The low point of my otherwise fine education at the University of Chicago came when a professor on the brink of retirement screwed up his book order. When we, in some puzzlement, inquired as to the whereabouts of the books, he shrugged and said, "Eh. We just won't use any."
Needless to say, this arrangement predated GoogleBooks and company. I retitled the course, appropriately enough, "The Course with No Books."
Right now, my courses are also without books. I sincerely hope this is a temporary arrangement. In the meantime, perhaps I should rename them...
Reimagining British Literature, Because We Have None to Read
The Poetics of Invisibility
Erasing the Canon
Post-Textual Studies in British Literature
Making Words Mean Many Different Things: The Collaborative Reconstruction of British Literature in the Twenty-First Century Classroom
An Instructor Reads Aloud: Reviving Medieval Pedagogy for the Modern Day
Literary Study by Vulcan Mind-Meld: A Group Experiment
Mediums and Media: Studying Victorian Poetry through Seances
As someone whose books are also not in, I really appreciate this.
Posted by: Sarah | August 29, 2011 at 09:00 PM
I like "Erasing the Canon" (shades of "Erased De Kooning Drawing") but that won't work for you, will it, as you've already Abandoned the Canon. Perhaps you'll have to adopt Post-
Textual Studies -- though again, you're one of the most textual folks I know. Shucks.
Posted by: nbm | August 30, 2011 at 09:47 PM
I've just been through a course where everyone had a different edition of the text - makes for fun when someone is talking about what they are seeing on pX, which is pX+11 for someone else and pX-4 for another...
Posted by: Kerry NZ | September 01, 2011 at 01:10 AM
"How To Do Things Without Words". Something performative and J.L. Austinian, presumably.
Posted by: John Holbo | September 01, 2011 at 03:57 AM
The College Bookstore ordered the wrong textbook for my ADVERTISING course. How does that happen when my book order had the correct author, title, publisher, and ISBN????
Posted by: George Kelley | September 06, 2011 at 12:52 PM
Can I audit the Mediums and Media course? Sounds fascinating. I also like the sound of Collaborative Reconstruction of British Literature... sounds a bit like the end of Fahrenheit 451.
Posted by: Benjamin L Clark | September 08, 2011 at 01:45 PM