Not of General Interest

For the first time in many years, there are actually jobs in my field. I don't want to move, and I probably won't apply, but a lot o...

In one of my classes this semester, the students (some of them) seem happier to watch and listen than to speak up and participate. It's ...

Some technological, some not. First the not-technological: First of all, the Another Damned Notorious Writing Group . It really did help to ...

With all due respect to Profacero , Dame Eleanor , Dr. Virago , and Jonathan at Prose Doctor , writing is not either * neither easy or fun r...

The shorter version of the free, crowdsourced book Hacking the Academy is now online (via Profhacker) at this site: http://www.digitalcultu...

Sometimes it happens: didn't sleep well, woke up early, went back to sleep and had a bad teaching dream (they showed up in a room I hadn...

Gone to the Chronicle, every one--well, two of them anyway: Tenured Radical and now Lesboprof . The Chronicle is not what you'd call e...

Dear Mr. Gates, The Chronicle reported today that in a time of huge cutbacks and givebacks for brick and mortar state universities, wher...

Like Dame Eleanor and Dr. Crazy , I'm tired but pleased after the first week of classes. I've also been thinking about the recent...

It just wouldn't be a syllabus, would it, without a mistake on it? I don't mean a typo (which there mercifully weren't any of), ...

Today I did something I don't do often enough: I went to each of the rooms where I'm scheduled to teach and checked to see if I coul...

I'm taking break from planning classes that start almost immediately to think about this year. What do I want to happen? Less time spen...

Two quick clips on writing. Jennifer Egan, via ia Perfect from Now On : The second thing is, I feel like getting in the habit of it is h...

As I begin to think about assignments for the semester, I find myself torn between the tried and true--assignments I've given before--an...

As I mentioned a few posts ago, I was a little ambivalent about this trip to the archives; I had too much to do, and so on--all work that I ...

Walking into an archive (and a town) I've never been to before doesn't feel strange, somehow, for as soon as I caught sight of Autho...

Our family used to have a dog that did this: If she didn't want to acknowledge the presence of something she was afraid of, like a cat o...

Historiann has an interesting post up about Michelle Nijhuis's "Not one more winter in the tipi, honey." It's about the g...

Apparently Indiana has abolished the teaching of handwriting (cursive, I think, though the articles don't say) in favor of more typing. ...

At various points in my teaching career, I've heard of classes in which students were told something like this the first day: "Ever...