On the Coming of Winter in Boston
November
peels away
like buttery sheathes
of apple-crisp,
sizzled brown skin
off a roasted turkey
that your grandmother
accidentally stuffed with snow
As you can see, the existence of the humanities at MIT is non-trivial. In fact, I have just proved this fact in such a way as to cause e.e. cummings to weep in his grave.
As an MIT student, I devote at minimum ten hours a week to thinking about the humanities, listening to lectures about the humanities, going to recitations about the humanities, writing papers about the humanities, eating lunch with the humanities, working on problem sets about the humanities, going to off-campus events about the humanities, and generally making sure that the humanities don't unfriend me on Facebook. In my endeavors, I am greatly assisted by the MIT HASS (Humanities and Social Sciences) course requirements. By assisted, I mean something more like “forced to comply in order to graduate,” but let us not fret about semantics.
HASS, in a vague and deformed nutshell, is MIT's method of making sure that students take at least one humanities/communication class per semester. As you may be able to surmise, I'm trying to avoid telling you anything specific about the HASS requirements because there is a 93% chance that I will say something that is completely imaginary, spurring a horde of upperclassmen blog commenters to descend like locusts upon a ripe orchard of false information. Anyway, the main point is that (1) thinking too much about the HASS requirements will erode your massive brainpower, which is why I don't do it and instead just listen to my advisor when I have to pick classes, and (2) HASS is kind of awesome, even if the requirement descriptions are written like a psycholinguistics aptitude exam.
This semester, Paul B. and I both selected Introduction to Linguistics (24.900) as our HASS course. The workload involves:
2 five-page papers
Regular fieldwork with a native speaker of a foreign language (read: some random international student in your hall)
A midterm but no final
4 or 5 problem sets
A ten-page final paper
Laughing at Professor Norvin Richard's jokes and/or beard and/or beard jokes
Realizing why the “and/or” construction is actually redundant but using it anyway
One of the reasons why 24.900 is an amazing course is that the problem set solutions can look like this. Keep in mind, I'm referring to a humanities class.
Also: Problem sets involve writing sentences that sound uber-loony when taken out of context.
Also: Lecture slides can legitimately remind you of the day you discovered Paint in Windows 95.
Interestingly, it seems that about half of the theories covered in 24.900 were written by MIT professor Noam Chomsky, whose Wikipedia page is about as long as that of Switzerland.
Speaking of famous writers at MIT, Pulitzer-Prize winning MIT professor Junot Diaz gave a reading of his Pulitzer-Prize winning novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao a few months ago in the non-Pulitzer-Prize winning Stata Center. After first hearing about The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao in the brief, wondrous blog of Matt McGann over the summer, I entered a long and fruitless cycle of (1) going to Borders, (2) intending to buy the novel, and (3) failing to reach the d-section of the alphabetized-by-last-name bookshelves without becoming irrevocably distracted. Blasted Truman Capote.
So I showed up to Diaz's reading, regrettably bookless, and was magically endowed with a free copy of the novel, courtesy of MIT and FASAP. Elated, I flipped the cover . . .
And wondered why some literature-despising philistine had defaced the title page. That is, until I was told that Junot Diaz had personally autographed every last book.
(Trust me, it's his signature. He won a Pulitzer for literature, not for autographing.)
It almost goes without saying that Junot Diaz was brilliantly witty, humble, and daringly honest, with hand gestures to prove it. I was inspired to go forth and fill the Internet with art, which is why you're reading this right now.
Here, Junot Diaz does something that I have never done before. That is, read his book.
Luckily, I have a four-hour plane flight on Thursday, so I shall proceed to rescue myself from literary starvation as I feast on overpriced peanuts.
Comments (Closed after 30 days to reduce spam)
haha.
and I think that hass makes mit so much more well-rounded than people think it is.
and i love your writing style, yan!
Posted by: dopaminescene on November 25, 2008
I have to read that book sometime soon.
As soon as I have sometime to read it... :/
Posted by: anonymous on November 25, 2008
Onward...
Are you allowed to take more than one hass class in one semester?
Posted by: Lin² on November 25, 2008
You win. Superscript, first time ever.
Posted by: Snively on November 25, 2008
You're going to love the book. It's great.
Posted by: Lexy on November 25, 2008
Posted by: 0 on November 25, 2008
Posted by: 0 on November 25, 2008
Posted by: 0 on November 25, 2008
Yup.
Posted by: ilyanep on November 26, 2008
Great photos!
Posted by: another 12 on November 26, 2008
Fully 80% of my courseload right now falls under HASS. I think I'm going to finish the HASS requirement twice over by the time I graduate.
WOOO! I love MIT HASS...=D (probably because I'm not techy enough to do engineering...le sigh)
Posted by: Oasis '11 on November 26, 2008
The gist is that "or" does not entail "either/or," which means that in many cases "and/or" is actually redundant. For instance: Everyone who is a blogger OR reads the admissions blog is awesome. Clearly, someone who is a blogger AND reads the admissions blogs is also awesome. I'm living proof of this, naturally.
Here's a trickier example:
"John isn't afraid of anyone who is a student or under 19, but he's afraid of everyone else."
Is John afraid of anyone who is both a student and under 19? Why/why not?
Posted by: Yan on November 26, 2008
Posted by: 0 on November 26, 2008
Posted by: 0 on November 26, 2008
Posted by: eecominghere on November 26, 2008
Posted by: eecominghere on November 26, 2008
Posted by: 0 on November 26, 2008
I'm so flattered.
Posted by: Yan on November 26, 2008
The "OR" I used was exclusive, by the way.
Posted by: Rebeca on November 26, 2008
Posted by: Deb on November 26, 2008
Posted by: Stacy on November 26, 2008
Posted by: Ryan'14Hopeful on November 27, 2008
Posted by: Ashwath on November 27, 2008
Posted by: June on November 27, 2008
P.S. As always, you have such a fun-to-read writing style!
P.P.S. I find it amusing that "hass" is the stem of the German verb "to hate."
Not that I don't believe HASS classes at MIT are as wonderful as you describe them, I just think it's a fun coincidence that a tech school chose that acronym for its humanities requirement.
Posted by: Reena on November 28, 2008
HAHuhaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
Posted by: E.E. Cummings on November 28, 2008
Unfortunately, the GIR requirements are pretty restricting. You'll either have to take 7.012 in the fall or 7.013/7.014 in the spring (unless MIT is offering computational biology as a GIR class next year, or something else that they don't usually do).
Interesting fact about HASS. I always thought it was short for hassle, but I like the German spin on it.
Also, way to go on picking Course 12. My roommate and I, weirdly, both have parents who are geophysicists.
Posted by: Yan on November 28, 2008
lmao
Posted by: Łĭvĕŗpőőł on December 4, 2008
>.>
Posted by: Aoede on December 7, 2008
Posted by: R2D2 on December 8, 2008
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