College is supposed to be the place you go to learn the skills you'll use to build your career. One of the many useful skills you learn there is bullshit--the art of making something useless, pointless, and worthless sound important, pertinent, and complicated. What follows is a list of the most useless classes my university offers and a helpful guide for explaining to your future employer why you took them:
AAS 4550
Race and the University
On the surface, an in-depth examination of the role race plays in higher education sounds like a good use of your time. You might learn about the historical struggles of minorities to obtain higher education, or the debate surrounding affirmative action. But you'll be hard pressed to explain to your future boss why this counts to your major in Asian American Studies.
| Not a racial stereotype. At all. |
That's right. The class on race and higher education is in the Asian department. Since I'm white, I can't exactly say this is racist--but the course says it will focus on examining America's 'major research institutions' and explore how it is 'that certain knowledge formations and disciplines come to be naturalized or privileged within the academy?'
How would I explain this to my future employer? Hand them the course description and say, 'I understand this'.
ASRC 6517
The Oprah Book Club and African American Literature
Yes. This is a real thing. I understand that Oprah's a major icon for the African-American community, but she has more classes named after her than Martin Luther King Jr, President Obama, and Fredrick Douglas combined. I could understand a course on Oprah's role in the African-American community--perhaps focusing on how she's inspired black women, or on how she's worked outside cultural boundaries. But a class on Oprah's Book Club?
ASRC 6517 promises to 'draw on a range of critical and theoretical resources related to the Oprah Book Club archive', a sentence your average Oprah's Book Club reader can't even understand. The very fact one watches Oprah indicates you don't really have that much to do during the day. Next thing you know, the American History department will be offering courses on Honey Boo Boo and What Not To Wear.
How do you explain this class to your future boss? 'It was a requirement for my major. The department chair was Oprah herself'.
EAS 1220
Earthquake!
You can say this much about this introductory Earth sciences class--it sounds like a direct to DVD sequel to Airplane!, but one that'd be slightly better than Airplane! II. I understand the importance of making your course sound memorable, bu t come on, this is Cornell. Part of the Ivy League tradition is taking classes with pretentious names. 'Introduction to Anthrobotany in Geographically Isolated Systems' just sounds better than 'People Farming On Islands'. Adding an exclamation mark after the course title will convince absolutely nobody to take it.
 |
| Or watch your horrible, horrible movie. |
This class is supposed to be about understanding how natural disasters occur and are mitigated. The first half of the course focuses on building earthquake proof buildings, which is probably good knowledge for society to have. There's a lot of stuff in there about analyzing data and public communication, which sounds pretty boring for a class with an exclamation mark in its title. But this class doesn't just focus on plain old earthquakes. Rather, it covers volcanoes, tsunamis, and the ever exiting 'threat of extinction from a future impact by an extraterrestrial body'
How to explain this to your future boss? 'Ever seen Armgeddon'?
SHUM 4864
Pirate Humanities
Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum! This class (which is BYOR, by the way), sounds like it can't quite be what it sounds like. This is about media piracy? Right? Nope. Offered through the Cornell Society for the Humanities, this class 'examines pirate assemblages as an ineluctable underside of capitalist modernity'. In other words, where you've got money, people are gonna try and steal it. This is an actual class about actual pirates.
| You will always remember this as the day you almost had Professor Jack Sparrow! |
And yet the course description makes it sound like the most boring class ever. 'Within a framework of control and emergence (derived largely from contemporary theories of risk, biopolitics, and securitization), the course seeks to develop a posthumanist understanding of the pirate'. Seriously? What does that even mean? It's a course on freaking pirates! Stop trying to make it sound all smart and stuff. Anyway, there might be some good stuff in this seminar but it's limited to 15 people, so I suggest illegally downloading Pirates of the Caribbean instead.
How to explain this to your future boss? Tell him it was a current events course about crime in the failed state of Somalia. Try to look somber.
DSOC 4210
Theories of Reproduction
Is this class about . . . reproducing machines? Reproducing ancient texts? Nope. It is exactly what it sounds like. A four thousand level course on human reproduction. Keep in mind, this is something human beings have done for thousands of years without any real need for explanation, but apparently Cornell students are so nerdy they need an advanced class on the correct procedure for baby-making.
This class will empathize 'gender-based' theories of reproduction. I'm assuming this lecture will begin with 'When a man and a woman love each other very much . . .' I'm not sure how you could have a theory of human reproduction that wasn't gender based. It will also examine what makes 'families have any, few, and many children', and I assume the answer will be closely related to sex. Isn't this material taught in ninth grade health classes across the country. The very existence of this class puts the future of the American educational system in doubt. If you take this class, it actually lowers your chances of getting laid. Or you might just be a developmental sociology major, in which case, sorry.
How to explain this to your future boss? Don't.
No comments:
Post a Comment