[lit-ideas] The Importance of Being Dorian
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 13 Oct 2007 14:26:24 EDT
Geary writes:
>"I'm not sure what that means. I'm not trained in philosophy."
Who's trained? Recall that for the Greeks, who _invented_ philosophy, only
little 'kids' (kuroi, paides, they called them) could be _trained_ and that
only up to their 'coming of age' (at 16 years old). The Greeks were very
strict
about that, and the coming of age had nothing to do with the current American
obsession with heterosexual rites of passage (dating and getting your
driving license card, or even getting married). It just meant that the
'kuros' or
'pais' _grew a beard_. Once the former 'kuros' needed to _shave_ to get rid
of the beard, he was _passed_ training. He was _trained_.
A problem of Greek Ethics, as Symonds notes (in his famous "A problem of
Greek Ethics") is that girls (kurai) don't necessarily grow a beard till much
much later (cf. Sapho). For radicals like Plato, this meant that they could
never be _trained_ (rather than that they should be _trained_ for ever and a
day).
In America, there are such things as Horse Training Institutes, and Teacher
Training Institutes. This bad use of 'train' travelled to England. But there
(with 'teacher' if not 'horse', 'train' is a misnomer for 'educate'. Only
Teaching Teaching Institute would sound redundant.
So, my dear untrained philosopher, have a Happy Halloween,
Cheers,
J. L.
J. L. Speranza, Esq.
Town:
Calle Arenales 2021, Piso 5, St. 8,
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Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Tel. 54 11 4824 4253
Fax 54 221 425 9205
Country:
St. Michael Hall,
Calle 58, No. 611,
La Plata B1900 BPY
Provincia de Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Tel. 54 221 425 7817
Fax 54 221 425 9205
http://www.stmichaels.com.ar
jls@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
http://www.netverk/~jls.htm
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