Tuesday, December 20, 2005

Searching for magic treasure



Like other careworn and busy academics (Rich), I too have spent the last few days reading through countless mind-numbingly repetitive essays on the topic of . . . ethics. If you're a rural sociologist, your mileage may vary.

One of the unique things about this year's crop of crap, er, I mean "undergraduate writing" is that I had students read one of my own papers for a change. First time ever. And I'm not proud of it. :-)

But lo and behold, when, upon the T.A.'s insistence, I asked them to explain "tragic wisdom" on the final exam, students actually came up with some good responses! and that actually demonstrated to me that they learned something! Imagine that.

Anyway, longstanding members of the grouse gab group may recall my inflicting the "search for tragic pleasure" paper on them several years ago--students this semester actually seemed to get something out of it.

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