Day 1 - Friday September 23

I decided I don't know enough about what Composition is to write it out in an artfully succinct section of a syllabus. To avoid that deficiency, I chose not to bother with the whole reading of the syllabus thing on the first day of class. Instead, I figured I'd just do some work in keeping with my understanding of what composition is as my way of introducing the class to the class. As I told the students, no one ever became a master of Kung Fu by studying it academically. Those people become Kung Fu scholars, or something, so we started with doing.

Well, technically, we started with my fumbling around getting my laptop connected. Then, as I took roll, I asked everyone to share something interesting about their name, where it comes from, what it "means" or how they got it or a nickname etc. After that, we spent 5-10 minutes answering a brief survey including the following questions:

1. If someone asked you what class you were going to just before you came in, what would you have told them?
2. What would you say that you would study/learn in that kind of class?
3. Why do you think people would study or learn more about that?
4. What do you think you’ll learn in this class?
5. What do you think that means?
6. What do you want to learn in this class?
7. How do you feel about writing? (something written which you would read)
8. How do you feel about writing? (as a participatory/active process)
9. How do you feel about your writing?

More than a little bit recursive, yeah, and I got plenty of didn't-I-already-answer-thats, but I figured they might as well get familiar with splitting hairs and parsing meanings. And, I thought it would be interesting to see how they interpreted the questions just as much as the content of their answers.

Anyway, then we started with the real Kung Fu, er, Composition. Though I thought the quiz and name thing were compositiony enough in and of themselves. The one annoying little bit of language that follows us around more than anything else is our names, and it's very compositiony to get all how-do-you-feel-about-writing, at least in my limited experience. Once again, on to the non-digression. I then progressed the little PowerPoint I'd put together to a quick slide-show of different monuments (and pieces/sections of monuments) on the National Mall. The Washington Monument, Lincoln & Jefferson Memorials, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial etc. We talked about how important texts are to the memorials, and how differently visitors interact with the different memorials via their texts. Is reading the Gettysburg Address etched in stone with Lincoln the Giant lurking behind you a different experience from making a rubbing of name or just taking in the numbers of names at Vietnam Veterans Memorial? Then we moved on to the latest memorial on the mall, the Dr. Mr. Luther King Jr. Memorial. I showed them some pictures, and then we moved on to discuss one particular phrase carved into the side of the main sculpture, "I WAS A DRUM MAJOR FOR JUSTICE, PEACE AND RIGHTEOUSNESS". (I don't really know where to put that period 'cause it's not in the quote and I don't want ya'll to think it was..., so yeah, it's been liberated and resides outside the quotes, muahaha....)

First we talked about whether or not Dr. King deserved a memorial on the mall, and then we talked about that phrase and it's appropriateness as it's been a source of some controversy. Then I broadened the conversation by giving some background about where it came from, a sermon on the last verses of Mark 10 which reinterprets the passage through a psychoanalytic lens considering the disciples' "drum major instinct." We listened to some excerpts from the sermon and some other excerpts of  NPR radio broadcasts detailing Maya Angelou's objections to its being paraphrased and reduced from the original phrasing. The sermon argues that Jesus redefined the definition of greatness to mean service to others rather than power or self-importance, which Maya Angelou thought lost in the quote's having been condensed. (I also threw in a bit on MLA and why it existed and how accounting for changes to the original text can be powerfully informative.)The students suggested that the original phrasing was "more humble," and I tried to throw as many factors and variables at them as possible to contextualize the larger issue of Dr. King's legacy and whether or not a memorial to him was a good way to honor and perpetuate that legacy, including the price tag of $120 million and the differnece in opinion on the appropriateness of the "condensed paraphrase" from the architects perspective and a writer's, Maya Angelou's specifically.

I then gave them a fairly open-ended prompt asking them to write a 2ish page writing sample on an issue surrounding the memorial for Monday, incredulously answered their "already?" whining with a "What else would you do this weekend, party or something? Might as well do something fun and interesting!" and wished them well.

Then I got a bunch of kids asking to add the class, told them I wasn't allowed or able to do that and suggested that they seek out the English Office folk for an answer as to what their options were, and called it a day.


In case you're interested:

• A Paraphrased Quote Stirs Criticism Of MLK Memorial 
• The Effect Of An Absent Clause On Dr. King's Cause  
• "The Drum Major Instinct" 

Chunk of original wording:
“Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice. Say that I was a drum major for peace. I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will not matter. I won't have any money to leave behind. I won't have the fine and luxurious things of life to leave behind. But I just want to leave a committed life behind.”

Wording as phrased on memorial:
I WAS A DRUM MAJOR FOR JUSTICE, PEACE AND RIGHTEOUSNESS

Rough MLA formatted phrasing:
“…I was a drum major for justice…peace... [and] righteousness.”