<p>I must admit that my Art History class (1870-present) was one of the most enjoyable and enriching classes I’ve ever taken. It had all to do with the quality of the teacher even though the majority of students were lame and took the class and teacher for granted. She was one of the best teachers I’ve ever had and looked forward to her class. I appreciated that she taught the class based upon her knowledge and excellent education instead of the Christian or Marxist propaganda prevelant in the majority of Art History textbooks. </p>
<p>I believe art can be very therapeutic but also think people with anxiety issues should ideally learn proper breathing. IMHO…exercise, eating properly and meditation is the better alternative to medication and eventually becoming addicted to ones neurosis.</p>
<p>(sorry for completely derailing your thread nerdasaurus)</p>
<p>Why do you keep misconstruing my posts? Don’t bother “translating” my text, because if I want to say something, I communicate it exactly how I want it to be said. There is no subtext. You’ve replied in a way that is irrelevant to the discussion too many times. I’ll be clear:</p>
<p>1) Your “challenge” in art history consisted of you raising doubt over–again something you misconstrued that I corrected–competency in one field correlating to competency in another. Obviously I was saying is that my competency is demonstrable in both.</p>
<p>2) If you can think–that is, process and synthesize information–then you have the means to be competent any academic subject. You’re missing the point if you think “His specialty is English; he CAN’T have the capacity to do well in other subjects!”</p>
<p>I observed this very phenomenon in high school when the relationship between Mathematics and English first unfolded before me: how syntax and diction could coalesce to create a beautiful sentence, instinctually compelling, despite its inherent linguistic limitations; it’s much like the curve of the natural exponential function 1/e^x, whose gently receding slope falls off to zero with the passage of infinite infinities, but never quite reaches it with all the paradoxical exactitude of infinite and perfectly calculable imperfection.</p>
<p>I don’t know why you were so initially hostile (nor am I particularly interested in the bellicose ravings of a short-sighted man trapped in an inflexible Euclidean reality) but my message has been consistent, clear, and reasonable. </p>
<p>But hey, I guess a guy’s gotta accumulate 6,000 posts somehow.</p>
You have never said anything that would establish your competency in art history. You have attempted to establish your competency in other fields and then argued for a correlation with art history. (Correlation is fine with me, by the way. All I am doubting is a perfect correlation.) </p>
<p>
When did I ever say that? </p>
<p>
Your intrinsic connection between English and mathematics is a poetic description of the properties of a graph? LOL.</p>
<p>
Your pretentious “my art history professor only gave me 93% when my rhetoric professor praises my work. art history professors suck” (paraphrased, not quoted) comment rubbed me the wrong way. </p>
<p>
Most physicists would disagree with you. Biologists too.</p>
<p>
If you have ever studied logic, you would know that there are many different ways of saying the same thing. Only some of them are much easier to parse than others, which makes flawed reasoning and empty statements much easier to spot. If you want to hide behind rhetoric, be my guest.</p>
<p>I don’t quite like taking sides, but I’ve really got to agree with b@r!um here. That was a pretty pathetic attempt. I’d been looking forward to it at first, to be honest, but if that’s all you have to offer, you’re really making the humanities kids look terrible.</p>
<p>I mean, if you’re going to try to compare mathematics to English (beyond a superficial level, that is), you at least have to touch on mathematical proofs.</p>
<p>I kinda have to agree… while that thing you wrote was nice and well-written, it was somewhat “purple,” at least from the perspective of a mathematician.</p>
<p>As much as I dislike people’s concentration on rhetoric, I’ll admit it it isn’t totally useless. Rhetoric (and some help from Palin) got Obama into the White House after all.</p>
<p>Would you all please take this conversation somewhere else, e.g. a private message? It’s deterring from my original point and it’s irritating to think that I’ve perhaps received a meaningful response only to see another part of the debate added to the thread. Thank you.</p>
<p>What 6281597 said. I don’t mean to sound blunt, but if your confidence in your writing has dropped because of one grade you received in one class from one professor, you really need to grow a thicker skin. I don’t know what you’re going to do after graduation, but if you ever plan on publishing anything, you’re going to have to face the reality that not everyone is going to like your writing. That’s just the way the world turns, man.</p>
<p>Either realize your writing isn’t as good as you thought it was and strive to improve it, or think that your writing is a gift from the gods and tell yourself that the people who critique it don’t know what the hell they’re talking about. I advise the former, personally; it’s much more productive, and if you go into every paper thinking you’ll get a C, you’ll push yourself harder (and therefore improve), and you’ll also feel happier when you receive a grade higher than a C. Just my two cents.</p>
<p>Your anxiety may come from completing a project independently and having to wait for a grade at the end, a kind of ultimate and final judgment.</p>
<p>This can be alleviated if you start your essays early and have your professor(s) help and even collaborate with you throughout the process.</p>
<p>You can start coming up with ideas and bring them to your professor to talk about. Then, as you begin writing, you can come back with your drafts in order to get feedback along the way. This is good not only to reduce your fears but also because it will make you a better writer, and is something every student should consider doing.</p>
<p>I only get nervous if I procrastinated and it’s due the following week…</p>
<p>I also have a tendency to go back and look at it once I’ve turned it in and panic about it (Oh, I didn’t notice that grammar error! Should have put another example in!). But don’t worry about one bad grade from one teacher. If you’re really that good at writing, other teachers will appreciate and acknowledge it.</p>