Posts tagged Kelly

So grad school started back up, and I’m taking three classes: Composition Theory, Writing Methodology, and Kafka. I had to keep some literature in there!

I think this is going to be a weird semester. I’m presenting at CCCC next month (panic attack much? I think so), I’m focusing much more on writing classes than literature (gearing up for the Ph.D. material), and my work schedule is just weird. I’m already enraged at my Comp. Theory course–almost the entire class is comprised of high school teachers, and, frankly, what happens in a high school environment is different than a college environment. It’s not that I’m not sympathetic to these teachers–I am–it’s just that, since I work in higher ed., I see different problems and concerns. While one of my classmates is worried about a homeless student who needs glasses, I’m concerned about the ESL student taking ENG110 and three writing intensive classes in her second-to-last semester. And these differences infuriate me. They don’t know the things we go through in higher ed., much like I don’t know what they go through. But constantly bitching about students who don’t care when I constantly see students who DO care, but just don’t get it–it frustrates me to no end.

So yeah, Comp. Theory is interesting. Writing Methodology has me stressed to no end–I’m supposed to pick my Master’s Thesis topic in one week? Sorry Prof, you may be totally awesome, but I highly doubt the topic will become my Master’s Thesis if I pick it in one week. I picked a topic, but it’s definitely not going to be my real Master’s Thesis. I’m using Mists of Avalon, which will be fun and awesome for the semester, but it has nothing to do with composition and rhetoric. I was thinking about something with narratology and Never Let Me Go, but I couldn’t iron it out quickly enough to use it for the class.

Kafka, for those of you who have never read Kafka, is insane. No really. His narrative style and voice is beautiful, but I just don’t understand the point of it all. For me, I like to analyze and create meanings etc. With Kafka, the point is that there is no meaning–it is what it is. Well if that’s the case, why am I studying this German writer in an English literature Master’s program? Bah. Plus there’s a ton of reading and a ton of blogging to go with it.

So yes, Geekoric is busy and stressed. I hope to still write posts her and there, but probably not too often. We’ll see. Expect far less towards the middle of March though, because I fly to the CCCC conference March 18th! Woohoo!