Mark
ALBRACHT
It’s time to seal the coffin on 1996
With the number of days left in
1996 now countable on one’s fingers
and toes, it is time for me to do what
many a columnist does this time of
year, and that is to recount the past
365 days in a
single-minded
and pointed way
so as to make the
majority of the
population think
I’ve been living
in somebody
else’s 1996.
As lam
not Shirley
MacLaine, reliving the past is a
somewhat daunting task. It’s difficult
to discern one mundane Monday
from another. Entire weeks of this
past year are completely muddled
together. And I’ve never been able to
discover what makes April different
from May of any year, let alone this
one. So I’ve decided to pick the top
10 events of 1996 and here they are:
10. Scandal. This year saw many a
scandal pinned to the clothes line of
media consumption. All articles hung
out to dry bore the skid marks of
smeared names and reputations —
Whitewater continued, the FBI
witch-hunted an innocent Atlanta
security guard during the Olympics.
But no scandal was as wrought with
laughs and personal satisfaction as
the one that faced Kathy Lee Gifford
after the exposure of her child
powered sweat shops. I had always
suspected a dark side to this termi
nally chipper woman and, at last, it’s
been found. That early spring
morning will forever shine as a bright
spot in morning show history.
There’s never been a more glorious
sight at 7 a.m. than the one of a bag
eyed and bed-headed Gifford
demeaning herself on the TV sets of
a million households nationwide.
God bless America.
9. Pestilence. Britain was gripped
in the terror of mad cow disease —
which afflicted, of all things, cows,
and made them, of all dispositions,
mad, which is British for insane. This
global headline-getter was of
particular significance to UNL as the
marching band was in Great Britain
at the time of the outbreak. The
peculiar disorder may have been the
cause of a castrato-ish effect on tuba
player Ryan Olsen who, afterward,
sounded like a French horn, and the
flute section, which subsequently
carried the pitch of dog whistles. It
was nice to see them weather the
threat of bovine lunacy and return to
normal, proving once again that our
university has the most indestructible
band in the universe. Kudos.
8. Obituaries. 1996 saw the
passage of some very popular human
mainstay^ George Bums died at age
100. By now it is likely that he has
experienced the ultimate in perfor
mance reviews — that coming from
God on Bums’ portrayal of the
omniscient, omnipotent being’s
wacky adventures with the likes of
John Denver and other goofy casting
choices. No doubt God liked what he
saw as two of the “Oh God” movies
brought good box office returns.
Spiro Agnew also died, which I
wasn’t aware of until after I started
writing this column. Frankly, I’m
appalled by the general indifference
toward his passing. He was a fine,
upstanding American, a terrific
bicyclist, a competent Scrabble
piayer, ana ... wen nevermina.
Timothy Leary dropped hitriast
terrestrial acid this past year. He was
a pioneer in life and in death.
Although his cyberspace suicide and
his final wish to have his head
cryogenicly frozen never came about,
he will receive his last rites in a very
spectacular way. His ashes will be
launched into space where they will
eventually drift back toward Earth
and bum up in the atmosphere.
That’ll be one hell of a turn-on, tune
in, drop-out trip, man.
7. Legalized ganja. 1996 proved
the existence of true irony —
wonderful, full-fledged irony apart
from the kind that is rain on a
wedding day. In the same year that
Timothy Leary kicked the bucket,
marijuana was legalized in two
states. Or maybe this isn’t irony and
is, in fact, proof of an afterlife,
celestial schmoozing and consequent
divine intervention. You never know.
Since pot has only been legalized
for medical uses, here are my only
predictions for the new year: Trend
setting California will start the first
ever hypochondriac-related fad. THC
levels in the smog will send Nabisco
and Old Home stocks flying past
Berkshire Hathaway as 35 million
people are consumed by the
munchies. And you’ll see more MDs
sporting dreadlocks than ever before.
6. The Sex Pistols reunited for a
world tour. I haven’t stopped
giggling since.
5. KISS wore the makeup again.
They played Omaha twice. I didn’f
go. Damn it.
4. Montana recluse, Harvard grad
and former Stanford professor Ted
Kaczynski was captured and accused
of being the Unabomber. But I don’t
mink ne am it. l tnink it was Ace
Freely from KISS and now that he
has found his scapegoat, he can
return to his normal life as a glam
rock guitar god. So far, I’m pretty
alone in this theory.
3. Disasters. ValuJet and TWA
800 water landings; fender-benders
don’t kill people, airbags kill people;
both presidential party conventions;
the Macarena. The list goes far too
harrowingly long.
2. It appears that I have run out of
space for my top 10 events of 1996,
so number 2 will have to suffice as
the top event of the past 365 days.
Here it is, the number one occurrence
of this year is my discovery that there
exists in this world masturbating
iguanas. Sure, it’s nothing landmark
like the discovery of Martian fossils
or the first re-election of a Demo
cratic president since the Pleistocene,
but when I read in the December
issue of Discover Magazine about
these wee lizards spanking them
selves, I said to myself, that’s the
kind of information that’ll give me an
edge in life. I’m glad to go into 1997
this much smarter.
Let me retract that last event as
the number one event of 1996 and
instead declare Dec. 31 as the best
day of the year — the day when ’96
gets 86ed and we can get to 1997, the
year of the theatrical re-release of the
“Star Wars” trilogy. That, my friends,
is reason enough to already include
’97 in the annals of the greatest years
of all time. So let’s all pucker up and
kiss 1996’s sweet ass goodbye.
Albracht is a junior philosophy
major and a Daily Nebraskan
columnist.
Jessica
KENNEDY
It’s your education — fight for it
Lecture classes are dangerous to
your well-being. They could leave
you helpless.
Let me show you why:
First, isn’t it a great feeling when
you’ve worked
really hard to
accomplish
something? You
develop a feeling
of responsibility,
have pride in your
accomplishment
and rarely forget
what you went
through to get
there.
If you make a half-ass attempt at
working your way through a project,
there’s little connection between it
and you. In essence, you “write-it
oflf.”
As a result, how many times have
you said, “I don’t remember anything
from that class”? Sure, that’s usually
your own fault, but not always.
Secondly, why are there those few
classes in which you really invest
yourself? The few lessons you will
take to your grave? What makes
them different?
The difference is either that the
subject matter of those classes
interests you, or the professors pull
you in. You are challenged and made
to think.
During my tenure as a profes
sional student, I’ve discovered that I
learn and remember the most from
classes that foster discussions,
challenge my preconceptions and
push me harder than any others.
Third, I’ll wager that the classes
you blow off are lecture classes—
full of busy work. Or they are run by
professors who seem perpetually
disinterested in being there.
. * - > '• • . -
U
Our time is too valuable, our money too
scarce and our freedom too precious to
not demand a responsible and responsive
education from our educators ”
Classes that promote self
discovery, encourage exploration and
make you learn from others are the
ultimate modes of learning.
Unfortunately, most educators
practice a method called the banking
theory. In general terms, this theory
describes die classroom situation in
which students passively receive the
information the professor has
determined as important for their
“education,” i.e. lecture classes.
So here’s why lecture classes can
kill you.
Educational psychologist Paulo.
Freire describes the banking theory
as a control method. Those with the
power control the knowledge. They
(teachers, administrators, govern
ment) ultimately control what we
learn and think.
Check this out:
“In the banking concept of
education, knowledge is a gill
bestowed by those who consider
themselves knowledgeable upon
those whom they consider to know
nothing... by considering their
[students] ignorance absolute, he
[teacher] justifies his own existence.”
What does this mean to you and
me? It means the majority of our
classes create an environment in
which the students’ only value is as a
justification for the professor’s job.
_ V
Education js also a method of
control, of socialization. It tells
students what they should know, how
they should use that information and
how they should act.
That’s a lot of power.
I don’t believe there’s a great
government plan to lull the people
into complacency while it has its way
with us, but you’ve been in those
classes where the prof cares more
about research than the students.
These are the busy-work classes, the
sleep-through-it-if-you-go, the “don’t
get so-and-so” classes.
Or the classes where you’re told
“that’s just the way it is” or “you
have to learn this.”
It’s time for some change.
Our time is too valuable, our
money too scarce and our freedom
too precious to not demand a
responsible and responsive education
from our educators.
In Freire’s plan, education would
consist solely of absolute self
discovery and self-motivation;
teaching positions would be arbitrary.
I wouldn’t go that far. There is no
need to call for a complete oblitera
tion of the educational system as we
know it. But I do believe that certain
elements of “lecture” classes are
needed in the classroom—just not
at the level that exists now.
The memorization and regurgita
tion aspects of the university must Jt)e
eliminated. This is the responsibility
of professors. They ought to strive to
create interactive and challenging
environments. They must provide us
with the tools and access to the
resources that can help us discover
the information and knowledge we
are looking for. They should let us
discuss topics so that we might
challenge one another’s beliefs and
ideas. They need to let us grow.
Students are not without responsi
bility either. If professors and
lecturers won’t change, force them
to. Ask questions, promote discus
sions, talk to the people around you.
Your disinterest or apathy could
cost you.
Freire writes, “The more com
pletely they accept the passive role
imposed on them, the more they tend
simply to adapt to the world as it is
and to the fragmented view of reality
deposited in them.”
A university education is theoreti
cally designed to eliminate such
passive reception of information and
truth. Yet semester after semester <
finds us in the same place—the
powerful telling the powerless what
they should know. .
Lecture classes create an unques
tioning “yes” citizenry.
To borrow a cliche: Question > «,
authority.
It can’t hurt you, but it most
certainly can help you.
Kennedy is a senior advertising t
and broadcasting major and a
Daily Nebraskan columnist.
