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bookyeom · 8 months

Note

minghao + “I noticed.”

Sorry this took me so long my friend!!! Here you go!

A/N: If you read and enjoy this, please reblog and/or send a comment! I’d love to know what you think.

Pairing: Minghao x Reader Word Count: 1.5k Warnings: swearing, art slander

Rembrandts, Monets, Picassos, Cézannes. Art pieces you’ve been dying to see since you were young and dreamed of Europe, all replicated in full and brought together in one spot for you to be in awe of.

And yet all you can do is make googly eyes at the man next to you, and hope he doesn’t notice.

Minghao, your classmate. The one you’d had a crush on since he sat next to you in your Race, Gender and Sexuality in Art seminar. The one who had snorted under his breath at a pretentious comment made by your balding, white, British professor, and who had subsequently made the professor look stupid when he’d been called out. You were impressed at the audacity of the dark-haired boy, and you’d told him so. A simple ‘nice one’ was what you’d whispered after the scene had died down, and you’d been rewarded with a smile and a giggle so different from the persona he presented that it had stunned you. (You hadn’t done much but stare at him for a solid minute after he thanked you and turned back to the lesson, so confused as you were by this boy that you’d never met before in your life.)

Since that first day, you’d sat next to each other, and you’d quickly decided that your new goal for the semester was not to get good grades – it was to make Xu Minghao laugh.

“Why is this class about race and gender being taught by an old, white man anyway?” He’d asked under his breath another day, and the snort you’d involuntarily let out was rewarded with another giggle from him. The amount of times the two of you have been shushed by your professor has quickly gotten out of hand, but you don’t care. Minghao tends to say exactly what you’re thinking, and you’re in awe of how easily he’s able to verbalize his thoughts. You’re in awe of him for a lot of reasons, actually; he’s good at art, he’s intelligent, he’s hilarious.

He’s also terribly cute, which has proven to be entirely devastating for you.

You’re friends, of that much you were sure, but you never could really read into it much more than that. The two of you had exchanged phone numbers early on, sending messages mostly about your homework at first, but it had quickly progressed into jokes about your professor and had snowballed from there. Soon after, the flirting had begun, and you had been incredibly confused and unsure because he had been so Minghao about it all.

Then one evening you’d gotten a text from him that read: ‘Do you want to go out with me to the City Art Show tomorrow? I got two tickets,’ and you’d nearly shit yourself.

Y/N (7:56pm): just us two?

Hao (7:57pm): that’s usually what a date is, yeah ;)

And now here you are, almost exactly 24 hours later, entirely unable to focus on some of your favourite artwork because of him. It isn’t your fault that he looks so good. He always does, but you’ve never seen him like this before – dressed up far more than his usual baggy hoodie, looking every bit like your art hoe dream boyfriend. What are you supposed to do other than look?

Thankfully, you manage to make it out of the museum without him calling you out on it, much to your relief. He suggests a walk, and you’re grateful for the fresh air, trying your best to suppress all thoughts of holding his hand as you stroll. The two of you eventually find a bench, and you’re fidgeting with your fingers when he speaks up.

“Did you like the museum?”

“Yeah,” you reply quickly. Wish I’d gotten to see more of it without you distracting me, you gorgeous motherfucker.

“What was your favourite part?”

“Um…” You wrack your brain in an attempt to remember something, anything, about what you’d seen. “The Monet one?”

You watch as Minghao’s face falls. “Oh… yeah.”

“You know, the one with the flowers?” Why are you still talking?

“Right,” Minghao says, monotone, and you really wish you could melt into one of the puddles on the ground below you. It’s silent, and he doesn’t try again, and you turn towards him abruptly.

“Minghao,” you say, a little desperate, and you hope he can’t tell that you’re sinking right now as you try to come up with something to explain yourself. “I don’t know if you noticed, but I wasn’t really looking at the artwork much–”

“I noticed,” Minghao says resignedly. “That’s too bad. I really thought you’d like the exhibit.”

“I did,” you try to explain, but you know there’s no real way out of this without telling him the truth. “I mean, I tried to! I just didn’t… absorb much of it. I’m tired, I think, and I–”

“It’s okay,” Minghao says with a shrug that you think is meant to appear nonchalant, but you can tell he’s dejected by the way he’s leaning back against the bench, arms crossed in front of him. “Don’t worry about it. It’s not for everyone.”

You stare at him for a moment, brain running a million miles a minute. Then you snap.

“Oh my god, Minghao,” you whine, “I’ve been dying to come here. When you asked me, I almost levitated. I wanted to look at it all, but I couldn’t stop looking at you the whole time!”

Minghao blinks.

You blink back.

You’re absolutely mortified.

Your hands fly up to cover your face, willing for the ground beneath your feet to open up and swallow you whole.

“Hey,” he says, and you suddenly register the soft squeak of his giggle.

You peer over at him through your fingers to find him absolutely beaming. Was he laughing at you? You hide behind your hands again, trying to figure out how best to escape this disaster.

“Come on,” he tries again, “look at me.”

You can hear him smiling.

You startle as you feel fingers gently curl around your wrists, but you don’t resist as Minghao gently pulls your hands down and away from your face. He lets go once he can see you again, one of his hands lifting to scratch at his ear, and you can’t help but watch the movement. Are the tips of his ears red?

“I’m sorry,” he starts, and you can tell he’s trying not to smile again as the corners of his mouth turn up. “I just really thought you were bored the whole time,” he explains, and you know you’re in for it when he smirks. “I have to say, I find this reason much more interesting.”

You groan, and he giggles again, and you hate how damn cute he is.

“I’m going to go and hide my face forever now,” you announce, rising onto your feet so quickly that you almost trip.

“Hey,” Minghao protests. He’s fast to stand up, too, catching your elbow before you can eat shit. “Don’t do that.” You look up at him in question, and he adds, “...Professor Mackenzie is going to miss you if you hide your face forever.”

You gape at him for a second, and then you’re turning on your heel and getting ready to make a run for it.

You don’t make it very far before his hand finds your sleeve, pulling you back, and you’re surprised when you find yourself flush against his chest. He’s laughing, but his arms are around you as he squeezes you in a quick hug before he’s letting you go, so fast you can barely process, his hands on your arms as he grins down at you.

“I’m sorry,” he tries, and you pout involuntarily. “I was distracted in there too, you know.”

You scoff. “Sure.”

“I’ve come here before, so I didn’t need to focus so much on the art,” Minghao continues, ignoring you. “What I had to focus on this time was not looking at you.”

It takes you a minute to process his words. “You’re just saying that because I said it first,” you finally say after a minute, ignoring the fluttering in your chest at the thought, and Minghao shakes his head.

“It’s true. I always feel like that when you’re around – in class, too. And you look really pretty today.”

You have to physically stop your mouth from falling open. What the hell?

“Oh,” is all you manage, and then he’s biting back a smile again.

“Yeah, oh,” he returns, squeezing your arms fondly. “So if you can forgive me for not focusing tonight because I was looking at you, then I’ll forgive you for it, too.”

“Deal.” You stick out your hand and he shakes it with another giggle. You feel a cheeky smile finding its way onto your own lips as you add, “And don’t worry about me not seeing the art… I found another subject far more riveting anyway.”

Your new goal: to make Xu Minghao blush more often.

Tags: @savventeen @wqnwoos @starsstuddedsky @dejavernon @tae-bebe

Message me if you want to be added to the permanent taglist! <3

#minghao x reader #xmh x reader #xmh fluff #xmh fic #minghao x you #the8 x reader #seventeen x reader #seventeen fluff #seventeen fic #seventeen imagine #seventeen drabble #my writing

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my-fanfic-library · 4 years

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Hello lovely!! Would you mind doing headcanons for Professor!Claes x reader? Maybe he teaches history or something like that and you both have a nice lil affair going on after a while. I saw your tags on that one gif set and now that's all I can think about 👀

This is gonna be the only ask I answer today but holy shit I haven’t stopped thinking about this in like 24 hours

K so

Claes is most definitely a history lecturer

I don’t know why but I imagine his entire class to be similar to Indiana Jones’

Just a bunch of girls looking at him like the heart eyes emoji

Anywho, Claes is like the coolest lecturer in the world

He’s really laid back and he likes to take the piss out of people

He also handles a lot of seminar groups as well

Which is how you meet

He saw you in the first lecture and was kinda like “wow cute” but obviously nothing could happen

But when you come to his seminar group

And start bombarding him with question after question and disproving the content he had taught you so far,

L o v e

And obviously you are totally in love with him too

This tall, handsome man teaching your favourite subject, with the loveliest accent in the world

You stay after the seminar to talk to him

And he’s blown away by how much you actually know

“I’m looking forward to teaching you, Miss [Last], I think we’re going to get into a few heated moments if you keep attempting to disprove my work.”

You thought he meant arguments

He did not

You always make sure to ask a question if he invites the class to, because it makes things less awkward

And you always have a question or two at the end of the lecture

He can’t believe he’s got this golden student

And he uses you as an example all the time

“Why can’t you guys be as enthusiastic as [First]?”

Stuff like that

It kinda becomes obvious to both yourself and everyone else that Professor Bang has quite a soft spot for you

Some girls, despite being in their early 20s give you nasty looks

You respond by sitting next to Claes in your seminar the next day

And doing no work and getting into no trouble for it

Instead you talk about Denmark

Because you’re curious about his home country

It is this seminar

During the middle of your first year

That Claes just falls head over heels for you

But it’s

F O R B I D D E N

Which makes it all the sweeter

Later that year, about two weeks before the exam, you show up at his office just as he’s about to leave

“What’s the matter?”

Immediately you just burst into tears and he has no clue what to do

So he does what he thinks best

He pulls you into him and you just stand there sobbing into him for like a solid five minutes unable to make a coherent sentence in your sudden outburst

When you’re calming down, he brings you into his office and sits you down and is all “ok so what the fuck is going on?”

You explain that you’re just too overwhelmed with everything and that you don’t feel ready for the exam

So he offers one to one tutoring up until the exam (so for two weeks, you’d visit him after class and you’d sit for like an hour and go through everything you didn’t get)

Turns out you knew a lot more than what you thought

The more time that Claes spends with you, the more he wants.

So. Much. Tension.

Because you want it, and so does he, but you’re both oblivious and thinking about how wrong it is

So nothing happens except for a few gazes, a few lingering touches

He’s actually pretty gutted the day of the exam when he realises you won’t be coming back for some secret time with him

He spends his entire summer thinking about you

Wondering if you’ll make it into his class

When he finds out you are, booyyyyy is so happy

He doesn’t know why but on the first day of classes, he finds himself dressing up a bit. Styling his hair, throwing on his glasses, a soft scarf, leaving the first two buttons of his shirt undone

He doesn’t even know if he’ll see you today but fuck

And he does

Your complexion is glowing after so many months in the sun and the heat

Your hair grew out a bit

You look angelic

He finds himself unable to concentrate and keeps fumbling over his words for the whole lecture

Because you decided to sit at the front and

He keeps looking at you

And your eyes never leave him

Because he looks so good?

You couldn’t remember when he looked so fucking delicious

After the lecture, he asks you to stay and wait for a moment and the room clears out

He doesn’t know why he’s doing this but

“Did you have a good summer?”

“Yeah, I guess. We went to Majorca for four weeks and-“

“I missed you.”

“Oh, that’s... Professor Bang-“

“It’s Claes.”

You literally have 0 clue how to answer that

Your mind is spinning

He missed you?

He wants you to call him by his first name?

Your heart is doing leaps and bounds by this point

He’s looking at you differently, licking his lips

And then they’re on yours

It’s hungry - it’s different

Your hands are in his hair, on his neck, you’re leaping into his arms, wrapping your legs around him and he’s driving you into the desk

The next day, you keep looking at that spot, where someone’s notebook is

You’re smirking, trying not to laugh because that poor person is writing right on the spot where you fucked your professor last night

Claes keeps looking at you and you know by his eyes that he wants you to stay after class

It ends and everyone leaves and the second the door shuts, you’re in his arms again

It’s a frenzy

Clothes off, and this time he’s got you arched over the desk, hands gripping into the chair behind it, ramming into you from behind.

And that is how it started

School nights, weekends, you’d find each other one way or another and you couldn’t get your hands off of each other

Post-sex cuddles

Where you just talk

He usually runs his hands through your hair, with the fondest smile on his face

It starts to get hard when other guys start to get interested in you

Because you can’t exactly tell anyone that you’re with someone - you’d get thrown out and Claes would lose his job

So, you have to play

You have to flirt back

Claes loses it

The sex gets rougher

The hickeys grow darker and bigger

One time, he got so frustrated that he sat you on the podium after a lecture and ate you out

He finds himself realising that he doesn’t just want to fuck you - he’s actually fallen in love with you

And you’re fairly sure that you’re in love with him

That summer, he whisks you off to Denmark

Best trip of your life???

He loves teaching you all the history of his home country, taking you everywhere he possibly can

Car sex

Sex on the beach

And even in a hidden corner of a museum

It’s like the honeymoon phase doesn’t end

And then the worst thing happens

One of your classmates is in Copenhagen for their own little trip

They see you with Claes in a cafe, kissing his cheek, holding his hand

They immediately report it (literally out of spite because who tf wouldn’t want to date Claes, come on, and they were high key jealous)

And when uni starts up again, a huge inquiry is undergoing

Both you and Claes are pretty much interrogated - they check your phones, they see if you have each other on social media, they check your emails, trying to find a n y t h i n g

And you agree afterwards that this can’t go on

It’s too risky to visit him outside of the university

And so it all has to stop

You’re a wreck

Because being with Claes was the happiest you had been in so long

You start dating someone new

And Claes almost quits

Your final year drags

Because you have to sit there

Looking at him

Being so close to him

But feeling the eyes of the other lecturer sent to sit in and watch and make sure no funny business was happening

One night, you go out and get just a little tipsy and find yourself at his home, throwing rocks at his bedroom window

He comes out and tells you to leave as much as it pains him to do so

You tell him you feel like dropping out, of you can’t have him then nothing matters

And he brings you inside

You don’t get any sleep, he fucks you over and over until your body is numb and your brain is nothing but a swirling mess of him

He ignores you after that

You find yourself transferred out of his classes and instead, you’re placed into professor Wells’ classes

You’re livid with him

How could he move you out of his classes after everything you’ve been through together?

You purposefully have him find you in public spaces with your new partner, a little closer than what would be accepted

He’s going stir crazy. He can’t stop thinking about the last night you spent together and how badly he needs to be with you again even if it costs him a job

Your graduation is suddenly upon you and it’s so bittersweet

You have finally gotten what you worked so hard for, but you will most likely never see Claes again now

Wrong

As you’re making your way off vampire for the last time, clutching your diploma, laughing with your friends, a voice calls your name

You turn, and he’s pushing past people to get to you

He reaches you and he has this dumb smile on his face, and then he says the stupidest yet most romantic thing

“Technically you’re not my student”

And he kisses you

In front of all of your friends, family, all of your former classmates, other teachers, everyone

He doesn’t even care

His hands are holding your face, pulling you close and you have to go on your tiptoes, in your damn heels, just to be able to wrap your arms around his neck

He promptly gets fired

But he doesn’t care because he’s waking up the next morning with you sleeping beside him and he feels like he’s won at life

#i think i went overboard with this one???#Authors AU Hour #hi i like drama #lmao #claes bang #claes bang x reader #claes bang x you #claes bang fanfiction

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therepublicofletters · 4 years

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Hey! I saw that you're studying art history and wondered if you'd be willing to talk a bit about it? I'd love to hear anything about your experience w classes, career aspirations, further education plans, etc. I would love to go back to school one day and study something that I could actually do for a living and love (hence my interest). Also if you've gotten this question a million times and are sick of it that's fine - no hard feelings :) Thank you so much xx

I’m always happy to talk about it! People will often ask “what do you plan on doing with a useless degree in art history/medieval studies?” and personally I intend on going into academia because I just love learning so much and it’s a way (despite all the red tape etc.) to do that and share it with other people, which is ultimately my goal. I’m not sure if that will mean working in a museum or at a university or in something like an archive; however I definitely don’t want to work at an auction house or for-profit gallery. I want to spend my time doing research and writing and teaching. I plan on getting a PhD, focusing on the Italian Renaissance.

As for classes, I’ve been really lucky to have great professors at my school. So far I’ve taken the survey intro course (which is considered a classic/must-take at Vassar; it’s taught by the entire department so each professor gives lectures on their specialty), 15th century Italian art, Medieval art, a class that was meant to focus on the ethics of collecting antiquities (but it became something rather different and more about the collection at our museum on campus, which was difficult considering that we weren’t even on campus for half of the semester), a short class on ancient urbanism, and seminars on Italian garden design and Raphael (which was meant to go along with the celebrations for the 500th anniversary of his death this year but, again, didn’t work out). Next semester I’m going to take Islamic art and architecture and a seminar on Baudelaire and mid/late 19th century aesthetics. I also work in special collections at our library so I get to work with professors and all the lovely old books we have, which range from Roman papyri to Medieval breviaries to modern small-press prints.

You know, though, it’s interesting - two of my favorite art history teachers started their careers in another field and then found that they were unhappy and decided to go back to school for art history. I know that that’s a rather privileged thing to be able to do, since you have to have the time and resources, but I suppose it goes to show that it is possible to change your career to something you love even after having made a choice.

#personal correspondence #art history #she goes to vassar #college #quid est studiosus sine studio

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manicpixiedreamjew · 5 years

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ok i rewrote and revised my letter! let me know what you think

2/9/19

Rabbi Randy,

As our Into class comes to an end, a lot has been on my mind. My spirituality, my values; how my perception of the world has changed as I solidify my Jewish identity, especially as a young woman. I spent a few hours poring over journal entries dating back all the way to 2016 this Shabbat, and a consistent theme stood out in all of them: an overwhelming, genuine urge to live an authentic Jewish life. I read, thrown back into the innocent curiosity, the puppy love, the childlike fascination with Jews and Judaism that began with a book. The Chosen, the very first Jewish book I read, and I’m sure I’ve told you this story before; I’ll spare the details.

Anyway, those first inklings of interest, say, early 2016, were academic. I was a vehement atheist born to a family of atheists. Then again, who has a nuanced understanding of religion and people-hood at sixteen? My atheism was an obstinate, cynical world view triggered by traumatic experiences with Christianity. When I picked up The Chosen, though...I was slapped right across the face. Judaism was the first thing that challenged my philosophies; it forced me into an entirely foreign universe I never thought I’d know, need or understand. It taught me empathy foremost, in those early days...studying Judaism exhorted me to bear the burden of others, to feed the hungry (a MAZON seminar comes to mind), comfort the weary. Looking at my journal, an entry dated 3/3/17 elaborates on the effects of antisemitism in America, and next to that a newspaper cut out of a Magen David. It wasn’t quite personal then, but it was something I wouldn’t have looked twice at a few years earlier. It disturbed me deeply.

Then, mid-late 2017. The journal entries shifted, as you’d expect; I’d been exhaustively involved in reading and researching by then. I see a lovingly inscribed entry detailing, religiously, my first Kabbalat Shabbat at CRC. 7/1/17. The smells, the melodies, my friends, the birthday celebration of two elderly men who loved baseball. “A deep, riveting admiration for something ancient and pulsing with life.” That puppy-love stage was in full effect, my love of Judaism and its personal implications blossomed over the springtime, although its fragrance wasn’t entirely sweet: I was forced to confront my identity and ask myself that looming question. Do I want to become a Jew?

That question threw me for a loop. It was an emotionally intense time. I confided to my closest friend that, although it may sound absurd, converting to Judaism was something I was interested in. I remember crying myself to sleep some nights because the decision was so massive, so heavy, so entirely suffocating for someone with no background in religion, no sense of community or family. Eventually, though, my fate did not seem so dire, and I came to my senses: I loved Judaism. I loved it, I love it. One of the first things that stood out to me and comforted me was the Jewish emphasis on family, something I never experienced. I clung to it: how someone’s always there for you; how you’re adopted into world-wide support network called the Tribe. How no matter where you travel, anywhere in the world, someone will enthusiastically invite you over for Shabbat lunch. How, because you are Jewish, you will never suffer alone.

That, then, began my serious resolve to be Jewish, do Jewish and live Jewish.

Ever since I met with you on 11/21/17 (I have an entry for that, too!), my life has been a foray into Jewishness. You told me to start observing Shabbat and Yom Tov, and I did so with vigor: I bought a chanukiah, acquired the shiniest candlesticks I could, and read every book the local library had regarding proper observances. I look back on my first few holidays and laugh now, playfully admonishing myself for my mistakes and mishaps. But that’s the fun, right? If I learned anything from this week’s Parsha (Terumah), it’s that the means are more much important than the end, the intention more meaningful than the actualization. Late 2017 to early 2018 was all that: learning, doing, experiencing, interacting, existing with a fat dose of humility. Organizing a basic Jewish vocabulary, and through Shabbat services and working with the community, pinning down what it means to live a Jewish life.

Enter 2018! This was, perhaps, the most frustrated and chaotic year on my Journey to Jewish. To start, it was my last semester of high-school. Everything, and I mean Everything, was dependent on my graduation—most saliently my own happiness and sanity. My synagogue attendance was dwindling, my ambition and motivation was all but absent. I’ve always suffered from depression and severe anxiety, but its clutch tightened horribly those first few months. I managed to attend a Kol Nidre service in early September—and, it remains one of my most beautiful and cherished memories to date. December, I know, was the hardest. Between my Catholic father making crusade jokes and my Jesus-obsessed mother spewing casual antisemitism, between unending loads of coursework and no free time, I felt my spirit literally withering. This never weakened my resolve to live Jewishly, but some days I just couldn’t bring myself to enact the values I knew I held in my heart. Some days Judaism felt like a beloved friend, and others Judaism felt like a stranger. Nevertheless I continued to live as Jewish a life I could, but even kindling the Chanukah candles felt joyless. I was like Tevye standing in the middle of the woods, anguished, as his horse refused to budge. Through all of it, though—the sadness, numbness, friction—I was never, ever, once deterred. That’s how life is sometimes. But to be a Jew, as our own Reb Tevye zealously insisted, you must have hope.

And I did. This is when Judaism became real to me, when I realized it was a part of my life and etched into my very being. If I could live Jewishly, study, be a part of my community and find solace while also dealing with these hardships, this was clearly meant to be. I’ve been using “us” and “we” pronouns for a few months now, referring to myself as Jewish even though I’ve yet to immerse in a mikveh. When our class visited the Holocaust museum, the loss and heartache I felt was profoundly intimate...a personal loss, the loss of family I never had the opportunity to know and love. I had never experienced anything like that before, and it continues to haunt me. I’ve been the target of hateful and ignorant remarks. People have glowered at my Magen David; they’ve called me names and insulted me. “Christ killer, money hoarder, dirty Jew.”

But, and I’m a bit weepy remembering this, living Jewishly (and loudly at that) is a blessing. Maybe two summers ago I catered to an older family for their son’s graduation party. An uncle approached me, blinked at my Magen David and muttered “bless you.” I was visibly shaken; I wasn’t sure what to make of it. Later in the evening the grandmother touched my shoulder and asked, “are you Jewish?” I told her I was a conversion student. She embraced me, dug out dreidels from her kitchen drawer, and told me that she was separated from her Judaism during childhood. That it was too dangerous for her to practice, that she wanted to go back to synagogue now that she was safe. I encouraged her daughter to finally have her bar mitzvah. My heart was full. Another memory I’m fond of: wishing a stranger chag Pesach sameach and Shabbat Shalom on the street. He was wearing a kippah. The smile on that man’s face was unforgettable.

Those moments, to me, were godly. Actions are a conduit of holiness; I’ve learned that over the years. To act with intent and sanctify the mundane is second nature to us. A bracha, a kind word, charity, song...everything is a vessel for godliness.

Fast forward a bit: 2019. As I grew into my adult identity, so did I into my Jewish identity. I had my 18th birthday, graduated, passed my driving test. I began to wrap my hair on Shabbat, meditate on the Sh’ma swathed in a tallit, give tzedakah. Often times I sat in the little CRC classroom and pondered on the application of my learning: how it translated into my everyday life, how it reconciled with my values as a progressive woman in today’s society...but mostly, I think, I thought about how at home I felt. I walk into CRC and immediately feel at peace; a part of a family, the member of a loving household. I walk into the sanctuary and about a dozen people are ready to greet me with big, heartfelt smiles. It melts me every single time.

Alright, I’ll quit boring you with all this schmaltz.

I’m not sure that there was one definite moment when I knew, for sure, that being Jewish was the right choice for me. In fact, to assume all that soul searching could fit into one tiny, fleeting, ephemeral moment is ridiculous...as you know from the absurd length of this letter, which is only a minute fraction of my story. Seriously, I could go on, and on, and on; but I digress. Sitting at our Sukkot celebration and dancing with all the other people, looking up through the sukkah and marveling at the hanging plants and leaves. Baking challah on Friday morning and realizing that somewhere, other Jewish women are doing the exact same thing. Feeling warm summer wind on my face, seeing fireflies flicker through the bushes and knowing that HaShem is there. Touching my siddur to the Torah for the first time and bristling, feeling as though something breathed new life into me. Group Aliyah, a guiding hand on my shoulder as we chant the brachot in clumsy unison…

Each moment (and many more, and yet more to come) reaffirmed the fact that Judaism is my home. Ruth said it more succinctly and eloquently than I ever could: Your people shall be my people, and your God shall be my God.

Randy, I never thought I’d be doing this. Ever. Looking back at the learning and growing I’ve done, reading those journals and reminiscing on my journey, I can firmly say, if you agree, I’m ready to enter this Covenant officially.

Thank you for everything, as always,

Zoë

#oops its 5 pages #save

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madamlaydebug · 5 years

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Toni Morrison (born Chloe Ardelia Wofford; February 18, 1931) is an American novelist, editor, and Professor Emeritus at Princeton University. Her novels are known for their epic themes, vivid dialogue, and richly detailed characters. Among her best known novels are The Bluest Eye (1970), Sula (1973), Song of Solomon (1977), and Beloved (1987).

Morrison won the Pulitzer Prize and the American Book Award in 1988 for Beloved. Beloved was adapted into a film of the same name (starring Oprah Winfrey and Danny Glover) in 1998. Morrison was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1993. In 1996, the National Endowment for the Humanities selected her for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. She was honored with the 1996 National Book Foundation's Medal of Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. Morrison was commissioned to write the libretto for a new opera, Margaret Garner, first performed in 2005. On May 29, 2012, Morrison received the Presidential Medal of Freedom. In 2016 Morrison received the PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction.

Toni Morrison was born in Lorain, Ohio, to Ramah (née Willis) and George Wofford. She is the second of four children in a working-class family. Her parents moved to Ohio to escape southern racism and instilled a sense of heritage through telling traditional African American folktales. She read frequently as a child; among her favorite authors were Jane Austen and Leo Tolstoy. She became a Catholic at the age of 12 and received the baptismal name "Anthony", which later became the basis for her nickname "Toni".

In 1949 Morrison enrolled at Howard University. She graduated in 1953 with a B.A. in English, and earned a Master of Arts from Cornell University in 1955. Her Master's thesis was Virginia Woolf's and William Faulkner's Treatment of the Alienated. She taught English, first at Texas Southern University in Houston for two years, then at Howard for seven years. While teaching at Howard, she met Harold Morrison, a Jamaican architect, whom she married in 1958. The couple had two children and divorced in 1964. After the breakup of her marriage, she began working as an editor in 1965 for a textbook publisher in Syracuse, going on two years later to Random House in New York City, where she became a senior trade-book editor. In that capacity, Morrison played a vital role in bringing black literature into the mainstream, editing books by authors such as Henry Dumas, Toni Cade Bambara, Angela Davis, and Gayl Jones.

Morrison began writing fiction as part of an informal group of poets and writers at Howard University who met to discuss their work. She attended one meeting with a short story about a black girl who longed to have blue eyes. She later developed the story as her first novel, The Bluest Eye (1970). She wrote it while raising two children and teaching at Howard.

In 1975 her novel Sula (1973) was nominated for the National Book Award. Her third novel, Song of Solomon (1977), brought her national attention. The book was a main selection of the Book of the Month Club, the first novel by a black writer to be so chosen since Richard Wright's Native Son in 1940. Song of Solomon won the National Book Critics Circle Award.

In 1987 Morrison's novel Beloved, inspired by the true story of runaway slave Margaret Garner, became a critical success. When the novel failed to win the National Book Award as well as the National Book Critics Circle Award, 48 black critics and writers protested the omission in a statement that was published in The New York Times on January 24, 1988. Not long afterwards, Beloved won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction and the American Book Award. It also won an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award. That same year, Morrison took a visiting professorship at Bard College.

Beloved was adapted into the 1998 film of the same name starring Oprah Winfrey and Danny Glover. Morrison later returned to Garner's life story in the libretto for a new opera, Margaret Garner, with music by Richard Danielpour. In May 2006, The New York Times Book Review named Beloved the best American novel published in the previous 25 years. In 1993 Morrison was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. Her citation reads: Toni Morrison, "who in novels characterized by visionary force and poetic import, gives life to an essential aspect of American reality." Shortly afterward, a fire destroyed her Rockland County, New York home.

In 1996 the National Endowment for the Humanities selected Morrison for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Morrison's lecture, entitled "The Future of Time: Literature and Diminished Expectations," began with the aphorism, "Time, it seems, has no future." She cautioned against the misuse of history to diminish expectations of the future.

Morrison was honored with the 1996 National Book Foundation's Medal of Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, which is awarded to a writer "who has enriched our literary heritage over a life of service, or a corpus of work."

In 2000, The Bluest Eye was chosen as a selection for Oprah's Book Club.

In addition to her novels, Morrison has written books for children with her younger son, Slade Morrison, who worked as a painter and musician. Slade died of pancreatic cancer on December 22, 2010, aged 45. Morrison's novel Home, half-written when Slade died, is dedicated to him.

Her 11th novel, entitled God Help the Child, was published 2015.

Although her novels typically concentrate on black women, Morrison does not identify her works as feminist. When asked in a 1998 interview "Why distance oneself from feminism?" she replied: "In order to be as free as I possibly can, in my own imagination, I can't take positions that are closed. Everything I've ever done, in the writing world, has been to expand articulation, rather than to close it, to open doors, sometimes, not even closing the book – leaving the endings open for reinterpretation, revisitation, a little ambiguity." She went on to state that she thought it "off-putting to some readers, who may feel that I'm involved in writing some kind of feminist tract. I don't subscribe to patriarchy, and I don't think it should be substituted with matriarchy. I think it's a question of equitable access, and opening doors to all sorts of things." Critics, however, have referred to her body of work as exemplifying characteristics of "postmodern feminism" by "altering Euro-American dichotomies by rewriting a history written by mainstream historians" and by her usage of shifting narration in Beloved and Paradise.

Morrison taught English at two branches of the State University of New York and at Rutgers University: New Brunswick Campus. In 1984 she was appointed to an Albert Schweitzer chair at the University at Albany, The State University of New York. From 1989 until her retirement in 2006, Morrison held the Robert F. Goheen Chair in the Humanities at Princeton University.

Though based in the Creative Writing Program at Princeton, Morrison did not regularly offer writing workshops to students after the late 1990s, a fact that earned her some criticism. Rather, she has conceived and developed the prestigious Princeton Atelier, a program that brings together talented students with critically acclaimed, world-famous artists. Together the students and the artists produce works of art that are presented to the public after a semester of collaboration. In her position at Princeton, Morrison used her insights to encourage not merely new and emerging writers, but artists working to develop new forms of art through interdisciplinary play and cooperation.

At its 1979 commencement ceremonies, Barnard College awarded her its highest honor, the Barnard Medal of Distinction. Oxford University awarded her an honorary Doctor of Letters degree in June 2005.

In November 2006, Morrison visited the Louvre Museum in Paris as the second in its "Grand Invité" program to guest-curate a month-long series of events across the arts on the theme of "The Foreigner's Home." Inspired by her curatorship, Morrison returned to Princeton in Fall 2008 to lead a small seminar, also entitled "The Foreigner's Home." Also that year, The New York Times Book Review named Beloved the best novel of the past 25 years. She continued to explore new art forms, writing the libretto for Margaret Garner, an American opera that explores the tragedy of slavery through the true life story of one woman's experiences. The opera debuted at the New York City Opera in 2007.

In May 2010, Morrison appeared at PEN World Voices for a conversation with Marlene van Niekerk and Kwame Anthony Appiah about South African literature, and specifically, van Niekerk's novel Agaat.

In May 2011, Morrison received an Honorary Doctor of Letters Degree from Rutgers University during commencement where she delivered a speech of the "pursuit of life, liberty, meaningfulness, integrity, and truth."

In March 2012, Morrison established a residency at Oberlin College. In addition to Home, Morrison also debuted another work in 2012: She worked with opera director Peter Sellars and songwriter Rokia Traoré on a new production inspired by William Shakespeare's Othello. The trio focused on the relationship between Othello's wife Desdemona and her African nurse, Barbary, in Desdemona, which premiered in London in the summer of 2012.

She is currently a member of the editorial board of The Nation magazine.

In writing about the 1998 impeachment of Bill Clinton, Morrison wrote that, since Whitewater, Bill Clinton had been mistreated because of his "Blackness":

Years ago, in the middle of the Whitewater investigation, one heard the first murmurs: white skin notwithstanding, this is our first black President. Blacker than any actual black person who could ever be elected in our children's lifetime. After all, Clinton displays almost every trope of blackness: single-parent household, born poor, working-class, saxophone-playing, McDonald's-and-junk-food-loving boy from Arkansas.

The phrase "our first Black president" was adopted as a positive by Bill Clinton supporters. When the Congressional Black Caucus honored the former president at its dinner in Washington D.C. on September 29, 2001, for instance, Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX), the chair, told the audience that Clinton "took so many initiatives he made us think for a while we had elected the first black president."

In the context of the 2008 Democratic Primary campaign, Morrison stated to Time magazine: "People misunderstood that phrase. I was deploring the way in which President Clinton was being treated, vis-à-vis the sex scandal that was surrounding him. I said he was being treated like a black on the street, already guilty, already a perp. I have no idea what his real instincts are, in terms of race." In the Democratic primary contest for the 2008 presidential race, Morrison endorsed Senator Barack Obama over Senator Hillary Clinton, though expressing admiration and respect for the latter.

In April 2015, speaking of the deaths of Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and Walter Scott—three unarmed black men killed by white police officers—Morrison said "People keep saying, 'We need to have a conversation about race.' This is the conversation. I want to see a cop shoot a white unarmed teenager in the back. And I want to see a white man convicted for raping a black woman. Then when you ask me, 'Is it over?', I will say yes."

Toni Morrison was the subject of a film entitled Imagine – Toni Morrison Remembers, directed by Jill Nicholls and shown on BBC1 television on July 15, 2015, in which Morrison talked to Alan Yentob about her life and work.

Morrison's papers are part of the permanent library collections of Princeton University. Morrison's decision to add her papers to Princeton instead of her alma mater Howard University was criticized by some within the historically black colleges and universities community.

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lettersfromhav · 7 years

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college advice from someone who’s been on both sides of it

So I'm finishing up my Ph.D. and preparing to depart for the real world (no, just kidding, I'm going to be in school forever, only in a different capacity) and I thought I'd put together a list of some college tips to share with you all. I graduated with my B.A. in 2012, magna cum laude, with 2 majors, 1 honours thesis, 2 on-campus jobs, and 3 music things. Since then, I've gone to grad school and also taught six semesters of first-year seminars. Now I'm going on the job market for teaching positions. All of this means that I've seen both sides of the college experience, as a student and as an instructor. There are a lot of great & useful college advice posts going around studyblr this time of here, and I wanted to add my own. I hope it’s useful. So here we go, with a “read more” because it’s long (sorry if you’re on mobile):

academics

find your classrooms ahead of time (profs' offices too)

figure out how long it will take you to walk between places

figure out where your best seat will be & claim it

say hi to the people next to you, learn their names

take notes in class

take advantage of extra credit

try your best not to fall asleep in class (and if you do fall asleep, apologise to the prof afterwards)

bring your glasses if you need them, don't be stubborn about it

check out the library, wander in the stacks, talk to the librarians

figure out how & where to print

buy used books/textbooks, or rent them, but be careful with ebooks (some profs don't allow them)

plan breaks into your class schedule, or block everything together, whichever works best for you

work out the pros & cons of 8am classes and/or night classes

plan ahead – have a planner, put things in it, do them

fake deadlines are a thing (write down earlier deadlines, trick yourself into meeting them, bask in satisfaction)

grades won’t be what they were in high school

keep in mind GPA values: a 3.5 will see you graduating with honours

be nice to the departmental administrative staff, thank them for helping you (even with small things)

office hours versus emailing profs: both will get your questions answered (probably) but if you can go and talk in person, do it

profs & TAs are people too, they have lives, they have bad days

if something comes up, talk to your prof, be honest but don't overshare, just show them you're trying

on that note, try

ask friends and especially older students for opinions about profs when you're deciding on your classes, but also check things out yourself

if your profs invite you to dinner/coffee/events, show up

unless the prof is not a good person, in which case AVOID and spread the word to your friends

if your friends spread this word to you, believe them

if you end up with a prof that your intuition tells you “no” about, trust that intuition

switch classes, talk to the dept. head, talk to the dean, do whatever you need to do

also document everything (save emails, screenshot things, write it down)

also “confidentiality” might be a lie, even if they tell you that your report is confidential (at my undergrad, only the counseling center & chaplain's offices were truly confidential, and even then only if there was no immediate threat)

the above isn't meant to scare you, just make you aware – statistically, you'll probably meet some people you'll wish you hadn't met, so take care of yourself and know your options

you might change your major a few times and that's ok

if it takes you more than 4 years to graduate, that's ok too

it's not the end of the world if you get a bad grade

it's not the end of the world if you need tutoring

tutoring is awesome & you should take advantage of it, especially if it's free -- campus writing centers are great too

it's not even the end of the world if you have to withdraw from a class, or take a leave of absence

keep at it & you will be fine

food

remember to eat

be nice to the dining hall staff (and all campus staff, especially maintenance/facilities, they are the ones who can help you out)

figure out how to discreetly take food from the dining hall (dry cereal, fruit, a sandwich, not entire pantries please)

keep snacks in your room (and don't eat them all at once)

fruits & vegetables are your friends

you all know this already but stay hydrated

take advantage of free food events on campus (my undergrad had a twitter dedicated to this)

sometimes religious organisations will host them – you can go even if you're not religious, just be polite

find a coffeeshop & be nice to the baristas, tip if you can

but also take it easy on the coffee consumption, you only have one heart

you still have to eat even if you get sick – at least what one of my family members calls the “BRAT diet” (bread, rice, applesauce, tea) until you feel better

if you have allergies, talk to the dining hall staff and explain your situation, ask them for advice & they should be able to help you out

if you feel pressured to diet or lose weight, 1) leave those people, and 2) eat what's right for your body

housing

make a roommate contract (rules for lights on/off, quiet hours, temperature control, guests, cleaning, locked doors, etc.)

don't lose your keys, but also don't wear a lanyard (carabiner inside a backpack pocket is a good plan)

unless lanyards are your thing, in which case, go for it

don't overspend on décor/bedding, go basic & minimal (rooms are small)

figure out how much sleep you need & get it, and try to stick to a routine

bring a padlock or two and some cable, use if it you feel you need to – also, laptop locks are under-rated, get one

bring a mirror, a lamp, and possibly a comfortable desk chair

extension cords with surge protectors are the way to go

if you want to bring a stuffed animal or something just bring it, don't worry about it not being “cool”

bring clothing that makes you feel like yourself when you wear it

get a plant or two and try not to kill it

open floor space creates the illusion of a bigger room

find out how to take out your trash & then actually do it

keep a few basic cleaning supplies in your room (Clorox or Lysol wipes will take care of almost anything in a dorm room, plus maybe a vacuum)

if you have white towels and white sheets, you can wash them together & add a little bleach, they will always look clean

lofted beds look nice but are a pain to change sheets on, just fyi

invest in a mattress topper (I say “invest”; mine was foam and like $20, no need to get super fancy)

if your mattress really is crap, talk to facilities about your options

invest in good headphones (this may actually be an investment)

bring a few favourite non-academic books to keep in your room for when you need a break from school reading

co-ed bathrooms might be a thing, it will be fine

if it's not fine, report it (RA, residence life, campus security) – be safe, kids

shower sandals are your friend – you might also want regular slippers

don't sexile your roommate – that's just rude, it's their room too, they're paying for housing just like you

if you are the one sexiled, have a conversation about it (after the fact, when everyone is clothed again) and lay out the rules

get your RA involved if need be, you have a right to your own room

don't hole up in your room all the time, but also don't be afraid to retreat back to it when you need to

if you have an apartment:

know what the deal is on how/when to pay rent, utilities, etc.; take photos for your security deposit; say hi to your neighbours even if you're not friends; have a basic toolkit; write down the non-emergency numbers for local police & fire and post them on your fridge; learn the system for taking out trash (dumpster, trash tags, etc.); make sure you know parking rules if you have a car; check your mail every day so it doesn't pile up; clean regularly

you will not survive college without a good living situation, so do whatever you need to do to make that happen

life

don't be afraid to do things alone

don't be afraid to fake-date your friends in order to get free stuff (for example, my undergrad had some free “couples” events on Valentine’s Day that a friend & I took advantage of a few times)

keep an eye out for dogs on campus & pet them (unless they're service dogs and hard at work, in which case admire from afar)

get a backpack that's comfortable to wear & can hold what you need

send postcards to your friends at other colleges (getting mail is surprisingly nice)

learn how to do laundry before you go to college

find the gym & use it (if it's free)

find the campus health clinic & use it (especially if it's free or low-cost)

don't leave your things unattended in the library even if it seems safe

learn how to use your local public transportation, if it exists

explore your town/city, bring friends along

bring a bicycle if you can and if your campus isn't entirely hills

if you have a car: wash it from time to time, keep the gas tank at least half full, get a snow shovel and keep it in your trunk (climate depending)

have at least one warm jacket, and one rain jacket (climate depending)

have good shoes, possibly boots – you'll likely be walking a lot

take early morning walks with friends (but be safe about it) and then go to breakfast together

find a playground & use it

go into campus buildings that you otherwise wouldn’t and explore – find new study spaces, cool art, comfortable chairs, who knows what

check out campus museums

join clubs you will actually enjoy, or that have people you want to spend time with

you can quit clubs at any time

you can change your mind any time – show up to an event, don't like it, leave, it's fine

you can also make up things if you need an excuse to leave -- no one will know, you are the master of your own schedule in college

there's something weirdly wonderful about showering at 5pm with the windows open, just saying

if you're queer and want to come out, come out; if not, no pressure

if you do, be careful about who you come out to, and what gets spread on social media -- look out for yourself

also your campus almost certainly has an lgbtq resource center so maybe use it (mine was a subset of the women's center)

if you came out using a term that then stops working for you, you're allowed to change your terms

don't drink too much, look out for your friends, tip $1 per drink, figure out which bar is least sketchy (also most sketchy – and then avoid that one)

the least sketchy bar is possibly going to be the place your profs hang out -- do the casual nod/wave to say hi if you see them, don’t just ignore them, but then get back to your friends

be super careful of what/how much you drink at house parties since you probably don’t know what you’re actually drinking

don't give in to pressure to be sexually active if it's not your thing

if it is your thing, still don't give into pressure, and also use protection every single time

enthusiastic consent is a thing, check in with your partner, make sure you're both good

get to know people in years both above and below yours

save people's numbers, names, birthdays in your phone

take photos with your friends & save them too

listen to your college’s radio station (maybe even DJ for them)

call your parents or family of choice from time to time, or at least text them

watch whatever will fit your mood and don't worry about what anyone thinks: childhood movies, HGTV, YouTube, whatever

in general don't worry so much about what people think, everyone is mostly a mess anyway

so try to be patient with people, and with yourself

survival kit: full water bottle (maybe one with a filter if your tap water is bad), gum or mints, lip balm, a pen, ibuprofen/advil, some cash

do what you want to do, within reason – you're an adult now and can make your own choices, so make good choices and be the person you want to be

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chandlermovestomichigan · 6 years

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Thanksgiving break seems like a good time to reflect on my semester.

With only a month remaining, I’m past the point where things started to get crazy. This week was certainly one of the more difficult weeks, with a project due Thursday, a test Friday, and two papers the following Tuesday. It’s not going to get easier anytime soon, but that’s okay.

This semester, I’m completing two of my three remaining requirements for my history major and my last class that’s part of the core curriculum

Constitutional Convention - Dr. Rahe I was really excited about this course when it was first announced. Unfortunately, I was not prepared for the very extensive reading requirements for each class. I regretted taking it for a little while, but I’m glad I stuck with it. I’ve enjoyed discussing the notes from the Constitutional Convention, and having a better understanding of why the Constitution is the way it is.

Ancient Rome - Dr. Calvert This has been a great class. My favorite part is that instead of tests, we write papers. I definitely think all history classes should be this way. It’s so much more valuable to spend time with a text and analyze it than to just memorize facts, which often happens on tests. I was surprised to learn that we have two papers due during finals week, though. Until about two weeks ago, I thought there would just be one.

Human Biology - Dr. Johnson I’ve complained before on this blog (when I took Physics/Chemistry) about how awful my experiences have been with science classes. I hoped this class would be different, but it is not. There’s a tendency in the core science classes to assume that— even though they’re taught to non-science majors— everyone in the class has a pretty decent understanding of the subject from high school, and that this class is just a review and extension of everything we learned before. My last biology class was seven years ago, and it was bad. I have no knowledge to build on, and I have learned nothing in this class. I hear the tests are difficult even for people who understand the material, so you can imagine how that’s going for me.

Philosophy of Education - Dr. Beier I’ve been interested in taking this class for a while, and I’m glad I finally could. It’s been really interesting. It’s definitely a philosophy class, not so much a “how to teach” class, which I like. We’ve read Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Aquinas, and, most recently, John Dewey. It’s all discussion-based, which is fun. I gave a presentation recently on “The Well-Trained Mind” by Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise. I think it went well.

Lastly, I’m still taking voice lessons with Kristi Matson, and that has been good, although more challenging than previous semesters.

I’m also now the web editor for the Collegian, so I edit the online-only section Study Break. It’s a good time. It’s pretty flexible, so I can pretty much run whatever I want to. It’s certainly a challenge to get writers to turn pieces in on time. There were a couple of times at the beginning of the semester when I scrambled to write something since the pieces I was counting on didn’t come in. I started assigning more pieces than I needed, and that worked for a while, but there have still been a surprising number of instances where I get pieces back very late, incomplete, or not at all.

I tend to try a new planner technique every year, and I’ve finally settled on my favorite yet. It’s called bullet journaling, and I wrote an explanation of it on Study Break. It’s been fun to adapt my layouts as the semester goes on to find out what works best for me. I like doodling, and I like the super customizable aspect.

As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t blog as much as I used to because I journal much more consistently. I started my “One Line a Day” journal over a year ago, so now I can read what I was doing on a year before when I write my entries, which I love. And, I can refer to my journal when I blog.

September highlights 9/2- Some guys who live off-campus in a house called “The Womb” threw a music festival called Wombstock. I had a blast listening to loud music, and later, hanging with friends at Rough Draft, my favorite coffee/cocktail place in town. 9/17- I went to the Toledo Museum of Art, thanks to the Art department! I posted a few photosets from this day earlier on the blog. We went mainly for the Berlin painter exhibit and saw a lot of really neat Greek vases, and I also enjoyed seeing two paintings by Monet and two by Van Gogh. 9/21- At every SAI meeting, someone performs a “musicale.” I performed my first this semester. I did “Sawdust & Diamonds” by Joanna Newsom. I love her and I have long wanted to perform one of her songs, but they are generally very long and require a harp. So, this was a good chance to play only the last third of this song and with a piano, since it was pretty low-key. 9/23- Every semester, SAI hosts a Rose Tea. It’s a chance to get to know our potential new members and reminisce, as seniors share a memory. It was more emotional than I intended, but in a good way. 9/29- I went to the Most Popular Fair on Earth! It was super fun seeing animals, eating donuts, and more with dear friends. My favorite part was seeing a baby cow who had been born just a few hours earlier!

October highlights 10/5- SAI pledging ceremony! My friend Elena Creed and I are now co-bigs to Jessica MacFarlane, which is very exciting! Initiation is happening soon. 10/7- The Phi Mu Alpha electric serenades are always a delight, and this year was no exception. I watched them at both the SAI house and at Mauck because I was so excited. 10/16- I took a journalism seminar with Matthew Continetti about the history of conservative journalism. There was a lot of really good reading, and I enjoyed the discussions as well. 10/20-22- Mom and dad flew in for Parent’s Weekend. We took family photos, got dinner at Handmade (a sandwich shop that I had never been to that was delicious), and hung out reading and listening to live music at Rough Draft. 10/25- Fall Break began, and I house sat for a professor. 10/16- I drove with friends to Frankenmuth, Michigan, a cute little Bavarian tourist-y town. And, my boyfriend Jonathan flew in and met us there! That was wonderful! We ate delicious German food and fudge and went to the world’s largest Christmas store. 10/27-28- I showed Jonathan around all the important spots, like the Arb, Baw Beese, Checker Records, and Rough Draft. 10/31- I went with friends to a Halloween party at Rough Draft (which I realize now I have mentioned a lot) and that was very fun!

November highlights 11/4- SAI concert! I sang Regina Spektor’s “Us” with Maddie Greb on violin and Sarah Schutte on piano. It was delightful. Here is a video. I also sang in our two group pieces (“Give My Regards to Broadway” and “New York, New York”) and in an ensemble for a Hamilton song. 11/7- Fall Convocation, and I suddenly felt like an actual senior. 11/10- I went to Phi Mu Alpha’s annual Battle of the Bands, and it was a blast, as always. 11/11- I saw the Opera Workshop performance of Pirates of Penzance, and it was incredible. 11/17- I saw the theatre department’s performance of Proof, which I really loved.

It’s been a good semester, and it’s hard to believe I only have one left.

#blog #photos #senior year #year four #fall #hillsdale #hillsdale college

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couldnt-think-of-a-funny-name · 7 years

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pls expand on your ridiculous experiences during one semester at a fake college

okay I got a few asks about this so let me see what I can remember right now. These might not all be in chronological order

- At orientation, they were talking about the reservation near campus and all these pretty sites and this kid in the back of the auditorium goes “So uhh…heard this place might be built over a Native American burial ground?”

- The speaker: “…Let’s not think about that, okay?”

- The freshman were on campus alone for like a week and a half (other than the RA’s) before the other students and I just. The parties. Were out of control. An ambulance was called basically every night.

- I walked into the bathroom the first night there to find a girl literally dying because someone slipped something in her drink and she was having a Very Bad Reaction

- Sting- you know, the singer- ‘s son lived in my residence hall. This boy almost accidentally killed me on three separate occasions (while I was just trying to do my laundry)

- I told my family about this at Thanksgiving. Everyone in the room advised me to seduce him

- I ate breakfast in the dining hall exactly once. I got scrambled eggs. I noticed no one had brought out ketchup with the condiments and politely asked about it. I received glares from at least ten different people. Apparently people there don’t believe in ketchup on eggs.

- There were these two boys in my English class known as “The Lumbard Guys”. They didn’t live in my residence hall, but they would come over almost every night, start a party, and destroy part of the basement.

- At orientation this one kid got mad and set his shoe on fire to prove a point

- Also at orientation like??? My roommate disappeared???? And I never saw her again???

- Listen like…this campus just looked like the perfect setting for a horror film, but none of the people from the area got that. They all thought I was crazy until some comic from Comedy Central did a stand up act and said “Why the hell is this campus so creepy? I feel like I’m gonna leave here with someone else wearing my face!”. I felt way too validated.

- ALL OF MY CLASSES WERE SO FAKE

- My “math” class was actually a disguised home ec. course???? All we had were word problems that were incredibly detailed recipes or instructions on how to fix things. The teacher, who I swear to GOD was actually my Mr-Rogers-Wannabe guidance counselor from high school in disguise, spent more time trying to come up with names and backstories for the models in the text book than actually trying to teach

- I had to take a class called “first year seminar” because neither of my parents went to college. It was supposed to be teaching you about how the school works and stuff but SUPRISE BITCH WE’RE JUST GONNA YELL ABOUT RACISM AND PRIVELGE FOR AN HOUR.

- Literally that’s all we did. Just the whole class bonding over all these struggles we had gone through and getting fired up. Like, it was great, but I also ended up knowing very little about campus and school stuff bc that was the class that was supposed to be teaching me lmao

- My Psych teacher was fucking hysterical for the first few classes but then he just. Vanished. I had to drop the class

- My Fine Arts teacher just. Couldn’t stick to a teaching plan. Her entire wardrobe was scarves. She was very passionate about African masks. She had a flapper haircut. She spoke quietly, but with a marvelously forced tone of voice that I’m certain was her trying to sound impressive and hide a Boston accent. She didn’t seem to understand the year was 2014. She took us into the city to go to the Art Museum and we lost her in there, never to be seen again

- I’m not even kidding

- My “writing” teacher was my absolute fav omfg. She was this long grey haired hippie lady who worked as a nurse for the Grateful Dead and was still stuck there. She may or may not have hooked up with my uncle. I was her favorite student because one day I came in wearing a “HAIR” shirt. She wanted to take the class to England for the sole purpose of going on a Beatles tour

- But like…she did not teach a writing class omfg. She taught a social justice class. All we did was have informed debates about The Issues and listen to music and occasionally watch the Breakfast Club. Every time there was a big paper due on the syllabus, she’d just sit on her desk and go “I mean, I don’t have to cover anything, right? You guys know how to write!” Like I genuinely don’t think she knew what class she was teaching

- There was a boy who sat next to me in that class. He was deaf in one ear and used that as an excuse when he got caught blatantly not paying attention. It worked every time. But I was right next to him. I saw him playing Yu-Gi-Oh on some website on his phone under the table. One time we started talking about model cars and he pre-cummed.

- There was a boy who roamed the campus in a long black trench coat and a weird hat. I never saw his body and started to suspect he might not have one, just the theory of one. He took interest in me because I was the only person in class who ever got his Doctor Who jokes. He’d come up to me at dinner and blast quiz me on various nerd culture before running off and disappearing into the shadows. Just as I was starting to grudgingly accept I was probably going to have to eventually hook up with him for the greater good, I apparently offended him by saying I like Picard more than Kirk. He didn’t stick around to listen to my reasoning. Whenever I saw him after that he would loudly start talking about how great his girlfriend was. Everyone knew he was lying. I wonder if Kirk ever sucked his theoretical dick as well as I would have.

- I gave a football player a shout out on Yik Yak. He really appreciated it, and gave me some fries laced with weed as a thanks. That was such A Night ™ , I watched the Lorax and left the dimension.

- Every time we had dances, this creepy guy named Horace would find me and use my obvious discomfort to make me dance with him. He’d hold my wrists and shove his crotch on mine while vaguely swaying to the beat. I had to escape to the bathroom every few minutes. Finally the security just banned him from the events altogether. I can still see his face clearly in my mind.

- One night, I walked into the bathroom to find a perfect, untouched pizza laying on the floor…but not in a box. Someone literally just took it out of the box and laid it down. I’m still fuming.

- One time I was in the mostly empty library when I smelled something. I walked down the rows of shelves before rounding the corner, and found the President of the college hidden there, sitting on the floor, smoking, a bottle of vodka in his hands. We held eye contact for a solid minute. He slowly shook his head at me. I said “Sir, your house is like…literally across the street.” He shook his head more vigorously. I left the library.

- One night, I heard screaming. I looked out the window to find a girl in a giraffe costume scaling my building. People were throwing water bottles at her. I was concerned. I didn’t know who to talk to for answers.

- I was in line trying to pay for dinner. One of the lunch ladies climbed on top of the ice cream machine and refused to come down. Her friend came over and they started recreating the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet. Very few people acknowledged it.

- Someone jacked up the soda dispenser so it was only dispensing beer. None of the staff cared enough to fix it.

- I caught my RA in the middle of a drug deal so she gave me a coupon for free ice cream

- Also side note: The soft served ice cream machine on campus was actually a frozen yogurt machine. I had no problem with that, but like, advertise correctly, you know? Nobody else seemed to understand my confusion. Nobody else seemed to understand that froyo and ice cream are two different things. What the hell.

- There were just…so many moths all over the campus. A terrifying amount. When it started getting colder I was like, finally, I won’t be attacked by moths anymore! Only for even more moths to appear. I asked a local about it. “Oh, those are the winter moths!” What the fuck are winter moths? What the fuck, Massachusetts? My friend back home grew convinced that Mothman was in the area. I was inclined to believe her. Sometimes I close my eyes and all I can see are moths everywhere, waiting for the moment to strike.

- I’ve encountered deer many times in my life. I know how they act around people. But the deer on this campus were just weird. They’d run out at people all the time. One almost shoved me into traffic.

- My roommate gave my phone number out to literally anyone she found who mentioned they liked to read or liked Doctor Who. She was concerned I had no friends. No one ever called.

- I met a small Greek girl in my Fine Arts class. Our first day of talking, she made me climb a mountain with her so she could get to tutoring, even though I had no reason to be in that building. Her roommates kept mysteriously disappearing. She was late to everything. She’d call me randomly to get food at 1 in the morning. She kept somehow breaking phones and tvs and other electronics. When I asked her how they kept breaking, she waved it off with “Oh, I have OCD. You wouldn’t understand”. I have OCD, and I still don’t understand. One time she invited me out with her friends from high school. I waited outside her building for two hours, while the other friends waited in the parking lot for two hours, because we didn’t know how to find each other. She eventually came outside at 10:30 pm. We went to Friendly’s. She made us stop at her house so she could grab something. We pulled up a long, winding driveway and stopped in a parking lot. At the end of the parking lot were stone stairs that lead up to a mansion on a hill. She ran inside and the rest of us stayed in the car, listening to High School Musical and talking about Supernatural. When she came out 40 minutes later we decided to try and prank her. It went wrong. We almost ran over her friend’s sister with the car. They invited me to a pumpkin patch. When I started complaining about my roommate, she asked me to move in with her. I thought about the other three girls who had seemingly gone missing. I politely declined. Six months after I left the school, I received a text from her asking for notes for an exam, and radio silence after that. I can’t find her on facebook. I fear she might have gone missing too.

- One night, as I was standing outside huddled in the cold, a boy came up and offered me a cigarette to help me stay warm. I turned it down, but he stood around talking to me for a few minutes afterwards. I felt absolutely no awkwardness at all. He was a musician from Colorado. He sang a bit of one of his songs. He was dropping out of school to go to California the next week. He told me I had beautiful eyes, but his were the most alive eyes I’ve ever seen so I couldn’t believe the compliment. We talked for about ten minutes and I fell a little bit in love. He had to rush off to a club meeting, but he told me he’d rather keep talking. He gave me the sweetest smile before he left. I didn’t get his last name or number and I never saw him again.

- There was a dance on Halloween. I couldn’t think of a sufficiently slutty yet classy costume, so I just went as Osgood from Doctor Who. When I got there there was a huge crowd, but people quickly grew bored and started leaving. There ended up being six people left (myself included). We stayed because we could see the upset faces of everyone who had planned the event, but actually had one of the most fun nights of my life. We- myself, the girl from across the hall, Trench Coat Boy, his tiny friend who never spoke, and a boy and girl I didn’t know who seemed to be professional dancers- danced nonstop for almost three hours. The strobe lights and poppy music solidified an unspoken bond. I had never and to this day haven’t felt as free as I did that night. The tiny quiet boy’s smile could have lit up a city. It’s etched into my mind. We all left the dance talking about the surreal feeling in the air, as if something had shifted. None of us ever mentioned the dance again. It’s still one of my fondest memories.

- For a solid month, there was someone in a gorilla costume running around campus.

- There was a rash of sexual assaults on campus. A gang of boys kept jumping girls in the woods. The only thing the school board did was give out free rape whistles at lunch one day. I missed that day, making me one of the only students on campus without a whistle. Later that night when I ordered pizza, the delivery guy tried to start up a conversation with me about all the assaults. He blamed the girls. I took back my tip.

- Sometimes the showers just…filled up with black sludge. No one knew why.

- The girls in the room next to me were very bizarre. They always shot me odd looks and whispered to each other constantly. I couldn’t figure out if they were sleeping together or not. They never washed their hands when we were in the bathroom.

- The doors to each dorm were thick and heavy and required effort to push them open. My roommate and I made sure to lock ours every night, and would triple check it. It swung open by itself almost every night. The channels on the tv would change with the remote equidistance away from us. Sometimes I heard humming in the showers when I was the only one in there.

- My roommate…deserves a whole separate post dedicated to her, honestly.

- She would call her mother and have her do her homework for her. She blasted music constantly, and it was either country or hard rap, nothing in between. She sexiled me constantly. I once walked in on anal. She’d meet guys on Tinder, fall in love with them after a couple of days, and then bring them into the school and into our room like it was no big deal. One of them made it clear he was a budding serial killer. She was in a new drama every week. One time someone called her a dilf on Yik Yak. She was firmly convinced her cousin was blonde because her aunt dyed her hair when she was pregnant. She tried her hardest to get me laid by a football player. She was the loudest drunk I’ve ever encountered. Honestly there’s just too much about her for this omfg

- John Zaffis, the famous paranormal researcher, came to the school on my birthday. I went because I’m a loser who’s been watching shows with him since I was a kid, and I was having a bad day so I decided it could be a treat. I sat in the front row. He held an uncomfortable amount of eye contact with me the entire presentation. He was impressed with my questions. He lamented about the fact he’s always cut out of movies or replaced by priests that look like him. He apparently came to the school every year around Halloween to do a ghost tour around the campus for the students. A girl allegedly killed herself in my floor’s bathroom. He apparently always got a lot of activity around the campus. Everyone in the freshman class started wondering if the rumors about the Native American burial ground were true.

- One time in “writing” class the teacher gave us a number and then whatever song came up as that when we put our music on shuffle we had to play for the class. I ended up with “Touch Me” from Spring Awakening. Midway through the song, the teacher from another class came to complain that they could hear everything. My teacher tried to defend that all music has an important message. “Molly, dear, tell her the message in this song!” I looked around the room and at the other teacher. “It’s about sex,” I said quietly. She stormed out of the room while the class started laughing.

- There was this girl that just had the natural ability to make anything boring. I feel bad saying that, because she’s such a sweet girl, and she’s smart, and she’s gorgeous, and she’s talented, but just…every time she says anything, it’s boring. I’m still friends with her on facebook, the talent transcends to writing as well. You could be having a fun, lively conversation and she could say something completely relevant to the point and yet it would still just be boring. It’s a baffling talent, I still don’t understand how she does it.

- There was a boy who’d come into my room. He lusted over my s’mores poptarts. He kept trying to hit the high notes in Broadway songs. He didn’t understand my sense of humor at all, so we both were constantly worried we were offending each other. He cried about Selena Gomez a lot.

- The dining hall only offered horrendous food. I had pasta almost every night because it was the only thing remotely edible. If you wanted good food, you had to go to Late Night, which was between like 10:30 and 1 I think??? They set it up specifically for stoners and people leaving parties. I was frequently the only sober person there. Except for the moths.

- The chief at the pasta place found out I like theater and got like…weirdly passionate about it. He kept telling me about different theater groups in the area and wanted to know if I was in the school musical. He asked me every time I went up for food.

- There was a disproportionate amount of large black birds to trees. It wasn’t hard to figure out why we so rarely saw smaller animals

- When I told my advisor I was thinking about leaving (mostly for financial reasons but also the fake classes were preventing me from getting an education I wanted, you know?), this little old man looked around his office as if checking for people listening in, then put his hand on top of mine, leaned in close, and whispered “Oh, you sweet little girl. Run as fast as you can.”

There’s definitely more but listen. This school was weird and fake and vaguely surreal and off-kilter. I am fully afraid that one day, years from now, I’m going to be driving through the back roads and pass the place where the campus should be, only I won’t find anything there at all, and won’t be able to find any trace of it ever existing. I won’t be able to find any record of it. I won’t be able to find a record of any of the people. Every time I think about this place I just get a weird feeling, like I somehow managed to escape the Twilight Zone but left a part of me behind in the process. Be careful when applying to college, kids.

#college life #college lyfe #true story #glitch in the matrix #liminal spaces #asks #molly mumbles

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averyevilunicorn · 7 years

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The last academic year: a special edition

I’ve been feeling kind of down about how little I’ve done in my first year (courtesy of my assessors, who pretty much spelled it out for me), so I’ve tried to assess all that has happened. So...

happy arrival to the university to start my Phd in October

the announcement that my supervisor is leaving and that my department is closing

a relatively normal first term, with a preliminary semantic essay written, the text corpus assembled as well (ignoring the fact that it then changed)

my mother in a hospital in critical condition, with me being unable to go back to my country

intense pain and tendency to having constant vertigo since january

my mother getting better and my college starting to ask what the hell is happening in my department

accepted in a research group not that related to my doctorate, but the one i really wanted to get in

my first one-hour seminar talk, nearly losing consciousness in the middle and needing to take a break, but deciding to be tough and finish it

finishing the second term with 'i taught at high school about medieval history' being the most significant progress, though i've also written a first version of the paper for my transfer of status

an even stronger tendency to having constant vertigo during march and april, technical house arrest and 'if you ever faint, go directly to hospital'

a shitload of medical tests, diagnose of a slight B12 deficiency and suggestion to also visit a neurologist

my mild lactose intolerance has been transformed into a not so mild lactose intolerance

my department still can't decide what will happen with my studies

a bit of a needed health break in may, with a lot of research group workshops, one graduate conference and really exciting training with museum education officers

vertigo returns with a vengeance, inability to break repetitive motions for hours, inability to tolerate loud noises, one breakdown in my supervisor's office

submitting my transfer of status paper, attending teaching in higher ed training and then one cataleptic episode lasting 10 minutes and scaring the people around, all in one day

one out-of-hours GP visit and a ban on driving and cycling

my department still can't decide what will happen with my studies

one hospital assessment with other shitloads of tests, a long interview and 'i have a good news for you, i don't think there's anything wrong with your brain. i think you just might be autistic.'

all in all the third term was a strange one, and i've rewarded myself with visiting a nice conference in my favourite country and short holidays in Scotland, which went well except for airport breakdowns, but they're kind of the norm for me

my abstract got accepted for my first regular, not graduate-only conference (happy and scared - see, doc, sometimes i am actually able to identify my emotions immediately)

one assessment of my entire life at university's counseling services, 'had any one suggested anything about your behaviour when you were younger?' - 'well, my family always made fun of my speech patterns and my movements, my kindergarten teachers complained i prefer playing with objects rather than children, lack motivation for interaction with others and seem to not understand or willfully ignore instructions for group activities, i started school only at 7 since teachers previously didn't think i would be able to cope, and throughout the whole school experience there were loads of accidents involving wrong smells, wrong music and my overall 'oversensitivity' to pretty much anything, and... shall i continue?'

passing the transfer of status interview, in the same day (i'm starting to see where i'm possibly making a mistake) while being told i did good work, but i should be able to do more in one year (yeah, i wish)

with the help of the counselor, a 'fast-track' application for a referral to a specialist for a possibility of Asperger's syndrome

waiting to hear back

my mother's reaction: 'So I've tried to read what it is they're trying to diagnose you with... and it actually makes sense! every single weird thing you did i could never understand suddenly makes sense!'

one, for the lack of better term, epileptic episode caused by the sudden and unexpected use of a frigging stroboscope, several and shorter cataleptic ones (i don't think i'm ever getting that driving license)

the common practice of interacting with people while covering my ears almost all the time

explaining things to friends: 'you didn't want to speak with me, i don't know why' 'well i was holding my hand in a really odd position, staring past you without blinking and absolutely unable to move for several minutes even though you talked to me, maybe it was more than just not wanting to speak with you, i speak with you all the time' - 'well, it looked like you don't want to speak with me, it was kind of rude'

i have a new supervisor and it's actually someone i know and like, yay, and i do not need to move to a different university

waiting to hear back

So, yeah, this way it seems a bit better, since there were many times when I just wasn’t able to do anything. But the silent judgment was still kind of grating... Let’s just hope the next academic year is a bit more productive. And I should probably really get better at scheduling things.

And to talk about future a bit (motivation!), September plans include:

another meeting with my counselor, to discuss how to make the new academic year a bit less wild

updating my GP about my summer adventures, particularly the ‘it kind of looked like epileptic seizure’ episode

the great room change-over day, which i am really not looking forward (but i'm getting a nicer and more comfortable room, so i'm trying to think positively)

the final preparations for the gallery talk which i will be giving in autumn, stemming from our research group, and all other things associated with the exhibition

meeting with my new supervisor, to consult my plans for the new academic year

writing the paper for the conference

revising the syllabus for the high school history classes

reading, reading, reading (Patristics and Old Irish primary text mainly, the never-ending secondary literature reading list on medieval magic secondly)

really starting to write my thesis in a thesis format, not as a series of loosely connected essays on interesting topics

#academic year #academic health #productivity is a relative concept anyway #but i really hope next year will be better or i won't be able to finish on time

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i-only-blow-bubbles · 6 years

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Everyone knows that college is not cheap. It’s an investment that people make in the hopes of getting a job that requires skills gained from higher education. Many people take out loans, apply for scholarships or work in order to attend universities of all sizes.

In my case, I was blessed to have a wonderful scholarship from the Hendrick Scholarship Foundation. This scholarship is unique in that they don’t just give you money. Rather, they are focused on providing you with all of the resources that you may need in order to be successful.

A part of this is a requirement for me to attend two seminars a year to expand my skill set. The seminar that I did actually counted for two, and it was a course that taught me financial skills and information. Now I know what a mortgage is, how to determine what credit cards are best for me and what different retirement plans are.

Additionally, I am supported by an amazing group of people. I have a personal sponsor, named Barbara, who checks in on me from time to time and gives me advice if I ever have questions. She is a hard working lady who is sweet enough to take the time to talk to me about almost anything. I also have the team at Hendrick, who have been nothing but loving, motivating and supportive. There’s Veronica, who I talk to about most things, Greg, who is in charge, and Laura, who is the new receptionist. Lindsey used to be in Laura’s spot, and I actually got to know her better. She is a ball of energy and never fails to make me laugh or smile.

Thanks to Hendrick, I have the majority of tuition paid for every semester, and I don’t know what I would do without them.

In order to pay for the rest of things at college, such as my apartment, my groceries and occasional outings with friends, I took up a few jobs. The first one that I got was at the Campus Computer Store. My job description includes selling computers, cleaning and handing out flyers from time to time. However, the most important thing that I gained was not a paycheck but the group of friends that came with it.

Since I spend the majority of my time at the store, I have gotten to know my coworkers well. They are the people that have given me countless, priceless memories while here at UT. They have taken me to the movies, taught me how to two-step and shown me around Austin. These are the people that go to dance classes with me, the people that go to dinner with me, and the people that I get to mess with.

In addition to the store, I found another job opportunity through Texas Belles EPO, an event planning organization that I am now the communications director for. This job was for a student manager of events at the Blanton Museum of Art. And let me tell you, this job makes me feel so sophisticated.

While I am the youngest one on staff, it is my job to help manage events, whether it is to tell people that they aren’t following building rules, to monitor catering crews that are setting up or to clean up any spills in the area. In other words, I get to wear fancy clothes, wear a name tag that says MANAGER and tell people what to do in certain situations. Pretty cool, right?

It also means that I get to attend amazing events planned by my even more amazing boss, Stacy. This lady is the sweetest, most hardworking woman that you could ever meet. She is always so patient, and she goes with the flow of things. She also has a keen eye for events, and she plans wonderful things like galas and new exhibit parties that we call B-Scenes. Dawn, another amazing woman that I get to work for, also helps to plan these events, and she is so much fun to work with.

The Blanton also serves as a venue for events that we don’t plan, which are mainly handled by Christa, who is basically an older version of me. Because of this, I have gotten to attend a Jewish wedding, the International Symposium on Online Journalism (which I got a bag, umbrella, and thermos from!!!) and multiple musical performances.

Beyond the store and the museum, I pick up oddball jobs from caterers or event planners who are looking for extra hands. These are opportunities that I also get from Texas Belles EPO. These have included packaging donuts in boxes at 7a.m. on a Sunday for a Google PR event, managing the coat rack at a party for a video game development company and spinning cotton candy at countless events. I’m even going to be spinning cotton candy this weekend for Austin’s Pecan Festival. These odd jobs have given me the opportunity to make connections in the events world as well as learn new skills and practice hospitality.

While this does seem like a lot at first glance, it really isn’t. Because I know how to manage my time fairly well, thanks to my Passion Planner, I have been able to balance school and work effectively. I say effectively because it isn’t perfect. It is a constant trade off. I can stay up studying and be prepared for class and have my body unprepared for a day of work or I can sleep and eat and not necessarily get all of my work done. It’s a juggling act. And even though I may have almost slipped at times, I haven’t dropped a single thing.

I’m usually quite glad to be working a lot. I remember last semester just wondering what to do with myself because there were so many time gaps. I was used to high school where I was hopping from one thing to the next. Perhaps most people use their free time to study? I don’t know. I don’t need large expanses of time to study and make good grades. In fact, I work better under pressure. I like to feel challenged.

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Year In Review: Working As A College Student Everyone knows that college is not cheap. It's an investment that people make in the hopes of getting a job that requires skills gained from higher education.

#Blanton Museum of Art #Campus Computer Store #college #Event Planning #Fancy Fluff #Friends #Opportunities #Sales #Work

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uniliving · 7 years

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A Studycation this Summer In London Part 1

Do you groan at the name Summer school? Well, you really need to read this article. We see summers as a time for vacation and party but we miss the fact that we completely lose touch with our academic ground. Why not take a midway? Have a great time and not lose touch with your academics at the same time. But, how you ask?

Well, my friend, the answer to this question is summer school.

Summer schools help opening up new educational horizons and push you towards academic excellence while entailing the element of fun in the curriculum. They have smaller class sizes which help you become more active and confident in the class. There are field trips, research work that lets you go out and about in London. You explore as you learn, so hard to find a deal like that. Isn't it?

Academic summer schools cater to two different audiences:

1. The ones who are still at school - Pre-University Summer School

For those who are still at school, this kind of programs helps in getting a head start in the university front so that you are well prepared for the actual marathon. You get an idea of the academics and the activities you will be interested in, helping you make an informed decision later.

2. The ones who are studying at University or are Graduates

There are a wide array of options of summer schools for recent graduates and University students in London. The opportunities are academic as well as include industry related trips in and around London. Most times, courses can often be taken for credit towards degrees at your home institution.

Summer Schools in London

From literature to architecture, London has immense amount of prospects for you to delve into. We recommend you on choosing a course that excites you and gives you a learning that will further help you in your degree. Some prominent options we suggest are:

1. London School of Economics & Political Science :

LSE offers courses in English, Accounting, International Relations, Culture, and Law etc. You can choose from 80 specializations for the three week course. They also have Executive Summer School, Methods Summer Programme and Summer Languages Programme.

2. Imperial College London :

Imperial College Business School provides courses to undergraduates and postgraduates in the field of Strategic Marketing, Corporate Finance, Entrepreneurship and Business consulting. They also have courses aimed at 16-17 year olds who have a passion for science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

3. Royal center of Speech and Drama :

If you have a flair for theatre and improvisation, this is the place to me. Royal center of Speech and Drama has acting, voice and youth courses. The acting course has elements like musical theatre, stage combat while the voice course has insights on voice modulation and performance. The youth course is for students between 6 to 17 who want to develop theatre skills.

4. King’s college, London :

King’s college has summer courses for university, pre-university and graduate students. There are Summer study visits about a place’s history, summer weekends where classes happen on weekends, and summer courses on health, law , science, business etc.

5. London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine :

This research university provides courses ranging from global mental health, cancer survival to travel medication. The course duration ranges from a day to a three-month program. Students gets to research with the latest technology to improve world health issues.

6. City University London :

The Summer school module at Cass Business School includes lectures on quantitative abilities, finance, decision making and mergers. They also have real life corporate interactions to get hand on experience

7. Courtauld Institute of Art :

This summer course offers classes in front of art in museums and art galleries in and around London. You can choose from 32 courses, on the basis of period like medieval, renaissance, modern, contemporary etc.

8. Royal Veterinary College :

The two-week program at Royal Veterinary College is for students interested in a career in veterinary medicine or biological science. The two-week summer school allows you to explore central London and the English countryside

9. University of Westminster :

With modules as varied as Tourism, Media, English, Liberal arts etc., University of Westminster offers three-week courses for students who are studying at the University or are recent graduates.

10. University College London (UCL) :

UCL has three and six week’s courses to choose from like Anthropology, Economics, Business, Geography, Health and Law. The modules are taught on the Bloomsbury campus and include lectures, seminars, group work as well as excursions and field trips to areas of interest in and around London. They also have exclusive summer course in English language helps students to improve their communication. There are also a series of visits to places of significant cultural importance around London such as Tate Britain Art Gallery and the BBC.

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blackkudos · 7 years

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Toni Morrison

Early life and career

Writing career

In 2000, The Bluest Eye was chosen as a selection for Oprah's Book Club.

Her 11th novel, entitled God Help the Child, was published 2015.

Relationship to feminism

Later life

At its 1979 commencement ceremonies, Barnard College awarded her its highest honor, the Barnard Medal of Distinction. Oxford University awarded her an honorary Doctor of Letters degree in June 2005.

In May 2010, Morrison appeared at PEN World Voices for a conversation with Marlene van Niekerk and Kwame Anthony Appiah about South African literature, and specifically, van Niekerk's novel Agaat.

She is currently a member of the editorial board of The Nation magazine.

Politics

In writing about the 1998 impeachment of Bill Clinton, Morrison wrote that, since Whitewater, Bill Clinton had been mistreated because of his "Blackness":

Documentary film

Papers

Bibliography

Novels

The Bluest Eye. 1970. ISBN 0-452-28706-5.

Sula. 1973. ISBN 1-4000-3343-8.

Song of Solomon. 1977. ISBN 1-4000-3342-X.

Tar Baby. 1981. ISBN 1-4000-3344-6.

Beloved. 1987. ISBN 1-4000-3341-1.

Jazz. 1992. ISBN 1-4000-7621-8.

Paradise. 1997. ISBN 0-679-43374-0.

Love. 2003. ISBN 0-375-40944-0.

A Mercy. 2008. ISBN 978-0-307-26423-7.

Home. 2012. ISBN 0307594165.

God Help the Child. 2015. ISBN 0307594173.

Children's literature (with Slade Morrison)

The Big Box (1999)

The Book of Mean People (2002)

Peeny Butter Fudge (2009)

Short fiction

"Recitatif" (1983)

Plays

Dreaming Emmett (performed 1986)

Desdemona (first performed May 15, 2011, in Vienna)

Libretto

Margaret Garner (first performed May 2005)

Non-fiction

The Black Book (1974)

Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination (1992)

Race-ing Justice, En-gendering Power: Essays on Anita Hill, Clarence Thomas, and the Construction of Social Reality (editor) (1992)

Birth of a Nation'hood: Gaze, Script, and Spectacle in the O.J. Simpson Case (co-editor) (1997)

Remember: The Journey to School Integration (April 2004)

What Moves at the Margin: Selected Nonfiction, edited by Carolyn C. Denard (April 2008)

Burn This Book: Essay Anthology, editor (2009)

Articles

"Introduction." Mark Twain, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. [1885] The Oxford Mark Twain, edited by Shelley Fisher Fishkin. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996, pp. xxxii–xli.

Awards and nominations

Awards

1977: National Book Critics Circle Award for Song of Solomon

1977: American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Award

1987–88: Robert F. Kennedy Book Award

1988: Helmerich Award

1988: American Book Award for Beloved

1988: Anisfield-Wolf Book Award in Race Relations for Beloved

1988: Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for Beloved

1988: Frederic G. Melcher Book Award for Beloved. A remark in her acceptance speech that "there is no suitable memorial or plaque or wreath or wall or park or skyscraper lobby" honoring the memory of the human beings forced into slavery and brought to the United States; "There's no small bench by the road," led the Toni Morrison Society to begin installing benches at significant sites in the history of slavery in America; the first "bench by the road" was dedicated July 26, 2008, on Sullivan's Island, South Carolina, the point of entry for approximately 40 percent of the enslaved Africans brought to British North America.

1989: MLA Commonwealth Award in Literature

1989: Honorary Doctor of Letters at Harvard University

1993: Nobel Prize for Literature

1993: Commander of the Arts and Letters, Paris

1994: Condorcet Medal, Paris

1994: Pearl Buck Award

1994: Rhegium Julii Prize for Literature

1996: Jefferson Lecture

1996: National Book Foundation's Medal of Distinguished Contribution to American Letters

2000: National Humanities Medal

2002: 100 Greatest African Americans, list by Molefi Kete Asante

2005: Honorary Doctorate of Letters from Oxford University

2008: New Jersey Hall of Fame inductee

2009: Norman Mailer Prize, Lifetime Achievement

2010: Officier de la Légion d'Honneur

2011: Library of Congress Creative Achievement Award for Fiction

2011: Honorary Doctor of Letters at Rutgers University Graduation Commencement

2011: Honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of Geneva

2012: Presidential Medal of Freedom

2013: The Nichols-Chancellor's Medal awarded by Vanderbilt University

2014 Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award given by the National Book Critics Circle

2016 PEN/Saul Bellow Award for Achievement in American Fiction

2016 The Charles Eliot Norton Professorship in Poetry (The Norton Lectures), Harvard University

Nominations

Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album for Children (2008) – Who's Got Game? The Ant or the Grasshopper? The Lion or the Mouse? Poppy or the Snake?

Wikipedia

#Toni Morrison

0 notes