Derek Nystrom
@dereknystrom1
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Indolence capable of energies. I teach and write about various things, mostly stuff on screens. @McGillEnglish . He/his.
Montréal, Québec
Joined February 2016
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This morning, I sent an email to my fellow Faculty of Arts profs at McGill, announcing that 60% of us have signed union cards & that we plan to file for certification with the provincial labour tribunal in a week.
It was maybe the best email I have ever sent in my life.
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Taught Cruel Optimism today & when I said that one fantasy of the good life was that working hard in uni guarantees a well-paying job after graduation, a student wrote in the chat "sir all due respect most of us are getting B.A.s in English, there is no delusion of a paying job"
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The biggest problem with
#TheChair
is simply that, to adapt Brian Eno's line about the first Velvet Underground album, only 10,000 people will watch it, but all 10,000 of them will write LARB pieces about it.
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Used this clip for my lecture on surface reading this week. I think I enjoyed it more than my students. But I regret nothing.
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@OllivanderOllie
@girlziplocked
@C0G1TO_ERG0_SUM
@upstaterica
Can’t speak for the original poster, but I’d say that it is making university an outrageously expensive commodity—rather than a free, public good—that creates a consumer mindset in students. Students are not to blame! The funding model is.
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@erikmbaker
When Cohen died, a Canadianist in my dept wrote a long obit that had just one reference to Cohen’s “digression into popular music.” (He read the obit aloud at our dept meeting)
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I can't be the only one to note this, but Sinead and Pee Wee were both brilliant, one-of-a-kind artists whose careers were ruined by the worst kinds of conservative moral panic.
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Still tinkering, but this might be the screening schedule for my U.S. Teen Film this coming term. Suggestions/criticisms welcomed!
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Updating a letter of rec for a fantastic scholar and teacher still in search of a TT job, and I realized that I have versions on file for this person for the 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 job market seasons, too, and it just makes me want to burn everything down.
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We keep being told that many at the McGill encampment are "not members of the McGill community." They are students from Concordia & most likely UQAM & UdeM, who we invite into our classrooms per the QC Inter-University Transfer Agreement. They belong there are much as anyone.
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Today is the day in my Intro to Film Studies course when I get to tell the class that there is no movie in the world I detest more than Dead Poets Society.
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Found this used today and I am excited to read it, but what is with this cover?
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This is exactly the situation at
@mcgill
. I was on campus yesterday, stopped by the encampment to talk with various people, then went to my office to grade papers. Food trucks were doing a brisk business, the endless construction continued--nothing is being blocked or hindered.
You can tell the people who are either lying or nowhere near a college campus by their insistence that pro-Palestinian encampments prevent non-protesters from going about their days as normal. It’s simply a false claim!
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Final class of my Marxist Lit&Cult Theory course today (which goes chronologically from realism to pomo), and one student said "The 1st half of this course was 'here's how art can be revolutionary' and the second half was 'here's how art can do nothing'" and she's not wrong.
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@aquariumglass
I had a PhD student who said he felt guilty b/c the (not great) stipend he got was more than any member of his family had ever made. I had to keep reminding him that nothing is too good for the working class.
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Daughter texted me from her restaurant job to say she thought a friend of mine was there—“You know, the guy with a beard who is really depressed”—and I was like, you gotta narrow it down a bit, kid.
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Album titles that could also be university press monographs. I'll start:
A Tribe Called Quest's debut, People's Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm.
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It was the product of an organizing campaign that over two dozen wonderful colleagues worked on during these past few months.
Introducing the Association of McGill Professors of the Faculty of Arts/l'Association mcgilloise des professeur·e·s de la Faculté des arts (AMPFA)!
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Some important context for
@mcgillu
's assertion that its "operating procedures" for dealing w/protests and occupations were the product of "extensive consultation w/ the McGill community": these measures were never voted on (and thus never approved by) McGill's Senate. (1/3)
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I just referred to a student as "my dude" in my comments on his final paper for my Intro to Film class. I have never spoken with him individually. I would not recognize him on the street. And yet, his paper made me want to call him "my dude."
This is fine, right?
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@johnsemley3000
It is kind of the equivalent in cinema of Bob Marley in music: actually much better and more interesting than its weed-centric fanbase would lead you to believe.
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What is most depressing to me about pandemic teaching is that every pedagogical option you have has some major problem, so you spend all of your energy trying to achieve, at best, the least shitty version of your class possible at that moment. Which is ... not inspiring.
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Trying to think of white guy Gen X artists other than Steve Albini whose first act was "ha ha I'm such an offensive asshole" only to become genuinely empathetic and thoughtful as they aged, and it's basically just the Beastie Boys, right?
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A modest proposal: we cancel the spring term (or the winter term, as it is called here in Canadia) and just sleep for 4 months. Who's with me?
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Yes. So much discussion is wasted on “Is this person a racist” instead of “Are they doing a racist thing?” The latter question is the one that matters.
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Our little girl passed away yesterday.
She was only 12 pounds, so how is it that our apartment feels so empty without her?
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Monica's brilliant and prolific scholarship would have made her an intimidating colleague if she hadn't also been such a wonderfully sweet, kind, and warm person. It is crushingly unfair that she was taken from us so early. We will miss you terribly, Monica.
Beautiful Monica Popescu, gone too soon, too young. I will miss my most generous, vibrant, brilliant friend. Her intellectual legacy of reinventing Cold War studies thru incisive interpretations of African literature is an extraordinary loss. Rest in peace & power ❤️🌹
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What makes the police invasion of Columbia even more upsetting is the sickening feeling that it is the future of my university.
@mcgill
is following the Columbia admin's playbook ("Outside agitators! The green is private property!") & they show no sign of changing course.
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The mask goes over your nose. The mask goes over your nose. The mask goes over your nose. THE MASK GOES OVER YOUR NOSE. THE MASK GOES OVER YOUR NOSE. THE MASK GOES OVER YOUR NOSE. THE MASK GOES OVER YOUR NOSE. THE MASK GOES OVER YOUR NOSE. THE MASK GOES OVER YOUR NOSE. THE MASK G
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I wear a KN95 mask to lecture to my class of 120 students who are masked but not socially distanced, and while I am getting a little better with it, I sound permanently a little out of breath and a tiny bit like I am about to cry, and frankly that's seems about right.
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My first ever total eclipse and honestly? Holy cow. 10/10, no notes, big ups to the solar system--it knows how to put on a show.
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@sleepyrichey
I'm so sorry. I don't know you, but I can't imagine what it would be like to deal with this. (Also, I was a grad student at UVA a long time ago, and it breaks my heart to see this.)
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Is this the first cinematic representation of adjunct faculty?
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@ChildFragments
Erik Olin Wright assigned his own book (Classes) for one week of the Marxism seminar I took with him, and he gave everyone a dollar for buying it, so as to return the royalties (and more, obvs) he would make on it.
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So many came out in truly awful weather for this beautiful event.
Despite the blizzard, McGill students and workers rallied today in solidarity with the newly formed Association of McGill Professors of the Faculty of Arts (AMPFA), a faculty union representing Arts professors at McGill.
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First day of my third decade at McGill. Let's do this.
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@johnsemley3000
Absolutely right. Also, am I wrong to think that, when asked to pitch himself to Mattson, his character discloses a kind of self-awareness that no other character has?
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@jelani9
This hypothetical reminds me of Derrick Bell’s “The Space Traders,” the premise of which white readers almost always reject, and black readers find eminently plausible.
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If I ever quit academia, it will be due to the infinite hassles associated with expense reports. I have now exchanged multiple emails over several weeks to try to justify the most basic of expenses, most of which were rejected, saving my multi-billion dollar uni about ... $500.
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The reading schedule, for those who asked. (Which is to say, yes, part of this is my fault.)
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My only contribution to the discourse about that Netflix show is that I'll be happy if the professors are not depicted as people who took up teaching English because they are frustrated would-be novelists.
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RIP to the patron saint of drunk and high dudes who tell everyone "no wait, you have to listen to this song right now."
RIP, Robbie Robertson
Here’s Robbie and Marty listening to Van the Man.
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I am too tired to come up with a witty tweet for this, but: I just realized that a colleague has taught the same undergraduate courses every year for the past nine years, and is proposing to do so again next year. This depresses me on so many levels.
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Me, after finally finishing last ep of White Lotus with partner: I think season 2 is actually more interesting than season 1 & I have both Marxist and non-Marxist reasons for this position.
Partner: ...
Me: Did you hear me?
Partner: [Aubrey Plaza-like stare]
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In other words, McGill's actual procedures for addressing protests and occupations were NOT the product of the collegium's deliberation over how such democratic contestations should be treated.
They were imposed from above by the administration. (fin)
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The condescension on display here is truly appalling.
And to every young climate activist who has been told by someone around my age "you've hurt your cause"? That's a sign that you are doing *exactly* what you should be doing.
RAGE: In a Nantucket fundraiser for
@MassGovernor
Maura Healey,
donors become enraged when a wine party is disrupted by a protest from
@ClimateDefiance
over Healey’s support for fossil fuels.
Boston real estate titan Bruce Percelay to a protestor: "I don't care if you die.”
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@maddiewhittle
This is always what flummoxes me about the depiction of Scorsese as some avatar of Difficult, Pretentious Cinema. Have you seen any of his films? They are wildly entertaining!
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Huge sectors of my life at the moment are draining and/or depressing, but this week I am teaching essays by Lauren Berlant, Fredric Jameson, Sianne Ngai, and Stuart Hall, and it is impossible not to feel exhilarated when doing so.
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Literally just remembered that I joined dozens of other student protesters in 1990 to occupy Bascom Hall & then the Board of Regents room for 5 full days and nights to protest my uni's capitulation to anti-gay exclusionary programs (ROTC). Bc that is just a thing you do.
I feel like I'm losing my mind a little: people understand that "occupying buildings on campus" is, like, one of the most common forms of studen protest for decades and not some devious new ploy devised by professional anarchist plotters, right?
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Can a historian tell me the last time a sitting president joined a picket line? (This is a real question—I can’t recall any POTUS doing this in my lifetime.)
Tuesday, I’ll go to Michigan to join the picket line and stand in solidarity with the men and women of UAW as they fight for a fair share of the value they helped create.
It’s time for a win-win agreement that keeps American auto manufacturing thriving with well-paid UAW jobs.
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Solidarity with my colleagues in Law. See you on the picket lines!
It is official:
@mcgillu
has pulled the trigger forcing a strike that will inconvenience students, their parents, staff, & the annual meeting of the
@acds_clsa
that had been scheduled at
@lawmcgillu
in June. Join us on the picket line.
#polqc
#solidarity
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Sinema is basically the tenured prof who gives up on doing their actual job to pursue some hobby, but still votes the wrong way in department meetings and capriciously fails grad students on their comps.
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@zunguzungu
@emilynussbaum
"The Gilded Age is a little like those podcasts people listen to if they’re having trouble sleeping."
This is savage.
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@sarahchihaya
Someone once said that course evals should have only 2 questions:
1. Which works on the syllabus did you not like?
2. What personal shortcoming does this reveal about you?
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Was also thinking about this today: the entire song is a masterpiece of narrative economy and compression. Every line, every word, hits precisely and expansively.
Thinking again about "Fast Car" and how the lines "I know things'll get better / You'll find work and I'll get promoted / And we'll move out of the shelter / Buy a bigger house and live in the suburbs" convey more meaning than entire novels sometimes do.
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One of the great tragedies of growing older is watching the younger generation make the same mistakes as yours (just walked by a group of undergrads listening to the Spin Doctors).
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May December is one of Todd Haynes's best. If his earlier great films are abt women who are trapped (Safe, Far From Heaven) OR abt men who are transgressive but fucked-up (Velvet Goldmine, I'm Not There), May December is abt women who are trapped AND transgressive but fucked-up.
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@dee_bee_h
This is basically the poetry version of Thomas Friedman columns based on conversations he has with taxi drivers.
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Each time I see "4-part biopic" and a bright blue image, I find myself hoping that this will be the pic if I keep scrolling down.
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My depression over the fact that Quebec just ordered all the gyms closed is compounded by my depression over how dorky it is to be so bummed out over closed gyms.
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There is a point in the Montreal winter when the subzero temps, snow, and ice make one start to wonder if humans are meant to be on this planet, and lemme tell ya, having an out-of-control pandemic at the same time DOES NOT HELP.
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Dogs are stupid bc you will be grating cheese and suddenly start crying bc the dog you had for 12 years would always annoy the shit out of you begging for cheese and now you miss being annoyed like that so much and jesus it sucks when they are gone.
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My uni just announced that we are fully divesting from the fossil fuel industry! But it drives me nuts that the announcement does not acknowledge that without
@DivestMcGill
's decade-plus of tireless activism, this would never have happened.
via
@mcgillu
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@PaxVictoriana
Not a union movie per se, but 9 to 5 is literally about workers seizing the mode of production.
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The only thing I have to add to the "should profs circulate their syllabi before the term starts" discourse is that we are already in week 3 at my uni and I envy the hell out of everyone who is still merely preparing for their semester.
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An openly fascist ode to straight-up lynching. But also, I feel professionally obligated to note that cultural studies was basically invented to unpack the kind of battle over political and cultural signifiers at work in this thing.
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Student just walked past my office window blasting at top volume, from his bluetooth speaker, Culture Club's "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?" and my hope for future generations just improved significantly.
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@ChildFragments
He also felt super sheepish about assigning it, even tho most courses in Marxist sociology in late 1980s would assign that book!
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We should all try to get a good night's sleep, everyone, because we are going to wake up to some truly horrible think pieces on this tomorrow.
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How is it that I frequently forget important things for work, etc., and yet can remember every stupid/cringey thing I have done in my entire life with 100% accurate recall?
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Embarrassed to say that I had never seen Cléo de 5 à 7 until tonight.
But now I am more angry at every single person I know who did not force me to see this movie earlier in my life. I have been completely failed by my friends.
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@ChildFragments
Maybe the most intellectually fair prof I ever had--would spend more time offering the best possible version of arguments he disagreed with than his own take. A model of rigour and kindness in everything he did.
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Me: This success in tying labour gains to environmental progress is huge, and what everyone should focus on.
Also me: Holy shit he is actually wearing that on his shirt.
BREAKING:
@GM
has agreed in writing to place their electric battery manufacturing under the UAW's National Master Agreement.
#StandUpUAW
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I mean, this is just fucking truth: "Whenever a Duplass brother is cast in a dramedy, you have a sense that showrunners are testing the limits of how much sympathy we’ll be able to muster for a deeply flawed but likable man."
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If many 80s bands made great music *despite* the production trends of the time (e.g., The Go-Betweens), what 80s bands made great music that was suited to and/or enabled by those production trends?
I'll start: Cocteau Twins
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@sarahljaffe
As a US citizen now living in Canada, can confirm. Renewed my drivers license AND health care card in less than 30 minutes during a weekday lunch hour. Your public systems do not have to be this way, Americans!
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I know that this is one of the biggest dad clichés ever, but boy, having a teenage daughter who is straight gives you a whole new window into what absolute fuckheads teenage boys are.
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Proof that, after a full year of remote instruction, I have mastered all of the audiovisual affordances of online teaching.
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In a phone call with my dad, I told him about our plans to drive home for xmas, a two-day drive, & I told him our planned route and the town in which we'd stay overnight, and he said "That's what I would have chosen, too" and I swear he sounded prouder than when I got a TT job.
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Submitted two external tenure reviews on or before the requested deadlines please clap
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@HeerJeet
Taking advantage of this to share my fave exchange, which I play in my Criticism and Theory courses:
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I noted, but only briefly, in my undergrad theory class that Berlant used "they/them" pronouns, and now, every single paper I have received on Berlant's work uses these correct pronouns flawlessly.
The kids are alright.
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As you can see from this screenshot of the March 20, 2013 Senate agenda, a "Statement of Principles" was debated and voted on. But the actual procedures were presented for "information" only. (2/3)
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All performers in Pynchon adaptations must also have Pynchon-esque names.
Paul Thomas Anderson casts newcomer Chase Infiniti in his next feature, further fueling rumors it will be a
#Vineland
adaptation.
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I would have hoped that since Brad Gilbert is a coach of a currently competing player in the U.S. Open we would not have to listen to his jackass commentary on other matches, but apparently the universe is a cold, merciless void indifferent to the demands of simple human decency
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What is your dorkiest teacherly habit? Here's mine: writing "always avoid alliteration" in the margins next to an instance of same.
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Explain to me again why our weeks don't have 3-day weekends.
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OK fine. In alphabetical order:
Make a 20-track comp of your all-time fav tracks, each artist can only feature once. Not the 'best' songs, the ones that bring instant joy the second you hear the first note, the ones that give other people the best insight into what stirs your soul. Share when ready.
#20tracks
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Is it a cheap shot to say that I can't imagine Toni Morrison tweeting out a smug, self-congratulatory pic like that?
Well, I'm going to say it anyway.
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Everything is of course horrible and depressing, but damn, my students are just amazing this term. Even though we have been holding class via Zoom so far, they are so eager and thoughtful in their engagement that I end every class feeling totally elated.
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Just reflecting on how, if you were going to be a groundbreaking scholar of science fiction, Darko Suvin is the best possible name to have.
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Yeah, I know caring about the Oscars is dumb, but a big fucking hooray for Sarah Polley.
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