Fear and conformity in higher education

Fear and conformity in higher education

 

Faust illustration
An illustration from an early English edition of Goethe’s great tragic poem “Faust.”
J. W. von Goethe is an old dead white European male.  Furthermore,  the people shown here don’t dress (and probably don’t think) exactly like us.
Enough said, I think.
(Click to enlarge.)

 

 

I happen to feel passionately about the importance of reading old books and foreign books, and eating foreign foods, and traveling to unfamiliar places.  I think it’s essential to encounter different things and different ideas.

 

At Columbia University, though, some seem to feel that the most important thing is to keep students intellectually safe and unchallenged:

 

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/419025/columbia-students-triggered-old-books-are-ones-who-need-them-most-ian-tuttle

 

“The past,” L. P. Hartley famously wrote, “is a foreign country; they do things differently there.”

 

Plainly, some fear to travel.

 

Posted from Darmstadt, Germany

 

 


Browse Our Archives

Follow Us!