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An Ideal Summer Job of Teaching, Learning

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An Ideal Summer Job of Teaching, Learning AustinAmerican-Statesman ❖ Tuesday,August 2, 2005 All Commentary Thomas G. Palaima REGULAR coNTR1suToR An idealsummer job of teaching,learning et's keep Austin weird. Please. the intelligence of the Telluride L I'll tell you why. students. I have been team-teaching a Imagine hearing musician Ernie Telluride seminar at the University of Durawa, music writer John Morth­ Texas at Austin. We are exploring the land and blues master Clifford Antone stories people tell about war and vio­ talk for two hours about the long his­ lence. By stories, we mean every kind tory and many ethnic components of of human expression: diaries, mem- Texas music. Then imagine Carolyn oirs, histories, Wonderland demonstrating the very letters, novels, next day where Lightning Hopkins short stories, and Townes van Zandt and Bob Dylan poems, songs, and Albert Collins are in her music photographs, and how she uses it to convey her own speeches, jour­ ideas about our society. Imagine nalistic ac­ having UT's remarkable humanist counts, official Douglass Parker guide you through reports, clinical violence in Homer and other ancient sessions and di­ authors. And imagine hearing agnoses, movies, paintings, drawings, Statesman feature writer Brad Buch­ plays. holz talk about writing stories about a Imagine yourself in a room three World War II tail gunner and a re­ hours a day for six weeks with 18of the union of Vietnam veterans who had most intellectually gifted soon-to-be not seen each other since a firefight in high school seniors in the world. They Vietnam left some dead and others are all creative, hard-working and severely wounded. respectful. They think and talk and An experience like this is rare. For write and listen well. They are nearly me, the only thing comparable was tireless in investigating who we have when the MacArthur Foundation in been, are and will be as human beings. Chicago used to hold regular re­ They are diverse in interests, cultural unions. Then I remember having backgrounds, educational experienc­ breakfast, by chance, with author es and political and religious beliefs. CormacMcCarthy, whose new book is They discuss ideas openly and hon­ absolutely gripping and is Texan estly. And they do this because they through and through. I then talked in want to. the hallways with biologist Jared Di­ Imagine teaching with a talented amond, who was just embarking on professor like Stacey Peebles of the the study that produced his just­ Honors College at the University of concluded three-part National Geo­ Houston. Stacey was in the Plan II graphic special "Guns, Germs and Honors Program and then got her Steel" about how and why societies Ph.D. in English at UT-Austin on the differ in their most important traits subject ofhow violence is portrayed in and institutions. war novels and films. She under­ Imagine, too, meeting once a week stands the human condition and poses in UT's national cultural treasure, the hard questions, big and small. She Harry Ransom Center, and having on inspires all students in the seminar, display every week new selections of including me. She is relaxed and original manuscripts, galley proofs, friendly but quite serious about first or rare editions, drawings, learning. She knows how to write and paintings, musical scores, photo­ how to teach how to write. She knows graphs of H.G.Wells, e.e. cummings, that clear writing begins with clear William Faulkner, Tim O'Brien, thinking. Bessie Smith, Homer, Euripides, Stacey and I have been doing this Siegfried Sassoon, Ezra Pound, Walt with two dedicated University of Whitman, Joseph Conrad. Imagine Michigan students, Keary Engle and being guided through Bill Broyles' Lynn Eckert, acting as teaching as­ collection of mesmerizing photo­ sistants, fellow students and senior graphs of the horrific eastern front in guides for the Telluriders. Then World War II. These black and white imagine having the resources of UT­ images take you right to the heart of Austin and of Austin itself at your Broyles' provocative essay, "Why disposal. Imagine having someone Men Love War," despite brutality and such as Jay Jorgensen of the Liberal waste on an unimaginable scale. Arts dean's office to solve all practical problems like a benevolent Harry If you have a vivid enough imagi­ Potter wizard. nation, you will grasp why I feel now, Outside of seminar hours, imagine in the last week of the Telluride sem­ hearing Nobel Prize winner Steve inar, like Lou Gehrig in Yankee Sta­ Weinberg talk - almost think aloud dium on July 4, 1939. - for an hour about our universe and Austin is weird all right. Weirdly multiverses, about string theory, rich in people and institutions dedi­ about science and religion and the cated to preserving our humanity and history of knowledge. Weinberg spent freely sharing their own deeply hu­ another hour answering questions man passions with others. and posing new ones, until his voice Palaimateaches Classicsat UT. For Telluride was hoarse. He spoke with respect for programs, see www.tellurideassociation.org. .
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