Hi everyone.
This week, students did their Inspiring Stories presentations. If any students who missed on Tuesday attend in Week 6, we’ll hear their Inspiring Story then.
The backup video is available in Course Materials/Backup Videos (Live Class Meetings). Those of you who were present in class can just use the Youtube Playlist to find your presentation day and watch yourselves present. You can also find my notes for today’s class below.
I mentioned in class what you should write in your Presentation Journal: just take some notes about the feedback and advice you received, what you thought went well or could have gone better, and what you’re working on for next time.
I explained what your next assignment is. (See “Chuseok/Rant Videos” below.) I also told you what to prepare for Week 6.
Chuseok/Rant Videos
METHOD: Because ranting is a somewhat emotional performance, it can be difficult to do live. Therefore, I request that everyone pre-record their rant as a short video. Feel free to use your phone or webcam. Your face should be visible, and your audio should be clear enough that we can hear and understand it.
Have the video on your computer and ready to share during our next class meeting (next week).
EXPLANATION:
How can we define rant? Here’s a definition from the Cambridge English Dictionary:
rant: /rænt/
to speak, write or shout in a loud, uncontrolled, or angry way, often saying confused or silly things:
Example:
- He’s always ranting (on) about the government.
- I get fed up with my mother ranting and raving (about my clothes) all the time.
- This is pretty good, but I want to emphasize that not all “rants” involve saying “confused or silly things.” Especially since about 1990 or so, the word “rant” has tended to be used when speaks ins a very emotional, angry or frustrated way about a problem.
Usually, these are about problems you can’t do much to fix. If you could fix the problem, you would, but since you cannot, you fell stress and frustration, and end up letting it out in an emotional speech. Of course, some people rant with their friends, over a beer, but especially comedians have used the rant as a way to criticize problems or annoying things in society: the habits of lazy or bad drivers, the struggle of dealing with one’s parents or in-laws (spouse’s parents), the stupidity of governemnts or institutions, and so on.
In past Presentation in English courses, my students have ranted about:
- badly behaved dormitory roommates
- their parents favoring one sibling over them for no good reason
- abusive or disrespectful professors
- ex-boyfriends or ex-girlfriends who had been cruel, disrespectful, just plain annoying
- experiences of racism, sexism, homophobia, or other bigotry
- frustrations having to deal with stupid people in general
The thing you should understand about ranting is that it’s sort of two things at once: it’s an expression of angry and frustrated feelings, and it’s a kind of public performance of criticism.
A lot of students, approaching this assignment, say, “But I’m not a very angry person!”
That’s fine. But then again, everyone has something that frustrates them deeply. For example:
- Maybe it’s that 꼰대 you had to deal with, but wanted to ignore.
- Maybe it’s a relative who is disrespectful every time you interact.
- Maybe it’s the driver who was reckless and almost killed your family when you were driving somewhere last week.
- Maybe it’s something bigger, like the way humanity seems to be sleepwalking into a climate apocalypse, or how frustrating it is to have to inherit the world from a generation that has destroyed it and is still continuing to do so.
- Maybe you have a friend who committed suicide, and you’re angry that the government does so little to combat the suicide epidemic in Korea.
- Maybe you hate craft beer and wish people would stop talking about it.
- Maybe you’re frustrated at your parents, who don’t really treat you like an adult yet.
- Maybe you are sick and tired of the school cafeteria serving the same food, or maybe you’re burned out complimenting your parents’ cooking because it being terrible?
- Heck, maybe you’re angry because you believe that students shouldn’t be forced to study English in Korean universities.
The point is, to do a rant, you need to find something about which you feel a lot of negative emotions. In the rant, your job is to:
1. Show your negative emotions, without being overwhelmed by them. Maintain control, but show us your strong feelings.
2. Express criticism of the thing you’re attacking. Talk about the problem that is frustrating you in a way that will help others to understand why you are so upset about it.
To be clear, both of these are challenging. For some people, #1 is harder: they’re too used to keeping their emotions inside, and have to struggle to really show their negative feelings. For others, it’s #2 that’s harder: they need to really work hard make the listener understand why they are so frustrated, which means they need to plan out what they’re going to say, in what structure and order—which can make the presentation less spontaneous, and then makes #1 more of a challenge.
As with the last presentation, definitely don’t read us a script. Rants are supposed to feel spontaneous (even when they are practiced a lot), and they depend on the feeling that it’s your anger or frustration that is making you continue speaking. Scripts make it very hard to express emotion in a convincing way.
Topic Selection: As always, I request that you choose something classroom-appropriate. I’m sure we could all rant about topics that might make another person in the class uncomfortable, but I ask that you don’t do that. (If you want to complain about, say, politics, save that for when you’re with your friends. Pick a problem that you think everyone in the class will understand and be able to relate to.)
I reserve the right to stop your presentation and ask you to prepare a new presentation on a different topic if the content is not classroom-appropriate.