tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post518479404698985489..comments2024-03-10T20:46:19.274-04:00Comments on In the Middle: Do and Die, and Faith in the ClassroomCord J. Whitakerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06224143153295429986noreply@blogger.comBlogger39125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-17295367809483849032007-08-07T11:30:00.000-04:002007-08-07T11:30:00.000-04:00And probably be told i'm off the topic, since the ...<I>And probably be told i'm off the topic, since the topic is supposed to be "Dreams and Visions", not "medieval christian literature". But ah, such is life.</I><BR/><BR/>Well, if it's <I>medieval</I> Dreams and Visions, lord knows you can't do the study without bringing in a lot of Christian material (although you would also require the Romance of the Rose (for your purposes, I would suggest confining yourself to the Guillaume de Lorris portion), i.e., Julian of Norwich, Margery Kempe, some Hildegard of Bingen, some Christine de Pizan, and even some little-known works like the Flower and the Leafe and Why I Can't Be a Nun, and, oh, I could go on all day. Good luck with your studies! You'll love Langland...Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-85440491934858160212007-08-07T07:32:00.000-04:002007-08-07T07:32:00.000-04:00As to what I think of Chaucer's own faith: I don't...<I>As to what I think of Chaucer's own faith: I don't have a good answer, and I don't think it's the best question to put to Chaucer. If we're talking late 14th-century British authors, Langland is probably the better choice for asking that question.</I><BR/><BR/>just starting on Langland this week. So far, <I>Piers</I> seems to me to be so passionately concerned with the gospel and the correct ordering of the church that I'm reluctant to think he could be anything but a passionate believer. Atheists criticise the church intensely, and so they should, but they don't tend to get hung up about the correct preaching of the gospel. And an apathist wouldn't bother at all...<BR/><BR/>Anyway. Thanks for the tip ;) I'll make sure to badger my lecturer about it. And probably be told i'm off the topic, since the topic is supposed to be "Dreams and Visions", not "medieval christian literature". But ah, such is life.highlyeccentrichttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14049193555531624608noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-2395708852071647882007-08-06T19:44:00.000-04:002007-08-06T19:44:00.000-04:00Readers who value their internet privacy will be i...Readers who value their internet privacy will be interested to know that prime.tops.gwu.edu:https is spying on the traffic to and from this blog. This server is connecting to your computer.<BR/><BR/>Confirmation of this was achieved using TCPView.exe (available from microsoft.com), which is a handy little executable that shows all connections to your computer. Try it, you'll see what I'm describing. You can also open your command line window and enter "netstat" and that will show connections.<BR/><BR/>What is interesting is that the prime.tops.gwu.edu connection will remain after you move to another www page.<BR/><BR/>Spying of this sort is reprehensible, and, fortunately, easily subverted.<BR/><BR/>If you have a firewall (which you should have!), set it to block out this range of IPs:<BR/><BR/>128.164.0.0 to 128.164.255.255<BR/><BR/>This will prevent that server from connecting to your computer and monitoring your traffic.<BR/><BR/>This will absolutely no effect on your access to this page (which resides on a different server--web.bloglines.com).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-11104915207346914432007-08-03T23:26:00.000-04:002007-08-03T23:26:00.000-04:00I think to some extent I have taught by example. ...I think to some extent I <I>have</I> taught by example. If Eileen were around, maybe she could/would throw in on that score. <BR/><BR/>I do want to encourage a certain fearlessness in thinking and doing. Though I'm more convinced of the value of others' egos than that of my own, I do recognize that fear is now alien to me in the specific sense that, by excoriating layers of false consciousness, I see things with a clarity that compels me to forge an ethics that is not rendered inactive by, say, 6 books dealing with the same metaphoric chain. <BR/><BR/>In short, the project is Diogenesian: I have come to debase the coinage.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-12080832199838862422007-08-03T22:49:00.000-04:002007-08-03T22:49:00.000-04:00it aint easy... bein' green...it aint easy... bein' green...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-82611883365605208312007-08-03T22:15:00.000-04:002007-08-03T22:15:00.000-04:00Sure, I'm green. No offense taken. As for reading:...Sure, I'm green. No offense taken. As for reading: a kickass database and a few great syllabuses can help anyone out. As Plato complained, who needs a memory?<BR/><BR/>Now, in terms of Jeffrey: I could counter by testifying for my friendship and affection for him. I like him. We have good times together. He's fun to needle and confound. &c. I've also found his work inspiring. Yadda yadda yadda. But that's no good, because it keeps us churning here, unproductively, keeping aloft an argument that just isn't going to produce results, perhaps because of what you think is Jeffrey's personality (but <I>please</I> let's not get into that any further), but likely because of the venue itself. Seriously. What response could you hope for <I>here,</I> given how very very public this all is? My advice, <I>please,</I> is to let it go. Tolerate it, if you must, but I'd like to see you do something better. If you're convinced of the great value of your ego, then, you know, docere exemplo a bit.<BR/><BR/>Starting from outside the classroom and moving in is a fine suggestion, in general, but this particular instance in the classroom, especially in light of the Bible as Lit course I'll be teaching in a few weeks, is what got me thinking. So in general, sure; but that general notion isn't particularly applicable here.Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-77863489699773883162007-08-03T21:42:00.000-04:002007-08-03T21:42:00.000-04:00Karl, don't be grumpy. I think the classroom is a...Karl, don't be grumpy. I think the classroom is a fine place to think about tolerance etc., but my point is the real work of being tolerant, practicing tolerance, is not likely to be located there. Why not think one's way (back) to the classroom, instead of starting there? The classroom may be where you work, but it's not where you live.<BR/><BR/>Shoaf was out of his mind, in a good way. <BR/><BR/><I>Now. . .isn't it possible that Eileen and I are able to draw you out because you've no history with us?</I><BR/><BR/>No, I don't think so. Here's why: I stand on my judgment of personality when I say that Eileen, whom I know far better than you, is one to take intellectual risks, do serious rethinking, ask questions and not get flustered when she receives an answer she didn't anticipate or initially finds unpalatable or challenging. She's got a foundationally solid ego. I've never known Cohen to be like that--that is, rethink without defense. His ego is heavily fortified. He's led, despite what he might claim, a pretty placid academic life, set on a boring trajectory to deanhood. I think too of the time Cohen once backed down from justifiably chiding Dinshaw when she delivered a NSC address that not only ripped him off, but left him unacknowledged. Cohen doesn't stir big waters, even when they need to be; he's not self-actualized to the point that he can transcend his enculturation.<BR/><BR/>Karl, you're a bit of an unknown to me. You're smart as fuck, better read than any medievalist of your generation I personally know, and, I'm not being mean, you're still kinda green. Our history is virtual.<BR/><BR/>My "history" with Eileen is richer than my history with Cohen, and since the duration of the former is a fraction of the latter, that should give you an idea of the richness of the latter. (I'm not rewriting that sentence...)<BR/><BR/>So, I think it's a matter of personality structure, not history. You will recall that I challenged EJ back when, and that she wasn't perturbed and she didn't stammer like Cohen. When was that? Hmmm...a year ago? Yes, a year ago!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-90423522040445858122007-08-03T19:48:00.000-04:002007-08-03T19:48:00.000-04:00As Al Shoaf once told me, "I don't know a better r...<I>As Al Shoaf once told me, "I don't know a better read medievalist than MU."</I><BR/><BR/>Huh? Must have forgot Caroline Walker Bynum, Joan Ferrante, and Jocelyn Wogan-Browne. I'm sure everyone's wellread, but of course in different things.<BR/><BR/><I>Karl and Eileen exhibit little anxiety drawing me out, and the result has been some productive exchanges. You, on the other hand, appear unable to get past the trauma...</I><BR/><BR/>Now, Michael, isn't it possible that Eileen and I are able to draw you out because you've no history with us?<BR/><BR/>Now, I have to say that while some of what's happened here is interesting, I'm a bit grumpy that you've more or less explicitly signaled that my original question <I>about the classroom</I> wasn't worth asking. It might be a waste of time for you, but it's not for me. It is, after all, where I work.Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-64765100809907992072007-08-03T17:52:00.000-04:002007-08-03T17:52:00.000-04:00I'm just a bystander, and I like Jeffrey and Micha...I'm just a bystander, and I like Jeffrey and Michael equally. I can understand JJC's reticence to match wits, scholarship, whathaveyou, against MU. As Al Shoaf once told me, "I don't know a better read medievalist than MU." And that was said to me a few years ago, before MU's reinvention of himself as another kind of thinker. I think what MU has done is admirable--and formidable at the same time.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-16593398009505270742007-08-03T17:28:00.000-04:002007-08-03T17:28:00.000-04:00Postscriptum: Cohen, you really ought to take a l...Postscriptum: Cohen, you really ought to take a look at your own fear of engaging me. Get inside that fear, mate. <BR/><BR/>Karl and Eileen exhibit little anxiety drawing me out, and the result has been some productive exchanges. You, on the other hand, appear unable to get past the trauma of having your work called into question as the often superficial and inert stuff it is. Put yourself out there, instead of resting on your misunderstandings from a year ago. Inert, indeed. You gotta roll, man. Risk that authority you spent your life convincing yourself you have. That's my advice. (God, I love being Spotnitzian sometimes.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-54650844292935687772007-08-03T17:05:00.000-04:002007-08-03T17:05:00.000-04:00Cohen: Haha. If your life, your self, your work,...Cohen: Haha. If your life, your self, your work, your thoughts, were a fraction as peak, creative, and self-actualized as mine, I'd take what you said as insulting. Instead, I still love you, man.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-90831493450219675252007-08-03T16:44:00.000-04:002007-08-03T16:44:00.000-04:00Beautiful intersection of Levinas and the interper...Beautiful intersection of Levinas and the interpersonal moment, on a plane to the Zoo no less.<BR/><BR/>You know why I take pot-shots now and then at Levinas, right? It's not because he's not extremely rich (I still return to him often--indeed passages like those are marked in my copies, and I picked up the Companion about a month ago), it's because he's come to be the horizon of what a literary humanist reads when he or she begins the study of the ethical. I think that’s unfortunate, because ultimately limiting due to his lack of historicization. Not that Levinas should be a historian, it’s only to point out that nearly all his major ideas are found elsewhere (e.g., the one-for-the-other found in Hampden-Turner’s Radical Man (1971), and thus his ideas, along with the others, are better, I think anyway, historically conceptualized/contextualized. <BR/><BR/>So...that said, what I hear in your story of the seat substitution is mainly compassion (and I won’t repeat the relevant theorists and researchers again), but also what, in gestalt specifically and humanistic psychology generally, is called the paradoxical theory of change. It may be stated thus: change occurs when one becomes what one is, not when one tries to become what one is not. So I would reflect on the ways in which you internalized Levinas’s passage before acting compassionately toward the other person. So, in retrospect what might look like (and this is how you describe it) a case of influence producing change is more like a becoming of who you already were. The Levinas passage was icing on the cake. <BR/><BR/>The reason I like the paradoxical theory of change is that it can be plugged into the social easily. It is not only a theory of personal change. To take an example involving power/domination, since that came up, the political version of the theory may be put thus: to become fully aware of being dominated is itself a step toward ending domination. I have argued in my book on masochism that this kind of thinking underlies radical action in the 60s. An excellent account of this is the memoir of James Kunen (The Strawberry Statement, 1968), his account of the “revolution” at Columbia U.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-4605324475702317922007-08-03T15:45:00.000-04:002007-08-03T15:45:00.000-04:00IndieFaith, that sounds like a valuable contact fo...IndieFaith, that sounds like a valuable contact for me. So far GW and G'town haven't collaborated much. As department chair I have been working to change that. In three weeks I am leading a departmental retreat, and one of the issues we'll be discussing is how to make productive alliances with educational, artistic, social (etc) institutions outside of GW.<BR/><BR/>On a different note, readers wondering why in general I haven't had much to say here to Michael Uebel (mu phage etc.) may want to <A HREF="http://jjcohen.blogspot.com/2006/06/reply-to-emile-blauche.html" REL="nofollow">check out this post from a year ago</A>. Yes, a year ago. ("Emile Blauche" is an anagram of Michael Uebel). I don't really have anything to add to what I said then.<BR/><BR/>I don't think I've ever met anyone with so great a comprehension of the world, but so little understanding of himself. Michael: in your meditations upon identity and being (meditations you have often shared with us here to good effect) I hope that you eventually come to a greater equanimity than you demonstrate here.Jeffrey Cohenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17346504393740520542noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-66684365912245595912007-08-03T15:44:00.000-04:002007-08-03T15:44:00.000-04:00Sorry - Anon was me. I am trying to tame the least...Sorry - Anon was me. I am trying to tame the least tameable chapter of my albatross - which i do not want to be a typical chapter on 'government'. It has masses of material which needs taming into a coherent narrative - and today the light came on and I think that power and love will come close to doing that. Fingers crossed.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-59976362648292672532007-08-03T14:52:00.000-04:002007-08-03T14:52:00.000-04:00let's just say for argument's sake, more Levinas o...<I>let's just say for argument's sake, more Levinas or dead-end musings over "coexist."</I><BR/><BR/>Okay, 'real life' example of Levinas and ethics. On the flight to Kalamazoo, I was reading <A HREF="http://www.powells.com/biblio/17-9780521665650-0" REL="nofollow">this,</A> happily ensconced in the aisle seat. The person who had the seat next to mine came along and looked surprised. I asked what was up, and he said that he thought he'd had an aisle seat; and he added that he found window seats frightening. I switched with him. Now, I might have switched anyhow, even though I'm <I>also</I> afraid of flying and, being sort of tall, I don't fit well in window seats (particularly in the small craft we flew from Chicago to Kzoo); but I had just read <A HREF="http://books.google.com/books?id=yo2RKtKESCMC&pg=PP1&ots=MWNoYTomFz&dq=intitle:cambridge+intitle:companion+intitle:to+intitle:levinas&sig=7JAajXi1Hm5HrVIVCJCBhUZCPuc#PPA235,M1" REL="nofollow">this passage</A>:<BR/><BR/>The same claim is reformulated a little later as follows: 'It is through the condition of being a hostage that there can be pity, compassion, pardon, and proximity in the world--even the little there is, even the simple 'after you sir.' This suggests that Levinas is asking what underlies that behaviour which is sometimes called superogatory, gratuitous or, as he prefers to say, ethical. His answer is that at the heart of subjectivity is not a 'for itself,' but what he calls 'the one-for-the-other.' This is his working definition of substitution, and when Levinas explains substitution as 'the one-for-the-other' he not only posits an alterity at the heart of subjectivity, but gives it an ethical sense. Levinas is not preaching. He is not saying that <I>should</I> sacrifice oneself. He merely wants to account for its possibility. (235)<BR/><BR/>How could I not give up my seat, here, in the world, when I had just underlined this?<BR/><BR/>(Nicola: now I really have to get some work done. But that's a great question)Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-83662178826230301822007-08-03T14:45:00.000-04:002007-08-03T14:45:00.000-04:00Ok, Karl, so how about tolerance as forgiveness, a...Ok, Karl, so how about tolerance as forgiveness, a word I think Michael used a while ago, tolerance as <I>loving</I> allowance of the other?Nicola Masciandarohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01279665722551517693noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-77510590473313960452007-08-03T14:24:00.000-04:002007-08-03T14:24:00.000-04:00Or is it a by-product of it? That is, the negativi...<I>Or is it a by-product of it? That is, the negativity (e.g., scorn) might one feel toward another's politics or his beliefs may be a reaction to the positive feeling of tolerance that preceded it. Scorn is often compensatory.</I><BR/><BR/>This explanation sounds right to me. I think, haha, of Zizek, and his discussion of the disgust we feel when someone declares his or her love for us. In his response essay in the Truth of Z., he quote Deleuze, which I'll translate from memory as "if you get caught up in someone else's dream, you're fucked." In other words, when we tolerate, we've been put in a situation in which our concentration, our peace, our whatever, has been disturbed: by demands for love, by forwarded email jokes, by parties next door, by embarrassing (because unwanted or unfelt on our part) sincerity and emotion. In these situations, tolerance is forbearance. We've had responsibility thrust (that word again) upon us, and we've decided to "be the adult." Of course we're going to compensate with secret scorn, with our horde of contempt that we'll share out over drinks with friends, if we're lucky. Hence my suspicion at "tolerance" for community building: I know what I feel when I do tolerance, and I know that it's all about shutting down, deferring, redirecting conversations, not, in other words, about working out ideas together. Because if I thought the person I was tolerating was willing or capable of working out ideas together, I'd let him or her know what I 'really' thought.Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-38175604271035872772007-08-03T14:12:00.000-04:002007-08-03T14:12:00.000-04:00Karl, allow me to take another tack.Is scorn an in...Karl, allow me to take another tack.<BR/><BR/>Is scorn an inherent part of tolerance?<BR/><BR/>Or is it a by-product of it? That is, the negativity (e.g., scorn) might one feel toward another's politics or his beliefs may be a reaction to the positive feeling of tolerance that preceded it. Scorn is often compensatory.<BR/><BR/>Myself, I come down on the side that human beings are complex, one sign of which is that they are able to hold potentially contradictory or self-cancelling affective states simultaneously. So the scorn one might feel exists along side the more positive tolerance one also feels. It is telling that tolerance in a sense "wins" the struggle, since it emerges as the way you characterize your behavior, your restraint.<BR/><BR/>I, for example, can hold warm fuzzies for JJC as a Mensch, while at the same time find his thinking to be inconsequential and often objectionable.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-91441275740243408052007-08-03T14:06:00.000-04:002007-08-03T14:06:00.000-04:00Anon: who are you? I've done thinking about those ...Anon: who are you? I've done thinking about those matters in a few sermons by Raoul Ardent, a 12th-century scholar (I think a Canon Regular) in the circle of Peter the Chanter. I'd love to see what you're working on. My interest in Raoul had to do with a sermon on the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus and the question of who got to count as 'poor' (the Canons themselves? or the people we traditionally think of as poor).<BR/><BR/><I>how do you know that what you were practicing with respect to containing your thoughts about God and Republicans is tolerance, as opposed to, say, what psychologists might could label personal control or reality negotiation?</I><BR/><BR/>I don't know, in part because I don't know the professional terminology you're using. If you have time, what's the difference?<BR/><BR/>As for my own 'personal strength': I doubt it. Although I should say, if I can make this distinction, that I don't scorn my <I>uncle,</I> as that's too total. We actually get along well. What I scorn is his (dominant?) belief system.Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-40910269381671313702007-08-03T14:00:00.000-04:002007-08-03T14:00:00.000-04:00Lurking under a stack on the floor:Batson's The Al...Lurking under a stack on the floor:<BR/><BR/>Batson's The Altruism Question: Toward a Social-psychological Answer.<BR/><BR/>And from the files:<BR/><BR/>Cialdini, Schaller, Houlihan, Arps, Fultz, & Bearman, "Empathy-Based Helping: Is it selflessly or selfishly motivated? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 749-758.<BR/><BR/>Rushton, Fulker, Neale, Nias, & Eysenck, "Altruism and aggression: The heritability of individual differences. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 50, 1192-1198.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-88113071566008080652007-08-03T13:37:00.000-04:002007-08-03T13:37:00.000-04:00Quick glance at my shelves...On power:Scott's Domi...Quick glance at my shelves...<BR/><BR/>On power:<BR/><BR/>Scott's Domination and the Arts of Resistance<BR/><BR/>Third volume of The Essential Works of Foucault<BR/><BR/>Bataille's The Accursed Share and his Theory of Religion [very likely useful to you}<BR/><BR/>Ricoeur's new Reflections on the Just {also potentially very useful}<BR/><BR/>Closer to your topic perhaps:<BR/><BR/>Helmuth Berking's Sociology of Giving<BR/><BR/>Alan Schrift's The Logic of the Gift: Toward an Ethic of Generosity<BR/><BR/>and the classic:<BR/><BR/>Romand Coles's Rethinking Generosity: Critical Theory and the Politics of Caritas.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-45440302214557616182007-08-03T12:55:00.000-04:002007-08-03T12:55:00.000-04:00character strengthTolerance as a negative or a pos...<I>character strength</I><BR/><BR/>Tolerance as a negative or a positive - this is very close to my current agonies about the relationships between power and charity (in 12th/13th cents) - so I need a reading list/suggestions on power - please - I am currently on MF's The Subject and Power.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-72652897581627828742007-08-03T12:37:00.000-04:002007-08-03T12:37:00.000-04:00Karl, I appreciate your "real world" example. It ...Karl, I appreciate your "real world" example. It is so much more convincing than, let's just say for argument's sake, more Levinas or dead-end musings over "coexist."<BR/><BR/>The question I have for you is this: how do you know that what you were practicing with respect to containing your thoughts about God and Republicans is tolerance, as opposed to, say, what psychologists might could label personal control or reality negotiation? Notice that in my question, I am not going for the pejorative "edge" of tolerance (as Beard did or as you do in the linkage to scorn). <BR/><BR/>So the meta-question is: what prevents us from parsing tolerance in positive terms? I could acknowledge your scorn of your uncle but also see that the tolerance you were exercising was also based in something drawn from your character strength. Do you see my point?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-72504577821049223882007-08-03T11:45:00.000-04:002007-08-03T11:45:00.000-04:00Highly Eccentric wrote:If your students have probl...Highly Eccentric wrote:<BR/><BR/><I>If your students have problems with the idea of a character being "god-like" without being "good", it might be a good opportunity to prod them a little.<BR/>Ask if they think the parrallel could be between the church and the husband. Most protestants have a horrible negative view of the medieval church anyway, that shouldn't be too hard a step.</I><BR/><BR/>Right. This actually happened in the classroom: someone spoke about the corruption of the church. To my mind, that rhetoric preserves God's goodness from the wickedness of the world. It's analogous, isn't it, to the complaints against Richard II's courtiers, which also preserved the King's goodness (and also preserved the complainers from the wrath of the King, at least ideally). We might say it's a belief in the purity of God or the King, but we might also say that it's a kind of Manichaeism. <BR/><BR/><I>What do you think of Chaucer's faith? Like I said, i've never read any, but I've always just assumed that as a medieval person he was in one way or another Christian.</I><BR/><BR/>Well, there were lots of medieval people who weren't Christian. Chaucer wasn't one of these. Most, however, claimed some kind of faith as their own: Judaism, Islam, or indeed various heterodox Christianities (and indeed faiths that don't align with any of these). As to what I <I>think</I> of Chaucer's own faith: I don't have a good answer, and I don't think it's the best question to put to Chaucer. If we're talking late 14th-century British authors, <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piers_Plowman" REL="nofollow">Langland</A> is probably the better choice for asking that question.<BR/><BR/>Indiefaith: <I>As educators do you talk to your students about the "third discourse" that guides your institutions?</I><BR/><BR/>Some of us do. I have. I taught my first college class in 1997 and have taught every year since then except for 2000. Given that I started graduate school as an anarchist, I've actually spent a fair amount of time thinking through the power dynamics of the institution and the classroom. I'd like to think it's affected my pedagogy. That said, I've generally found that my students are not very much interested in the topic, but perhaps I've been presenting it incorrectly, or perhaps my position in the institution has made it impossible for me to have that conversation. I imagine it's even harder when someone's a "hotty totty."<BR/><BR/>Now, without any analysis, here's an example of the problem of tolerance. An uncle who lives in the Twin Cities sent a family-wide email concerning the recent bridge collapse in Minneapolis. There was a lot of hooha about God looking out for his family, as various coincidences and delays preventing them from being on the bridge when it fell. What do I do with this email? So far I've merely 'tolerated' it, which is to say, I've let it be, as I've let all questions of religion be in my family. They don't let me alone, but I let them alone, in part because I want to allow them the pleasure of their belief (surely Zizek could help me here, something along the lines of the teenager who enjoys orgies so long as he believes his mother is sexually puritanical), in part because I'm so confident in the truth of what I believe, and the risibility of what they believe, that I think it would be cruel to let them know my thoughts. <BR/><BR/>So I "tolerate" rather than, say, pointing out the obvious: that by my uncle's logic, God didn't care about the people who died; or that God just had a plan for them, which means that perhaps the uncle should complain because God didn't intervene in his family's life by implementing his plan; or that any praise or complaint to God is as rude as telling your host that his food is good: of course it's good, and the compliment is a sneer as it suggests that it could have been otherwise; or, more materially, that my uncle's Republican politics are <A HREF="http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/8/2/125940/9440" REL="nofollow">directly responsible</A> for the bridge's collapse, given that Republicans seem to believe that one can let the rich get off with paying no taxes because, after all, the infrastructure doesn't need any money. <BR/><BR/>So there's a 'real world' dilemma of tolerance, where tolerance is a kind of scorn.Karl Steelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03353370018006849747noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21165575.post-12685121951548231862007-08-03T11:00:00.000-04:002007-08-03T11:00:00.000-04:00Indiefaith, you may find this very recent essay by...Indiefaith, you may find this very recent essay by Camille Paglia interesting. It's on "Religion and the Arts in America," and she argues that "Without compromise, we are heading for a soulless future. But when set against the vast historical panorama, religion and art—whether in marriage or divorce—can reinvigorate American culture."<BR/><BR/>http://www.bu.edu/arion/Paglia.htmAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com