ENG 306: Theory in Practice

The Day After Tomorrow shall be the penultimate examination of the End of Semester Examinations comma Second Semester 2010stroke2011 for the seven Third Year English Honours Students at the Faculty of Arts at the University of Peradeniya fullstop The examination paper titled openparathesis write carefully as on the examination paper closeparanthesis ENG 303 colon Semantics comma Pragmatics and Discourse Analysis will be administered at precisely 11colon30 am openparanthesis UTC addition 5colon30 closeparanthesis two hours openparanthesis many whispers comma scratchingshyphenofhyphenhead comma jigglingshyphenofhyphenleg comma clearingshyphenofhyphenthroat closeparanthesis after which slim booklets of scribblings will be retrieved from the patients students for assessment of their aptitude for memoryhyphenmaking comma parroting comma bullshitting comma academizing English studies paragraph Their lecturer comma the young openparanthesis and just graduated closeparanthesis Chathurika Senanayake paranthesis whoinvertedcommas new hair style one of the males of the said seven is rather impressed with closeparanthesis comma has strikeoutperformedstrikeout taught well comma keeping her head above water in the face of having to teach the strikeoutradical and revolutionarystrikeout worst-reputed batch of English students since the famed English Department had openparanthesis and lost closeparanthesis its heyday fullstop In the hope of securing strikeoutthe status-quo and perpetuating the capitalist ideals of the academiastrikeout a strikeoutboring and predictablestrikeout good future the said seven strikeoutfacebookstrokeblogstrokecallstroketextstrokewatch moviesstrokemake out in secretstrokemasturbatestrokeorganize gayhyphenprotestsstrokesweatstrokesmokestrokecrystrokescreamstrikeout study throughout the night fullstop In the light of their oppression by the taxhyphenpaying masses that expect an educated generation of the said seven comma their representative had this to say colon openquote!@*^$%&@#$*(&@#$&!!*@&$^!#&$#%*&&………….closequote paragraphparagraph #static# paragraphparagraph endoftransmission fullstop

New World

I started the language component of my ENG101 course on the wrong footing by missing the first class. Woe unto me. AP now takes the class and he is everyone's nightmare. (Not really, but we'll talk about him at length some other time.) Today was the second class, and the discussion was on our assignment due at the end of the semester, before the exam. According to the hand-outs we were given; "Assignments should focus on the language used by a clearly definable social group or specific practice/activity, and include a 'field-work' component". Now, AP's idea of a good report must involve a group of people that are of immediate interest to us AND push us out of our comfort zones.

Our group started by listing interests and the list is something like this:

• Wild-life
• Writing
• Clubbing
• Drug/alcohol abuse
• Campus culture
• Internet
• Criminology
• Oriental dance

Tomorrow we meet to discuss what we're going to focus on and how we push ourselves out of our comfort-zones in that respect.

AP is dedicated to making new people of his students. It's endearing and in a way frustrating. He is trying, unlike most of our lecturers, to give us the real university experience; something different from what we were doing in school. He wants us to get 'out there' and learn something real, so we leave with a BA and a heap of experiences which drastically change who we are from who we were. He cares for us. All this is well, but his projects leave us stranded. The two most conservative kids in class were asked today to prepare a presentation for next Monday on the Khajuraho sculptures. One is a shy boy from a rural village in Ratnapura who as the lecturer points out seems "keen on remaining a virgin all his life" and the other is a Muslim girl who doesn't know what baduwa means. Both probably believe god dropped them in their mothers' arms at birth. The boy might actually enjoy preparing for his presentation, but the girl no doubt is going to be in a lot of trouble.

A nineteen year old girl wearing a hijab sits hunched in front of a computer with a stunned and scared expression on her face. Her mother enters the room. The girl is startled and attempts to close the window. The mother has already seen what she is looking at. Kama sutra diagrams.

Mother: [red in the face and shaking] Allah forgive us! What on earth are you looking at you terrible child!?

Girl: [almost in tears] Ma, it's for a University presentation. I have to prepare it for Monday.

Mother: [now angry] Do you think I'm a bloody fool!? Is THIS what they teach you at that University? You think I'm completely uneducated to think anyone at a University would ask you to learn about things like THIS!?!

Girl: Ma… it's the truth!

Mother: [slaps the girl] Don't you ever say things like that again. Shameless girl! How dare you! Wait til your father finds out about this! [grabbing her head] Oh… the shame! MY daughter! Allaaaah…! What have I done to deserve this!? Is this what you are doing saying you're at university!? Allah! What a shame you are! Oh…

Ok… I'm not exactly a playwright, just experimenting there, but you get the drift.

So this class is fun, and it's interesting, and it's getting us 'out there'. We will probably learn more here than we will in ALL the other classes we attend throughout our undergraduate career. But some of us will probably have serious injuries from it; either a failed grade or a social black-mark. I'm serious.

Introducing ELA

The word 'ela' here has nothing to do with the word commonly used by the younger generation to express something close to "awesome", it's actually an acronym for English Literary Association. I was informed that I, along with the other 60-something students in my class am a member of this group by default. Apparently every student who reads English as part of their curriculum for a BA is automatically a member of the ELA. Now, I don't know who the ELA is, or what the ELA does, but I must pay Rs.50 to the class representative (how often I wonder?), ASAP. Apparently they "really need" the money. For what?

I admit, I didn't want to make a scene so I just kept my mouth shut and listened to this cute little senior give us this info when she strategically caught us right after a lecture on Bernard Shaw. Her words were punctuated every few seconds by an "okay?" which although written here might mean "did you understand darlings?" (when looking at the person who was saying it) actually seemed to mean "fuck you, just pay the goddamned money" (okay, I'm possibly disillusioned).

This girl is not my favorite senior (she's so fragile), so I chose one closer to that to pose my questions to. Apparently the English Literary Association of the University of Peradeniya:

1. Organizes Book Launches
2. Has Alumni Nights
3. Hosts Peduru Parties

I see 30% of this having any connection with English Literature. I see 0% of this being beneficial to the students who are compulsory subscribers. Maybe I'm just ill-informed about the whole thing, but hey, all the 'representative' kept saying (very emphatically) was "just pay the fifty bucks"!

I'm not grudging them the dough, but it seems that leaving the crucial question unanswered is a popular thing here. What are we paying for?