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The National Air & Space Museum in Washington D.C.
If you go, be sure to take the time for a side trip to the Smithsonian Udvar-Hazy Center - an extension of the National Air and Space Museum out at Dulles Airport -- pretty impressive. The Enola Gay, SR-71, Space Shuttle, etc... well worth the extra time. Admission is free (parking is like $15 bucks!)
For every person who gets it right there will be ten who will think He got it wrong.
While the ratio may be less, this can apply to a certain percentage of "scholarly academic work" too.
I think that it entirely depends upon the level of the course. For those students taking survey courses, I find nothing wrong with offering the opportunity for extra credit – provided that the work is worthy of credit above and beyond. Those little BS assignments that don't require that the student rise above and beyond – shouldn't count. However, by the time a student moves into the core and major requirements for their degree, extra credit seems a little juvenile. So, in other words, for HIST-101, sure, extra credit work (provided that it is at least as rigorous as the regular credit work) is fine. HIST-455... not so much. By then, either you "get it" or you don't, and you shouldn't get any "do-overs".
“We only discovered it because we were drunkenly fooling around and decided to have a look at what was beneath the grid – It was amazing.”The finest element of historical method!
There was a lack of fodder in Virginia for the number of horses and mules in use – and the railroad refused to carry the amount of fodder needed by the Army of Northern Virginia because it took up too much space – wasn't profitable. Remember that the Confederacy never “nationalized” their railroads like the Union did.
Panamas are nice – I used to have one that I picked up in Colon during a brief tour at Ft. Sherman. Alas, it is no more. I ought to get a new one.
Here's what did it for me – his claim that adjunct professors naturally teach the worst students – inferring that if you are taking night or weekend courses (instead of during the work day) that you must be an inferior intellect. Of course, the corrollary could be the same, that if you are teaching as an adjunct that you must be amongst the worst instructors….Of course, both arguments are, in my mind, uh... bunk.
I am a hat wearer – and I have a variety of hats, from the fedora style to an outback style to traditional wool “snap caps” or English “Driving Caps” – mine aren't so much a fashion statement as they are recognition that The Almighty has blessed me with a fine shaped head that He deemed should be on display and not hidden under hair, and that it is my responsibility to protect it from the ravages of the sun, cold rain, and biting winter winds.Pertaining to the article, of course I take my hat off when I enter a building - the Marines taught me that much....
You'll also probably want the credit card that you used to buy the ticket – a lot of times you can print your bording pass or check luggage at a kiosk – and the credit card is tied to your ticket record.
I do not believe so. Some folks just aren't made out for college and are better off doing things that they excel at. I would encourage young people to consider it for their future however.High school on the other hand I believe everybody should attempt to complete, and at bare minimum finish grade 10.
While I agree with you, I think everyone should have the opportunity to go to college - whether at 18/19 years old fresh out of high school, or at 45, 55, or 65. College doesn't necessarily mean the traditional 4 year private or public college - it includes community colleges and other open enrollement institutions.We shouldn't preclude anyone from attempting a college education - and there should be no stigma for those who find themselves lacking in basic skills who need remediation or who decide that they aren't willing to go through the effort to get up to doing college level work.Now, for the article, "Professor X" appears to be a bit of an elitist ass... but that's for another post.
I was taught that, as a historian, you examine every source (primary or secondary) with a healthy dose of skepticism. Therefore, I would start with a belief that the source is probably inaccurate, that the author was biased and was trying to assure that his or her perspective was justified or recorded. In the scenario that you offer, I would have to make judgments based on perceiving bias in the source and would start with an initial level of doubt. I would have to ask:Why would the author have written the document?What did the author include and what did he or she choose to exclude?What do we know about the author and their allegiances or position at the time? Did they perhaps have a patron?What biases could have influenced their writing - racial, ethnic, economic, social, national, personal?Needless to say, you are going to have to make a judgment call - that's what we have to do. But I'd start with being doubtful of the author's intentions, and go from there.
2. Was it true that only 2 out of 10 couldn't read/write, yet only 6% graduated from high school? I would have thought that there would be more illiterate people at that time.
I can accept that 6% HS grads because of the following. I can tell you this. When I graduated U.C. Berkeley in 1954, only 6% of the population had attended 1 semester of college. I did not see the % who graduated.
To add to that thought, something like only 28% of Americans over the age of 25 hold a college degree (or higher) - and that is as of, I think, 2007.
Personally, I don't think I've read anything else he has written...his only work was Huckleberry Finn, and that was many years ago. Yet I know he is an important historical figure because he is frequently quoted, and his name pops up from time to time in places in history, which tells me that he was a popular figure in his own day.
Okay Phid - here's your reading list for the next twelve months - plenty of time to read these and other, more serious, stuff. Tom Sawyer, The Innocents Abroad, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, Pudd'nhead Wilson, Following the Equator, The Prince and the Pauper It may be fiction, but I think that his works really help us understand that period of American history and society - besides, they're entertaining in their own right. My brother makes a rather convincing argument that nothing original (that was any good) has been written since Huck Finn.I think that one of the things that made Twain such an icon is not only his ability to capture the reader with accurate and "living" descriptions and characters, but his unrelenting stab at the popular culture of the time.
How about the Blues?
I think one could make the case that the Blues is the most distinctly-American form of music, but this has to do with the way it evolved with more appeal to people in more isolated parts of the country (i.e. Mississippi Delta, Texas, the Deep South). Jazz, on the other hand, grew in popularity in more cosmopolitan cities such as New York where foreigners would more likely hear it. I know that jazz artists of the 50s and 60s were playing shows in Europe, owing to their popularity across the divide back then.
I brought up the blues because it crossed racial and cultural lines much like jazz. It was more than just the rural music scene too - while most folks think of the blues having its roots in the deep south and the Mississippi Delta, it can also be traced to Appalachia and the West -- there are some "blues DNA" in some of the old cowboy songs as well as country music, rock and roll, soul, funk, and yes, even rap. As America's appetite for the blues grew, it migrated to the cities and evolved differently. Memphis blues were different in sound from Chicago blues - and blues singers in Nashville and New Orleans went different directions as well. Blues musicians such as Robert Johnson and Son House influenced almost every form of popular music in the last fifty years.
