Toby P: The Hidden Magic of Overloading

So, you’re signing up for classes. You’ve got all four mapped out, some for your major, maybe a language, a hub class, maybe you even have one for your minor. You’re all set and ready to go, but then you remember that, as a sophomore and above, you’re allowed to take up to 20 credits per semester. A lot of people wouldn’t give it any second thought and would go ahead with the standard four classes, but I’m here to tell you that there’s hidden magic in overloading.

Of course, you can graduate early if you overload, but I’m not here to talk about that. Instead, I’m here to talk about how taking a class outside of the HUB and the required coursework for your degree can actually help you understand the classes you already have to take even better. Let me explain.

This semester, I’m taking a slew of classes, one of which being the beloved FT 310, or Storytelling for Film. It’s a great class, and I’m learning a ton about how to tell an effective story and how to translate that into an effective script. At the same time, I’m taking a class in Wheelock, known as DE 351, or Deaf Literature and Visual Arts. As someone who is hard of hearing, I knew I would be interested in a Deaf Studies class, but I didn’t expect Deaf Literature and Storytelling for Film to mix so beautifully. If you’ve ever seen Ratatouille, you know the scene where Remy eats a strawberry and a piece of cheese at the same time, savoring how they blend into perfect harmony and complement each other in all the right ways. That’s what’s going on in my brain in FT 310 and DE 351.

On Mondays, I’ll walk into the Data Science building (lucky me!) and learn about the beholder’s share, or how an audience has lots of control over what the world of a book is like, but little control over what the world of an ASL poem is. The next evening, I’ll sit down in CAS and learn about how screenwriters can force a film’s audience to suspend their disbelief by providing a reason why some insane solution is the only one that could possibly work. Together, these individual lessons have combined in my mind, showing me how much power I have as a screenwriter to tell the audience what to believe, but also how I can back off and let the audience fill in the gaps.

Maybe you aren’t interested in Deaf Studies, and that’s completely fine! My goal in this short blog post is to encourage you to take another look at the course search before you register for classes. You never know, you might find that taking psychology classes could help you develop better advertising strategies, or that learning about anthropology will help you write better profiles for your journalism classes. It just requires believing in the magic of overloading.