Tag Archive for 'bardcollege'

College: One Month Later

Published
by
Kabren
on September 7, 2008
in Bard, College, Education and School
. 4 Comments

I’ve been at Bard College for a month now; the Workshop in Language and Thinking is over, and I began my “real” courses last Monday. I went home last weekend to see family, pick up my bike, tennis rackets, and relax. It feels very different having upperclassmen on campus now(they arrived last weekend), Language and Thinking was a lot like high school, everyone had (almost) the same schedule, and studied similar material, but now that courses have started, everyone seems a lot more independent.

L&T was truly amazing - now that the workshop has ended, I appreciate what I learned even more. My teacher was fantastic, and I’m happy to have him as my First Year Seminar teacher, too. He helped me most with my writing and development of ideas. He is also the reason I’m now taking Ancient Greek. During L&T, we read such amazing texts; Hannah Arendt, Aristotle, Samuel Beckett, Susan Sontag, Franz Kafka, Charles Darwin, Prigogine and Stengers, and more. My final essay was surrounded around the question, “Why do we speak?” It was a political analysis of communication and media throughout history. I talked about the idea that speech makes us human, and humans are, by nature, “political animals,” in reference to Aristotle and Arendt. I also talked about Internet Censorship in china, and the importance of sharing our opinions using free new media tools available on the Internet. I touched upon sousveillance, or inverse-surveillance, surveillance as a means of speaking. You can read my essay, but please don’t steal it or use parts of it without my permission. Download it as a PDF.


My class schedule.

I started courses on Monday, Labor Day. Here’s what I’m taking: First Year Seminar, Media and Society, Intro to Philosophy: Philosophical Classics, and Ancient Greek. All of my courses have been great so far, though I have spent a fortune on books, 22 in total. To me, it is strange having most classes only twice a week.

My side of the room.

College has been an overwhelming positive experience, so far. On Friday night, I attended Shabbat services at Beit Shalom Salaam - twenty people showed up, in contrast to the two or three who would show up last year, the upperclassmen tell me. The school just got a new Rabbi, who really wants to reinvigorate Jewish life at Bard. I helped cook dinner, too - we made Challah, lasagna, and salad. I have not yet recorded a new episode of Nerd News Radio, but hopefully I’ll get around to that next weekend.

What was your college experience like?

Language and Thinking

Published
by
Kabren
on August 17, 2008
in Bard, College and School
. 0 Comments

I’m in college. A little early, but that’s the way Bard College does it. All freshman take a three-week workshop called “Language and Thinking.” So far, being at Bard has been an amazing experience. I love being in such an intellectually stimulating environment. I have an excellent teacher, Thomas Bartscherer, and a great class - everyone seemed to get along, right out of the box. L&T moves fast, and the course started in “the deep end;” no introductions or family histories. The class works, as Thomas said today, no one is sitting it out, everyone is involved.

I have never seen an entire class get along so well, so soon. In fact, the class began by writing for five minutes. Over the past few days, I’ve grown to love free-writing with a pen and paper. It’s nice to be unplugged. In middle and high school, free-writes never had a purpose, they were a filler, and if anything, they were too structured. The campus is so beautiful. Today with some people from my dorm, we went walking around the campus, hiking around, I forgot my camera, but I’ll be sure to make the walk again and take some photos.


My pen. On my paper.

My dorm room is almost all set up, only a few small details to tend to. Bard is great, I’ve been having a good time. I’m happy to have an actual break this weekend, though, I’ve been in “meet new people” mode for 7 days now, need some time for myself (you know, I’m a very quiet almost anti-social person). I’ll keep blogging. Podcast next week Sunday, I hope.


My desk.