The Fighting TA

[robinturner]

I had two odd dreams last night. In the first one I went to an class held by my old aikido teacher (this is from about 25 years back, so he must be either dead or very good by now). We sparred, and he got the better of me, even managing to defeat my killer t'ai chi sucker punch, though it did graze his cheek. Actually, this doesn't qualify as an odd dream for me, given that I have a tendency to get rowdy in my dreams, but the degree of physical realism was unusual. I normally don't have very tactile dreams, but this was all wham bam, thank you sensei.

In the other one, I had just been hired as a teaching assistant to tsenft. Given our diametrically opposed views on a number of subjects, that would be the kind of working relationship that could also end up in one of us being picked up and thrown on the floor, but in the dream we never got further than arguing about teaching schedules.

Comments

[hfx-ben.livejournal.com]

Dreams of engaging one's master?! Good stuff!

Freakin' spacious it is, after one's teacher bows and backs away.

[solri.livejournal.com]

I suppose it's a good sign, but he still wiped the floor with me!

[hfx-ben.livejournal.com]

"... he still wiped the floor with me!"

Mmmm, 'course ... the teacher's generosity is unobstructed.

Also, and perhaps more operative: self-limiting is a plausible way to avoid that spaciousness.

*watches solri out the corner of his eye*

[trochee.livejournal.com]

What do you and tsenft disagree about?

[solri.livejournal.com]

She's a bit on the pomo side, and I'm severely pomophobic. Example:

"Do you think that classical rules for music cant be formally read as a hetero-normative system?"

[trochee.livejournal.com]

hee. I've been reading her thesis, and I like most of it thus far (in chapter two, though), but there are a few bits where I can't tell if it's vague because it's vague [and just needs an explanatory paragraph or two] or it's vague because she's referring to a theory I haven't read [okay, I'll ignore it] or it's vague because it's relying on a system of rhetoric (e.g. her conception of pomo) that I don't understand.

Your comment suggests the third category for some of those spots, but I'm agnostic on pomo as a whole thus far in my academics: although I have seen specific postmodernist efforts that I can't stand, I've also felt like it's too hard to tell whether the individual is a flake or the theoretical edifice is shaky. I can guess where you stand on that question. ;)

I'm also not likely to learn too much about postmodernism in my current academic path, so I may be forever agnostic on this.