Nashville: The Mood (Part 2)

  Professor Donald E. Johnson sat at his desk and watched the students file in for the first day of class. It was a short class—only six weeks in length—but he felt it was perfect for the summer session. Being an experimental course, not much was expected, although the administration saw a lot of potential for the class, as did the dean of the engineering school. He had hoped that the class would be completely full, so he was a little bit disappointed that only about two-thirds of the seats were taken as the time to start class approached. Maybe too many students were away for the summer, he thought. Too many of the out-of-town students, at least. And the ones who live in Nashville are too familiar with the subject, he thought wryly.

  He stood up and turned to the blackboard and wrote:

  Gossip from an Engineering Standpoint

  “Is everyone in the right class?” he asked, looking from one side of the group to another, then toward the back, then back across, then back to the front. A few of them nodded; no one else had much reaction. “GoodI suppose you hadn’t thought about this type of course until you saw it in the guide. The idea isn’t to make it something too easy, but merely to get you to think about a side of it that hasn’t always been considered.

  “We have a very rich heritage of gossip in Nashville, and we’re only beginning to scratch the surface of it—its meanings, origins, and a strategic purpose. But it very much interacts with engineering, and if you think about it long enough, it interacts with every aspect of life. Here we’ll only consider the engineering side of it.”

  He paused for a moment and studied the faces in the classroom, scanning from right to left, then back again. Most of them were paying attention, but he knew it was still early. He knew this class would be a challenge for engineering students, used to very precise measurements and concepts, and not used to a free-flowing social order, or disorder might be more accurate. He had worried, when the idea of the class had first been discussed, that it might be too much for an engineering student to handle. It wasn’t precise; it was murky to the nth degree. If he could find some way to translate it more mathematically, most of them might get it; he didn’t think that could be done, but he hadn’t ruled it out entirely.

  “My colleagues in the social sciences think they have this field all to themselves. Of course, that is where the great strengths of the subject lie. It is more akin to a sociological phenomenon, or even a psychological one. And my colleagues in the distinguished architectural profession think that when it comes to structures of different sorts, and how they are built, they have that portion of the field all to themselves. So you see, we have a lot of stiff competition in discussing this subject, and eventually, when Vanderbilt’s Department of Gossip is fully integrated five years or so down the line, all of these strands will be pulled together into one unified hole. Much more to your liking, I’m sure. But for now, we have to present it individually, and recommend to you that you follow up within each discipline.”

  “Can students major in this?” The question came from a sandy-haired youth in the back right-hand side of the class.

  “Not just yet,” Professor Johnson said quietly. “The University is working on that, but they haven’t fully fleshed out the curriculum for the major. I think right now there are only about five courses. But I understand eventually there will be a dozen or more, and that should be enough to allow one to major in the field, or at least minor in it.”

  “Why did they put a class about it in the engineering school?” This time, the questioner was an Indian student, Harold Aziz. Professor Johnson knew him from some of his other classes; he was bright, alert, and seemingly interested in every idea and concept put before him.

  “The idea was that the engineering school could structure the discussion along a more precise, scientific line. I won’t guarantee to you that we’ve done that yet. It’s very much in the exploratory, almost experimental stages. But there was a feeling that you could talk about this subject very generally without ever giving it the precision it needs for someone to study it usefullyOr at least there was a thought that some major components of it were missing, and that we might be able to provide it hereTime will tellI have to confess I’m still working it out in my own mind, developing a text and course material that can be completely on point, absolutely relevant.”

  “What are the other courses?”

  Professor Johnson smiled at the question. He knew that he liked answering these simple questions too much. It would be better and more useful to simply push forward with the course material, rough and imperfect as it was. But for some reason, he wasn’t mentally set to go forward with it. He liked the delay from answering questions of a general nature, and inwardly he chastised himself for liking it.

  “There’s a biological aspect to gossip, and the Department of Natural Sciences is going to put together a course in that. Professor Wagner over there will be heading up that effort; I don’t know whether he’ll be teaching it or notThen, of course, the sociologists want a crack at it. They think it’s their domain exclusively, as I noted. We don’t have to burst their bubble just yet. We know that gossip started out probably as a sociological phenomenon, at least the way people thought about it, but once you get into this course you’ll realize there’s far more to it. It permeates every aspect of society. It is both dependent on each aspect, and influential upon each aspectThen, Professor Burke-Edmunds is gearing up over in the history department for—what else—History of Gossip. We need to know where this all started, and why. Although I guess the ‘why’ portion is going to be taken up by the Department of Psychology. And I understand they are indeed ready to start their course, if not today, probably in the fall semesterThere you have it.”

  “Why is there so much gossip in Nashville?”

  Professor Johnson looked at the young man on the second row, right in the middle. He could have recognized Jared Kaplan’s squeaky voice without even looking in that direction. Kaplan, a Long Islander, had been in three of his classes, and was an above-average student, although not one of the best. He was very inquisitive, though, and sometimes liked to question a subject to death, long after the essential part of a question had been answered.

  “That’s not really part of our course, and I’m going to leave it to others to flesh that out in detail. Speaking as a member of the Board of Deacons at my church, though—some of you know that I attend Glory Episcopal Church over in Green Hills—I do have some knowledge, and a working theory. Our church is not, hopefully, as subject to this as the First Baptist Church, but we do have our gossipy segments and factions spread throughout every room of the church.

  “Why is there so much in Nashville? That’s an excellent question, and probably has a long and complex history, one with which I’m not totally familiar. But as a native of Connecticut, and having lived here more than thirty years, I would say there is a uniquely Nashville aspect to gossip. Gossip exists everywhere, but in modified form. Is it only in Nashville that it is taken to an extreme level, that it boils up constantly and acts almost as an independent force, independent of the people out of whose mouths it comes? It certainly seems that way at times”