Hi Marc,
Re: Below, I already do this in my courses; I've taught for a long time,
and the classes, for better or worse, are based on the students and mostly
grow organically. This course seems a 'catch-all' - the topic wasn't my
choice, but the outline below is. The background I'm using is ecology,
which students relate to; there are a lot of international students at the
school (School of Visual Arts), and they bring a lot of concrete informa-
tion to the classes. I'm not sure what you mean by 'earn' this knowledge -
in the (networked, organic) class, the way I teach, knowledge wells up
from below, and is everyone's contribution, to the extent I can get
students motivated. One problem, at SVA more than any other artschool I've
taught at, is that students are taught that humanities are really irrele-
vant - it's the concrete examples that manage to reach them, if anything
does. I haven't had this problem at other artschools. We actually 'have
to' take attendance - this never was a problem elsewhere, but students
tend to skip classes if I don't. It's weird. On the other hand, I seem
well liked, etc. - it's just that 'relevance' has to be pointed out con-
stantantly. The problem is compounded by the way this school (and so many
others of course) depends on adjunct teaching - a whole miserable intel-
lectual economy that's inherently bad for students, whatever necessary
pittance it brings us. (I get paid $3000 per semester per course - that
would make for $18000 a year, without benefits including health insurance
- if I were teaching what's considered a full-time load. In the U.S. this
is typical. But we're broke all the time and I take what I can get, etc.
etc.)
Thanks, Alan
On Wed, 30 Dec 2009, marc garrett wrote:
> Hi Alan,
>
> Reading your list, I would think that it would be enough for a whole
> semester. Personally, I would hesitate in offering them too much so soon.
>
> I would rather put in place functions which are more based around,
> reflecting a dialogue around their collectively 'earned' knowledge and
> experiences.
>
> Encourage the students to earn this valuable 'given' knowledge - and be
> wary of filling them up with an awful lot of information that they may
> not contextually know how to enable themselves with - step by step
> awareness.
>
> In respect of my own experience when teaching - supporting, advising,
> and sharing information with students is one of the most important
> aspects of connecting with others. Understanding and respecting their
> own ideas and circumstances, thus expanding one's own knowledge base in
> making authentic and relational dialogues, mutually with them. If they
> can pratically use the information that you propose, then they will show
> how they can use it as well as declare through their activities how much
> they actually understand, hopefully reflecting their own contexts mixed
> with your own teachings. A kind of critical and pragmatic engagement
> through their experience, will inform all involved how to succeed and
> fail when using/exploiting received knowledge with others - a valuable
> learning curve. I would also allow space for personal responsibility and
> human context, what it means and what effect they have on others from
> their future actions and interactions with networked technologies - why
> it exists politically, socially and creatively. As soon as anyone is
> informed of anything it changes their own position, but without
> knowledge and responsibilities of why and how to use it, they are merely
> drones following mannerisms rather being empowered, in understanding the
> bigger picture.
>
> wishing you well.
>
> marc
>
>
>
>
> > > Hi - I'm teaching this course as an adjunct/replacement; the
> description covers
> > > racism, feminism, queer theory, religious factionalism, the
> shrinking planet,
> > > and so forth - more or less of a grab-bag. I want to emphasize the
> global
> > > aspect. For reading materials, I'm hoping to use Ryan's Culture
> Studies: An
> > > Anthology (as background), and all sorts of online materials (as
> foreground).
> > > The approach will be less theory and more description, etc. than
> usually the
> > > case (perhaps). Anyway, below is a description of the first two
> classes'
> > > material, which is designed to create a kind of backdrop; it's
> divided into
> > > 'Picture' and 'Framework' - the former, a rough description of
> global issues,
> > > etc.; and the latter, a close division emphasizing theory,
> practice, and
> > > example. Any feedback will be greatly appreciated, including URLs
> of relevant
> > > sites.
> > >
> > > Thanks greatly, Alan
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > Notes for course on 'cross-cultural human relations':
> > > PICTURE and FRAMEWORK
> > >
> > > PICTURE:
> > >
> > > EXPONENTIAL, SINUSOIDAL, and LINEAR models:
> > > CATASTROPHE THEORY:
> > > The UNIVERSAL and the CASE:
> > > Global resources: ecological constraints: water, territory, food,
> > > climate, population.
> > > Group resources: cultural inhibitions, identifications.
> > > Carrying-capacity of earth: EXPONTENTIAL POPULATION INCREASE.
> > > Wars and their causes, increased weaponry, numbers and power.
> > > Expansion gap between haves and have-nots: enclaves, gangs, 'rogue
> states,' and
> > > shifting territories.
> > >
> > > FRAMEWORK:
> > >
> > > Heredity and environment: entangled (Waddington's chreod).
> > > Essentialism and 'choice': what is taken as a given in human
> experience.
> > > Prosthetic technologies: transformations of essentialism.
> > > Identifications, a-identifications, non-identifications, issues of -
> > > tolerance, prejudice, advocacy, all the way up and down.
> > > Projections and introjections.
> > > Purity and abjections.
> > > What are the cultural and political manifestations?)
> > > Race (how defined, how divided, how is it culturally and
> > > biologically manifest, what sorts of groups are created?)
> > > 'Traditional' male/female divisions: political and biological issues
> > > (wage, pregnancy, life-span, crime, socio-cultural issues).
> > > Cross-gendered, trans-gendered, gays, lesbians, heterosexuals:
> queer theory.
> > > Religious divisions: issues of inerrancy, truth, world-view.
> > > Subcultures: punk and other divisions.
> > > Class and caste divisions: related to economic divisions.
> > > Cultural and economic capital (Bourdieu, Distinction).
> > > Age divisions (individual and national/international demographics).
> > > National divisions.
> > > Bias, stigma, bullying: symptomology and theory.
> > > Sociobiology, anyone?
> > > History and historiography of divisions, individual and group memory.
> > > Technological capital increasingly important.
> > > Related to technological capital: information/communications capital.
> > > Related to all of the above: attention economy.
> > > Can one speak of an entertainment economy?
> > > Global culture identifications: Michael Jackson, football (soccer),
> etc.
> > > -- Their relation to corporate production and local cultures. (Think of
> > > radio/television in this regard.)
> > > Splintering of identifications online: Youtube or Facebook for
> examples.
> > > Hardening of identifications online: Stormfront, jihad sites, political
> > > blogs.
> > > Animals: extinctions, bushmeat, starvation, habitat shrinking,
> disturbed
> > > systems ('extreme' sports etc.).
> > >
> > > How are all of the above entangled/interrelated?
> > > Ecological constraints: the carrying-capacity of the earth, limited
> > > resources (water, energy, food, shelter, transportation, medical care,
> > > wilderness, changing climate, pollutions, extinctions, etc.).
> > > Labor force. (Slave, wage, surplus, global, etc.)
> > >
> > > What are the lines here?
> > > 1. Ecological constraints.
> > > 2. Inherent identifications: sexual?, health, age, race?
> > > (What constitutes inherency?)
> > > 3. Cultural and territorial identifications: subcultures, religious,
> > > national, global: ~~ selves and others.
> > > (Primatological, psychoanalytical, sociobiological explanations.)
> > > 4. ECONOMIC and SYMBOLIC CAPITAL.
> > >
> > > Think of a playing-field of continuously-changing structures, virtual-
> > > particle vacuum.
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