Category Archives: teaching

The Nexus of Politics and Grammar

glbt, politics, rhetoric, teaching, transgender Leave a comment

In addition to discussing linguistic relativity with my classes this week, we’re also going to go over the problematic issue of singular/plural pronoun agreement, in particular the sticky issue of indefinite pronouns. If you’ve ever gotten red ink on your writing for saying “Everyone is entitled to their opinion” then you’ve had to deal with this, and it’s one of the longest-lingering grammar-based arguments I’m aware of. I grew up when the appropriateness of using male pronouns as defaults (“everyone is entitled to his own…

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Bound to the System

books, kink, music, personal, sex, teaching, writing Leave a comment

“Fifty Shades of Grey” sparks marketing mania (Reuters) Thanks to its inclusion in a My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic online video anthology, I’ve had the Lonely Island’s song “Threw It on the Ground” stuck in my head on and off for about a week. (Let me add here, as an aside, that I’m majorly bummed that I couldn’t make the pony con that’s going on in Ohio this weekend.) As I teach and encourage my students to question their assumptions, and not to let those…

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.musecast Episode 7: Stacking the Deck

musecast, teaching Leave a comment

I think the confluence of my recent blogging about teaching, and the Tigers being the playoff hunt this year, led me to ruminate a lot about school field trips, including one in particular that I actually missed, and how what happened on that trip still led to a sea change in how I saw the world. [Season 1 of the .musecast is currently offline due to blip.tv shutting down. Episodes will be reposted when circumstances permit me to do so. – Sean] Link list for…

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The Reality of Fantasy and Imagination

freespeech, kink, sex, teaching, television Leave a comment

Beneath the Bondage, Harmful Effects (wbur.org) With 50 Shades of Grey still selling big, I don’t think I’ll be at a loss for kink-related news articles to blog about any time soon. As it is, though, this article gets to an issue that goes beyond kink, something that I’ve had to deal with in other contexts, although primarily in my advocacy of kink and sexual freedom: The difficulties some people have in separating fantasy from reality and how to best cope with that as a…

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Don’t Mess With Texas Kids

politics, rhetoric, teaching Leave a comment

Texas School ID Tracking Chips Protested By Parents And Students (Huffington Post) These past few years Texas has seemed to be at the forefront of really bad educational ideas. A couple of years ago the Republican-dominated Texas Board of Education reformed its textbook requirements to include an incredibly conservative-skewed version of American history, and in states that lack the clout or resources to make textbook manufacturers create textbooks that follow their state’s guidelines, students across the country are now learning about how good of a…

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