Classes

Word on the street (by “the street” I mean “my mom’s email to me”) is that I’ll be receiving my new laptop (and by “new” I mean “my old-school Powerbook Ti”) on Wednesday via UPS. Hopefully it means that I’ll be updating the blog more frequently. Unfortunately, being sans-laptop means most of my blogging for a while will just be in an effort to catch you up on my life over the last three-and-a-half weeks.

So, let me tell you about my classes. This semester, I’m taking four courses: Dutch, Health and Development, Violence in Peace and War, and Urban Anthropology. The latter three are all UvA courses, and since they’re taught in English, they are open to international students like myself. Dutch is put on by CIEE, so it’s only for the American students on my program. Classes are around three hours long and take place once a week. This is kind of a double-edged sword. On one hand, it’s pretty nice because I spend very little time every week in class. On the other hand, three hours can be an excruciatingly long time if you don’t want to be there.* Because UvA is a de-centralized campus, my classes take place all over the city – which is great because it makes you learn Amsterdam quickly.

Dutch:

I’m just going to start out by saying that knowing Dutch is not a necessary part of living in Amsterdam. As such, I originally didn’t want to take the class, considering how many other interesting-sounding classes there were (i.e. Ethnic Diversity in Popular Culture and Terrorism in the News). Too bad Oxy requires its students to take the course, even though everyone knows it’s technically pointless. To tell you the truth though, I’m glad I’m taking the class. The professor (Bonny) is hilarious and it’s pretty cool to be able to order a beer at a bar in Dutch (“Mag ik ein biertje graag”).  I’m always really happy with myself when I can throw down some Nederlands (the proper way to refer to the Dutch language) at the Albert Heijn and have the cashier mistake me for Dutch. If I’m going to live in Amsterdam, I want to take the time to actually be a part of the city

Dutch is unlike the rest of my classes in that I have it twice a week, Monday and Thursday, for two hours at a time. We spend the first half of class learning grammar and vocabulary (as one is wont to do in a language class) and in the second half, Bonny teaches us practical things about Dutch culture. So far, we’ve had an in-depth discussion about how to find what we’re looking for in Dutch supermarkets (and no, they don’t have applesauce), what kind of glasses we can expect our beers to come in at a bar, and gossip about the royal family. Riveting.

Health and Development:

Initially, I was really stoked for this class. The class description on the UvA website made it sound like a course on healthcare and poverty, which could definitely apply to my UEP major. What I didn’t know (and apparently neither did any of the other American students who signed up), is that the UvA has a very specific definition of “development.” From what I can peice together, development revolves around super-impoverished, rural villages in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, and the study of it is pretty anthropological in nature. Basically, this class isn’t a discussion about healthcare systems and how poverty affects ill-health (you know, all that fun UEP stuff). Instead, it’s about how to convince African villagers to take precautions to prevent HIV, and what role the medicine-man plays. It’s on a very micro level. I guess we have some interesting discussions in class, but I was really expecting (and hoping) for something else. Oh, and did I mention that it’s four hours long? Yeah, that definitely doesn’t help. In this instance, I actually wouldn’t mind being lectured to for that period. But unfortunately, for the final two hours, the class breaks up into smaller discussion groups, and then we regroup to share with the entire class. This style of teaching, in the which the professor doesn’t have enough interesting or relevent material to fill the alotted time, is one that I absolutely loathe.

Violence in Peace and War:

This class is legit. It probably won’t count for anything (maybe I could get it to count for a Sociology class), but it’s super-interesting. We basically take an inter-disciplinary look at what causes people to be violent. Each week, we look at violence from a different perspective:  We looked at the philosophical definition of violence (Hobbes, Rousseau, Freud, etc) and we will look at the issue psychologically, neuro-biologically, sociologically, and crimonologically (yeah I just used that word). I’m still forming an opinion about the professors and my class-mates. I’ll keep you posted. I have it every Thursday from 15:00 to 18:00.

Urban Anthropology:

Honestly, I had no idea what to expect from this class. The last time I took an anthropology class was in high school, and that was taught by (who we assumed was) an acid-head who admitted to eating lead-paint-chips as a kid. This class has probably turned out to be my favorite. I still haven’t figured out what the class is about, but I think that’s a testament to how many different, but interesting, topics we’ve covered. The first class we talked about “the city” as an ideal, and what kind of philosophical and literary connotations it has (i.e. it’s a place when you can forge your own identity and make a name for yourself). The last class we had was about Soviet modernist urban design. We talked about everything from Marxist philosophy to the use of baroque architecture in government buildings in Moscow to history of a failed steel-town in Siberia that was supposed to compete with Gary, Indiana. It’s pretty crazy but I love it. The only downside is that Urban Anthropology is at 9am on Fridays, which is probably the worst time for anything, ever.

Right know, I’m chilling in the Amsterdam public libary – the Oba, as it’s called – listening to live piano-playing and sitting in a fourth-story window that looks south over the entire city. Life’s good.

*Last week I got hella sick. I sat through the four-hour class with a fever, and every part of my body hurt. I never wanted something to end so badly.

You can pay for school, but you can’t buy class