Essay topics An anthropological canvass of campus essay topics revealed that political scientists were focused on what they described as "old chestnuts", such as whether a constitution must be written down to be effective, which, naturally, brought up Bagehot (Badge-ut). An English prof asked her students to read Orwell's essay Politics and the English Language , and to comment on what Orwell meant by "sheer cloudy vagueness". In the bird courses, Soc (Sewsh) and Psych, no essays were assigned--and none were submitted.  Similar results were reported at Mount Royal College--MRC-k-e-y m-o-u-s-e. Spanish onions Apparently Henry Kissinger had distinguished leaders who were like onions (with many layers to peel back) from others who were more like marshmallows (whom you could push and push and never come up against anything solid).  It would be inflammatory to identify which dictators around the world were considered onions or marshmallows.  I thin...

No one warned us that starting university was going to be such a strange experience.  Well, perhaps not strange, but certainly an essay in sociology or anthropology.  So, it was with some relief that our Anthro 101 prof suggested that we each undertake an anthropological study on campus, partly to acclimatize ourselves to postsecondary life, partly to begin to learn a discipline whose goal was to help you understand the weird and the wonderful. Among the topics proposed by our prof were: A"content analysis" of iron-on T-shirt transfers spotted on campus; Stitch designs on the back pockets of blue jeans; First words spoken by profs by discipline; Elevator behaviour per building; Graffiti on the risers of stairs in the Social Sciences tower; Graffitti on the backs of fiberglass chairs, also in the Social Sciences tower; Subjects, authors and titles featured in low traffic areas of the library; Reception of persons with amputations; Faculty and student satisfaction...