First week of classes in spring quarter

My first impressions of my classes and professors.

The social anthropology class is taught by a very a young hip professor. Interestingly, he studied math and literature as an undergraduate at Rice and then got a doctorate in anthropology at the University of Chicago (top anthro school) after he realized that math and literature did not give him as much social interaction as he liked. For his PhD he went to study the workers at a Japanese leather processing plant. The subject of his study was something confusing about politics and labor relations. It is refreshing to have an example of an anthropologist who studies living and relevant cultures. However, despite the interest in my professor, I am off to a bad start, having missed two classes already, due to study abroad paper work which I procrastinated on.

The professor for anthropology of medicine is an amazing woman. She is currently working on seven different projects that focuses on victims of post traumatic stress disorder. One of her projects involved using Second Life, the MMO, to reintegrate returning soldiers back into normal society.

On one of her projects she received this (picture)


Nasty looking laceration



Not to worry though, it is just some movie make up.

Before coming to class, my professor was touring a movie studio that was helping train soldiers for their deployment. The studio would build sets that recreated Iraqi and Afghan villages and soldiers would be faced with an ambush situation. The particular scenario that she was shown, involved an enemy sniper in a building firing on the troops. Eventually, an rpg hits the building that the sniper is in and blasts him from the building. The sniper is an amputee, so the studio was able to turn his stump into a blown off leg using movie make up as shown in the pictures. The exercise is meant to give the soldiers a taste of battle in order to inoculate them for the stress in the field. It is always nice to see that there are actually jobs for anthropologists, and not just any jobs, but exciting ones too.

My psychological anthropology professor is a flaming homosexual, which would make you think the class would be interesting, but you would be very wrong. His lectures are boring and messy but his class is supposed to be easy so it all works out. Also every once in awhile he does something so flamboyantly gay, I cannot help but chuckle and stay awake.

Life-History Seminar and Practicum is the most open ended class that I have ever had. The whole object of the course is to interview one person about their life and try to deduce how their life history was influenced by their culture. Mind you, this is not a one time interview that you can bullshit. I have to do five to seven recorded, one hour interviews over the course of the next six weeks. I am very excited for this class not only because of how unique it is but also because there is this beautiful girl who sat directly across from me.

- muffinman