“Was not their mistake once more bred of the life of slavery that they had been living?—a life which was always looking upon everything, except mankind, animate and inanimate—‘nature,’ as people used to call it—as one thing, and mankind as another, it was natural to people thinking in this way, that they should try to make ‘nature’ their slave, since they thought ‘nature’ was something outside them” — William Morris
2 comments:
Mostly.
I actually have some criticism to deliver to the modern version of liberal education, my own college experience notwithstanding. It WAS a lot of money, and though I received a much more balanced and contextualized perspective on my chosen field of study than I could ever have achieved by studying on my own, I don't really see (15 years later) how the investment has materially helped anyone, though that may be my own fault. My main issue with it, though, is that while the liberal side of the argument clings to--for lack of a better word--traditional standards in terms of liberality of education, we (yes, I am on the SAME side) have grossly neglected any system of guidance for students in terms of matching aptitudes to directions. On that level, I think a little more vocationalism would be a very good thing, and not just in college. Treating everyone as if they are the same, with exactly the same potentials partitioned only by their own interest or inclinations, is horse pucky of the most naive kind. That sort of freedom is hugely more attractive to affluent twenty-somethings than to working class people with their college years half a generation behind them, to whom total educational liberalism in no way seems sustainable. I don't want total vocationalism, but I think a bit of it would be of some use.
Nick Guetti writes (not sure why he can't post!)
Mostly.
I actually have some criticism to deliver to the modern version of liberal
education, my own college experience notwithstanding. It WAS a lot of
money, and though I received a much more balanced and contextualized
perspective on my chosen field of study than I could ever have achieved by
studying on my own, I don't really see (15 years later) how the investment
has materially helped anyone, though that may be my own fault. My main
issue with it, though, is that while the liberal side of the argument
clings to--for lack of a better word--traditional standards in terms of
liberality of education, we (yes, I am on the SAME side) have grossly
neglected any system of guidance for students in terms of matching
aptitudes to directions. On that level, I think a little more vocationalism
would be a very good thing, and not just in college. Treating everyone as
if they are the same, with exactly the same potentials partitioned only by
their own interest or inclinations, is horse pucky of the most naive kind.
That sort of freedom is hugely more attractive to affluent
twenty-somethings than to working class people with their college years
half a generation behind them, to whom total educational liberalism in no
way seems sustainable. I don't want total vocationalism, but I think a bit
of it would be of some use.
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