And I’m now craving mock duck. And my all-time favorite food, xiao long bao. How to get a new group of students comfortable talking in the classroom? One idea: have the students each assemble a group of images that represents themselves and their interests. Have them post them to the ‘net and then introduce them […]
Random Notes
Next fall’s task: reinvent an undergraduate methods course in History. More precisely, the task is to take a one-semester methods course for new majors and create, in its place, a two-semester course for the same audience. This is a slightly daunting project. The one semester course, as I developed my version of it over the […]
So, the Gulou / Drum Tower site is officially a success (though there are diverse definitions of that word, to be sure.) It’s officially a public success. And yet, that’s happening at the exact same time that Tumblr is being sold, for a great sum of money, to Yahoo. It’s been an interesting sale to […]
Once upon a time, last fall, while settling back into teaching after a spring sabbatical, I found myself diving into social media. I was already there in many ways, of course. I have a twitter account. I have this blog. I have other sites, old and sundry, for non-academic diversions. But I had let much […]
I donned my regalia for Commencement yesterday, rolling up my jeans under the gown, and had a lovely time cheering my students in the Class of 2013 as they crossed the podium on a fine Saturday morning. I also celebrated the end of the school year over tea today, on a lazy Sunday morning, by […]
“A Construction Engineer’s Thoughts on the Sichuan Earthquake” blog post by “Book Blade” – link [accessed 31 March 2013] Nanking Massacre Project – Special Collections, Yale Divinity School Library – http://www.library.yale.edu/div/Nanking/ Ai Weiwei on Twitter (Chinese): @aiww (English): @aiwwenglish “Who’s Afraid of Ai WeiWei” — Frontline documentary (PBS) Fan Xiao, “Did the Zipingpu Dam Trigger […]
I was going to write a post on social networking, but I seem to have fallen into a GIF hypnosis (thanks to Jim Groom) and haven’t yet escaped. A few weeks ago I offered students in my Chinese film course the opportunity to earn extra credit for a GIF+film analysis exercise. Andy Rush and Jim […]
In work for the Domain of One’s Own project this past weekend, I’ve read chapters 6-8 of Martin Weller’s The Digital Scholar while also thinking about recent conversations. These have run a gamut of issues related to openness vs. pressures of the P&T and publication climb for academics as well as differences in opportunity (or freedom) determined […]
I’m hopping back to the blog (for the first time in a good while) as I join colleagues in the Domain of One’s Own project at UMW, working together with our Division of Teaching and Learning Technologies (DTLT) and Center for Teaching Excellence and Innovation (CTE). The framework and goals of the project are timely: This […]
Recently we’ve seen the emergence of serial programs created for online video sites in China (e.g. Youku, Tudou, and as we’ve seen with Youtube, etc.). Often sponsored by major corporations, including Apple and General Motors, among others, they’ve served as popular entertainment and, not surprisingly, a venue for product placement. Several of these internet shows have also begun to […]
