"Arthur Gadney" <a_gadney@hotmail.com> wrote:
Bloom wasn't wrong in his criticism of the deteriorating, collective
academic American "mind," but his assessment of causes was often >rather convenient as well as elitist and self-serving.
Just curious: Did he suggest any way to solve this problem?
Well as I recall (I no longer own the book), Bloom promotes a return to classical education--a reading of the "great" books as part of the educational system and the necessity of "cultural literacy" a la his contemporary E.D. Hirsch, who were bothered by the newer emphases in American academia. -- His face is turned towards the past. Where we preceive a chain of events, he sees one single catastrophe which keeps piling wreckage upon wreckage and hurls it in front of his feet. The angel would like to stay, awaken the dead, and make whole what has been smashed. But a storm is blowing from Paradise; it has got caught in his wings with such violence that the angel can no longer close them. This storm irresistibly propels him into the future to which his back is turned, while the pile of debris before him grows skyward. This storm is what we call progress. --Walter Benjamin on the Angel of History You can always rely on America to do the right thing, once it has exhausted the alternatives. --Winston Churchill __________________________________________________________________ The NEW Netscape 7.0 browser is now available. Upgrade now! http://channels.netscape.com/ns/browsers/download.jsp Get your own FREE, personal Netscape Mail account today at http://webmail.netscape.com/