Since we're talking schools - have you guys heard about what's going on with the backdrop for McCain's speech the other night?

It appeared to be a large mansion (um?) with a big green lawn but actually turns out to be a middle school in LA. Which middle school? Walter Reed. Which kind of begs the question - which Walter Reed do you suppose they intended to have displayed behind McCain?

Seriously idiotic.

Kristin, that class sounds fascinating. Maybe you could do an online version? (Kidding!)

David, that just sucks. I'm sorry it didn't work out.

That would be the MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL RECORD SETTING BRAD ZIEGLIER!!!1!

Damned straight.

Pix, I've got some articles bookmarked at home from when I was helping my cousin with her thesis research (her topic was immigration, with an emphasis on the LA area).

My CEO brought me over a signed baseball today. No big deal, 'cept it's his nephew, Ziggy, whose signature graces it. Very cool.

VERY COOL!!!! Just a wee bit jealous here. SO COOL.

VERY COOL!!!! Just a wee bit jealous here. SO COOL.

There's this kid I know, who just moved to Colorado, who could score this ball by not having any more principal-calls to his mom for the remainder of the year.

I inherited the course ("The Fractured American Dream") but not any guidance or material with which to teach it. I thought we'd do a few days on the mythos of "American Dream" and talk a bit about the ideal versus the reality through some essays about early US immigration before moving on to other facets of the dream,

Damn, Kristin, what I wouldn't give to come in there and give you a hand...

Kristin, that class sounds fascinating. Maybe you could do an online version? (Kidding!)

Heh. Thanks. So far we did a concept map using about 30 quotes about the "American Dream" that I pulled from all kinds of sources, read/analyzed Lazarus' "New Colossus" (the Statue of Liberty poem) and an excerpt from a critical essay about Lazarus' "conflicting citizenships," contrasted a photograph of the Statue of Liberty with Dali's painting of the Colossus of Rhodes (Bartholdi based the SoL on earlier depictions of the Colossus) to discuss artistic purpose and message and to contrast Victorian and Classical values, and read Mary Gordon's personal essay about a woman going to visit Ellis Island because it was the only "historical American landmark" that she felt any real connection to. The quiz today was to get them to synthesize all of this information into some early thoughts about the tension between the myth of the dream and the political realities. And the first day of class was Tuesday!

ETA: Java, thank you! And Barb, if you know of any good short essays or stories about Cuban immigration under Castro, I would love to see them.

ETA#2: Jesse, thank you!!

I just read that to him (hope you don't mind). He got a big goofy grin on his face and huge eyes. We will see. I'm not above bribery at this point.

Java is the best. What an awesome incentive.

Btw (and I'll really shut up after this, because I'm going to go pick megan walker up from the airport--YAY!), here's the passage from Mary Gordon's article that most shocked and horrified me:

“By the 1880’s, the facilities at Castle Garden had grown scandalously inadequate. Officials looked for an island on which to build a new immigration center, because they thought on an island immigrants could be more easily protected from swindlers and quickly transported to railroad terminals in New Jersey. Bedloe’s Island was considered, but New Yorkers were against the idea of a ‘Babel’ ruining their beautiful new treasure, ‘Liberty Enlightening the World.’ The statue’s sculptor, Frederic-Auguste Bartholdi, reacted to the prospect of immigrants landing next to his masterpiece in horror; he called it a ‘monstrous plan.’ So much for Emma Lazarus.”

Talk about bitter irony.

Kristin, on the Ellis Island/NYC side of it, maybe something by Anzia Yezierska? I've only read her novels, but I know she's got a few collections of short stories, too.