Monday, February 1

Today is Monday. Week 2 is now over... and Week 3 has begun. Monday morning, until noon, is the grace period if you did not finish the final Week 2 assignments. This week's topic in the Myth-Folklore class is Biblical or Classical again, and in Indian Epics, you'll be finishing the Ramayana!

Class Procedures and Reminders

Project Stack. As always on Monday, I will have a HUGE bunch of assignments in the Stack that were turned in over the weekend or on Monday morning. The first thing I will do on Monday morning when I get to work is to update the list of items in the Storybook stack. So, after 8AM or so on Monday, you will be able to check the contents of the stack to make sure I received your assignment. I will then start reading the assignments in the order they were turned in. Please do not go on to the Week 3 Project assignment until you get Week 2 comments back from me; I will get comments back to you by the end of the week.

Visiting the Blogs. I hope you are enjoying the blog commenting each week. There are about 40 people in each class, which means there are lots of blogs to visit. In addition to the blog groups, you can do extra blog commenting so that you can meet new people and/or return to blogs you liked; that extra option is available any time during the week. When you find people who are doing some fun and useful stuff with their blog, you can bookmark their blog as one you might want to come back to and check on from time to time. For example, Lore (Indian Epics, Professional Writing major) is collecting some great writing-related materials in her blog: Lexicon of Lore. Lore took Myth-Folklore last semester, so she knows how much good stuff you can accumulate in a blog if you save things week by week!

The following items are for fun and exploration:

Don't Wait for Perfection. Great advice from writer Margaret Atwood: "If I waited for perfection, I would never write a word."


Words to Watch: Today's words to watch out for are ARC and ARK. For details, see this blog post.


Featured Storybook: Epic Festivals of India. This Storybook is a "calendar of enchantment" which brings to life the stories and rituals of the festivals of Rama Navami, Hanuman Jayanti, Krishna Jayanti, and Diwali, the festival of lights.


Free Book Online: The Book of Saints and Friendly Beasts by Abbie Farwell Brown. This blog post provides additional information about the contents of the book which is one of the reading options in Myth-Folklore this week.


India Featured Book: Heroes of Hampi: The Mythology of Kishkindha. This blog post provides additional information about this reading option for Indian Epics. This is one of my favorite Amar Chitra Katha comic books because it blends a historical legend from the 14th century with legends that are far more ancient.


Words of Wisdom: Today's proverb poster is No chick ever came from a fried egg (a Latin proverb). Details at the Proverb Lab. The Latin rhymes! Ex frixis PULLUS ovis numquam venit ULLUS.


Today's Video: The Mundane Goddess. In this brilliant modernization, you will see Uma Thurman as Hera, living the life of a modern housewife... and badly in need of therapy!


Growth Mindset: Today's growth mindset cat is on a quest: Success is not coming to you; you must come to it. Details at the blog.


Event on Campus: There will be a lecture at 7PM in Bizzell LL118 by Giancarlo Casale: The Eunuch's Galleons: Cultural Exchange and the Technology of Warfare in the Early Modern Indian Ocean (details); this is another lecture in the "Science and Civilization in Islam" Presidential Dream Course. Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online.

February 1: Langston Hughes. Today, February 1, marks the birthday of the African-American poet, Langston Hughes, who was born in 1902. He was one of the luminaries of the Harlem Renaissance, and you can read about his remarkable life and career in this Wikipedia article.

(cover of Weary Blues, 1926)

Here's a video interpretation of "Weary Blues" that I found at YouTube.



Note: You can page back through the older blog posts to see any announcements you might have missed, and you can check out the Twitter stream for information and fun stuff during the day.