Score 1 for the University

Equal to my calling to point boldly to areas of lacking in my scholastic experience is the imperative to tip my hat when actual learning is taking place.  Such is my experience so far in Advocacy in Communications Class this semester.  Real reading, real research assignments, real interactive discussions.  Although my return to academia is still new, I cannot help but wonder at the reasons for the difference.  Could it be that this class being advanced for graduate students in pursuit of a Masters is the difference?  It is a 500-level course.  But if this is the actual learning and intelligence level that I hoped for—and I am still and undergrad—is there an unspoken comment in there reflective of the quality of undergraduate education?  Have we seen standards slip so that we are churning out “basic” college graduates as if they are High School diplomas and therefore the “Masters” is the “New Bachelors,” and perhaps the High School is the new Middle School?

I will let that question stand unanswered for now as I enjoy my semester in the trenches.  I do not want to sound egotistical, but how refreshing that someone else besides me quoted Aristotle in class!

I do need to gripe a bit about tuition escalation.  I took one 3-unit course last semester at a cost of about $770.  This semester, my one, 3-unit course is going to cost over $1250—a 65% increase in three months time.  This raises the estimated cost of completing this degree from about $22k to $38k, +/-.  When Shakespeare said to, “Empty your purse into your head and no one can steal it from you.” I do not think that he meant the “purse-emptying” quite so literally.

Be well.

Score 1 for the University

Equal to my calling to point boldly to areas of lacking in my scholastic experience is the imperative to tip my hat when actual learning is taking place. Such is my experience so far in Advocacy in Communications Class this semester. Real reading, real research assignments, real interactive discussions. Although my return to academia is still new, I cannot help but wonder at the reasons for the difference. Could it be that this class being advanced for graduate students in pursuit of a Masters is the difference? It is a 500-level course. But if this is the actual learning and intelligence level that I hoped for—and I am still and undergrad—is there an unspoken comment in there reflective of the quality of undergraduate education? Have we seen standards slip so that we are churning out “basic” college graduates as if they are High School diplomas and therefore the “Masters” is the “New Bachelors,” and perhaps the High School is the new Middle School?

I will let that question stand unanswered for now as I enjoy my semester in the trenches. I do not want to sound egotistical, but how refreshing that someone else besides me quoted Aristotle in class!

I do need to gripe a bit about tuition escalation. I took one 3-unit course last semester at a cost of about $770. This semester, my one, 3-unit course is going to cost over $1250—a 65% increase in three months time. This raises the estimated cost of completing this degree from about $22k to $38k, +/-. When Shakespeare said to, “Empty your purse into your head and no one can steal it from you.” I do not think that he meant the “purse-emptying” quite so literally.

Be well.

Score 1 for the University

Equal to my calling to point boldly to areas of lacking in my scholastic experience is the imperative to tip my hat when actual learning is taking place. Such is my experience so far in Advocacy in Communications Class this semester. Real reading, real research assignments, real interactive discussions. Although my return to academia is still new, I cannot help but wonder at the reasons for the difference. Could it be that this class being advanced for graduate students in pursuit of a Masters is the difference? It is a 500-level course. But if this is the actual learning and intelligence level that I hoped for—and I am still and undergrad—is there an unspoken comment in there reflective of the quality of undergraduate education? Have we seen standards slip so that we are churning out “basic” college graduates as if they are High School diplomas and therefore the “Masters” is the “New Bachelors,” and perhaps the High School is the new Middle School?

I will let that question stand unanswered for now as I enjoy my semester in the trenches. I do not want to sound egotistical, but how refreshing that someone else besides me quoted Aristotle in class!

I do need to gripe a bit about tuition escalation. I took one 3-unit course last semester at a cost of about $770. This semester, my one, 3-unit course is going to cost over $1250—a 65% increase in three months time. This raises the estimated cost of completing this degree from about $22k to $38k, +/-. When Shakespeare said to, “Empty your purse into your head and no one can steal it from you.” I do not think that he meant the “purse-emptying” quite so literally.

Be well.

Score 1 for the University

Equal to my calling to point boldly to areas of lacking in my scholastic experience is the imperative to tip my hat when actual learning is taking place. Such is my experience so far in Advocacy in Communications Class this semester. Real reading, real research assignments, real interactive discussions. Although my return to academia is still new, I cannot help but wonder at the reasons for the difference. Could it be that this class being advanced for graduate students in pursuit of a Masters is the difference? It is a 500-level course. But if this is the actual learning and intelligence level that I hoped for—and I am still and undergrad—is there an unspoken comment in there reflective of the quality of undergraduate education? Have we seen standards slip so that we are churning out “basic” college graduates as if they are High School diplomas and therefore the “Masters” is the “New Bachelors,” and perhaps the High School is the new Middle School?

I will let that question stand unanswered for now as I enjoy my semester in the trenches.

I do need to gripe a bit about tuition escalation. I took one 3-unit course last semester at a cost of about $770. This semester, my one, 3-unit course is going to cost over $1250—a 65% increase in three months time. This raises the estimated cost of completing this degree from about $22k to $38k, +/-. When Shakespeare said to, “Empty your purse into your head and no one can steal it from you.” I do not think that he meant the “purse-emptying” quite so literally.

Be well.

Back in Black (or Back at the Blackboard)

Well after a Summer hiatus where I worked at my job--and worked, and worked, and worked--I am back in acedemia. I am taking a graduate level course as an undergrad. It was available, within my major, and the university computer system mistakenly let me register. I do not know whether to be greatful or otherwise.

I have reviewed the syllabus--it is challenging from both a volume and an intellectually demanding perspective. I hope that I have not bitten off more that a wayaward returning scholar can chew. Weeks one and two have been allabout introductions to the coursework and the expectations laid upon us, so there is precious little to report. We dig in this week and so I expect much ado starting soon.

Be well and I will write again soon.

It's a Wrap! Pass the Pizza Mr. Mao....

Day 13
Well, we turned in our Final Exams at the beginning of class today. If you will allow me one gentle conceit, I come to class with 74 out of a possible 75 points tucked into my pocket, so a “C-level” grade on the Final should still get me an “A” for the class. But I am confident that all will be well.

The lecture was mercifully short, and the professor brought pizza for the class. I always knew he was a likable sort—and this proves it. So, in addition to being utopian-control freaks that lean precipitously away from freedom, toward tyranny, and in denial of theism and human nature whose ideas—if fully implemented—would pose an existential threat to our way of life and a degradation of civilization itself, they can also be relatively intelligent folks who bring free pizza to class. Who’d have thought?

I will be registering for my next wave of classes soon and will write in an update at that time.

Be well,

Academic Apartheid

Day 12
We spent the first half of class today watching the first part of a television documentary on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (RCC) in post-Apartheid South Africa. Remarkable how Bishop Desmond Tutu officiated that noble public discussion and testimony—helping guide that country away from devolution into anarchy and additional bloodshed and into a more-free, equal, and open society. Thus, Apartheid rests upon the ash-heap of history with sister evils: Communism, Fascism, and slavery, among others (though pockets of Communistic thought and slavery exist to this day).

I take nothing away from the historic nature of those events or the tragic impact upon the individual lives and collective soul of South Africa when I ask, “Why are we watching this video here and now, in this class?”

If this topic is to be the framework for our study of Advanced Argumentation, why are we not exploring the nature and quality of the arguments that facilitated the philosophical surrender of the South African regime? Why do we not hear Desmond Tutu’s speeches that were of such quality as to prevent revenge-seeking and retaliation by the repressed and disaffected black population? Why do we not hear the arguments made before the United Nations that caused the governments of the world to lean the weight of economic sanctions against the few, struggling, and increasingly isolated supremacists leading the South African Nationalist Party?

Instead, we only see the suffering and hear the stories of the oppressed in emotional appeal. These are worthy stories, indeed. They are worth telling together with the tales of the Holocaust, Gulag survivors, and other heroes and martyrs for humanity. But this class is to teach us the intellectual weapons wielded in such struggles and the student might be better served with less history lesson and reflected guilt—and a bit more effective argument and persuasion technique. This is an opportunity lost to learning the lesson at hand. Progress toward the focused education course implied by my degree track sits in the back of the bus behind dogma and indoctrination.

Be well,

“The Destruction of the Christian Church…is…Necessary”

Day 11

I lead today’s entry with a heartbreaking quotation from one of our primary texts, James Baldwin’s Collected Essays, "White Racism or World Community?":

“It’s got to be admitted that if you are born under the circumstances in which most black people in the West are born, that means really black people over the entire world, when you look around you, having attained something resembling adulthood, it is perfectly true that you can see that the destruction of the Christian Church as it is presently constituted may not only be desirable but necessary.”

Now, one can refer to the literary devices of great writers—as, for all of his faults, James Baldwin certainly was—as they might use shock and exaggeration to garner the attention they require in making what they believe to be salient points; but the questions are begged:

• What would a student be indoctrinated to believe in reading this in a structured class?
• What would a radical take from an independent reading of this work?
• What use would such language be in the hands of a race-monger or sophist seeking adoration and power?

Mr. Baldwin’s prose has a keen edge, but a sharpened tool left idly on the ground gains action in the intent of the hand that finds it laying there—for good or ill.

Be well,

A Lesson learned

Day 10
A bit is revealed to us this evening. Our professor—again, a very bright and studied man—who is charged with instructing us in Advanced Argumentation has:

• Undergraduate degree in psychology
• Masters in Philosophy
• Completing his doctoral dissertation in Cultural Studies

I venture that he is pursuing the Liberal trifecta. I do enjoy the class and I believe that one gets out of all educational opportunities a proportionate measure of what one puts into them. But his hat-trick of left leaning coursework would seem to do less than adequate to prepare for the professorship of the course at hand.

This new information does give us a window to understand and more readily forgive his Liberal ideological bias spread so thickly in our assignments. He is simply teaching what he has learned—and probably all that he has been effectively taught.

Ironic that we are this very week reading from Emerson’s essay of 1844, “New England Reformers,” that:

“The criticism and attack on institutions, which we have witnessed, has made one thing plain, that society gains nothing whilst a man, not himself renovated, attempts to renovate things around him: he has become tediously good in some particular but negligent or narrow in the rest; and hypocrisy and vanity are often the disgusting result.”

As we approach the end point of this class—a mere three addition sessions on—we begin to see evidence that renovations are sorely needed in our institutions and in the minds of the educators.

Be well,

Do You Know What “Performative” Means?

Day 9
We spent the entire class today discussing essays by Emerson on history and the abolitionist movement of the 1800’s. This may seem strange for a class ostensibly designed to instruct the class in effective argumentation—but such is the wandering mind of our professor. It would, of course, be different if we diagramed the distinctive qualities of the various positions made and how they were effective or not, persuasive or not, impactful or not. Instead we wholly shy away from such productive analysis that might be germane to the title of our course.

He made a telling slip of the tongue in today’s lecture. In describing some point made in an assigned essay he said, “The statement has a certain ‘performative’ quality. Do you all know what ‘performative’ means?”

I raised my hand and was called upon. I had to remind the professor that the class indeed did know about the concept of performative utterances because we had studied it as part of the course work in the first few days of this very class—that it was part of the core curriculum of the session. The professor laughed and said that he “forgot” that was part of this class.

To sum up—he spent so much time in civil rights discourse over the last few weeks that he forgot one of the core concepts he was supposed to be focusing on.

This simple faux pas says more than I am capable of relaying and any attempt to add further emphasis would likely bring diminishment.

Be well,

When do we get to the Learning Part?

Day 8
It has been three weeks since the last class—Spring Break intervened into one and our professor was ill for another. Today we are back at it.

As previously discussed, this class is called “Advanced Argumentation, Critical Reasoning, and Public Communication.” I feel compelled to restate the title of the class because—as we have now passed the half-way mark towards its conclusion—we have had precious little argumentation, mostly no critical reasoning, and the public communications we have studied have been more indoctrination than analysis. One could forgive the abject Liberal ideological nature of the works we have studied if in the process we analyzed what techniques or methodology made one argument more effective than another. Instead it seems that we are consigned merely to read extremist Liberal demagoguery and discuss its relative “correctness” as compared to another in the metrics of agreement with mainline Liberal thought.

Please Sir, I Want Some More…
It would be refreshing if the professor were to introduce a Conservative author once in a great while—even if such introduction was purely to pour ridicule. Sowell, Buckley, Safire, et al—they will not whither before even an unfair onslaught. At least the students would be therefore aware of contrary view. Rather, we are given one set of Liberal writings and assigned to compare them to another set of Liberal writings and we get to judge between them. This seems akin to offering a man his choice of entre’ at a soup kitchen—you get to have whatever you want so long as you bring low expectations and choose precisely what is being served that day.

I am afraid that I embarrassed the professor just a bit today. We always have a good deal of reading for each session, and today it was doubled up due to the missed class. But the professor spent a great deal of time on two essays in particular—namely, “The Crusade of Indignation” by James Baldwin and “Wealth (2)” by Emerson. As is his wont, he focused on anti-capitalist snippets here and collectivist sentences there, all to the previously defined somnambulant nodding of the class (I am left to wonder if they had read the assignments at all). I had, in fact read them thoroughly—the dismal science of economics being, to my mind, not so dismal—because I was interested in what they had to say. I offered to openly contrast the two essays by reading excerpts from each and the professor eagerly agreed.

Emerson Said What?
Turns out that when it comes to industriousness and productivity, Ralph Waldo Emerson was pretty Conservative, indeed. Where Baldwin sought some method of artificial wealth distribution, Emerson very squarely believed in individual productivity and self-sufficiency, and said so in words more forceful than even I am comfortable with. I will let Emerson speak for himself:

“Wealth brings with it its own checks and balances. The basis of political economy is non-interference. The only safe rule is found in the self-adjusting meter of demand and supply. Do not legislate. Meddle, and you snap the sinews with your sumptuary laws. Give no bounties, make equal laws, secure life and property, and you need not give alms. Open the doors of opportunity to talent and virtue and they will do themselves justice, and property will not be in bad hands. In a free and just commonwealth, property rushes from the idle and the imbecile to the industrious, brave and persevering.”

Yep…that’s Emerson on the topic.

I did not comment beyond reading this passage from our assignment. Our professor then spent the next fifteen minutes parsing that what I read aloud did not quite mean what I thought it did. Well, it seemed rather clear to me.

I actually felt a bit uncomfortable on behalf of the professor. He stammered through his rebuttal and directed his comments to me (again, at great length), but—since I offered nothing more than a gentle reading—he was, in fact, arguing with Mr. Emerson himself. What’s worse…he knew it.

I must sign off. My wife will be quite upset that I come home so late as it is. Be well.

Thoughts on James Baldwin

Brilliant Writer, Cynical Heart - Day 7

As with last week, half the class departed before the mid-point. Where last week I despised this behavior, this week I feel almost relieved by it. Even though I disagree with a large majority of those who remain, the fact that they remained says something indeed. As the Bard said in Henry 5th, “I would ask for not one man more” than those who would freely and actively participate in learning with me.

Paper #2 was due this week. I am particularly pleased with my paper, as I believed that I discerned a literary and poetic sleight-of-hand by Emerson (part of our required reading) that I think novel and—to the best of my knowledge—as yet undiscovered. I must find a way to post my essays online via this blog to make them accessible.

We had more readings by Baldwin for this week and we saw a snippet of a documentary about the man. The snippet was of no real help—perhaps if we had watched it in its entirety we could have gleaned some value. If the professor had a point in the particular segment he showed us I am afraid that I missed it. But it was, to my mind, at least partially beneficial to hear Baldwin’s actual audible voice. As I read his other works, I will be able to imagine him speaking them now that I have somewhat of an ear for his meter, inflexion, and tone.

Nothing that I write here could diminish the quality of Baldwin’s prose or the moral courage of his participation in the civil rights movement of the 1960’s. But his work reflects a disconnection and pessimistic outlook that screams out from the pages. I fear that, for all of the good he effected, there is also a legacy of error in his work that harms those he sought to help—even to this day. I pretend to no psychological authority, but some of this mystery may be in James Baldwin’s “personal” diaspora.

More than Personal
Baldwin was one of nine children and never knew his biological father. His step-father was reputed to have a cruel streak and opposed James’ literary aspirations. James, of course, was African-American (to use the terms of today)—which presented well established incumbent identity challenges of that period. And it must be noted that he was also homosexual at a time when it was profoundly more difficult to be so (setting aside that hot-potato for the moment). So, to paint this picture in broad strokes, Baldwin was a relatively poor, black, out-of-wedlock, “blended” family, homosexual whose natural talents were not readily accepted by the authority figure of his home. The fact that he managed to rise above that station is a testament to his talent. But it is also reasonable for us to postulate that his personal feelings is disaffection were given amplitude by his personal condition. Perhaps this increased amplitude served to increase his effectiveness--giving constructive output to his many frustrations by channeling his energies.

But we should also Consider...
There is a psychological condition called “transference” where emotions or associations that naturally belong to one person, object, or circomstance become linked or directed at another. Baldwin writes about the disassociations and disaffections of/by/and among America and African-Americans, but he so often tosses the baby out with the bath water that plausibility suffers. He wrote ably for decades—some of the most progressive decades in racial matters—and in that time if one were to listen solely to Baldwin (albeit to my limited readings so far) that not a step of progress had been made. And as he defends the struggles and culture of the African-American, he becomes what he abhors—mocking and deriding the struggles and cultural traditions of other groups and seemingly denying the ones we share. Such blindness speaks to a pathology of the soul that denies the ability to belong and to celebrate the victories. Even if fresh battles await.

James Baldwin was an important and great writer, but I think that there was a lot more broken than he would let anyone really see.

Be well,

Somnambulation in Education

Dozing Off on Day 6

I full well understand the special challenges facing a night class taken all in one gulp. A continuous 3-hour lecture and reading class from 6:30-9:30PM on Monday evening is a challenge to the heartiest. In each session there is either a quiz or paper due and they are always at the start. Recognizing this, fully one third of the class disappear themselves into the hallways round about the middle point—trusting, it seems, that the reading alone will prepare them suitably for the next test or essay and that our professor will notice not and keep no record. Another third of the class is locked into staring at their cell phone text messages and/or MySpace page and/or personal email and/or assignment for another class entirely. This evening, the poor bloke to my right nodded off into a sound sleep for almost an hour. Water therefore seeks it own level and the weakest and most fluid among us run to their puddles on the sidewalk.

It is not that I do not have compassion for these souls. I come to each class after a ten-hour workday. Add to that this three-hour class and hour-long total commute time and simple math tells a weary story indeed. But it is what it is and there are the remaining third of us who stay relatively focused and alert to the lessons at hand.

It is this remainder that tells an even deeper tale of weariness and wandering.

It is in their answers and input that this group falls—so indoctrinated that each answer to professorial query is steeped in a type of pandering prattle. It seems that none can challenge the authors we read—as if, though professing the Godlessness of the universe, the Gods have become the ones who themselves have declared God dead. Where I and my ilk feel free to challenge any and all except the Deity, the others feel forbidden to challenge those for whom there is none. Their answers become common—not crystalline and unique as snowflakes, but ubiquitous as raindrops—each comment indistinguishable from the one coming before. Racism, socialism, and American failings simply cannot be the answer to every question posed. Those are the kinds of answers they have trained themselves to give to the bobble-headed consensus of them all. But such consensus does not truth make.

I tip my hat and recognize one or two of my fellow students that, though they might disagree with the majority of my rooted Philosophy, at least demonstrate active and engaged minds. But how many of us total are in this group? Three? Four? Out of a roster of 40? It is worth noting that this is a senior-level course and that it might be reasonably assumed that the vast majority of the students will find their way clear to pass this course and garner their diplomas. They will apply for positions with earned degrees in Communications, Law, Political Science, Journalism, and the Liberal Arts. They will enter the workforce with the tacit assurance that these printed parchments and enhanced resumes will open the doors to their future success—unaware that free markets ultimately value performance and intelligent engagement over documentation. This is the unseen and truly democratic hand of freedom. It is the application of real learning that differentiates between an Education and a Bachelor of Arts in Sleepwalking.

Be well,

Credit Where Credit Is Due

A welcome glimmer of light on Day 5

I feared the worst, but was prepared for the best and the best is what I received. Our Written Response Papers were handed back to us and—though mine is filled with his notes of philosophical correction and disagreement written in the margins—I got an “A.” My professor also made a few solid comments that I will embrace and use to make my writing better and my thoughts more concise.

This speaks very well of him and my future experiences in this class.

We also studied a bit on the types of communication incumbent in certain music and how Blues and Jazz exemplify democratic expression. We listened to a little Robert Johnson, Son House, and Billie Holiday—how can that be bad. A good grade on my paper, some good music thrown in, and we have the makings of a good day in school.

For now and tonight, dear reader, allow me to leave this post as completed. My head aches and the weariness of ten hours at the office and three hours in class is upon me.

Until next time, be well,

The Difference is in the Definitions

The mind reels on Day 4

The reading assignments tick away beneath my reading lamp. Each one steeped more into twisted logic and bent thought. Straight lines seem impossible. For today, our first written Response Paper was due. We have been instructed to analyze informal fallacies in a written piece of our choosing. For our class, the professor has assigned a great deal of reading by one of the most radically Liberal writers of our day—Cornel West. I chose to analyze a brief passage of his work for fallacies and have just now dutifully turned in my completed paper.

Let’s see how that works out for me.

Having spent some time in the steam bath of Liberal thought has done me some good in that I have the sense that I am gaining an understanding of the thought processes that exist for the contemporary Liberal. I certainly have not mastered such depths—I am not sure that is possible or desirable—but glimpses of understanding are breaking through the fog.

Definitions are Key

• The various philosophers and writers we study in class speak of truth—but for them, truth is an impermanent and transitory thing. Truth is different for each of us.
• They speak of Democracy and Democratic ideals—but for them, Democracy is a kind of unrestricted and shifting tyranny of the populace; it is Socialism with a small “s.”
• Cornel West speaks of Nihilism—but to him, Nihilism is a loss of hope on its public face; masking the institution-destroying definition that most of us are familar with. He writes of Free Markets—but to him, Free Market philosophy carries the same definition as our classical understanding of Fascism. He defines Evangelical as to mean “by force” and militaristic.
• To these writers, Justice, Equality, and Freedom are unfulfilled promises instead of noble principles and objectives to be continually strived towards.

It’s enough to break you heart.
So when a young mind schooled in this "other" language hears of truth, justice, and the American way (to borrow from Superman), what they hear bears little resemblance to what the Founding Fathers undertook to mean. So by controlling the “meaning" of the sacred words we use, the Liberal makes us do their dirty work for them. If I say to the less-privileged that I want Justice for them—they scoff at my apparent sophistry. If I profess the democratic and freedom ensuring power of Free Markets—I am pictured goose-stepping down the halls in jack-boots. All the while feeding and reinforcing their contrivances. They make a straw man of me through sophistry.

God love ‘em….words mean things and language is a big part of culture. I shiver that our language—my lifelong friend and the reasoned Conservative’s greatest ally—may be dulled and serrated by the efforts of sinister minds.

Be well,

A Related Thought as I Sit to Write a Class Paper

I have heard it said that men choose to become Sociologists because they loath society and that men choose to become Psychologists because they loath themselves. I cannot definitively confirm those statements, but have become confident that contemporary Philosophers secretly hate truth.

Truth is compelling. Truth takes no prisoners. To the post-modernist mind, Truth is the beautiful woman who--upon discovering that she is either unattainable or, in their impotence, impossible to satisfy--they choose to despise from their self-loathing. To them, Truth is sour grapes.

Be well,

Of Sand and Stone

Day 3
Class is interesting once again. Though our class is described as Advanced Argumentation, Critical Reasoning, and Public Speaking; we tend to spend a great deal of time on Philosophy. Not that I mind terrible much—Philosophy is one of my favorite topics. It is my “home court,” if you will.

For this week we had quite a bit of reading: articles by Michael Foucault, J. L. Austin, and James Baldwin. It may seem impetuous to state so after only a brief reading, but Baldwin is a great writer. The quality of his prose veritably seeps from the pages. Note that agreement with an author is not synonymous with the greatness of an author—Baldwin steps into his own biases once or twice as we all do—but there is no denying the quality.

Foucault and Austin, by turn, are—to my mind—lesser part writers and more philosophical communicators, though no less influential and both men are widely read in academia. Specifically we hear from Foucault on his definitions and conditions of “parrhesia.” From Austin we discuss the instances of “performative utterances.” Both men attempt to define types of communication. What they have in common is that they use the words “true” and “truth” in unique ways to communicate philosophical points. In Foucault’s case, the proof of truth is evidenced by the saying of it. In Austin’s, the reality of truth is created by the act of saying.

I can see the validity in both positions, but only in the framework of their intellectual constructs. We must let authors define their terms within their own works to evidence their positions. But such definitions and constructs must remain in context lest they extend beyond the scope of their isolated arguments into areas for which they are unsuited. I detect that Foucault’s and Austin’s definitions—intended to remain contained within their litero-philosophical laboratories—has escaped into the wild. Thus, like wildfire, that which was designed as constructive wrecks havoc and damage to the psyche—cracking foundations best left whole.

It is therefore little wonder to me that those who are given first to reading the works of Foucault and Austin (et al) prior to or instead of Jefferson and Madison (et al) might feel the world more made of sand than stone, and noble ideas more malleable than authoritative.

Day 2, Of Fallacies and Irony

I am halfway through my second day of class. An attentive reader will notice that the date reflects a greater passage of time—two weeks to be precise. This is due to the Martin Luther King holiday and since this class meets once per week for three hours at a crack, I got a week off. The Reverend King certainly deserves thoughtful remembrance (the “thoughtful” part being in short supply these days) and students, bankers, and certain government workers benefit in a less cerebral manner of respite, but benefit we do.

With today’s class we launch again into the worlds of argumentation and rhetoric. “Launch” is rather an overstatement. It’s more like we skip as a stone skips across the surface. The reading assignment due for today (26 odd pages) took all of two hours. The subsequent quiz given at the beginning of class today had two questions that were merely definitional and easily dispatched from the first page of each chapter—yet still the quiz was met with furtive groans from the majority of the class. Ah, the challenges that will face them in the workplace if they think that this is hard!

We have spent quite a bit of time discussing rhetoric, logic, and the fallacies. A brief time was spent on the use of words and symbols to avoid ambiguity. Irony ensued when the professor (again, a bright and likable fellow) forgot the meaning of the symbols he wrote and could not reconstruct the logic in his logic statement because…well, he was not sure what they meant. Irony defined.

Back to the studies.

As the title and subtitle of this blog suggests, I am attempting to record my journey through the ostensibly liberal-dominated world of academia. The last post suggested that I was in fertile territory for such and today added evidence. We are studying the Formal and Informal Fallacies—this is wholly correct and appropriate for a course in advanced argumentation. However, the examples used by the professor to demonstrate the fallacies are rather telling.

To demonstrate the fallacy Argumentum ad Hominem - Circumstantial (personal benefit unrelated to the conclusion) the professor cited the following phrase:
“Lowering taxes is good for the economy because you will have more money!”

To demonstrate the fallacy Argumentum ad Populem (popular believe is unrelated to truth)he said:
“90% of people believe in some form of a higher power so therefore there is a God.”

To demonstrate Ignoratio Elenchi (irrelevant conclusion) he said:
“Condi (Dr.) Rice said that we could not wait for a ‘smoking gun’ to invade Iraq because the smoking gun would be a ‘mushroom cloud.’”

(I focus on the use of Liberal position statements rather than the obvious points that this combines two different statements by two different people—neither of them Condi Rice—and takes them out of context, thus committing formal fallacies of fact.)

But to demonstrate the Ambiguity Fallacy of Accent, he predicted that the opposition would emphasize the middle name of one current presidential candidate to create an unfair impression of the man:
“Barak HUSSEIN Obama”

Although the professor certainly may have additional, more even-handed examples at his disposal, these were the only ones discussed. I also should say that their Liberal bent does not necessarily make them incorrect or un-useful examples of the related fallacies (in the logic statement sense). But their selection and use in conjunction with the topic at hand is certainly slighted.

It is a further irony that the professor fails to realize that he is creating the fallacy of bringing his bias to the table in the discussion of fallacy

Until next week,

Later in the Evening, Day One

9:30 PM

Well…in the first session of my first class I have been instructed that Truth is relative and that America has failed at democracy. If there is such a thing a liberal bias test, so far we have failed it. As evidence I offer a paraphrase of a brief conversation I had with the professor at the break:

Me, “Professor, should we assume then that you lean toward subjectivism?”

Prof., “Well you should never assume, that is what gets you in trouble. And it depends on what you mean by ‘lean’ and ‘subjective,’ doesn’t it.”

Me, “Subjective infers that you do not believe in absolute truth—that truth if relative to place, time, and circumstance.”

Prof., “Well then…yes.”

The professor is amiable enough and obviously bright, if significantly eccentric and prone to ad hominem digression. I find those qualities tolerable. But it remains to be seen if I and my obviously contrary viewpoint will get the fair shake I felt denied two decades ago.

Class One, Day One, Before the Begining

6:15 PM, January 14, 2008

Well, today is my first day of class. I will return at a later date to talk about my efforts to actually re-enter Arizona State University after so long a departure. But I will foreshadow that blog a bit by simply saying that it was harder to get back into ASU than it was to get in the first time.

My first class starts in about 15 minutes and I must admit that I approach my return to University with a bunch of preconceptions and my fair share of biases. Most of those biases have to deal with the quality of the education I am to receive and expected biases I anticipate encountering. It is those biases that have prompted me to start this blog. Thus to document my thoughts as I experience them. It is worth stating that my fears were not assuaged by the selections of courses open to my chosen degree field (Communications)—most notable those of the “gender awareness” and “women’s studies” variety.

But I will give the college the benefit of my open mind. So here we go on this grand adventure. Stay tuned.