(no subject)

[bowl_of_lilacs]

so today in my class we watched the tristram shandy movie (which is, by the way, really funny).  we talked a lot about meta-narratives, and how to distinguish between narrative and reality, and how often it's very very difficult to do so, if there even is a difference.  i was asking them how they thought that the critical theories we learn in class could be useful to them.  one of my students stopped me after class and asked how i used the theories in my own daily life.  i told her that i do think about them consistently, and try to be lucid about what society is trying to tell/sell me, but that i'm also just really interested in stuff like how it's so weird that we are in time.  she was confused.  so i talked to her a bit about how we have this moment, and then it's over, and it's over for everyone everywhere, and then it's just gone, but it's in our memories, and this happens every single second, and then the memory is often unreliable, so what actually happens to the past when you remember it wrong...  and her eyes kept getting bigger and she just kept saying "whoa" in a genuinely thoughtful voice.

we kept talking about the book and the movie and theory, and finally she said, "i just came into this class thinking that, you know, we'd read some books and talk about if we liked them or not..  i didn't expect this stuff.  it's so cool and weird.  i didn't think that the class would actually make me think these things about my life and stuff."

i'm still all happy from this.  this is when i really like teaching.  the "you just blew my mind" look is totally priceless.