[lit-ideas] Re: Can U Read Kant?
- From: "Torgeir Fjeld" <phatic@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 13 May 2008 19:42:51 +0100
Just came back from watching the new Las Vegas movie with Cameron Diaz. I
found it pretty funny -- parents watching it along side me found it
mostly not so funny. I believe dad found it loaded with cliches. I
thought it had lots of clever intetextual references.
Whatever.
I remain,
Torgeir Fjeld
----- Original Message -----
From: "John Wager"
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Can U Read Kant?
Date: Tue, 13 May 2008 09:17:59 -0500
Phil Enns wrote:
. . .The issue for me is not the
'U' but the reference to Kant. If, as educators, we are supposed to
adopt the ways and manners of our students, leaving behind canonical
texts and big ideas, who cares whether you or 'U' can read Kant? On
this account, being able to read Kant would be like being able to read
Phoenician, both equally pointless in this YouTube 'communication
environment'. However, if being able to read Kant is in any way
worthwhile, which seems to be the implication of the title, then how
are the recommendations given, new electronic devices and transforming
universities into YouTube communication environments, relevant to the
task?
Philosophers and philosophy teachers are a subversive lot! If anybody
can figure out a way to use
technology to do something it isn't supposed to do, I'd say it will
probably be philosophers. As a
very crude example, I've been teaching an introductory level online
ethics class for a few years now,
and we do indeed read a few short selections from Kant's "Grundlegung"
online. I keep getting
the same questions from students about the readings, and I keep
asking students the same questions
when they come to me saying they don't "get" Kant. So I put those
questions online, inside the
reading, and make students stop and think about what they are reading
WHILE they are reading
it. Their replies go to my email; every student has to reply to all
the questions in all the readings. I've
found that this works much better than asking for replies listed at
the end of a reading, or on a so-
called "study guide" that doesn't produce as close a reading as these
tutorial questions produce.
If you want to see a slightly earlier version of this, there is still
a page on the department's public
website that shows how it works. It's here:
http://academics.triton.edu/uc/kant1.html
So yes, reading Kant matters, especially to freshmen community
college students, and yes, it is
important to adopt to the "ways and manners of our students" as well.
-------------------------------------------------
"Never attribute to malice that which can be
explained by incompetence and ignorance."
-------------------------------------------------
John Wager john.wager1@xxxxxxxxxxx
Lisle, IL, USA
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