The thing with borrowing a buck is it's not really a loan. It's a jack; a polite way of asking "can I have?".
 
When I read a NY Post article announcing that Harvard University was developping a course on HBO's "The Wire", I felt conflicted. How would the show's message and social commentary translate into "curriculum-speak"? Are they going to get it right this time or are we tuned into another episode of academic co-opting?
 
A few days later, someone sent me the link to a panel discussion that featured the three sociologists who designed the class and three cast members from the show. Professors and actors sharing the stage. 
 

(http://vimeo.com/7405379)

 
I won't wax lyrical about why certain media loses its potency when lured into classroom settings. I won’t bring attention to the university’s inclination to exoticize city life and urban culture. I won’t dabble in any of that but I will share a few quotes from the talk, alternating between academics and so-called laymen.
 
“The Wire is fiction”
 
"It’s by the grace of God that brothers like Donny were able to live and had to survive on those streets of Baltimore so that I could become a 'TV star'… No, it’s real! It’s so real that I can’t begin to tell you the things that going on in these streets of our cities."
 
"In short, in watching this fictional drama, viewers not only gain a new understanding of the multi-faceted and inter-related aspects of a structure of urban inequality that so profoundly shapes the lives and life chances of poor inner city residents, they also come away with a greater appreciation of the incredible challenges these residents face in their day to day lives."
 
"I can sit here and use a number of adjectives… sad, painful, unconscionable (...) Honestly, if I could take my heart out my chest and sit it here, right on the table and let you watch it beat and bleed and cry for these kids that would be the best description of what I have to see everyday when, when I’m working with these young people."
 
I was taken aback by how emotionally detached the professors sounded when reading their addresses and intellectualizing the plight of urban youth. In contrast, Sonja Sohn and Michael Kenneth Williams spoke with the fiery passion that schools and universities work hard to extinguish.
 
If you really want to learn about poverty, if you're genuinely concerned with the failure of our institutions, if your intent is to effect change rather than engage in mental masturbation, then follow David Simon’s cue. Take a leave of absence from your job, from your program, from your life, and spend some time on the corner. If you’re daring enough, talk to people. See. Hear. Feel... and if you can't or won't, that's fine, but please don't think you've done your part by registering for a university course.
 
I want my f…ing dollar back.