Saussure! No, seriously, Saussure!

Today we connected Dr. Doug Eskew to Ferdinand de Saussure. The elation I felt at that point was ridiculous in its quantity and object, of course, but that's the beauty of being an English graduate student. It's not our stopping point, I hope. And it wasn't the direction we first started in either. At one point we were lost in turn of the century Czechoslovakia, which is never a good place to be. So we retraced our steps and looked for another name. And there are many of them, as I'm sure you're all finding in your own research. To imagine that there is only one line of learning is outrageous hubris or naivete, but I must say I rather saw it that way when first imagining how this project would turn out. We would find out Doug's mentor then connect him to this one guy who in turn connects this other specific guy. But there are many influences on a single person's academic and personal growth. Influence is also such a nebulous term, including people you've had direct contact with and others you've read or heard, and still others who influenced those you've read or heard. There are literally infinite ways we could trace this project.

What I think we will learn, at the end of this, is that we are not so far removed from major theorists we read about every day. That we are connected to each other and every person who has even begun to think critically about the broad and bloated field of English. That through us, our students are and will be connected. That the ideas of these people we are researching are connected just as the physical bodies are connected, passed on, carried down, growing and evolving. That literature theorists are connected to linguists are connected to rhetoricians. That learning, knowledge, and ideas are viral. But we already knew that. I'm interested to see if and how we manage to coherently connect all this.

As McLuhan said, the medium is the message, so what form will this project ultimately take? I still do like the traditional tree, for its simplicity and inherent metaphor, but I also appreciated all of my classmates' suggestions on spider webs, celestial constellations, etc. The constellations especially would be interesting to see depicted. As for multi-media, I think incorporating on the board would be impractical. But I like the idea of creating video and uploading it to a facebook page, as Autumn suggests on her blog, and other locations. It's an excellent idea to connect this class, as well as future Dr. Souder classes who might participate. If we're going to be a part of this connection, let's start now by creating new media forms to celebrate it.