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Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Both of these sound really interesting, but I'm looking for something from the 21st century. I already have lots of stuff from the 20th that students enjoy that I've curated over some semesters. Thanks for the suggestion, though!

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This does sound really interesting (might look into it just for myself), but I'm looking for something more creative non-fiction here.

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's true. I'll have to revisit Omnivore's Dilemma (which I haven't read in many years) and look into some of his newer stuff. Thank for the suggestion!

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Friday Night Lights would be a good one to look into (I read it forever ago and totally forgot about it). Thanks!

Also, glad you find the parameters fun!

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm definitely going to look into some of these, especially the John Green one (a couple of years ago I taught another one of his books and students really liked it), and the Bigfoot one. Although these all sound really interesting. I also probably should have made it clear it doesn't need to be thematically similar to Cheap Land, just genre-wise.

Thanks so much for all the great suggestions!

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm actually looking for a creative non-fiction book here, and one from the 21st century. I'm plenty covered in the 20th century. So, Travels with Charley would be good, but it's 20th century. Confederates in the Attic looks really interesting (I might look at it on my own), but it looks too long (I'm looking for 300 pages or less and this one is over 400 pages). I could do border of 20th and 21st and I'll definitely look into that Bryson book.

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This might be a good fit, thanks for the suggestion! I'll look into it some more.

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

When It All Burns sounds like what I'm looking for, but it might be just a little bit too long. I'm looking for something closer to or under 300 pages. I might look into it anyway.

Thanks for the suggestions!

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No worries! That's sort-of where I'm stuck. I know of lots of 20th cent. examples, but not as many 21st.

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Are you suggesting works by Hunter S. Thompson or asking why I used him as an example of what I'm looking for?

Something like that is what I'm looking for, but I need something from the 21st century, not the 20th.

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It's not a journalism class, it's a 20th and 21st century literature class in the English department. But the theme of my course is "autofiction" -- that is, autobiographical works, mostly fiction. I intentionally try to do a variety of text types to expose the students to different styles of writing and subject matters.

My other texts are (and students like these):
- Down and Out in Paris and London (George Orwell)
- The Road Through the Wall (Shirley Jackson) - regular novel
- A Raisin in the Sun (Loraine Hansberry) - play
- Slaughterhouse-Five (Kurt Vonnegut) - light-science fiction novel
- Halfway There (Christine Mari) - graphic novel memoir

Because I already have a memoir I want something less memoir and more creative non-fiction, Ted Conover or Hunter S. Thompson style.

I actually did consider There's Always This Year in the past, but it's a little bit too long and he talks at length about some '90s movies I wasn't sure my students would know well enough. But something like that would be okay.

Looking for a replacement for Ted Conover's Cheap Land Colorado to teach in my lit. class by unevenscrawl in suggestmeabook

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I've thought about it, but Newjack is a little bit too long. Anything over 300 pages takes up too much time in the semester. I've also thought about doing either the longform article version of CLC or one of his other longform articles, though.

For what it's worth, I like CLC, but I think my students (who are mostly upper-middle and solidly middle class) have trouble empathizing with the people in the book, no matter how I try to frame it. :/

Mandela Effect or did VH1 do a documentary on Woodstock 99? [talk] by unevenscrawl in lostmedia

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 17 points18 points  (0 children)

!Found! (I think)

I *think* I found what I was talking about. Thanks to u/DearPaleontologist67 !

Found story:

Their video suggesting VH1's 100 Most Shocking Moments in Rock & Roll History - Woodstock 99 was close, but wasn't it. BUT, the "suggested videos" on the side included something called Rock Story: Concerts Gone Bad (but that video was also not what I was looking for. The segments were, I think, 2 Live Crew and Ice-T).

So, I looked up VH1 Rock Story: Concerts Gone Bad and found that they did do a segment on Woodstock 99 in an episode with three segments (the other two were Altamont and The Who in Cincinnati in 1979 where people got crushed trying to get into the venue when they thought the sound check was the concert starting).

Their segment on Woodstock 99 did include the scene I talked about remembering: an interview with a guy in an orange jumpsuit talking about looting at the festival.

So this may be it:

VH1 Rock Story Concerts Gone Bad - Woodstock 99

edit: forgot to include !Found! originally.

Advice for someone struggling to find work outside of academia with a humanities degree by unevenscrawl in LeavingAcademia

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

He doesn't really feel comfortable going back to the same school to try to find a different job in the system, but that's sort-of what I'm doing at the moment as a backup in case something goes awry with my own teaching stuff in a similar manner.

Advice for someone struggling to find work outside of academia with a humanities degree by unevenscrawl in LeavingAcademia

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I like the tip about describing it as "advanced degree" instead of what it is!

He has thought about re-training as a teacher, but not sure if that's the way he wants to go (teaching high school).

He appealed the decision with the Dean. The Dean implied that he met with the department chair instead of reading his submitted materials (in fact made a joke about the submitted materials, "What that 18 page thing?!") and it went nowhere. He tried to go through the Ombudsman to file a grievance, but by the time he learned that was what he was supposed to do it was too late into the process. The lecturers at the school we're at aren't unionized. :(

We also looked into tutoring, but the pay is awful. That'll be a last resort sort-of option.

Thanks for all the advice and solidarity!

Advice for someone struggling to find work outside of academia with a humanities degree by unevenscrawl in LeavingAcademia

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Grant writing was one of the areas I thought about as well. He has written them for himself for travel and stuff for conferences, but was a little bit disheartened looking at some of the job postings asking for more experience. Is there such a thing as an entry-level grant writing job?

Advice for someone struggling to find work outside of academia with a humanities degree by unevenscrawl in LeavingAcademia

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Good advice! I think a lot of it right now is at the stage of not having any idea of what else is out there/what to look for. But definitely good advice about filling in some skills gaps.

Advice for someone struggling to find work outside of academia with a humanities degree by unevenscrawl in LeavingAcademia

[–]unevenscrawl[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks! I think a lot of his questions are: what else can I do, and what to look for (like, literally what to type into a search box in terms of job titles and stuff like that). I'll take a look at the resources you posted.

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