This clown class encourages students to take things less seriously

Professor Henry Goldkamp’s honors course “Class Clown: The Art of Being an Idiot” is teaching students to take themselves a little less seriously.

Goldkamp was not always in touch with the clown world. He first stepped into the field out of boredom with the poetry scene during the COVID-19 quarantine. With readings and performances moved to Zoom, sitting at the laptop and listening to people recite poems began to get stale. Goldkamp felt like he was losing his mind with the isolation and repetition, so he reinvented what a virtual performance could look like.

His laptop camera became a prop in his poetry. He would film himself outside and from different angles to break up the monotony.

“To this day, I still don’t know anybody that’s done some of the things that I have with Zoom in terms of performance,” Goldkamp said.

Clowning was his logical next step.

This was not a switch everybody took to with open arms. Goldkamp said that early in his clowning journey, many people dismissed his new method.

“It’s important to disrupt that passivity of just, ‘I’m going to sit here, you talk to me and then I’m going to go home,’” Goldkamp said. “So, a lot of my poetics and my performances involve people like clowning does.”

Despite pushback from some in the poetry community, the LSU Honors College was more than happy to hear about clown poetics. He began teaching HNRS 2021, his clown class, just a few years ago. So far, it has made a big impact on many students.

One such student is biology and English literature sophomore Claire Burton. She said that despite her apprecition for the class now, she almost did not stick with it.

“First class, you go in and he’s explaining the class and everything,” Burton said, “and I literally sat there the whole time, [and] I was like, ‘I’m going to drop.’”

Still, Burton is glad she pushed through that first week. A big hurdle to get over initially was the embarrassment of the activities students had to do in class.

After getting through her first clown moment, she realized it was not as bad as she thought, and it would get even better as time went on. She recalled a lesson Goldkamp taught his students on how to push past their embarrassment.

“‘The speed of fun is supposed to be faster than your worry and louder than your critic,’ I think is the way it was quoted,” Burton said. “It’s just being able to do it without thinking about the implications of what you’re doing, but everyone has that ability. It’s just whether or not you choose to unlock it in yourself.”

This is a lesson Goldkamp understands all too well. Not only does he put a lot of trial and error into his own personal art projects, but in the classroom as well.

Each lesson plan goes through a cycle of working and not working, and it is different for every class. He will sometimes have a successful attempt one semester, and then the same method will completely bomb the very next semester.

Goldkamp recalled a time when he was trying an exercise about mirrors. He had students sit across from each other and mime what the other was doing until they experienced a complete loss of self. Several students underwent such an existential moment that they broke down crying.

It seemed like a surefire hit — at least that is what he thought. He tried the same experiment the next semester, but the results were less than desirable with this new class.

“They just thought the whole thing was really stupid, and everyone got a case of the giggles,” Goldkamp said, “so no one could take it seriously.”

Burton considers herself lucky that she has such a good group of people in her class. She said that all of her classmates truly commit to the clowning and turn out some funny bits.

She has even taken her clowning outside of the classroom, which she promised herself she would never do. Making her friends laugh as a clown gave her a sense of enjoyment greater than just telling a joke. She credits Goldkamp’s class with helping her see her artistic side.

“I don’t ever consider myself a particularly creative person,” Burton said. “Honestly, this class has made me realize how creative I can be when given opportunity to.”

It means a lot to Goldkamp as well. He sees a synergy between his students learning about how to let loose and be a clown and him learning through evaluating how they do it.

When speaking to strangers at an airport, he always gets a kick when they ask him what he does for a living. Ultimately, he said he is grateful for the opportunity to do this not just for himself, but with all of his past and present students.

“All things considered, I’m just really glad that this course exists, and I’m glad that people seem to take after it and be into it,” Goldkamp said. “I hope to continue to just keep doing this in perpetuity.”

If Burton had a chance to take this class again with the exact same people, she said she would do it in a heartbeat. She had a great time growing, learning and laughing with her classmates. With that, she has one final message for her class.

“I love my class, so if they read this, I want them to know that they were a great group of people,” she said. “I’m going to miss them.”

HNRS 2021 sign ups are open for the fall semester while slots are available. If you want to learn more about Goldkamp and his work, you can check out his website, henrygoldkamp.com.