Comments on: Goof-Off Readings: Genesis; The Muqaddimah; The End of History and the Last Man; Guns, Germs and Steel

By: kthomas

kthomas — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 20:52:41 +0000

Tim, you clearly do not understand. The use of the word enchilada, regardless of the context, reading materials or work, clearly presents a grave challenge to the canon, and indeed, western civilization itself. As a fellow Williams alum, I am shocked and ashamed at this behavior. You are deluting the value of the degree! Use a honest-to-god American word, such as hambeurger! If English was good enough for…

(Saludos de la Cuidad de M??xico. Don’t have that reading list in a pdf anywhere? Enrique Krauze might be interesting to consider. &: Somewhat crossposted from ephBlog, http://www.ephblog.com/2010/01/08/cgcl-the-canon/#comment-79539)

By: mrscoulter

mrscoulter — Tue, 19 Sep 2006 12:35:51 +0000

Doesn’t everyone eat potato chips while they read Foucault?

By: ProfPTJ

ProfPTJ — Mon, 18 Sep 2006 20:49:42 +0000

I feel like the Weekly Standard slighted me by picking on Tim's (really excellent-looking, btw) course. I mean, I teach a course on social science and science fiction, and I didn't get blacklisted -- what is the world coming to? Sheesh.

By: Ralph

Ralph — Mon, 18 Sep 2006 19:29:10 +0000

Lindsley got two e-mails from me. I haven’t had a reply. But I thought he ought to know that he’s taken a beating on two or three sites on the net.

By: Doug

Doug — Mon, 18 Sep 2006 11:25:54 +0000

CMarko, I’d say dash off a letter. You never know. And even (maybe especially) something as stupid as Lindsley’s article deserves pushback.

By: bbenzon

bbenzon — Mon, 18 Sep 2006 10:48:44 +0000

Trouble is, your letter would be coming from reality, and that’s not where Lindsley is. He had to ignore a lot to get to the point where he can write such fluff. I’m afraid a letter from you wouldn’t register, water off a duck’s back, etc.

By: CMarko

CMarko — Mon, 18 Sep 2006 05:33:27 +0000

I don’t think I can adequately express how outrageous I find this assessment. I took and loved Whole Enchilada, and it was by far the most rigorous class of my first year at Swarthmore (and possibly my second year, come to think of it). It was the first class that made me really step up my work to a college level. Call it the opposite of fluff. And Lindsley’s criticism is made more ludicrous by the fact that he might actually approve of the reading list if he saw it–we read The Rise of the West, for pete’s sake.

I’m equally appalled by how quick he is to associate liberal or postmodern course material (e.g. gay and lesbian literature) with easy classes and lazy students. Whether or not students should be working hard is one issue; what they should be studying is another.

Think Lindsley would be even moderately shamed by an angry letter from me? My guess is he’d write me off as a gender studies-taking, cheetos-eating, blue-state coed. Sheesh.

By: Ralph

Ralph — Sun, 17 Sep 2006 18:30:58 +0000

It would have been hard to come up with a better illustration for your criticism of the conservative attack on higher ed course offerings than Lindsley offered up.

By: Timothy Burke

Timothy Burke — Sun, 17 Sep 2006 15:30:27 +0000

That’s true: he clearly just skims titles. No wonder he shows great familiarity with hanging around eating potato chips and watching TV: that’s obviously how he generates his reportage.

By: Leo

Leo — Sun, 17 Sep 2006 13:19:52 +0000

“Remind me to keep my course titles and descriptions boring.”

I’m not sure modifying the descriptions would help, as the author of this piece gives no evidence of having read any descriptions.