Thursday, June 12, 2008

This is so that I'll look smart

Click the photo above for a larger view.

In university, I took a little of everything. A smattering of this, a smattering of that... I didn't even declare my major (French) till my third year, and then only because I HAD to. Even my choice of major was, in part, to allow a large variety in the course I took. French lit, grammar, composition, phonetics, linguistics, history... there were so many different disciplines within my major.

I never declared a minor, though had I been allowed to combine classical studies and religious studies, that would have been it. In fact, I had 24 credits in those two areas, all because of a set of novels I read in high school - the Mark of the Lion series by Francine Rivers. Soooo good! I'll have to tell you about it in another post, but essentially it was historical fiction set in ancient Rome, and I got really interested so I decided to take a Classical Studies course in first year, and ba-BAM! 24 credits later... Who SAYS books don't influence people's lives? (Um, ok, no one. You're right.) In any case, the classics/religious studies minor wasn't allowed, so instead, I scooted my way around the campus soaking in all manner of courses. Chemistry, Greek philosophy, anthropology, physics, German, children's lit, family studies, calculus, astronomy, geography, psychology... you name it!

I SO loved university. The papers, not so much, but the classes? Awesome. (And? I can't believe I finished my undergrad SEVEN YEARS ago!!! The education program alone was already five years ago! WHAT IS GOING ON??? hehehe) I'm glad that I kept my books (well, ok, not the chem, physics, or math ones! Though that photo represents only a few of the texts I still have - I picked that shelf cause I thought it'd make me look the smartest! ;) hehe!), cause every now and then, I take them off the shelf and flip through them. This summer I'd like to re-read some of the Greek plays. I really liked them, and think I'll like them even more when I don't have to write a major paper on them! Can't say I'm gonna be dragging the Norton Anthology around with me, though! Sheesh!

Sometimes I feel like my brain is getting mushy and that I miss the academic world - the learning, the discovering... I'm not convinced I'm done with school yet. We'll see, but it sure was fun the first time around!

What was one of your favourite classes while you were in school/college/university/etc?

4 comments:

sarah cool said...

Gender Communication, Jane Austen Lit (we read ALL of her books in 10 weeks, it almost killed me, why they let a freshman into a graduate level class is BEYOND ME), many judaic studies classes... I loved college.

Julia Riber Pitt said...

Being in college, I'm pretty confused about what I want to take in the upcoming year. There's so much I want to take! Ugh, I'm going to be in school forever...

Unknown said...

Hmm... my favourite has to be Integrated Sciences 333, or what was famously called the "Lego Lab". It's supposed to integrate Biology and Computer Science - we students just played with and programmed robotic Lego Mindstorms toys!

Anonymous said...

I also completed my undergrad seven years ago... Man, I'm old! It was a thrill to look through the registration guide/course catalogue (before everything went on the web) and planning my timetable for the following year. So many courses, so little time (or money)!

I could've gone on any number of directions, but settled on majoring in history. The best courses I took weren't in history: introductory atmospheric science; US politics (at the same time as the 2000 election); and a survey of Jane Austen and Walter Scott.