"Hey, anyone have any Blue Jay cards?" "Yeah, I've got a Blue Jay. I'm looking for Mark McGwire. Got any of him?" "Anyone see Derek Lowe's no-hitter on Saturday? That was incredible." Sound like a dining hall conversation? Think again. As part of a new senior English elective taught by English instructor Christine Robinson, seniors spent the spring term reading commentary, discussing history-and yes, swapping trading cards-relating to one of America's greatest institutions: baseball. "Baseball has a history in this country that other sports do not," says Robinson, holder of the B. Rodney Marriott Chair in the Humanities and a lifelong baseball fan. "The nature of the game has symmetry; the same game is passed down through the generations, from grandparent to parent to child." An already-established love of the game brought Robinson together with her two sections of students, but the class did not simply revolve around conversation about the sport itself. Through reading selections, themes such as heroism, tragedy, gender and race were raised and discussed. Parallels to important issues in American history including World War II and civil rights were drawn from baseball literature. "I wanted people who have the curiosity or the enthusiasm to see the game from different angles," says Robinson. "The love of the game is the basis for more exploration from a common starting point." In one memorable class following an Assembly speech delivered by Alex Myers '96, a transgendered Exeter alum, students discussed the possibility and likelihood of homosexual, transgendered or female professional players. The debate covered tradition, morality and the perception of fans. Robinson grew up a baseball fan in Concord, NH, listening to the Red Sox on the radio. After rediscovering the sport while living in San Francisco, she was drawn towards the Giants and became, in her words, a "baseball schizophrenic." Robinson, who has created a number of other senior English electives, decided to offer Baseball: The American Narrative after discovering the wealth of baseball literature and the passion the sport inspires in other English classes. "The discussions in regular classes and the papers that came out of [baseball literature] were incredible," she says. "If there hadn't been this kind of literature, though, I wouldn't have done it. There's just so much good baseball writing."
Many students, though fans of the modern game, entered the course unfamiliar with historical players, equipment and style of play. "I liked learning about the early days of baseball and hearing about guys like Satchel Paige, guys who played before my time," says Ben Martin, a senior from North Andover, MA. Katie Kern, a senior from West Hartford, CT, was intrigued by "the idea of learning about baseball in the context of the history of America." Robinson emphasizes the study of literature and social issues over statistics, trivia and strategy in part due to the academic nature of the class, but in part due to her admitted lack of expertise in certain areas. "Some of the students know more about baseball history than I do," she says. "That does, however, allow me to learn things I don't know, and I like to learn from the things I teach. I can say I have seen Ted Williams play, because I'm old enough, if that gives me any credibility." During the review process in the spring of 2001 when the elective was first proposed, Exeter faculty overwhelmingly approved the creation of the course despite some criticism that it would attract primarily male students. "That person got hooted down by the female faculty members who were baseball fans," says Robinson. "It passed pretty easily." In its initial offering, the course did attract more male than female students. Kern is the only girl in one section of the class-the other section has five girls-but both she and her classmates agree that this causes no problems. "I didn't really notice it that much," says Kern. "When we talked about the idea of women in sports and women in baseball, I felt like it was part of my responsibility to speak up, but other than that, it wasn't a big deal."
"The girls brought a different perspective," adds Robinson. "Some of them asked different kinds of questions." Other unique views come from students who play varsity baseball or softball, as most students in the course played Little League baseball but did not continue beyond that level. "From the literature, we could ask, 'Is that how you feel?' or 'Do you agree with that as a ballplayer?'" says Robinson. "They brought immediate experience to the things we read in the abstract." Much of the assigned reading in the course came from Baseball: A Literary Anthology, which features such authors as Ring Lardner, Roger Angell and Exeter alumnus George Plimpton '44. The Glory of Their Times, a book by Lawrence Ritter containing interviews with early baseball stars, and The Natural by Bernard Malamud were also part of the reading list. "I was excited about reading the ways people put their love of baseball into words," says Kern. "I really enjoyed the things we read." "I was impressed with the seriousness of the class," says Robinson. "The students did the reading and wrote the papers with a high level of enthusiasm." The class produced a variety of final projects, as Robinson left the culminating assignment open. Several students created their own bats, baseballs or baseball gloves, and one student designed a set of trading cards depicting the Exeter varsity softball team. Others researched baseball history or wrote fictional narratives based on the modern game. The course, however, did feature an unconventional final class. After a term of studying the societal impact, historical significance and individual personalities of the sport, it was only fitting that the course ended not in the classroom, but on the field as the two sections challenged each other in a classic game of baseball.
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