Yesterday I had my last Friday classes of the school year.
Which means I had to say good-bye to the first-year students in Introduction to American Culture and Literature (America Bunka Bungaku Gairon). The class was held period 1 on Fridays, beginning at 9:00, and although in the first semester (spring), most of the students were mostly on time and in class, in the second semester (fall), too many of them started coming late or missing classes, and that plus the usual half dozen or so who'd regularly fall asleep, and the handful who'd regularly chatter to each other while I was lecturing, made me lose my temper a little too often. That's a pity, because most of the students did come to class on time and stayed rather alert for the 90 minutes of my almost only English lectures. And a fair number were among the best students I've met at Fukuoka University. And so far about 60 of the 120 students have posted comments on our class blog (where I post a summary of that day's lecture and a picture or two relating to its subject etc.), and many of their comments have been insightful and engaged. All this is to say that I will really miss them! For the last lecture, I covered the usual four benefits of studying American culture and literature: 1) it improves your English expression and understanding and motivation etc.; 2) it deepens your understanding of how American people think, feel, and live; 3) it entertains and excites and moves and pleases you; 4) it helps you become more human. To illustrate the last point, I told them about when my super colleague Dr. John Hatcher (my senpai, friend, big brother, etc.) said to me, Literature is about how to be human in the world." I then told them about how one our top students from about 2008 appeared in the University Guide, in which each faculty and department has their own PR pages, and said that she'd decided to study American culture and literature because one of her teachers had told her that literature was about how to be human. That teacher was me! (I was careful to then remind the class that I'd taken that great idea from John Hatcher!). And while I was showing a picture of John on the screen during all this, I also happened to mention that he was retiring after this year, and that this would be his last year teaching at Fukudai, and that I would miss him very much, and suddenly I couldn't continue speaking for a few minutes as the enormity of my/our loss hit me and as I focused on how vital he has been for me to work happily and healthily at our university in our English department. Later John and I had another delicious Indian lunch and talked about many things (health, politics, culture, and Patrick O'Brian's age of sail historical novels about two good friends, the naval Captain Jack Aubrey, and the naturalist/doctor/spy Stephen Maturin. Luckily even after John retires, he and I will be able to continue having those lunches. And then yesterday I had my last Friday class with my super graduate student Shiori, talking with her about her 75 or so page thesis comparing Virgil's The Aeneid with Le Guin's Lavinia in terms of gender, which she has to revise to submit next week. Yes, I'll also miss Shiori, who also happened to be my super TA for the American Culture and Literature class... Luckily, Shiori got a job working in our universities administration from the new school year, so we'll be able to keep in touch. Next week: the last classes of the school year!
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Jefferson Peters (JP)
Can you find me in the picture above? Archives
December 2023
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