February 25, 2022
Humanizing Our Professors: Karl Boehler
A little-known secret around campus is that our professors were once students. Nervous, confused, and probably as hungry as we all are while sitting through lectures, here are their first experiences as professors and what tips they have to offer for students taking their courses.
Karl Boehler, Humanities Department, Green Bay CampusLast semester, I had the privilege of meeting Professor Karl Boehler and taking his Topics in Lit course, which happened to be Arthurian romance at the time. It was a peculiar old genre with much foundational learning as to how our modern romance genre became a thing. It’s one of his favorite courses, though he remembers a time when he felt completely lost as a professor. Starting out as a new grad student, he didn’t have any teaching experience. So, before teaching an introduction to medieval studies for Western Michigan’s Medieval Institute, he visited the head of the department, a heavy-accented German professor who’d served in the German land forces in WWII. The professor told him to teach however and whatever he wanted. Pushing for further advice on how to teach, he was finally told that “no matter how dumb you are, your students are even dumber.” I would call that sound advice in my own case; he knew much more about prancing knights and how castles were constructed than I ever did (which is kind of the main point of attending college, don’t you think?).Professor Boehler discussed the importance of literature with me, which is good to know especially if you decide to take a course with him. “Literature—stories—are the foundation of society,” he said. They are lessons. They carry on our values, hopes, fears, etc. Without that, we have nothing to stand on and make improvements for our future. That said, we also need to have a great curiosity for what we’re learning and an understanding of how multiple areas of inquiry (religion, available building materials, societal rankings, etc.) contribute to one moment or occurrence in history. If we want to do well, we have to ask questions about our course material and search out the answers, rather than dragging our feet through the mud. One of my favorite questions in his course: Why, for the love of shiny blades, did anyone want to lock their prisoners in the highest tower room? A view like that, and I’ll be a prisoner of Arthur’s over-exuberant battles any day.