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I like 'em thick: an apology to my English teachers

experimental-history.com

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Re: I like 'em thick: an apology to my English teachers

#41

Post by thfuran »

lordnacho wrote: post #33

As an old man I now think the art and humanities classes in school landed at the wrong time. You need context to really understand a book or a work of art. You want to know what kind of environment produced it, what it's talking to. But when you're in school, there isn't time for that. You aren't going to know a bunch of things about history to put things into context, because there simply isn't enough time for it. S…

It’s certainly true that an adult would tend to have more additional knowledge and be better able to understand a lot of writing, but if you avoid exposing kids to anything they don’t have total understanding of the context of, you won’t really be able to teach them anything. Discussing books can help provide some of that context they’re missing. It’s probably fine to teach arithmetic before algebraic number theory too.

Re: I like 'em thick: an apology to my English teachers

#42

Post by Folcon »

There's an interesting part of this that's mentioned in the comments that the original author states:

> Haha I had a section in this, but cut it, about how people jokingly suggest we should include one regular person in every Olympic event to show just how astounding Olympic athletes are, and this is also a good idea for art...

I've been getting into fiction writing a bit recently and learning to focus on incremental improvement is necessary, for example, getting feedback and trying to find good venues to get it is a challenge because getting helpful constructive feedback is hard

I'm beginning to wonder if, because the skill level of the creators of media the average person consumes on a regular basis is so high, it's actually difficult to get good feedback for learning from by asking them until you get to a minimum baseline of skill and improvement is constrained by finding environments that can provide high quality feedback

Re: I like 'em thick: an apology to my English teachers

#44

Post by dehrmann »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #36
lordnacho wrote: post #33

As an old man I now think the art and humanities classes in school landed at the wrong time. You need context to really understand a book or a work of art. You want to know what kind of environment produced it, what it's talking to. But when you're in school, there isn't time for that. You aren't going to know a bunch of things about history to put things into context, because there simply isn't enough time for it. S…

It felt even worse when reading Shakespeare, which is nominally the same language you and I speak, but just barely. Add the fact that it's a play, where the performance carries a lot of the meaning. The end result was that I - and as far as I could tell, 99% of my classmates - got basically negative value out of sitting in class and reading lines we didn't understand out loud, without even time to try and parse it ou…

> where the performance carries a lot of the meaning

The big one for me is you don't necessarily know Elizabethan slang, but when you see the play performed, the dirty lines get delivered dirty.

Re: I like 'em thick: an apology to my English teachers

#46

Post by SamBam »

tony_cannistra wrote: post #7

I have to say, this guy should teach English to high-schoolers.

I genuinely think that the vast majority of English teachers have had experiences like this. It's what made them become English teachers.

Then, with all the best intent in the world, they try to explain to their students "Look, you don't get this, this fat book is transcendent if you can just sit with it and understand it! I, too, used to think that English class was just stupid words that they force you to read, but let me help you get this! You've got to..."

But all their students hear is Charlie Brown's adults going "Waa waa waa..." because they're genuinely not mature and experienced enough to "get" the book the way the English teacher understood it.

Ten years later a student will re-read one of their literature books, have this same epiphany, and talk excitedly about deep literature is, and someone will tell them they ought to be an English teacher. And the cycle continues.

Ok, so some English teachers are of course better than others, and some will convey their excitement a little better, and some students will be mature enough to understand it better than others.

But I will definitely maintain that all (close to all) English teachers have this same love of books, and want desperately to pass it on.

Re: I like 'em thick: an apology to my English teachers

#47

Post by pluralmonad »

CocaKoala wrote: post #19
legacynl wrote: post #12

Although I appreciate the article, what's the deal with calling depth thickness? Is it because it looks like the meme word 'thicc'? > If you allow for the existence of secret treasures that can only be accessed with effort and analysis, then you empower the elitists and the snobs. “Buddy, don’t even talk to me until you’ve been in the cave!” I don't agree with this statement. Being a snob and/or elitist means looking…

I think I like the term "thickness" over "depth" here because thickness implies a sort of solidity, an ability to stand up to being held and examined, turned over and and handled. Depth can feel unapproachable (the ocean is pretty deep and it is famously challenging to explore) while something which has thickness intuitively feels like you can walk right up to it and try to learn something. This doesn't hold for all…

Also, depth does not necessarily mean substance. Holes in the ground have depth. I think thickness works well here.

Re: I like 'em thick: an apology to my English teachers

#48

Post by PsylentKnight »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #36
lordnacho wrote: post #33

As an old man I now think the art and humanities classes in school landed at the wrong time. You need context to really understand a book or a work of art. You want to know what kind of environment produced it, what it's talking to. But when you're in school, there isn't time for that. You aren't going to know a bunch of things about history to put things into context, because there simply isn't enough time for it. S…

It felt even worse when reading Shakespeare, which is nominally the same language you and I speak, but just barely. Add the fact that it's a play, where the performance carries a lot of the meaning. The end result was that I - and as far as I could tell, 99% of my classmates - got basically negative value out of sitting in class and reading lines we didn't understand out loud, without even time to try and parse it ou…

I have heard that Shakespeare is much easier and more enjoyable for non-English speakers, because they get modern translations and we do not

Linguist John McWhorter says that Shakespeare is often an "the Emperor has no clothes" situation. No one wants to admit to themselves or others that they don't understand it, and the people who think they understand it are often misunderstanding a lot of it

Re: I like 'em thick: an apology to my English teachers

#49

Post by Bratmon »

In my understanding of literature, I went through the same arc as the poster, but then I made it to the next realization- "thickness" is just your willingness to give authors credit for things they didn't write, and it can be done just as well for works that are considered "schlock" as it can for the canon of works that are considered "great".

You can read "Moby Dick" as a story about a fish, and you can read "50 shades of grey" as a treatise on existentialism and the human spirit- it's all up to you!

Re: I like 'em thick: an apology to my English teachers

#50

Post by aeturnum »

jrmg wrote: post #4

I’ve long held the opinion that humans ‘over’-value complexity . It’s why we can spend so much time tasting, analyzing, and enjoying fancy coffee or whisky - despite the fact that almost everyone is repulsed by them the first time they try them. Literature might be the same? To be clear, I enjoy all three!

The simpler pleasures and pains of life are easier to speak to and we have a lot more (proportionally) media that reflects those experiences. Particular media does it better and worse and so there's a hierarchy, but if you are looking to have your enjoyment of good food and drink reflected in a story that's pretty easy to find.

But life is often more complex than that and it requires great skill to accurately reflect that complexity in creative works. When you're struggling with an experience that is difficult to talk about and understand, a creative work that seems to "get it" can be really valuable in sorting out how to think about that experience. I rarely need help in describing how much I like coffee, but I welcome good writing on the subject of "how should one understand the mixed experience of being very close to someone who you often disagree with."

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