Tag: cooperation

  • advanced literature nov 17

    advanced literature nov 17

    Our second book of the semester is Mike’s choice: Ernest Hemingway: The Old Man and the Sea. I have to say: Hemingway is the kind of author I think of as another “man’s” writer. 12387819Like Steinbeck, it’s all externals, action, physical details. This is another book I’m going to be suffering through. I hope everyone else enjoys it enough to make my pain worthwhile.

    Last summer, I read a book by Edith Wharton, a nineteenth century American writer, called The Reef. Towards the end of this novel, the female protagonist, Anna Leath, begins to realize that she has highly ambivalent feelings about the man she’s engaged to, whom, she’s just discovered, has had an affair with the family’s governess. Of Anna, Wharton writes:

    “She recalled having read somewhere that in ancient Rome the slaves were not allowed to wear a distinctive dress lest they should recognize each other and learn their numbers and their power. So, in herself, she discerned for the first time instincts and desires, which, mute and unmarked, had gone to and fro in the dim passages of her mind, and now hailed each other with a cry of mutiny.”

    I remember, when I read this passage, being so moved and impressed by it because it’s a perfect example of exactly the kind of thing I look for and love in a fiction writer – the ability to capture and express those psychological moments that are central to human life and relationships.

    This may sound like a roundabout way of why I don’t like Hemingway and Steinbeck, but in fact I’m working very hard as I read to understand why this kind of writing does so little for me, and why I find it so empty.

    In our discussion last week, Josh said, “men are visual creatures.” It’s certainly true that, in general, men respond to visual stimulation more readily than do women. The men in the group may enjoy this book because it’s so visual, and the characters so elemental, the story so simple and mythic: man and boy versus the elements. I’m not a visual person, however. What I look for is psychological insight and unexpected language, and this book has neither. Nor did the last one. Again, I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with the book – it just doesn’t have what it takes to get me going. There’s an old man, and there’s a big fish. But it’s not enough. Moby Dick, another story of an old man and a big fish, is much more interesting to me because there’s a lot of psychology involved (and some interesting secondary characters). But here, there’s just a man and a fish. And I’m not hooked.

  • New Partnership with the University of Baltimore

    New Partnership with the University of Baltimore

    UB_Logo_H_BLUETwo months ago, the Attorney General Lorretta Lynch and the Secretary of Education Arne Duncan came to Jessup to announce a plan to offer Pell Grants to some prisoners again. They gave us until October 2nd to find a university partner to offer credit-bearing programs.

    I’m very pleased to announce that the University of Baltimore has applied to the Department of Education to offer degrees at Jessup Correctional Institution: a BA in Community Studies and Civic Engagement, and a BA in Human Services Administration, starting in Fall of 2016. We hope to enroll a cohort of 20-30 students, starting with eligible members of the JCI Prison Scholars Program!

    There’s a lot of work to be done between now and next September, and it’s still possible that the Department of Education might refuse UB’s application. But I am bursting with pride in our students at Jessup for making this possible. At the University of Baltimore, it is our own Andrea Cantora who led the effort and will be shepherding the credit-bearing courses into being. Dr. Cantora came to us with plenty of experience working in prisons, but in her criminal justice courses she saw students who are deeply curious and hard-working taking classes without credit or recognition, and so she’s put an immense amount of time and effort into giving them what they deserve!

  • Reflections on Forbidden Island from one of our Games and Game Theory Students

    I’m still working on putting together my thoughts on Friday’s class and our chaotic game of Labyrinth Lord, but in the meanwhile, here are some thoughts from one of our students, L.B. (posted with his permission; I am transcribing this from his paper, so any typos are probably mine):

    It was very interesting from a sociological point of view when a group of us played Forbidden Island. Once the rules were explained, the confusion began. One man assumed a leadership role. He was directing the play of everyone else. In the beginning, the individual players permitted this guidance. However, the two men who explained the rules and refereed the play repeatedly intervened with their leadership, when questions arose or an air of confusion permeated the table.

    Finally, when the majority of players grasped the rules individuals assumed responsibility for their turn and the game proceeded rather smoothly. It was intriguing to see how well the men played when someone needed protection. The conversation took on an air of empathy for someone who could be taken off the board and everyone spoke on how best to save said player.

    Such cooperation was eventful in a prison atmosphere. The men shared a common thread of cooperation in order to win the game. Initially the man who assumed the leadership position easily surrendered his self-appointed role in favor of the group dynamic of mutually shared cooperation among all.

    It was with a shout of jubilation when everyone showed each individual player how to move toward the helicopter pad in order to fly off the island. The game was won and smiles and pats on the back were shared.

    I marveled at this game for the group dynamic that was quickly created and could see how much fun the group experienced. It would have been interesting to see how quickly such frivolity would evaporate into consternation if a player had assumed a role to sabotage play to lose the game. I can only surmise that the culprit would have been castigated with rude comments and other players would have been reluctant in the future to play with such a libertine.

    I would give Forbidden Island four out of five stars as a rating. I would have enjoyed playing this game as a child, as it would have helped to foster a cooperative approach to handling problems as they arose later in life instead of the me against the world approach that so many youth of my generation (Baby Boomers of the early 1950s) were taught in the games – win at any cost.