{"id":2718,"date":"2017-03-18T23:29:51","date_gmt":"2017-03-19T03:29:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/?p=2718"},"modified":"2017-03-18T23:37:11","modified_gmt":"2017-03-19T03:37:11","slug":"openly-dedicated","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/openly-dedicated\/","title":{"rendered":"Openly Dedicated"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Poetry<\/a><\/p>\n

When I got to college, I discovered there was a thing called intellectual history. Part of intellectual history, I also learned, was intellectual lineage: not just idea leading to idea, but thinker leading to thinker. Groups of writers interacting synchronously and asynchronously. Influences, meetings, letters, fallings-out, all of it.<\/p>\n

This semester, it occurred to me that I might at least signal to my students that I come from someplace too, intellectually speaking. More precisely, I come from someones<\/em>. I feel a great cloud of witnesses around me as I teach and as I learn. Those witnesses are intellectual parents, intellectual siblings, and in some cases, even intellectual heirs. These are the people whose work has shaped me, and who have shaped my work. In the most intimate cases, these are people with whom I’ve broken bread. People with whom I’ve fought, and cried. People who’ve believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself, people who’ve encouraged me, people who’ve intervened at key moments. People who are with me as I think and write and teach and learn.<\/p>\n

I have always felt that the\u00a0courses I design and lead, at their best, do not deliver content so much as they mingle souls, as John Donne said letters do<\/a>. My students sometimes hear a few of my stories, but somehow I wanted to communicate something in a more ceremonial way. So I came up with the idea of putting a dedication on my syllabi. My wish is that students will see how precious our time together may be, and how one day we may find we have changed each other’s lives. I want them to see that courses of study are books, but not just books; assignments, but not just assignments; credit hours, but not just credit hours. I want them to understand that a course of study is more\u00a0relational<\/em> than transactional. I want them to understand some of the gratitude I feel.<\/p>\n

And I’ll confess it: I want to send a letter of sorts, a communication, perhaps even an eldritch communication in some cases, to the teachers and mentors and colleagues who have sustained me and honored me with their faith and hope and love.<\/p>\n

So this semester, my poetry course<\/a> and my film course<\/a> both have dedications. The words are small and may well be overlooked, even though I did explain them on the first day of class. In the end, the words may mean little to anyone but me. But I have written them, even as those I honor have helped to write and teach and love me into being. And I am content.<\/p>\n

\"Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I got to college, I discovered there was a thing called intellectual history. Part of intellectual history, I also learned, was intellectual lineage: not just idea leading to idea, but thinker leading to thinker. Groups of writers interacting synchronously … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2720,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[28,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-openlearning","category-thoughtvectors"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/445-syllabus-header.jpg?fit=800%2C234&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4bHwM-HQ","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2718"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2718\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2725,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2718\/revisions\/2725"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2720"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.gardnercampbell.net\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}