Jamie Iredell's Blog, page 19
January 31, 2011
Students
I asked them to write about their education and reading experience. They were to respond to some specific prompts/questions. They were very honest. Some said they don't like reading very much and haven't read a lot, that most of the reading they do these days is online (mostly Facebook). Some, though, said they love to read and read novels (the biggest author is Zane, whose writing is crazy awesome porn that is marketed as erotica; you should check it out).
I asked them to talk about elementary/middle/high school. Did they enjoy school? Did they ever feel pressure not to be engaged, or to be very active in class, because they would get labeled as a nerd or a ass-kisser, or something like that. Every one of my students responded that they never had trouble speaking up in class, that they were told they were smart, that they were good students, had earned A's throughout, and they never cared what other students thought of them.
This is in a college learning support English class, or, to be politically incorrect: a remedial reading and writing class. These students' placement scores kept them from entering English 101. From what I've read of their writing so far, they have some pretty severe inadequacies as readers and writers, as students in general. For a recent homework assignment only two out of 24 students completed the assignment; everyone else turned in half of it or less, or nothing at all.
What strikes me about all this is that I'm suspicious of something that many American students might be afflicted with: they have a whole lot of confidence, and no skills. Although they say that they don't have trouble talking in class, when I pose a question to the room, even the crickets hear crickets. If they earned A's in high school, my feeling is that there are a lot of high school teachers inflating grades, simply handing them out, without assigning any real work, or having their students suffer the consequences of not completing their work. Why would almost an entire class think it's OK to turn in half of an assignment? I have to ask the class tomorrow morning. Maybe there was some sort of mix-up? I doubt it. Unfortunately, this is not all that uncommon where I teach. In fact, I've dealt with it every semester at the beginning. I have to teach my students how to be students, then I can teach them how to read and write. My students have been under served their entire lives and now they're trying to get a college degree.
I teach at a community college. I teach in south Dekalb County, Georgia. The minority percentage of the zip codes surrounding the college is 93.89%. In my classes this spring, I have a total of 60 students in 3 classes. 13 are males. 1 is not African American. I could go more into the inequities in school districts in GA if I wanted to, but to put it simply: schools in Black communities in GA, generally, get screwed. The people who attended those schools are those I'm trying to teach, to help. But I don't think anyone was helping them by handing out A's in high school.
I asked them to talk about elementary/middle/high school. Did they enjoy school? Did they ever feel pressure not to be engaged, or to be very active in class, because they would get labeled as a nerd or a ass-kisser, or something like that. Every one of my students responded that they never had trouble speaking up in class, that they were told they were smart, that they were good students, had earned A's throughout, and they never cared what other students thought of them.
This is in a college learning support English class, or, to be politically incorrect: a remedial reading and writing class. These students' placement scores kept them from entering English 101. From what I've read of their writing so far, they have some pretty severe inadequacies as readers and writers, as students in general. For a recent homework assignment only two out of 24 students completed the assignment; everyone else turned in half of it or less, or nothing at all.
What strikes me about all this is that I'm suspicious of something that many American students might be afflicted with: they have a whole lot of confidence, and no skills. Although they say that they don't have trouble talking in class, when I pose a question to the room, even the crickets hear crickets. If they earned A's in high school, my feeling is that there are a lot of high school teachers inflating grades, simply handing them out, without assigning any real work, or having their students suffer the consequences of not completing their work. Why would almost an entire class think it's OK to turn in half of an assignment? I have to ask the class tomorrow morning. Maybe there was some sort of mix-up? I doubt it. Unfortunately, this is not all that uncommon where I teach. In fact, I've dealt with it every semester at the beginning. I have to teach my students how to be students, then I can teach them how to read and write. My students have been under served their entire lives and now they're trying to get a college degree.
I teach at a community college. I teach in south Dekalb County, Georgia. The minority percentage of the zip codes surrounding the college is 93.89%. In my classes this spring, I have a total of 60 students in 3 classes. 13 are males. 1 is not African American. I could go more into the inequities in school districts in GA if I wanted to, but to put it simply: schools in Black communities in GA, generally, get screwed. The people who attended those schools are those I'm trying to teach, to help. But I don't think anyone was helping them by handing out A's in high school.
January 30, 2011
Compared to my contemporaries I read slowly, or at least ...
Compared to my contemporaries I read slowly, or at least it seems that way to me. Matt Bell is on book #13 for 2011. I'm still on book 3. I don't know what other writers are publicly counting out their reading lists. I'd be curious. Others within my physical proximity I know read pretty fast. It's not like I'm reading particularly long books, either. I'm reading Robert Coover's Ghost Town, which finishes up within 147 pages. I know how to read faster; I had to for graduate school. But if I really want to soak up a book, I have to take my time with it. I know every reader reads his own way, but how the hell do some of you get it done so quickly? Maybe it's because I can really only read what I want to read on my own before I go to bed? I have stuff to read for my classes. Sometimes I get to assign reading that I would normally want to be reading in my free time, but not usually. That's one of the things that sucks about my place of employment. But that's beside the point. I spend the rest of my day writing and getting things prepped for class or grading. What about everyone else? Are you all setting more time aside for reading during the day?
January 28, 2011
January 24, 2011
January 20, 2011
Snig diffidy morphine
You know, I used to take a lot of morphine. I also smoked and shot a bunch of heroin. It was fun. I never got that hooked on that shit. I also used to snort a bunch of cocaine. A few times I snorted a bunch of crank. I've snorted gasoline fumes, but you have too. I've snorted fresh paper. I've eaten an artichoke. I've killed a deer. You've killed a billion chickens at least a million cows, say nothing of the salmon. I've smoked PCP. I've fucking killed your dog. You know what about your dog? Fuck your dog. I hope the first thing you learn about anything is that your dog doesn't give a flying fuck about you no he/she doesn't love you has no idea of a concept such as love I've smoked crack before and when I did I felt really good for a minute but then just as quick it went away.
January 19, 2011
Man Martin's new book
My friend Man Martin has a new book coming out soon. It's called Paradise Dogs. It's at once both a very sad and a very funny book. George Singleton says, "In Paradise Dogs, Man Martin offers the reader my favorite type of protagonist: part Willie Loman, part Ignatius J. Reilly, and part Roman Strickland from Brad Barkley's Money, Love. But Adam Newman is his own man wholly. He's the true lovable scam artist wishing to do right. This is a great, fun read, full of absurdities, perplexities, and wonderfully cathartic insights. Fun, sad, and more fun." Check out Man's blog. He does and says silly things there. The book will be out this spring from Thomas Dunne
January 5, 2011
Blurbage
I just re-read this while going over the book, and it made me laugh so much. A blurb for Freaks:
"When I was 47 I killed a child with a razor bat and a pocket mirror. I had to beat the shit out of that childbaby face so good if it was going to die and I surely wanted it to, for it wore gold slacks, the best slacks to this day still I've ever seen. The good thing is that after I killed the child I brought it back to life, but then I killed it again for smiling. Point is, I have the gift of reanimation, which I picked up because I sometimes look at books and can imagine how writing a book works. Jamie Iredell likes fucking metaphors, but this blurb isn't a metaphor at all. Anything you read in this hot penis-lifting amalgam of Ire-language is meant in private by Mr. Jamie to stand for something else because he thinks metaphors are really powerful. But me, I really killed a child. This is a confession. The child's name was Spencer and he was clean. Next year when I turn 59 I'm going to unmetaphorically kill your fucking dog because fuck your fucking dog."
—Blake Butler, author of There Is No Year
"When I was 47 I killed a child with a razor bat and a pocket mirror. I had to beat the shit out of that childbaby face so good if it was going to die and I surely wanted it to, for it wore gold slacks, the best slacks to this day still I've ever seen. The good thing is that after I killed the child I brought it back to life, but then I killed it again for smiling. Point is, I have the gift of reanimation, which I picked up because I sometimes look at books and can imagine how writing a book works. Jamie Iredell likes fucking metaphors, but this blurb isn't a metaphor at all. Anything you read in this hot penis-lifting amalgam of Ire-language is meant in private by Mr. Jamie to stand for something else because he thinks metaphors are really powerful. But me, I really killed a child. This is a confession. The child's name was Spencer and he was clean. Next year when I turn 59 I'm going to unmetaphorically kill your fucking dog because fuck your fucking dog."
—Blake Butler, author of There Is No Year
January 3, 2011
Excerptedness
This thing from a novel I wrote in 2010 @ Dark Sky Magazine.
Other excerpts from the same novel are published
Here
Here
and, forthcoming,
Here
Other excerpts from the same novel are published
Here
Here
and, forthcoming,
Here
December 21, 2010
Books for Buying
@ Metazen's blog I put up a few words about Mike Young's We Are All Good If They Try Hard Enough and Joshua Harmon's Scape. Others also wrote about books that should be bought. Buy them for yourself and others.
