The English Literature Club: This Friday!

The Hungry Reader at the Feast:

Model Writers, Model Readers.

Or, Which Fork Do I Use With Hemingway?

--Matt Duckworth

Friday, December 2, 1:30-2:30 p.m. in Batmale 349.

This talk is meant as a tour, of sorts, as a modeling of and reflecting upon dynamic literary exchanges from the perspective of an avid lifelong reader.

I'll be looking into work by Ernest Hemingway (A Moveable Feast!), Richard Ford (including Ford on Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Faulkner), William Hazlitt (quoting Coleridge on WW and STC), John Fowles, Richard Holmes (on Shelley and Byron's marksmanship and on literary biography as pursuit), Barry Lopez, Rebecca Solnit, Virginia Woolf, and others, as needed.

I will have handouts. There will probably be coffee and treats.

Please tell your students. Please attend, if this seems intriguing.

Thank you.

MD

Ben at Berkeley!

Hello Colleagues,

This Thursday, December 1 at 6:00 p.m. sharp, U.C. Berkeley’s famous “Story Hour” series will host me reading from and providing literary analysis of my novel, Barrio Bushido. At the beautiful Morrison Library inside of the Doe Library building, with arms extended, I welcome you and your students to attend this unique, unprecedented event. Never before has U.C. Berkeley’s “Story Hour” opened its doors for urban literature. Many times urban fiction is portrayed as senseless and ultra-violent. At this event I will explain how Barrio Bushido both reinforces and smashes those stereotypes.

Many of you know my story and work. I come from the streets, the Marine Corps, and academia. Many of our students can relate positively to my background. I have performed throughout the state and have led functions that go beyond the literary level, including a first ever Ya Basta! Leadership Conference and more recently a successful Leadership and Education conference entitled “Inventing Your Destiny.”

Please come to this U.C. Berkeley event and suggest that your students come as well. Perhaps they can receive extra credit for attending this event that may change their lives.

If you would like to find out more about this event, please click on the links below.

Thank you and have a great rest of the semester,

Benjamin Bac Sierra, English Instructor

http://storyhour.berkeley.edu/#sierra

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1479422798&ref=tn_tnmn#!/events/143674205737913/

Filmmaker Ralph Bakshi and Poet Melvin Wilk in Conversation with Richard B. Simon

LIVE! Saturday December 3, 2011, Tikva Pop-Up Record Store, San Francisco

Rich Simon will be "in conversation" with animation legend Ralph Bakshi (Fritz the Cat) and his old friend from the neighborhood, poet Melvin Wilk, this Saturday, December 3, at the Tikva Pop-Up Jewish Record Store in the outer Mission in San Francisco.

Sponsored by the Idelsohn Society, the discussion will focus on the roots of Bakshi's work in his Jewish upbringing in Brownsville, Brooklyn, and will feature an unprecedented poetry reading by Bakshi and Wilk ... as well as opportunities to ask questions in an intimate venue. 

First, at 7pm, we'll show Bakshi's American Pop, about a Jewish immigrant family's quest for musical glory in America. Discussion, poetry, and Q and A will follow.

It's free -- with a donation requested -- but it's a really small venue (a storefront!) so reserve tickets early.

The Tikva Record Store runs the month of December in the Outer Mission, where Mission meets Valencia at the foot of Bernal, by the Argus. It's "The First Pop-Up Jewish Record Store in the World" -- and will feature live bands, lectures, films, comedy, food trucks -- and, of course, lots of rare Yiddish vinyl ...

This should be pretty cool, folks.

Info and tix: http://tikvarecordsdec3-eorg.eventbrite.com/

American Pop, Ralph Bakshi and the Jewish Experience:

Filmmaker Ralph Bakshi, best known for his films FRITZ THE CAT and WIZARDS, is making a rare San Francisco appearance to show his classic film American Pop and discuss, with longtime friend/poet Melvin Wilk, his Jewish upbringing and the influence it had on his art. The conversation will be led by writer/scholar Richard Simon.

1 show - 7pm

Doors open 15 minutes prior to show time

Limited to 2 tickets each

All events are free with a rotating suggested donation at the door

TIKVA RECORDS

"The First Pop-Up Jewish Record Store in the World"

Open December 1-28, 2011
(3191 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA)
* All events are free with a rotating suggested donation
* Advance ticket reservations required via Eventbrite

The store will feature an eclectic series of exclusive live music performances, film screenings, academic lectures, comedians, remix workshops, food trucks, and more.

Special events will emulate the historical and cultural significance of Tikva Records - NYC's most prolific Jewish record label of the '50s, '60s and '70s. Events will explore the Jewish American songbook, and Jewish culture in general, interpreted by some of today's brightest performers, comedians, musicians and lecturers. Rare vinyl from select Jewish musicians of the past 80 years will be sold at the new Tikva Records, and we will have all of our latest album releases for sale including: Songs for the Jewish-American Jet Set, Black Sabbath, and Mazeltov, Mis Amigos. San Francisco Public School tours will commence during the daytime hours at Tikva Records, and food trucks will be carefully paired with each event listed below.

Happy Thanksgiving!

GIFSoup

Follow-up to the Nancy Sommers workshop

Many people have expressed their gratitude for the Wednesday's workshop on responding to student writing.  I know that it recharged my disposition and my essay marking right away, helping me simplify, step back, identify patterns of strength and need, and direct students toward future learning in upcoming online exercises, lab tutoring, and essay assignments. 

Maybe there was just too much to cover since the issue of grading deserves its own week-long conference, but we really needed to spend more time discussing the student essay by Estelle Costanza (Frank's wife, George's mother) so kindly and bravely provided by Kristen Hren.  (Who else would have volunteered to do this?)  This essay was an incredible choice for our workshop, so perhaps we could continue the essay-response discussion in the comment section of this blog post.

I would also ask that those of you who marked the essay give your marked copies to Kristen so that she can compare the different strategies.  I had hoped that during the workshop we would be able to go into small groups and compare our response strategies and the aesthetic of our marked papers, but there was not enough time.

One reason that there may not have been enough time was that we may have talked a bit too much about the assignment sheet.  That was important, of course, since one of our goals was to analyze the relationship between assignment design and student/teacher response, but we needed to give more attention to what the student wrote and our responses to that writing.  We can do that in the blog comment area and discuss ways to help Estelle Costanza reach even more of her potential.

I hope that our dialogue on this workshop material and our dialogue on responding to student writing will continue to unfold.

Again, thanks to those of you who prepped and participated, and a special thanks to Kristen for helping all of us, including Nancy Sommers, by sharing her work with us.  We owe her!  So give her your marked copies at the very least.  Thanks.

To the comments!

Thank you, Nancy Sommers!

Nancy Sommers provided a truly wonderful workshop on responding to student writing yesterday in Batmale Hall. Many of us have been energized by the dialogue, and hopefully that dialogue will continue. Another way to continue the dialogue is on Nancy's blog: http://blogs.bedfordstmartins.com/hackerhandbooks/. There you will also see links to Nancy's movies with students and teachers.

And, hey, if you haven't seen the free videos at Re:Writing via the Rules for Writers companion site, take a look.  You and your students might like them, among other things.

Jump to Video Central.

Brilliant and Inspiring Composition Scholar!