working, which doesn't help), but even so his skill as a lecturer showed. While studying environmental history, this course will revisit the division between humanity and nature and consider how different conceptions of that boundary affect historical narrative. Jacoby offered the Main Green as an example, asking how we might read it "as a text." The straight-forward answer is to think about how the Green came to be and how each of its species came together. But we're also challenged to ask: is the green a piece of nature preserved in campus? or itself human-made? And so on. eo and I sat with each other again, and agreed we're likely to take it together...
Likely: HI 179
Skipped: EL20-2
D hour (11-11:50 AM)
No class! (I stopped at American Popular Culture for a moment but could tell that the prof's style wasn't going to make the class worth it). Instead, I went to the Farmer's Market (hooray for having an on-campus farmer's market) and bought fresh delicious local produce for lunch and then did Arabic homework.
E hour (11:00-11:50 AM)
Third year Arabic provided even more evidence that my Arabic has deteriorated - my vocab was far behind even in this class. And Suleimani will be a fantastic teacher: despite being maghrebi [Moroccans are notorious for their unusual version of Arabic], he has precise and clear formal Arabic, is a pleasure to listen to, and engaged as an instructor. He never lapsed into English, and despite the classes large size, ensured that everyone had ample time to speak. And he has gorgeous script, drawing out the sin's and marking each dot individually. Despite yesterday's leanings to 4th year, I left prepared to take this class all year and enjoy it. I also started to flirt with the idea of taking 2 Arabic classes to maximize my capacity for improvement this year.
I didn't make it to The 1001 Nights, which impressed Murray so much that he's taking it. It'll be a good class, but if I study with Colla this semester, I want to push myself to do so in Arabic (see below). Besides, Colla is available to me to discuss these texts anyway (see below). I also missed Sacred Stories, which I was mostly shopping as a chance to see Harvey in action once more, since she remains one of my favorite profs at Brown. I might stop by Friday for kicks (and then I could be surprised into taking the course), but I don't expect to end up there.
In the cart: AB 50
Still on the shelf: CO 142, RS 9
F hour (1-1:50 PM)
Nothing again! A trip to the bookstore and more Arabic homework! And a discovery that the lab component of MU30 was cancelled, making it into a perfect last course -- 4th if my primary 3 are high-workload, or possibly even a 5th class...
G hour (2-2:50 PM)
I returned to Fourth Year Arabic to give it one more chance, only to find that my Arabic continues to improve (I understand much more than I can express myself) and that my classmates are all speaking and understanding at my level. So, given the much smaller class size, I'm leaning towards pushing myself harder and trying for the higher level. To counteract the twice-weekly meetings, Dan and I set up a regular Friday Arabic hevruta, and Suleimani offered that I'm welcome to sit in on AB 50 classes as a vagabond on days when AB 70 isn't meeting.
I couldn't go to Classical Arabic Prose, but collected a syllabus and spoke to Colla separately. It's definitely above my level-class is conducted in Arabic only-but if I push myself, I'd be able to manage, and thereby take another class with Colla, improve my reading ability, and gain fluency with several basic core texts from the Arabic bookshelf. The meeting time is changing to accomodate AB 70, so I'm strongly considering taking two Arabic classes: either AB 50 + 70 for a big jolt of language work, or AB 70 + CO 71 to supplement the language with literature.
Almost definite: AB 70
Depends on whether I survive Friday: CO 71
N hour (3-5:20 PM)
My first stop was Mandel's Memoirs and Memory: Individual Experience of Modern Jewish Life. Mandel's long been on my list of excellent professors to learn with before graduating, but this won't be the class. For one, it's a seminar, so she won't be dripping the wisdom, but is trying to get us to drip it for ourselves and each other. And while the reading list is great, I already have conversations on this topic with my extended network of people, who I think are a more interesting and varied group to discuss them with than the group that assembled for class today. I'd be better off recommending to my [esp non-Brown] friends that we read the books and discuss them, and I probably will.
I decided to skip New England Environmental History, since it's so similar to the North American variety which I'm already pretty into, especially since Jacoby has a better reputation than Stein. Instead, after a brief visit to the Green, I dropped into Akarli's Identity Conflicts in Middle East History, 1900 to the Present. Unfortunately, that's a poorly defined topic with an equally unfocused syllabus and a professor with a penchant for rambling. I'll keep going to his office hours because I value the knowledge he has to share, but I won't be going to this class.
Out: HI 197-49, ES 70, HI 197-39
And then...
... an evening which exemplified what I like so much about Brown. Colla and a few students met for a snack at Byblos, and we ended up staying for over 3 hours catching up, going over shopping, trying to interpret Israel-Palestine-Lebanon, and then just talking. We spent the last hour discussing Tayeb Salih's Season of Migration to the North, which has been troubling me since I read it over the summer, and our conversation strayed into modern economic development, middle-ages philosophical conceptions of repentance, and more. And the shisha was tasty. Back at home we finally had a house dinner (tortillas), then went grocery shopping. And now I'll go to bed.
So where do we stand?
From the past two days, here are classes which are in the running, by topic:
Arabic
Very likely: AB 70 (4th year)
In the running: AB 50 (3rd year), CO 71 (Classical Prose)
History/Social Science
Very Likely: HI 179 (NA Env. History)
Possible: PS 143 (Roots of Political Islam)
Arts / Fun
Very Likely: MU 30 (Sondheim And)
Literature:
Likely: CO 142 (The South)
And that's already a potentially full course load, with relatively few choices to make! (Now's the time to start lobbying, BTW).
Just in case, these are courses I might still shop for the first time tomorrow:
ED 126 (Emotion, Cognition, Education)
CO 272 (Theory & Practice of Literary Translation)
CS 17 (Integrated Intro to CS)
ED 101 (Craft of Teaching)
US 187 (Green Cities: Parks & Designed Landscapes in Urban America)
Good night!
Summary
First class started: 8:30 AM
Left last class: 4:00 PM
Total classes shopped: 7
Approx hours in class: 5.5
Details
AB hour (8:30-9:50 AM)
McGarvey's Burden of Disease deserves its excellent reputation. McGarvey speaks clearly and to the point, and while his class demands a lot of its students, it does so in a managable way. Numerous guest speakers bring their expertise to this interdisciplinary study of global health, but I decided there were others more eager than I am to take the course capped at 70 students, and that it's really early for my schedule. So I gave up my preregistered spot and moved on. Even so, I stayed for the duration of the first day lecture and skipped Imagining Other, Constructing Self - since I've already found literature classes I'm super excited about, I decided not to rush to explore ones I was ambivalent about to begin with.
Out: BC 107, CO 81-5
C hour (10-10:50 AM)
Hooray for North American Environmental History! Jacoby was visibly nervous and on edge today (and his technology wasn't working, which doesn't help), but even so his skill as a lecturer showed. While studying environmental history, this course will revisit the division between humanity and nature and consider how different conceptions of that boundary affect historical narrative. Jacoby offered the Main Green as an example, asking how we might read it "as a text." The straight-forward answer is to think about how the Green came to be and how each of its species came together. But we're also challenged to ask: is the green a piece of nature preserved in campus? or itself human-made? And so on. eo and I sat with each other again, and agreed we're likely to take it together...
Likely: HI 179
Skipped: EL20-2
D hour (11-11:50 AM)
No class! (I stopped at American Popular Culture for a moment but could tell that the prof's style wasn't going to make the class worth it). Instead, I went to the Farmer's Market (hooray for having an on-campus farmer's market) and bought fresh delicious local produce for lunch and then did Arabic homework.
E hour (11:00-11:50 AM)
Third year Arabic provided even more evidence that my Arabic has deteriorated - my vocab was far behind even in this class. And Suleimani will be a fantastic teacher: despite being maghrebi [Moroccans are notorious for their unusual version of Arabic], he has precise and clear formal Arabic, is a pleasure to listen to, and engaged as an instructor. He never lapsed into English, and despite the classes large size, ensured that everyone had ample time to speak. And he has gorgeous script, drawing out the sin's and marking each dot individually. Despite yesterday's leanings to 4th year, I left prepared to take this class all year and enjoy it. I also started to flirt with the idea of taking 2 Arabic classes to maximize my capacity for improvement this year.
I didn't make it to The 1001 Nights, which impressed Murray so much that he's taking it. It'll be a good class, but if I study with Colla this semester, I want to push myself to do so in Arabic (see below). Besides, Colla is available to me to discuss these texts anyway (see below). I also missed Sacred Stories, which I was mostly shopping as a chance to see Harvey in action once more, since she remains one of my favorite profs at Brown. I might stop by Friday for kicks (and then I could be surprised into taking the course), but I don't expect to end up there.
In the cart: AB 50
Still on the shelf: CO 142, RS 9
F hour (1-1:50 PM)
Nothing again! A trip to the bookstore and more Arabic homework! And a discovery that the lab component of MU30 was cancelled, making it into a perfect last course -- 4th if my primary 3 are high-workload, or possibly even a 5th class...
G hour (2-2:50 PM)
I returned to Fourth Year Arabic to give it one more chance, only to find that my Arabic continues to improve (I understand much more than I can express myself) and that my classmates are all speaking and understanding at my level. So, given the much smaller class size, I'm leaning towards pushing myself harder and trying for the higher level. To counteract the twice-weekly meetings, Dan and I set up a regular Friday Arabic hevruta, and Suleimani offered that I'm welcome to sit in on AB 50 classes as a vagabond on days when AB 70 isn't meeting.
I couldn't go to Classical Arabic Prose, but collected a syllabus and spoke to Colla separately. It's definitely above my level-class is conducted in Arabic only-but if I push myself, I'd be able to manage, and thereby take another class with Colla, improve my reading ability, and gain fluency with several basic core texts from the Arabic bookshelf. The meeting time is changing to accomodate AB 70, so I'm strongly considering taking two Arabic classes: either AB 50 + 70 for a big jolt of language work, or AB 70 + CO 71 to supplement the language with literature.
Almost definite: AB 70
Depends on whether I survive Friday: CO 71
N hour (3-5:20 PM)
My first stop was Mandel's Memoirs and Memory: Individual Experience of Modern Jewish Life. Mandel's long been on my list of excellent professors to learn with before graduating, but this won't be the class. For one, it's a seminar, so she won't be dripping the wisdom, but is trying to get us to drip it for ourselves and each other. And while the reading list is great, I already have conversations on this topic with my extended network of people, who I think are a more interesting and varied group to discuss them with than the group that assembled for class today. I'd be better off recommending to my [esp non-Brown] friends that we read the books and discuss them, and I probably will.
I decided to skip New England Environmental History, since it's so similar to the North American variety which I'm already pretty into, especially since Jacoby has a better reputation than Stein. Instead, after a brief visit to the Green, I dropped into Akarli's Identity Conflicts in Middle East History, 1900 to the Present. Unfortunately, that's a poorly defined topic with an equally unfocused syllabus and a professor with a penchant for rambling. I'll keep going to his office hours because I value the knowledge he has to share, but I won't be going to this class.
Out: HI 197-49, ES 70, HI 197-39
And then...
... an evening which exemplified what I like so much about Brown. Colla and a few students met for a snack at Byblos, and we ended up staying for over 3 hours catching up, going over shopping, trying to interpret Israel-Palestine-Lebanon, and then just talking. We spent the last hour discussing Tayeb Salih's Season of Migration to the North, which has been troubling me since I read it over the summer, and our conversation strayed into modern economic development, middle-ages philosophical conceptions of repentance, and more. And the shisha was tasty. Back at home we finally had a house dinner (tortillas), then went grocery shopping. And now I'll go to bed.
So where do we stand?
From the past two days, here are classes which are in the running, by topic:
Arabic
Very likely: AB 70 (4th year)
In the running: AB 50 (3rd year), CO 71 (Classical Prose)
History/Social Science
Very Likely: HI 179 (NA Env. History)
Possible: PS 143 (Roots of Political Islam)
Arts / Fun
Very Likely: MU 30 (Sondheim And)
Literature:
Likely: CO 142 (The South)
And that's already a potentially full course load, with relatively few choices to make! (Now's the time to start lobbying, BTW).
Just in case, these are courses I might still shop for the first time tomorrow:
ED 126 (Emotion, Cognition, Education)
CO 272 (Theory & Practice of Literary Translation)
CS 17 (Integrated Intro to CS)
ED 101 (Craft of Teaching)
US 187 (Green Cities: Parks & Designed Landscapes in Urban America)
Good night!