tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post6420639561927794683..comments2024-03-10T20:46:19.274-04:00Comments on In the Middle: Bring Out Your DeadismCord J. Whitakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06224143153295429986noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-29747419267531607542008-01-31T03:53:00.000-05:002008-01-31T03:53:00.000-05:00There's an equivalent bunch of caricaturing misapp...There's an equivalent bunch of caricaturing misapprehensions and grotesque oversimplifications for the Victorian period: all the children up chimneys, 'the Industrial Revolution' turning cities into Hell etc.Rachel Robertshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09514816247989239714noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-13837787976053637752008-01-30T04:52:00.000-05:002008-01-30T04:52:00.000-05:00When teaching at a certain midwestern state univer...When teaching at a certain midwestern state university, where I had a survey of French lit before 1700, I tried doing a few lectures explaining the Middle Ages and why there is said to be a division demarcating them from 'the Renaissance' or 'modernity'. Then I tried putting a question about that on the final exam. Eventually I gave up. I got the usual proof of people just not paying attention, either to me or to themselves: Napoleon discovered America, 'Constantinople' proved that the earth went around the sun. Among the stranger claims was that 'back then' people used pagan myths to make themselves feel good. (Intriguing, yes, but the utter lack of explanation or elaboration on the subject led me to feel that the student was not, in fact, being clever, but just struggling to remember some snippet of something, anything, from those lectures.) The single worst moment, I'd say, was being told that the Renaissance came about because of the Plague, which 'weeded out' the population and after which 'only strong, intelligent people were still alive'. Needless to say this was not exactly what I said in my lecture on that subject. We were in the late 80s and AIDS was being much discussed. I couldn't help feeling that I was being told what this student, and an awful lot of the rest of them, thought about that crisis, which was a very discouraging thought indeed.<BR/>sylviaAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-55221329513647555292008-01-30T00:19:00.000-05:002008-01-30T00:19:00.000-05:00Andrea: brilliant!And JJC: I'd love to see that pr...Andrea: brilliant!<BR/><BR/>And JJC: I'd love to see that presentation too.<BR/><BR/>Brandon: I don't know if I <I>have</I> a favorite historical figure. I might end up interpreting "figure" very freely, but this should be fun. Expect something w/in the week.<BR/><BR/>I should also say that my students to their credit didn't get things so much wrong as mis-emphasized. The church <I>was</I> powerful; disease was bad; many women do have more professional freedom than they did then; knights, armor, castle: all there!; Cathars too (except see Mark Pegg); and so forth. It's just that there's <I>more</I> there (let's join JJC in calling it heterogeneity) than my students listed, and what they did list is a lot more complex. But I can't expect them to know about the Pope of Avignon or neo-Pelagians or neo-Donatists or the Waldensians or whatever. But, even without that knowledge, they still had the tools right before them for thinking the MA more complexly: after all, they had just read the first 18 lines of the GP! <I>That</I>'s what struck me.Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-91256366341122150822008-01-29T19:52:00.000-05:002008-01-29T19:52:00.000-05:00This is rather an amusing post. Shattering miscon...This is rather an amusing post. Shattering misconceptions of the Middle Ages in the classroom is something I look forward to someday, and I even slip certain things into discussions when I teach composition.<BR/><BR/>JJC, your PowerPoint especially sounds useful, enlightening, and very entertaining for its purposes.<BR/><BR/>Also, so that the whole ITM team knows, I have tagged each of you (individually, though I've linked collectively to this blog) for the mutated medieval meme (see <A HREF="http://bwhawk.blogspot.com/2008/01/two-for-one-deal.html" REL="nofollow">here</A> for details).bwhawkhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17909010609907741198noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-48096231037474803382008-01-29T18:34:00.000-05:002008-01-29T18:34:00.000-05:00I tried asking my students what they knew about th...I tried asking my students what they knew about the Middle Ages once. The best answer was "Everyone who ever lived in the Middle Ages is dead." I think the student was trying to make a joke. It turned out to be a great starting point for a discussion on what evidence we use to figure out what was happening in the Middle Ages, as we clearly can't t get our information from oral histories!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-81237219497436217182008-01-29T15:36:00.000-05:002008-01-29T15:36:00.000-05:00And Karl -- thanks for giving me the heads up on w...And Karl -- thanks for giving me the heads up on what I can expect to encounter out there in the "real world." I knew Monty Python was pervasive...but really! :)Mary Kate Hurleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14892991966276345782noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-7553587609737164432008-01-29T15:33:00.000-05:002008-01-29T15:33:00.000-05:00Now I just make a plea to my students: Grant the M...<I>Now I just make a plea to my students: Grant the Middle Ages the same complexity, heterogeneity, and smartness that we grant to modernity. Suspend judgment as you enter the worlds that the literature we will read creates.</I><BR/><BR/>Well put. I wish I could have done the meme justice so concisely.Mary Kate Hurleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14892991966276345782noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-79232427523467528392008-01-29T15:00:00.000-05:002008-01-29T15:00:00.000-05:00I have an old PowerPoint presentation that I used ...I have an old PowerPoint presentation that I used to do called "Everything You Know About the Middle Ages is Wrong." I'd put up a series of statements about the middle ages and then offer some evidence to the contrary. E.g., "The Middle Ages were chaste" would be followed by manuscript illustrations of people having sex, and a snippet of the fabliau "The Woman Who Couldn't Hear 'Fuck' Without Having Heartburn." "Times and people were simpler" would be followed by some scenes from the Franks Casket (!) and then an excerpt about the transvestite prostitute John/Eleanor. Etc.<BR/><BR/>Now I just make a plea to my students: Grant the Middle Ages the same complexity, heterogeneity, and smartness that we grant to modernity. Suspend judgment as you enter the worlds that the literature we will read creates."<BR/><BR/>I think I just answered the <A HREF="http://jjcohen.blogspot.com/2008/01/why-i-teach-literature-meme-graduate.html" REL="nofollow">Literature meme</A> as well ...Jeffrey Cohenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17346504393740520542noreply@blogger.com