There’s Something Very Cool About Being Studied Like A Chimp By A Bunch Of College Students + Valuable Tips For College Kids

by John Hawkins | August 27, 2003 11:27 pm

In Dr. Chuck Tryon’s English 1101 course at Georgia Tech[1], the students are doing something a little bit out of the ordinary to build their skills. They’re studying bloggers! Including these “famous bloggers”…

“Once you’ve looked around for a while, you can find bloggers whose values either align with or contrast with your own beliefs. A few more famous bloggers:

  • Oliver Willis[2]
  • Atrios[3]
  • Instapundit[4]
  • Lawrence Lessig [5](copyright law)
  • Andrew Sullivan[6]
  • Right Wing News[7]

    Ah! There’s something very satisfying about being considered a “famous blogger”. Of course, it’s not as cool as actually being studied in class…

    “Read sections from each of the following three blogs. Then, pick one blog, and take a closer look. For your second blog entry, you will then discuss how that one blog makes its arguments. You may use the questions on 100-102 to provoke your thoughts, but for the most part, you’ll want to focus on (1) locating a central argument; (2) analyzing the language and style of the argument; and (3) determining how the author establishes ethos, pathos, and logos.

    The three blogs we’ll be focusing on in class discussions (which will therefore be off limits for the paper): Rachel Lucas[8], Joanne Jacobs[9], Tom Daschle[10]. We will also spend a few minutes talking about Rhetorica[11]. Another blog you might find interesting is Chris Allbritton’s Back to Iraq[12]. Allbritton was an independent journalist during the war who was not embedded with the military. Looking through his blog you might find an intriguing position on the war. One example of a soldier blog is located here[13].

    Finally, you should explore adding comments to your blog no later than Monday of next week.”

    Wow, imagine that class discussion…

    Dr. Tryon: So Qadeer Parekh, what did you learn from reading the blog written by Rachel Lucas?

    Qadeer Parekh: Ehr…shooting people is good and dogs are cool?

    Dr. Tryon: Very good Qadeer! Now what is Joanne Jacobs trying to get across on her blog? Melissa Boswell, what do you think?

    Melissa Boswell: Uh…education is like good and stuff? And that people who don’t do a good job of educating kids are bad?

    Dr. Tryon: Very good! Now Lynn Replogle, what did you learn from reading Tom Daschle’s blog?

    Lynn Replogle: All I remember was something about him being saddened and disappointed and then I woke up 3 hours later. It put me right to sleep…

    Dr. Tryon: Well Lynn, no one can blame you for that…

    Just kidding everybody! That’s what us “famous” bloggers do when there’s no real news and we still feel the need to post something. But since I’m probably going to have a bunch of college students reading this post, I thought I should take the opportunity to give you a little advice. If only something would have told me all these things before I went to college!

    — Most of your professors are crazy quasi-commies who’d probably end up living in a shotgun shack or drunk in an alley if they ever left the sheltered university environment. So don’t pay any attention to them when they talk about politics.

    — Make sure to schedule all your classes on Tuesday and Thursday as soon as it’s feasible & Mon-Wed-Fri classes until then. Trust me, there’s nothing better than having 5 days a week to goof off!

    — Don’t take 8:00 AM classes. You’re not going to get up for them, especially if attendance isn’t mandatory.

    — If you’re making a “D” or “F” in a class early on, drop it before the deadline. If you’re not cutting it early on, it’s only going to get worse and you’re probably going to flunk. Why not just start over?

    — Get out of your parents house and on your own as quickly as possible. The sooner you have to start doing your own laundry, fixing your own food, and living without mom & dad looking over your shoulder, the better off you’ll be.

    — Don’t EVER give in to the temptation to “take a semester” off. Almost everyone I’ve ever known who has done that hasn’t come back.

    — If you don’t have any idea of what you want to do after college, well join the club. I got a Psychology degree and you know what my first job was after college? Working as a Walmart photographer. Now I work for an internet wholesaler, yet back in college I flunked the only computer college course I ever took.

    — When you’re in college, you think nothing can ever happen to you, mainly because it never has. Oh, how wrong that can be. Just ask my ex-roommate who get herpes at 19 & one of my friends who knocked one of his knees out of joint after passing out snorting nitrous oxide in the middle of a college dorm. The point is, don’t do anything stupid and just assume it can’t go wrong.

    — Credit cards are EVIL! I’m talking Freddy Krueger, Jason, & Fidel Castro combined evil. Take it from someone who ran up hundreds of dollars in charges on useless junk when he had $2 in his bank account. It was such a pain paying it all back that I STILL won’t use a credit card to this day.

    So there you go! Just follow all of those tips and…well you’ll still probably end up working as a night manager at Wendy’s after college, but it could be worse!

    Endnotes:
    1. Dr. Chuck Tryon’s English 1101 course at Georgia Tech: http://tryon1101.blogspot.com/
    2. Oliver Willis: http://www.oliverwillis.com/
    3. Atrios: http://atrios.blogspot.com/
    4. Instapundit: http://instapundit.com/
    5. Lawrence Lessig : http://www.lessig.org/blog/
    6. Andrew Sullivan: http://andrewsullivan.com/
    7. Right Wing News: https://rightwingnews1.wpenginepowered.com/
    8. Rachel Lucas: http://www.rachellucas.com/
    9. Joanne Jacobs: http://www.joannejacobs.com/
    10. Tom Daschle: http://www.daschle.senate.gov/travels_with_tom.htm
    11. Rhetorica: http://www.rhetorica.net/
    12. Back to Iraq: http://www.back-to-iraq.com/
    13. here: http://www.lt-smash.us/
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