I walked into my Cinema History classroom yesterday afternoon, hooked my laptop to the projector, cued five clips of Italian cinema (which I’d lovingly ripped and edited that morning), and booted up an accompanying PowerPoint. I was ready to deliver a lecture on Italian auteurs of the 1960s — you know, Fellini, Visconti, Antonioni, and friends. But within seconds of seeing the word Italian on the overhead screen, I heard the distressed student cries:
- “What? We’re not supposed to be doing this today?”
- “I thought we were covering African Americans in film.”
- “Hey, does this mean we’re not watching In the Heat of the Night?”
- “You told us we were skipping this chapter!”
Oh. My. God. They were right. We were supposed to be covering a brief history of African Americans in Hollywood and then watching Sidney Poitier in In the Heat of the Night (Norman Jewison, 1967), not screening clips from those hip, existential Italian guys. Here’s what happened:
Back in February, a student asked why we, a class that meets on Mondays and Wednesdays, would be meeting on Friday, April 15. “That’s what the syllabus says,” he assured me. First, I was ecstatic students were actually looking at the syllabus. Second, he was right; I’d made a typo:
The following class, I addressed this discrepancy, informing my students that in order for the calendar to be fixed, one lecture/screening would have to go. My decision: nix “Italian Cinema in the 1960s” and move up everything else. Finally, I encouraged them either to scratch out the Italian lecture on their syllabus or print the revised version I’d already uploaded to their course site (below). That way, there would be no mishaps once we got to April.
Well, April arrived, and guess who still had the “old syllabus” on her desk, where she prepares for class? Yep. And guess who didn’t heed her own words and print out a “new syllabus” from the course site? That’s right.
After several audible holy crap‘s (from me), the students and I figured out what to do: as planned, we’d forgo those Italian fellows and watch Poitier get it done in In the Heat of the Night. While I wasn’t prepared for a “full out” lecture on African Americans in cinema (it’s been over a year since I delivered that one), we were able to discuss Poitier’s backstory (poor Bahamian kid makes good in Harlem theatre troupes and then in Hollywood), his brilliant yet problematic screen persona (the “Ebony saint”), and his unfortunate post-’60s career. Afterward, I trucked over to the library, praying no one had checked out In the Heat of the Night and then ran (yes, literally) back to the classroom to start the screening. All things considered, not a bad class. Just a really frantic one, laced with several apologies.
Fortunately, Monday’s lecture on Woody Allen and Hollywood auteurs isn’t lengthy, and neither is our in-class screening, Annie Hall (1977). As a result, the students and I will have time to cover onscreen representations of African Americans then as well. Wait! I think that’s what we’re doing on Monday. Geez, I’d better double check to be sure…
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Professor of film and Shakespeare. Advocate of social media. Lover of popular culture,
I can relate to this one! I am kind of like that absent-minded professor guy, only with no scientific or mathematical ability. My students are constantly helping me figure out what happened. I once showed up on test day with no tests. I had completely forgot and there was nothing I could do except teach and push the exam back a session. Oops!
Way to rally.
Yep, that's happened to me before (not the material, mind you, but the syllabus mix-up). I used to be really troubled by such mishaps, but now I have a different outlook. I *hope* that it humanizes me a bit in the eyes of my students and lets them behind the curtain, so to speak. To that end, I tend to foreground the challenges of being a college instructor—and a GTA, for that matter—by discussing on occasion the pitfalls of teaching film. For instance, I tell them in week one how hard it is to cover the history of film in one semester and how this entails a number of vexing editorial decisions ("Do I cover Poetic Realism or Dogme95?" "Merchant-Ivory or Kathryn Bigelow?") I also attempt to explain my rationale for showing certain films. Why am I screening GEORGE WASHINGTON? Because I love it. Why did you make us watch BLOW-UP? Because I feel it my duty to put you outside your comfort zone. I hope that such honestly sets them up for moments when I simply drop the ball.
Good points re: the challenges. Thanks for sharing!
I do this sort of thing as a parent all the time. I guess parenting is sort of like teaching, only there is no degree required. I respond with things like, "Well, I changed my mind….I'm the boss…I make the decisions around here…You'll survive…Go talk to your father…etc" But that wouldn't go over so well with students.
Ha. No, that wouldn't go over well with students. =)