Monday, May 10, 2010

Las asignaturas, schmaschmignaturas

As all my UW friends are finishing up finals this week (and some siblings are graduating...), thought I'd post a quick update on my classes:

We have two weeks left of Reunidas classes.  My three finals for those classes are on the 24 and 25 of May.
  • Cervantes: Need to write one more paper between now and the final, and plan out the essay I'm gonna write for the final.  And read our last novela, La española inglesa.
  • Etnología de américa: Wrote my paper for this class on Saturday.  It's 300 words short, but I think I'll leave it as is... I have nothing else to add.  That's the paper where we had to interview madrileños about some aspect of Spanish culture.  I picked religion, since I had written that paper last semester comparing religion in the US to religion in Spain.  Next Monday/Tuesday each student will present their "results" of our interviews to the class, and then we turn in the papers on the day of the final.
  • Sintaxis: Wrote the paper for this class a couple of weeks ago (so I wouldn't be completely overwhelmed with papers these final two weeks).  I'll look at it again some point this week to edit it before we turn them in on the 17.  Just need to study for the final now.
And Complutense classes go through June 4, I believe.  Or maybe just the 28 of May.  I'm not sure, I'm kind of confused on when the last day of those classes are.  But I'll figure it out as it gets closer.  My finals are on the 21 and 23 of June. Yeah, kind of blows. But oh well.
  • Filosofía y historia de la ciencia: I keep meeting with my tutor every week, and we go through Esther's notes from class together.  Then the day after, I combine Esther's notes, my notes from class, and the notes I write down during sessions with my tutor, and re-write that week's notes in my notebook.  I've done all the required readings thus far, except for Francis Bacon's El avance del saber (Advancement of Learning).  I started it... but it's quite dull.  I'm 30-40 pages in, but I don't think I'll finish the whole book.  At least not in May.  Maybe I'll give it another shot in June...  So after classes end, my task will be to memorize all of my notes from the entire semester, and hope I can pull off the exam.
  • Filosofía y teoría de la lógica: So we have our new professor finally (can't remember if I've said that yet or not).  Two weeks ago he told us that since we had switched professors over halfway through the semester, that we have the option of writing a paper in place of the final exam.  I'm opting for the paper.  We have to pick some text... something that has to do with the philosophy of logic, summarize it, criticize it (using other philosophers' texts), then write our opinion on the topic  (I think.  The day he told us about the paper was the day I came a couple minutes later than usual... after he'd explained the whole thing.  But I think that's what we're supposed to do).  Anyway, so I wasn't sure what type of "text" we pick to base our paper on, so I asked him after class.  He told me to send him an e-mail as a reminder, and he'd send me some suggestions.  So I sent him an e-mail that weekend.  Never got a response.  Then last Thursday in class, he told me that on Friday he'd bring me some texts I could use.  Great.  I go to class on Friday... and he doesn't show up.  Turns out he had a conference or something, that he didn't tell us about the day before (or maybe he didn't know) so class ended up being canceled.  So that set me back another week... Hopefully he'll bring me something on Thursday.  If not, I'll go to the philosophy library and try to pick something myself.  I'm anxious to start this one, because instead of turning in the paper the date of the final (in June, which is the usual), he wants them at the end of May.  That means I only have two weeks now, and this paper will take a lot more research and time than other ones (reading all the philosophical texts, figuring out what the heck they mean, organizing ideas, etc.)  But at the same time I'll be studying for finals/writing trabajos for my reunidas classes.  A ver.

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