by Dina Odnopozova
Twenty years ago, I majored in English at Baruch. To say that I loved my major would be a grave understatement. English courses gave my life meaning. I joyfully grappled with the multi-headed hydra that is the English language. I delighted in discovering new texts and meeting people passionate about literature. Class discussions were stimulating intellectually and emotionally, and my favorite place to be was the Newman Library.
While English classes gave me an immediate reason to wake up in the morning, other classes did the opposite. I could not find a satisfactory answer to the question, “How will making aspirin from scratch enhance my understanding of Dante’s Inferno?” I dragged myself to math and chemistry classes, sat in the front row, and was a perfectly functioning zombie. I was there physically, but in my mind, I was circling up and down Inferno.
Students who major in finance or accounting are certainly wondering about the relevance of Great Works to their career plans. Why read nonsense written by people who are long dead? Why care about fictional characters when there are enough real people to care for? And on top of that, why use the insufferable MLA format? Of course, most of my students will forget about MLA when they submit their final papers.
My goal as a teacher is to ensure that my students acquire one most important transferrable skill: finding meaning not only in literary texts but in their lives — that is, in seemingly meaningless classes and the dreadful MLA format. In selecting texts and preparing class discussions, I focus on meaningful and often uncomfortable topics directly related to my students’ diverse backgrounds. Last week, in preparing for a class on Existentialism, I formulated three goals for myself.
- To encourage students to seek meaning rather than hope and happiness.
- To invite students to evaluate the authenticity of their choices.
- To persuade students to be more involved in forming their own life meaning.
At the beginning of the class, I invited my students to write on the board their answers to a relatively simple question: “What gives your life meaning?” Duty, food, parents, money were some words that they wrote. After five minutes of this activity, accompanied by a great deal of laughter, I asked students to pause and re-formulate the question: “What makes you get up in the morning?” We examined the very act of leaving one’s bed as an act of free will, a choice. I encouraged the students to add more items and wrote a few words myself.
Contemplating the list proved to be an incredibly productive activity. We went over some of the words that stood out. I aimed to question the authenticity of these reasons to leave the bed. For example, pleasure — whether in food or romantic relationships, proved to be a unanimously authentic choice. Education, however, was not. I asked the class: “Why are you here?” Unsurprisingly, only two students responded that they wanted to expand their knowledge. The other twenty-six students said they attended college because of other reasons listed on the board: duty, money, parents My next question was: “Are you enjoying your college experience?” Even less surprisingly, these twenty-six students answered with a definitive “no.” The other two students found college productive and enriching.
The other words we discussed were happiness and hope. We inquired into the very nature of these concepts. Are they attainable, sustainable, or productive? I asked the class to think of ways in which the pursuit of happiness can actually lead to unhappiness. Similarly, we analyzed the harrowing cases of Auschwitz prisoners who gave up and died partially because of false hope. We went over plentiful examples of lives lived according to inauthentic goals: Gregor Samsa, Ivan Ilyich, and Meursault.
I asked my students if they wanted to add things to the list. To my delight, various forms of meaningful pain and suffering appeared on the board: working out, giving birth, or writing an essay. “Can toothache be meaningful?” — I asked. Toothache kindles empathy and gratitude. What about MLA? Completing annoying, meaningless and mechanical tasks is a part of human existence. Through deep discussion of literary and personal life experiences, we arrived at the conclusion that it was meaning, not hope or happiness, that sustained humans through the worst times: Auschwitz, toothache or a Great Works course.
Next, I distributed hard copies of the old but good “The Purpose in Life Test” (PIL), designed to measure one’s perceived meaning in life. Students had to select the number from “Strongly Disagree” (1) to “Strongly Agree” (7) in response to twenty statements. Here are some of these statements:
- I am usually completely bored.
- Life to me seems always exciting.
- My life is in my hands, and I am in control of it.
- Facing my daily tasks is a source of pleasure and satisfaction.
- My personal existence is utterly meaningless and without purpose.
At the end of the test, students calculated their scores, reflecting their life purpose on a scale from 20 to 140. Although I did not ask them to share their results, many students did. The range of the scores was as diverse as our classroom, but we all agreed that to improve the quality of our lives, we need to find and generate more meaning.
Next, I gave students ten minutes to write down things they can do every day to improve their scores. I asked them to be specific and honest in their responses. Here are some of the things that they wrote.
- Learn a new word in my parents’ native language every day
- When I take an elevator (which makes me uncomfortable), give a compliment to a stranger
- Get wasted with my friends.
- Ask my parents how their day went instead just telling about mine
- Spend less time in my room
- Take a different route to college every day
- Motivate my brother to go back to college and get his degree so we can progress together
- Go for at least a thirty-minute walk each day with no phone
- Throw away meaningless junk
I intended to continue this exercise in groups by inviting students to share advice, but to everyone’s surprise, the class was over. I hope my students left the classroom with a little more meaning in their lives. I certainly did. After class, I made my own list of things I can do to make my students’ learning experience more meaningful. Some of the things on my list are:
- Use handouts and physical objects/documents more often.
- Include at least one ten-minute activity that requires students to use pen and paper.
- Invite students to write on the board/move around the classroom more often.
- Existential topics are great for learning!
- Straightforward and simple questions, such as “what makes you wake up in the morning” engage everyone in the classroom.
When we reconvened after the Spring break, I reminded my students of their day-to-day journey towards a more meaningful life. When discussing literary texts, I often asked, “What would you do in the characters’ shoes?” “Would this action be meaningful/authentic to the character’s life?” “Would this action be meaningful/authentic to your life?” While I cannot say that students’ participation increased, their in-class responses and papers became more thoughtful and self-reflective.
I ended the semester with Camus’ “Myth of Sisyphus.” For my students, the upcoming week of finals is a perfect example of Sisyphean labour: mechanically memorizing facts and numbers, recycling received ideas only to see this boulder of meaningless information roll down into oblivion. “What can you do to make studying for finals and writing papers more meaningful and, therefore, less miserable?” — I asked. Here are some of their answers:
- Become stronger emotionally. Exams give me anxiety. I get a chance to face my anxiety.
- Be actually curious about the stuff I memorize
- Practice important skills, such as time management
- Talk to a classmate, share our hate/anxiety about the exam
- Finals week is like a model of what life is going to be, we can practice and prepare.
I will remember this invaluable advice as I navigate my own end-of-semester stress. Teaching meaning has been a rewarding learning experience for the entire class. I learned about my students’ frustrations and challenges that are often invisible to professors. I hope my students learned that they have a choice: college experience can be a meaningless chore imposed by their parents. Or, it can be intensive training for the marathon of life and a platform for self-discovery. If this is the only thing my students remember about the course, my life has meaning.