English Studies

I'm thinking about the profession today.  Listening to NPR, I learned both that the killer was an English major and that his writing was "disturbing."  I'm going to set aside whether or not law enforcement could have reacted "better" (how can you plan for this?  and aren't your living room and hindsight comfortable positions from which to judge others?).  Instead, I want to ask about my role, and the role of my colleagues, in engaging students.  It's never easy to gauge intention in writing:  Did you mean to provoke or be funny?  Is the character a misogynist or is the writer?  This is where having bodies in front of you becomes an overwhelmingly important issue.  I feel like it may be gauche to add, but I think that someone like Derek Owens would argue that these issues of being aware of students as humans in front of you in a real context is an issue of sustainability.  Which is to say, not noticing cries for help is unsustainable.  Bu then we're too busy and stressed out, especially at R1 institutions, to notice our students.  And that's not sustainable.   This is not to blame his teachers; I feel certain that they're devoted, careful and aware.  Rather, it's an issue for all of us who teach, and it's an issue that has become forcefully emphasized. 

I'm also thinking about a conversation with my office mate from earlier today (hello, Dusty).  We were sharing our dismay at some of our students' writing, not the quality but the topics.  They are addicted to TV and movies and pc/video games, so they write those narratives.  In the midst of this, I suddenly was thinking about Dobrin and Weisser and their insistence that ecocomposition take into account all the environments our students live in and what those contexts mean for them.  That little insight took us into a discussion of students living in these narratives but feeling separate from them.  Thus, stories or poems that engage those settings, those plots, those characters are a way for students to make sense of their lives within that media context.  The students can begin to claim a space for themselves.  As teachers, our goal would be to move them through that space into others.  Sometimes we can, sometimes they resist.  It would be a move toward sustainability.