这是英语老师卡洛斯·马丁内斯
Carlos Martinez will join Boston University Academy as an English Instructor in the fall of 2019. He holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Texas in San Antonio and received his doctorate in English from Brandeis University. His dissertation, 题目是《BBIN集团官方网站》,” is a monograph on the author that treats themes associated with Southern and Southwestern American Literature. 他曾在普渡大学教授写作和文学课程, Brandeis University, Wheelock College, Boston University, Framingham State University, and Newbury College.
This summer, we sat down with Dr. Martinez to learn what makes him tick.
你是在哪里长大的，这对你现在的样子有什么影响?
I grew up in San Antonio, Texas, but my family is from a small town near Monterrey, Mexico. 我年轻时的大部分时间都在墨西哥往返, 这帮助我在个人层面上欣赏文化差异. When I started graduate school, I was focused on European Modernism and was interested in a career in Comparative Literature, 但我越来越被我的根所吸引, slowly through the process. 我的论文最终变成了关于我成长的地方, 我目前的研究和写作几乎完全集中在他们身上.
是什么吸引你把英语作为一门学科?
I’ve always loved story-telling. 阅读对我来说很自然. 但我的第一选择是成为像我哥哥一样的心理学家. 但当我开始在大学学习心理学并在实验室实习时, I quickly realized the day-to-day experience of the work was not right for me. Meanwhile, I felt like my mind was being blown the most in my English classes. Then I developed friendships with my literature professors as I worked and studied in the McNair Scholars program, and I never looked back. 从很小的时候起，我就一直热爱文学, the idea that tough novels existed and that reading them would reveal interesting things about the world that could only be arrived at through patience and diligence. 把它作为一项事业最终源于这种热爱.
Name three things that you can’t live without (oxygen, food, and water don’t count).
第一个是网球，打网球，甚至看网球. The exercise is great when playing it, 显然(没有它，我似乎无法激励自己去锻炼), 但最主要的是它所提供的同志情谊和竞争精神. What I love most about it is that it affords a space to practice in order to improve, 而且总会有改进的空间. Thus, 看网球比赛常常感觉像是在训练, 因为我经常学习如何提高自己的水平. 我发现看这项运动有时非常令人兴奋, 尤其是现在我妻子也很喜欢.
In a time not too long ago, music would have come first, playing and listening. But now tennis is at the forefront. 演奏音乐是我做过的最谦卑的事情之一. I’m not naturally good at it, 所以我需要走出自己的舒适区，让它在任何层面上都能发挥作用. 但听音乐是我经历过的最伟大的感受之一. I’m currently on a bit of record hunting spree that’s been developing over the last five years. So, now it’s also more active in that I’m often traveling to and then working my way through antique shops and old record stores, rifling through to see if I can find an elusive Peter Gabriel or Badfinger album, or, and this has not yet happened, a stray Smiths single.
This one should have gone first, 但把它放在首位似乎太做作了, 如果没有家人和妻子的支持，我不可能做到这一切. At every turn I’ve always had at least five people there egging me on: to prioritize education, to push for good schools, then to finish the dissertation, 让一切都更上一层楼. 我从不认为这是理所当然的，我也不知道如何感谢他们.
一所优秀的学校有哪些特质?
This is a biased answer, but I feel the most important thing is for the teachers to care about what they are doing. I’ve been privileged to work at places where all of my closest colleagues were giving everything they had to the job because they fully understood how much needs to go into it in order to make it really work. 我认为优秀的学校应该以学生为中心, 而不仅仅是为了留住学生或满足要求. It’s always felt to me that when the teachers are really into what they are doing, 然后支持团队真正开始围绕他们, 这似乎也是一所好学校的必要条件. I’ve been very luck to work at places where everyone collaborates and tries to produce the best experience for all of the students. 然后，当然，学生们以此为食，真正使它变得伟大.
相关问题:成为一名好老师的一些特质是什么?
Now all of my answers are feeling hokey, but I do believe that humility is the base of good teaching. I think that much of my training amounted to a ‘fake it till you make it’ mentality, but I was never good at faking things, 所以这个策略对我来说很难. From the very beginning, 我知道我有很多要学习如何成为一个好老师, 现在我对自己的技能和能力更满意了, I find it even more necessary to hold on to my sense that I am still nowhere near where I can be as a teacher. What grounds me, then, and what I think makes teachers great, 是否有能力倾听学生，教学生在我们面前. I was always so impressed by teachers who seemed to have both an agenda and then an amazing ability to riff off of it, almost like musical improv. It inspired me to want to reread texts to see what else I could wring from them. 对我来说，最好的课程是那些以讨论为导向的课程, and not by a fixed agenda, 但这仍然涵盖了我打算涵盖的所有材料.
你喜欢怎样度过你的空闲时间?
Gardening, and often intense landscaping, and in a broader scope just home improvements. 自从我们有幸“拥有”我们居住的地方以来, 事情改善的可能性似乎无穷无尽. What I most love about gardening is that just enough care is needed in order to grow things well. And what I love about landscaping and home improvements is that both offer an opportunity to be outside in a focused capacity, 当它完成后，我可以惊叹于原始的环境, finished product.
我也很喜欢电影，喜欢去哈佛的布拉特尔.
你在高中时的兴趣爱好是什么?
在高中，我的第一个课外活动/优先事项是音乐. I started a band my freshman year and spent at least three-to-five days a week practicing and writing. It was, thus far, one of the happiest experiences of artistic collaboration that I have experienced. 然后在镇上表演总是那么令人兴奋. 我从五岁起就开始收集音乐，并对音乐情有独钟, and finally being able to be in a band to try to emulate and then expand upon on the stuff I’d been listening to was a major highlight of my youth.
But I also played on the tennis team and kept a fairly busy tennis-playing schedule with friends.
Lastly, I was part of a book-reading circle that pushed each other to read tough books. 那占用了剩下的所有空闲时间. We used to go to an all-night diner, buy the $2 cup of coffee, 整晚都在谈论这些书. 我不确定他们是否喜欢我们.
今年夏天你在追什么剧?
只要有可能，我就尽可能多地看网球大满贯. 所以，我可以说我看了很多法网和温布尔登的比赛. The U.S. 当然，开放就在眼前. I don’t try to watch every match, but I often get hooked into very many matches.
But I’m also finally watching GoT. I’m really impressed by it. On the back burner, I have a season and a half of Masterpiece Mystery’s Endeavor to catch up on. And on and on and on. Too much!
Do you have a hidden talent?
This question has really stumped me. I’m not sure I do have a hidden talent, and now I’m thinking I should go and try to get one.
Nutrition aside, if you could choose one food — and one food only — to eat for the rest of your life, what would it be?
Pasta. 去意大利度蜜月是我一生中最美好的经历之一. The food in Rome was the best.
你最近读了什么书，你会推荐给bbin娱乐平台ers?
I really liked Gene Luen Yang’s American Born Chinese. It’s the first graphic novel I’ve read, and I can’t say enough great things about it. 我也推荐阅读Roberto Bolaño的书 The Savage Detectives. 人们似乎不是很喜欢那本书，就是很讨厌那本书, but I think it’s an interesting way to think about the ways that literary author’s lives impact people, 我喜欢它发生在墨西哥.
接下来的问题:你能说出你最喜欢的一本书吗?
My all-time favorite book has been The Picture of Dorian Gray, if mainly because it was the first novel I read that seemed so different from anything I had ever thought about or experienced. 我从来没有喜欢或讨厌过这本书所激发的那种程度的角色.
你在北航最期待的是什么?
I can’t wait to get into the classroom and hear what students have to say about these great texts I’ll be teaching. I was blown away by the discussion the students brought during my teaching demonstration, 所以我很想开始钻研这些文本.