Lit programs that have not succumbed to postmodernism/cultural studies

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sure. And physics departments shouldn't discuss any theories developed after Newton's Opticks!

They shouldn’t discuss Newton. He’s just another dead white guy, after all.

And this is where you fail. Of course they should discuss Newton. But not be afraid of relooking at his contributions in light of Einstein. And understanding him differently than on would in the 1800’s. That is both fine and necessary for us to keep moving.

Do tell! I can just feel that whatever you say is going to be non-sensical and yet highly entertaining.

I thought this was well known. Newton’s theory of gravity assumed an intertial frame. Which means his laws of motion are accurate at low velocities (which is most of stuff on earth). But relativity introduces a cosmic speed limit and Newtonian mechanics go out of whack close to the speed of light since the relativistic frames matter. So did Einstein reject Newton? No of course not. But his theories reshaped how we under Newtonian mechanics. And Einstein never took to quantum mechanics because he was never happy with its statistical nature. Theorists who are trying to reconcile quantum mechanics and gravity are looking at - wait for it - different frames to study the problem. It’s what scholarship is all about.

This is not “relooking at” Newton’s contributions. His contributions remain his contributions, Einstein and others who followed built upon his contributions. I think you clearly understand that, but your attempt to paint this as analogous to what is being discussed in this thread (basically rejecting classical literature because modern society declares the contributors to be racist or sexist or transphobic, etc.) is where YOU fail.

In other words, no one is trying to teach Newtonian mechanics as the end-all be-all of physics, but on the other hand no one is pretending that his contributions to science weren’t brilliant and significant and hugely influential because he… was a product of his time and did the best with what he had, so to speak.

Nobody but nobody is rejecting classical literature. It is foundational, respected, and worthy of intense scrutiny. Why be offended by deep analysis and/or the prospect of different conclusions? So what? Where is the issue? So long as new generations continue reading the classics where's the actual worry?

Plenty of people reject it as being written by dead white men

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't see how faddish ideological "reading" of Shakespeare is to literary studies what quantum mechanics is to physics.

I promise you that when quantum mechanical ideas were introduced, many many physicists, including great ones that laid the foundations of quantum like Milliken, wrote it off as nonsense. Sometimes (often?) writing off fads is the correct approach. But once in a while you learn something from them.

The nice thing about math and science is that eventually experimentation leads to one side being proven correct. Most scientists either accept this and move on or try to devise different experiments. Either way, science is better off for it. Modern literary criticism seems to veer into nonsense because there isn't really anything new to say about most canonical works, but english PhDs need something original every year

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree with OP.

One LAC offers a course titled Queer Feminist Environmental Studies (Hamilton College).

Is it required?

Required or not, it’s still ludicrous.

Maybe if you're a bigot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't see how faddish ideological "reading" of Shakespeare is to literary studies what quantum mechanics is to physics.

I promise you that when quantum mechanical ideas were introduced, many many physicists, including great ones that laid the foundations of quantum like Milliken, wrote it off as nonsense. Sometimes (often?) writing off fads is the correct approach. But once in a while you learn something from them.

The nice thing about math and science is that eventually experimentation leads to one side being proven correct. Most scientists either accept this and move on or try to devise different experiments. Either way, science is better off for it. Modern literary criticism seems to veer into nonsense because there isn't really anything new to say about most canonical works, but english PhDs need something original every year

Yea. That's the whole thing about doctoral research. Hard to expand the body of knowledge if new analysis is frowned upon.

And calling anything outside of the church "canonical" kind of gives away the game, dude. You want for the world to see your opinions on classic literature as actual religious law... wow.

Nah.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sure. And physics departments shouldn't discuss any theories developed after Newton's Opticks!

They shouldn’t discuss Newton. He’s just another dead white guy, after all.

And this is where you fail. Of course they should discuss Newton. But not be afraid of relooking at his contributions in light of Einstein. And understanding him differently than on would in the 1800’s. That is both fine and necessary for us to keep moving.

Do tell! I can just feel that whatever you say is going to be non-sensical and yet highly entertaining.

I thought this was well known. Newton’s theory of gravity assumed an intertial frame. Which means his laws of motion are accurate at low velocities (which is most of stuff on earth). But relativity introduces a cosmic speed limit and Newtonian mechanics go out of whack close to the speed of light since the relativistic frames matter. So did Einstein reject Newton? No of course not. But his theories reshaped how we under Newtonian mechanics. And Einstein never took to quantum mechanics because he was never happy with its statistical nature. Theorists who are trying to reconcile quantum mechanics and gravity are looking at - wait for it - different frames to study the problem. It’s what scholarship is all about.

This is not “relooking at” Newton’s contributions. His contributions remain his contributions, Einstein and others who followed built upon his contributions. I think you clearly understand that, but your attempt to paint this as analogous to what is being discussed in this thread (basically rejecting classical literature because modern society declares the contributors to be racist or sexist or transphobic, etc.) is where YOU fail.

In other words, no one is trying to teach Newtonian mechanics as the end-all be-all of physics, but on the other hand no one is pretending that his contributions to science weren’t brilliant and significant and hugely influential because he… was a product of his time and did the best with what he had, so to speak.

Nobody but nobody is rejecting classical literature. It is foundational, respected, and worthy of intense scrutiny. Why be offended by deep analysis and/or the prospect of different conclusions? So what? Where is the issue? So long as new generations continue reading the classics where's the actual worry?

Plenty of people reject it as being written by dead white men

Harold Bloom was not wrong about "the school of resentment."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sure. And physics departments shouldn't discuss any theories developed after Newton's Opticks!

They shouldn’t discuss Newton. He’s just another dead white guy, after all.

And this is where you fail. Of course they should discuss Newton. But not be afraid of relooking at his contributions in light of Einstein. And understanding him differently than on would in the 1800’s. That is both fine and necessary for us to keep moving.

Do tell! I can just feel that whatever you say is going to be non-sensical and yet highly entertaining.

I thought this was well known. Newton’s theory of gravity assumed an intertial frame. Which means his laws of motion are accurate at low velocities (which is most of stuff on earth). But relativity introduces a cosmic speed limit and Newtonian mechanics go out of whack close to the speed of light since the relativistic frames matter. So did Einstein reject Newton? No of course not. But his theories reshaped how we under Newtonian mechanics. And Einstein never took to quantum mechanics because he was never happy with its statistical nature. Theorists who are trying to reconcile quantum mechanics and gravity are looking at - wait for it - different frames to study the problem. It’s what scholarship is all about.

This is not “relooking at” Newton’s contributions. His contributions remain his contributions, Einstein and others who followed built upon his contributions. I think you clearly understand that, but your attempt to paint this as analogous to what is being discussed in this thread (basically rejecting classical literature because modern society declares the contributors to be racist or sexist or transphobic, etc.) is where YOU fail.

In other words, no one is trying to teach Newtonian mechanics as the end-all be-all of physics, but on the other hand no one is pretending that his contributions to science weren’t brilliant and significant and hugely influential because he… was a product of his time and did the best with what he had, so to speak.

Nobody but nobody is rejecting classical literature. It is foundational, respected, and worthy of intense scrutiny. Why be offended by deep analysis and/or the prospect of different conclusions? So what? Where is the issue? So long as new generations continue reading the classics where's the actual worry?

Plenty of people reject it as being written by dead white men

So that is the marketplace of ideas. Some will want to reject it. But that doesn’t mean that the discipline as a whole will decide to listen to them. Unless of course the work is simply not relevant to today in which case, people will stop reading it.

And the best way to keep these classics relevant is to look through today’s “lenses”. People find new meaning and new ways of thinking and it’s great.

A little different (social science rather than lit), my kid is reading Plato. She does not have to pretend she is living in Ancient Greece to understand the relevance of that work any more than she needs to experience not being able to get her own bank account to read de Beauvoir. Both are still applicable to helping a 20 year old American kid living in 2024 to process her world. If they weren’t, we would simply stop teaching them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sure. And physics departments shouldn't discuss any theories developed after Newton's Opticks!

They shouldn’t discuss Newton. He’s just another dead white guy, after all.

And this is where you fail. Of course they should discuss Newton. But not be afraid of relooking at his contributions in light of Einstein. And understanding him differently than on would in the 1800’s. That is both fine and necessary for us to keep moving.

Do tell! I can just feel that whatever you say is going to be non-sensical and yet highly entertaining.

I thought this was well known. Newton’s theory of gravity assumed an intertial frame. Which means his laws of motion are accurate at low velocities (which is most of stuff on earth). But relativity introduces a cosmic speed limit and Newtonian mechanics go out of whack close to the speed of light since the relativistic frames matter. So did Einstein reject Newton? No of course not. But his theories reshaped how we under Newtonian mechanics. And Einstein never took to quantum mechanics because he was never happy with its statistical nature. Theorists who are trying to reconcile quantum mechanics and gravity are looking at - wait for it - different frames to study the problem. It’s what scholarship is all about.

This is not “relooking at” Newton’s contributions. His contributions remain his contributions, Einstein and others who followed built upon his contributions. I think you clearly understand that, but your attempt to paint this as analogous to what is being discussed in this thread (basically rejecting classical literature because modern society declares the contributors to be racist or sexist or transphobic, etc.) is where YOU fail.

In other words, no one is trying to teach Newtonian mechanics as the end-all be-all of physics, but on the other hand no one is pretending that his contributions to science weren’t brilliant and significant and hugely influential because he… was a product of his time and did the best with what he had, so to speak.

This is the whole point. Our understanding of newton’s contribution today is different than it was in the late 1800’s. We have also dropped some of his stuff - we no longer teach alchemy. Now admittedly in the sciences, the arbiter of what works survive and what works do not is Mother Nature herself. Which is less subjective.

But to get to Einstein and quantum physics, you could not teach Newton as invariant. You had to allow the community to continually re-examine the axioms. And from there, we developed a deeper appreciation and context for Newton. It is really no different in literature. You re-read and re-examine according to what is going on around you today. Most times, the frames you use to re-look are flawed and dropped by future scholars. Every once in a while, the re-examination leads to dropping a classic and identifying a new set of classics. Not sure why this bothers you so much.

Actually in science today we are seeing a lot of papers but fewer radical ideas. This “accepting of the masters” is really bad for innovation.

It is different, and the bolded is why.

Additionally, it is ridiculous to look at past work and re-analyze through modern lenses without allowing for the possibility that our modern lenses are wrong and maybe we should actually allow these classic works to influence us. There should be a give and take, that is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sure. And physics departments shouldn't discuss any theories developed after Newton's Opticks!

They shouldn’t discuss Newton. He’s just another dead white guy, after all.

And this is where you fail. Of course they should discuss Newton. But not be afraid of relooking at his contributions in light of Einstein. And understanding him differently than on would in the 1800’s. That is both fine and necessary for us to keep moving.

Do tell! I can just feel that whatever you say is going to be non-sensical and yet highly entertaining.

I thought this was well known. Newton’s theory of gravity assumed an intertial frame. Which means his laws of motion are accurate at low velocities (which is most of stuff on earth). But relativity introduces a cosmic speed limit and Newtonian mechanics go out of whack close to the speed of light since the relativistic frames matter. So did Einstein reject Newton? No of course not. But his theories reshaped how we under Newtonian mechanics. And Einstein never took to quantum mechanics because he was never happy with its statistical nature. Theorists who are trying to reconcile quantum mechanics and gravity are looking at - wait for it - different frames to study the problem. It’s what scholarship is all about.

This is not “relooking at” Newton’s contributions. His contributions remain his contributions, Einstein and others who followed built upon his contributions. I think you clearly understand that, but your attempt to paint this as analogous to what is being discussed in this thread (basically rejecting classical literature because modern society declares the contributors to be racist or sexist or transphobic, etc.) is where YOU fail.

In other words, no one is trying to teach Newtonian mechanics as the end-all be-all of physics, but on the other hand no one is pretending that his contributions to science weren’t brilliant and significant and hugely influential because he… was a product of his time and did the best with what he had, so to speak.

This is the whole point. Our understanding of newton’s contribution today is different than it was in the late 1800’s. We have also dropped some of his stuff - we no longer teach alchemy. Now admittedly in the sciences, the arbiter of what works survive and what works do not is Mother Nature herself. Which is less subjective.

But to get to Einstein and quantum physics, you could not teach Newton as invariant. You had to allow the community to continually re-examine the axioms. And from there, we developed a deeper appreciation and context for Newton. It is really no different in literature. You re-read and re-examine according to what is going on around you today. Most times, the frames you use to re-look are flawed and dropped by future scholars. Every once in a while, the re-examination leads to dropping a classic and identifying a new set of classics. Not sure why this bothers you so much.

Actually in science today we are seeing a lot of papers but fewer radical ideas. This “accepting of the masters” is really bad for innovation.

It is different, and the bolded is why.

Additionally, it is ridiculous to look at past work and re-analyze through modern lenses without allowing for the possibility that our modern lenses are wrong and maybe we should actually allow these classic works to influence us. There should be a give and take, that is.

Heck, allow the possibility that the authors' lenses were wrong sometimes. Mark Twain wrote some great sh*t even while being on the wrong side of history. What is the problem with reading Mark Twain and discussing it thoroughly???

[Anonymous]

My grandfather was a Jewish immigrant who immigrated a century ago. He taught himself by reading the novels of Charles Dickens. He went to a prestigious university on scholarship, became a lawyer who fought for human rights and was one of the most widely read people I've ever known. He'd be turning in his grave to see "leftists" saying he needed a trigger warning about Oliver Twist.

[Anonymous]

* taught himself English