Month: October 2012

Norman Mailer’s Novel(ist)

In and Beyond the Late Age of Print

When we consider the history of art, and more specifically literature, the figure of the author — the bard, the rhapsode, the poet, the novelist — has always been a necessary element. This figure — perhaps within the twentieth century — has achieved a mythic identity. The author’s name functions, Foucault argues, as a signifier of status — a certain weighty authority — within a society and culture, influencing how we therefore experience the text. While we might argue about the validity of this “author function,” Foucault does seem to have a point about how a specific ordering presence must precede the art in question and any consideration of the weighty and the true of a work. The novelist, then, is inseparable from his or her novel and how that novel is received and respected. You cannot have The Sun Also Rises without having the Hemingway.

Read: Essay

Macon State Offers First iTunes U Course

The college’s first offering is a course that examines the intersection of the humanities and the digital world.

In recent days, several local sources have given my first forays into teaching courses in iTunes U some press. These include, Macon State College, Macon State’s student newspaper The Macon Statement, and The Macon Telegraph. This is great news for me, and also for the department and the college.

I want to thank Sheron Smith, MSC’s News Bureau Coordinator; Alex Willison, the student reporter who interviewed me and wrote the story in the college newspaper; and the editor of The Statement, Kristin Hanlin for giving Alex the assignment. I should also offer my thanks to Provost Martha Venn for her enthusiastic support — it would not have happened without her.

This is one of the reasons why I have the best job in the world.

Macon State Offers First iTunes U Course