ISI Faculty Resource Center

I don't think it is so much wasting time as setting aside time for contemplation or slow reading. There is a wonderful article about the art of slow reading at http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jul/15/slow-reading

One of the things I emphasize to students in my architectural history classes is my desire that they start looking at the built environment around them instead of obliviously moving through buildings and spaces without thinking about what they see. Being at Princeton reinforced this idea to me; Princeton's campus architecture certainly holds a great deal of meaning, and it's important to examine the buildings leisurely. A student once told me that after taking my "Architecture of Boston" class, he could not stop looking at buildings and analyzing architectural styles. This was a great compliment!

I've been wasting so much time lately, that I've come to this post relatively late. But I did want to comment because I've been happy to observe, and participate in, what I'd consider some very edifying time-wasting around the "smoking table" on my own campus. Our few faculty who still allow themselves the indulgence of tobacco will occasionally retreat to said table with a cup of coffee and some too-long neglected reading. More often than not, though, colleagues will already be present and so the reading is further neglected in favor of conversation. And though no sign is posted to prohibit it, it is generally understood that "business" is to be avoided; so the table-talk less resembles a faculty senate meeting than a generationally misplaced (and perhaps somewhat idealized) dormitory bull session. The conversation might revolve around questions such as: Virgil or Vergil? Iliad or Odyssey? What's the most important year in the last century? Who are the two most influential western figures between Constantine and Charlemagne? It's not exactly a Harlem barbershop, but it has something of the flavor. And judging by the number of undergrads who regularly pause to join their professors in such time wasting, even they find it's not a bad flavor.