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Friday, October 01, 2004
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SNAPSHOTS FROM HOME
IV O City, city... ...except that Washington DC isn't anything like the London T.S. Eliot has in mind - no crush of people on narrow streets, no gray dawn. No gray dawn today, anyway - sunny from the start, and unseasonably warm. On Fridays this semester, UD doesn't teach her Contemporary France course until 2:30, so she's evolved the routine of taking the Metro to Dupont Circle in the late morning. Next door to Teaism -- a tearoom UD likes but doesn't love (occasional loud New Age conversations)-- there's a pleasantly busy Starbucks with deep couches and little round tables always available. Here UD sips her latte and eats her cinnamon crisp and writes lecture notes. Today's are about Adam Gopnik's Paris to the Moon. UD likes this nicely observed account of a young American family's Paris life, but some of her students -- fluent in French, international in background, and familiar with Paris -- say they find Gopnik "snobbish." (Swims at the Ritz, whines that he can't find the coffee he likes...) UD suspects this response reflects, more broadly, the American dislike of serious high culture, our assumption that a real interest in things like repose, excellence, and beauty, coupled with a low level of tolerance for kitsch, means the rankest elitism. Sometimes UD thinks that her entire teaching life is about suggesting to young Americans that this may not always be the case. UD's teaching life is under a bit of a strain lately from the non-stop, high-tech, high-security environment of Foggy Bottom. Yesterday it was the silently revolving spy blimp; today, with International Monetary Fund meetings and attendant protests taking place, it's non-stop helicopters, sirens, and loudspeakers. UD's university recently constructed an outdoor classroom on campus - there are stone chairs, a stone podium - and she'd planned to use it today. But she'd have needed a megaphone. |