Entry tags:

human, humanities, liberal arts, read a book, sulks like achilles in his tent

Latest offense: Talking about our firemen.
I was taking with spkorb the other day about the fact that an education rich in humanities and liberal arts (you know, the kind people used to get) theoretically leaves us with an idea of what it means to be human, what other people think it means to be human, and how people explore the human condition through the arts and humanities.

When you cut that out of education, you eventually end up with people that insist that it's not necessary, don't want that level of introspection, or simply don't get concepts like metaphor and irony. Best quote (from the last link, emphasis mine):

In the complaint filed against the school by Alton Verm, he listed each objected item line by line, complete with individual page numbers. Besides bad language and violence, Verm lists "downgrading Christians" and "talking about our firemen" as reasons the book should be banned. The school committee is expected to meet about [the book Fahrenheit 451].

I don't need to tell you that Bradbury's calling the guys who burn books "firemen" is probably one of the easiest jokes (for lack of a better word) to get in the book. What I feel is being lost here is simple: people who aren't exposed to a wide range of arts and humanities (and I'll dispense with arguments about "canon", because they're stupid and useless) with concepts like metaphor, irony, sarcasm, etc will simply not be able to think in those ways. They don't have the practice, model, or language.

The Bible is a rich source of metaphor and exploration of human nature through parable. Many of the people who insist on taking it literally, literally (I believe) cannot conceive of it any other way. I'd say these people need to be dragged, kicking and screaming no doubt, into the 21st century, but it's the 20th century rigor of a (so called) classical education I think I'm looking for. This may be a culture war, but the foot soldiers of conservative movement do not know that they're fighting for (essentially) ignorance (I believe their leaders do). Once again, more and better education is the key.

Islam was a religion long before it was twisted and permuted away from expression and introspection. The various radical sects show beyond a doubt that banning certain ways of expression leads to an inability to reason clearly about abstract (and not so abstract) concepts, and from there it's only a short hop to seeing every cartoonist as an actual threat to the very underpinnings of the religion. The Christian book banners are no better, seeing the book burners in Farenheit 451 as an actual affront to real, current firemen, and seeing a book which uses magic as a stand-in for puberty/popularity/teen-angst (a metaphor which has led to actually funny SNL skit. Some might consider this evidence of the miraculous in our lives.) as an occult recruitment tool.

I'm not saying people should dispense with that silly "religion" thing. But introspection and exploration of the human condition are sort of the point of spirituality. Duh! I'm also not suggesting we turn these folks into brie-chomping avant-garde aficionados. I'm really only asking for these people to read, and think, and read some more. Read everything you can, look at all the art you can, watch all the movies you can. It's ok, it won't hurt you, really. A little Sun-Tzu, a little Shakespeare! Read a book!