A Pedagogue's Progress |
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Saturday, February 21, 2009
Poetry One of the most underrated things that I learned from studying poetry -- from Mr. McConnell's Practical Criticism in JC to Bill Cook's class on Modernism at college -- was how to write good prose. I still don't "get" most poetry that I read, but close reading New Critical-style, with all its attendant technical terms, forced me to hear how my own sentences unfolded on the page -- their structure, length, and rhythm. It forced me to contend with the implications of my words. Why this one and not that? Doesn't this expression just sound horribly cliched? Can't this be expressed more succinctly -- more poetically? The "best words in their best order," as Coleridge said about poetry, and Mr. McConnell said to us the first time we did it for PC. (It's strange how I remember such things.)
Students May I never have to work as a bureaucrat or only amongst them. It's in times like these, with work piling up (term paper marking! Vietnam's economic development! GP!), that you appreciate being amongst such brilliant and engaged young men and women. Stepping into the classroom and launching into lessons energise me in the absence of lunch and sleep. Even informal conversations with them renew one's faith in humanity. I cannot imagine how they manage; I get tired even thinking of their daily schedules. All I can do is help them to the best of my intellectual and organisational abilities. This is how I shall see through 2009. Monday, February 16, 2009
Lincoln's global impact This bunch of articles in the New York Times on Lincoln's influence in Germany, Japan, Liberia, and Hungary reveals yet again the global impact of American ideals and representative figures. Manela and Armitage have already written books on this impact. I smell a dissertation topic. Sunday, February 15, 2009
I am compartmentalising my brain, creating little virtual pigeon-holes in which to stuff stuff: JC2 History, JC1 History, JC1 GP, HISSOC, THI, committee work, Civics, etc. The holes are getting smaller and smaller even as the stuff gets bigger and bigger. Saturday, February 14, 2009
Form without substance "Representative democracy is the very essence of our political system, and voting is the foundation of representative democracy" - Law Minister K. Shanmugam, as reported in today's ST. |
WHO AM I? Your author graduated from Dartmouth College in 2004 having majored in History and English. From June 2007, he will be teaching contemporary Southeast Asian history at another of his former schools. SOME WEBSITES I READ The Dartmouth Observer Singapore Websites The Intelligent Singaporean Mr Wang Says So Mr Brown Singabloodypore Singapore Angle Singapore Window A Xenoboy in Sg Gayle Goh Aaron Ng Molly Meek Elia Diodati Stressed Teacher Tym Blogs Too! Yawning Bread Talking Cock Non-Singapore Websites Andrew Sullivan The Belgravia Dispatch The American Scene Oxblog The Corner Bradford Plumer Matthew Yglesias The Washington Monthly National Review Online The Weekly Standard The Plank Open University Marty Peretz Michael Totten Martin Kramer Daniel Drezner Joe's Dartblog Instapundit Christopher Hitchens Ross Douthat IvyGate Les Belles Lettres Arts & Letters Daily The Atlantic Monthly History News Network Guardian Unlimited Books London Review of Books The New Criterion Voice of the Shuttle New York Review of Books ARCHIVES September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 June 2007 July 2007 August 2007 September 2007 October 2007 November 2007 December 2007 January 2008 February 2008 March 2008 April 2008 May 2008 June 2008 July 2008 August 2008 September 2008 October 2008 November 2008 December 2008 January 2009 February 2009 March 2009 April 2009 May 2009 June 2009 July 2009 November 2009 July 2010 October 2010  |