FIELDNOTES Issue #9 4 March 2014 Last week I served as a “substitute teacher.” In mid-­‐January, a half-­‐dozen or so Swansea University American Studies Program faculty members with whom I dined one night talked about their collaboration this semester teaching a module (what we in the U.S.A. would call a course) titled “‘A Hard Rain’s a-­‐Gonna Fall’: America in the 1960s.” Aiming the module third-­‐year students (equivalent to seniors in the U.S. American university system) majoring in American Studies, a different instructor covers a different 1960s topic each week. It’s Vietnam one week, another week Hollywood in the ‘60s, U.S. literature of the era during another week, and so on. I joked that I appeared to be the only person at the table old enough to remember the 1960s in America. I then made a serious offer: I would be delighted to contribute to the module in any way, if desired. (McKinney and Bagnell: The three of us could very effectively team-­‐facilitate a lesson about Vietnam!) Indeed, a couple of weeks ago, I was asked to pinch-­‐hit to teach the unit on Lyndon Johnson and his Great Society programs. The blend of crudity, ambition and skill in persuading others through flattery, threat, manipulation and even tears, that distinctively brands the LBJ political persona, has long fascinated me. So I enthusiastically agreed to take on the unit. I planned and delivered a Monday lecture to sixty or so students, plus facilitated each of the three smaller seminar groups they divided into on Tuesday and Wednesday. At the end of one seminar meeting, a student quipped on his way out of the room, “I’m glad you made it through the ‘60s.” Well, five decades ago, I was for the most part a buttoned-­‐down, well-­‐mannered (albeit sullen) youngblood, a high-­‐school student (class of ’70) in very little danger of going over to the dark side -­‐-­‐ despite living not too terribly far from the Sunset Strip. So I replied by quoting the writer -­‐-­‐ was it rock critic Lester Bangs? -­‐-­‐ who said, “If you can remember the ‘Sixties, you weren’t really there.” A day or two ago, Dave Anderson told me that the “Hard Rain” students he’d spoken with liked working with me. One of them told Dave that “listening to a professor with an American accent made me think I was back in the U.S. for my intercalary year.” (“Intercalary year” refers to an option offered to American Studies students to spend a year at a U.S. American university.) Over the weekend, some visitors from UNCW arrived in Swansea. Dr. Bill Bolduc, my friend and UNCW colleague (and campus neighbor … our offices in the Communication Studies Dept. are side-­‐by-­‐side) brought Zach Pomeroy and Connor Buss, two of our finest communication studies majors, to work with him on a video documentary about the UNCW-­‐Swansea University relationship. No moss grew on the production team: They arrived on Friday early afternoon; and early Saturday morning, began shooting B-­‐roll exteriors in some scenic coastal parts of Swansea. On Sunday, we all attended a football match -­‐-­‐ you Yanks call it soccer. The Swansea Swans -­‐-­‐ very successful last year, less so this year -­‐-­‐ against Crystal Palace, a team from the London area. Jon Roper, Swansea Uni’s liaison officer with UNCW, drove us to the game, which he and his son, Jack, attended as well. En route, Jon briefed us on which Swans stars to keep an eye on. Inside Liberty Stadium, the pitch shone like a well-­‐manicured U.S. American baseball diamond before the home team takes the field at the start of the game. We saw no really bad seats in the whole stadium: Even from the top-­‐most row (we sat about ten down from there), you could distinguish one player from one another. (Liberty Stadium is known as the Ebbetts Field of Welsh football stadiums … not really -­‐-­‐ I’m just kidding you Brooklyn Dodger fans out there.) The Swans led by one goal for ¾ of the game…but then, on a penalty kick, Crystal Palace evened up the score and the match ended soon thereafter. Early in the evening yesterday (Wed.) I emailed Bill to see if he and his team were interested in getting some dinner. No reply. Then, approaching midnight, the following message came from Bill: Dinner at the Nortons’ house ... a night to
remember. Cottage pie, cheese cauliflower, sweet carrots,
peas, apple pie, raspberry trifle, Old Speckled Hen beer,
an amazing cheese platter with grapes, coffee, original
poetry and a Dylan Thomas reading. Fantastic hospitality
as well. A special evening. Don't worry, we got it on
tape.
I knew the genesis of this event: Bill and his students attended worship services Sunday at a Methodist church just down the street from me. They struck up a conversation with a parishioner (Mrs. Norton) who invited them to Wednesday dinner chez elle. This kind of opportunity doesn’t always fall into your lap when you travel, and can be the most memorable part of a trip. Lesson: Go to church … I certainly could have accompanied Bill and the lads there last Sunday. (A Dylan Thomas reading … yeeesh, I would have enjoyed that … I hope that video works!) Another visitor is Dr. Bill McCarthy from UNCW’s history department. Bill will in Spring 2015 hold the resident director position-­‐-­‐mine this semester. He arrived Sunday late afternoon and has come to town on a recon trip, to meet the people he will work with and to gather information about the UNCW and home students, the study-­‐abroad program, the university and the Swansea area. I met with Bill Tuesday late morning. He picked my brain on a variety of topics. I liked being the old salt able to alert him to important matters, or conversely, to set his mind at ease about various issues. I have not encountered any problems among the twenty UNCW students on the program. I meet each week with the eight UNCW students who are taking the Honors course I’m teaching here. I ask them if there are any red flags I should become aware of; and that if any of them would like to alert me in private about something that could be a problem, to please do so. So far no “alerts.” I’d like to administer a short quiz: How would you say or express in U.S. American English the dozen words or phrases below, which are taken from either the Welsh lexicon, or the British lexicon in general: ! beanie ! trainers ! semi-­‐skimmed milk ! soft cheese ! taxi rank
! “Are you all right?” ! cheese butty ! muffins ! “Cheers.” ! cotton buds ! swede ! garden peas The answers . . . . . . will appear in Fieldnotes #10! (No prizes for correct answers, though … this is a quiz just begging for Google abuse.)