Monday, September 24, 2007

Learning a Dead Language

Over the last month, I've had to learn a language I thought was dead.

Am I learning Latin? I can hear you all ask this. No, I don't hate myself (quite) that much. And I'm not learning Greek either.

No, I am learning the Dewey Decimal System. My new school, Southwestern University, still uses Dewey. I am confused as all hell. I have no idea where anything is. Nothing makes any sense at all. I just follow the call numbers and so it's fine to search for books, but browsing effectively is nearly impossible at this point.

I know it's not the only school still using Dewey. The University of Montana does and I believe Yale does as well. But if there's a reason to have a strong central government, it's to enforce singular systems of classifying books. I feel like it's 1885, I own a rail car, and I come to realize that my new rail line is a narrow-gauge.

God that's a nerdy reference.