Response to Ashley

Ashley, in her post, talks about the Villanueva article, focusing in especially on community forums as a form of social intervention. Ashely says:

"The school Villanueva discusses takes that concept one (important) step further. Rather than simply suggesting that your child speculate on the effect their actions had on someone else, the child is forced to confront that individual and hear them express their feelings."

I'd just like to reiterate how important these kinds of interactions seem to the development of the kinds of students we want (read: need) in our FYC classes in order to make a lot of the pedagogical approaches we've discussed actually work. We need students who are not uncomfortable with communication, and who are able to speak freely in order to identify and optimize their own voices. It also disheartens me (as I'm sure it does many of you) when you ask students to communicate with each other in an effort to actively engage them in learning and they act like they've never had to speak with another human being before. I honestly think that this springs from an innate fear of confrontation instilled at an early age.

Hot Media Electro

After the jump, you'll find a recording I made in which a Spell N Speak talks about identifying hot media, and the effects they have on a culture. It seemed to me doubly fitting to have this lesson screeching out of the failing speakers of a machine, essentially excluding all human voice and participation.

Mr. Abusjhadjjafzxcsda... Does this guy even speak English?

I didn't mention it yesterday in class, but three different people this semester alone, after learning my last name, have asked me something to effect of, "You're not one of those ISIS guys are you?" One of those people was someone right here in the English department.

Now the absolute ridiculousness of a statement like that aside, what I find most shocking is that fact that someone would just nonchalantly say such a thing. Each time its happened (and I've been hearing similar such bullshit since I was in 10th grade), it came completely out of no where, following a conversation about the weather, or where we're from, or something else innocuous.

It's made me think a lot about my appearance and reception in the classroom. Of course, I don't think many (or hopefully any) of my students see me and wonder whether or not I'm a card carrying  member of a terrorist cell. I like to think that's for the uniquely ignorant. However, I am well aware of how my ethnicity might have an effect on student perception of my authority over the English language. As writing teachers, I think that those of us of non-American decent are operating at something of a deficit. Or rather, I have a constant anxiety about that. I wonder if my students, on the first day, see my brown skin and here a foreign last name and think, "What can this guy teach me about English? It's probably not even his first language."

And it's embarrassing to say, but because of this I go in on the first day of class and I speak super clearly, and make a concerted effort to prove to my students that I know my shit. Which is probably a good thing to do, anyway, but I'm not doing it for the right reasons.