The Well Educated Mind: A Guide to the Classical Education You Never Had by Susan Wise Bauer

Source of book: I own this

Date originally posted on Facebook: May 16, 2011

This book served as a partial inspiration for my blog, and indeed my project to continue to expand my knowledge and experience throughout the rest of my life.

In addition, Ms. Bauer’s educational philosophy fit well with what my wife and I were already planning to do for our own children. Neither of us has been thrilled with the trend within the Christian homeschooling movement - and strong in our local area - away from a focus on academics and toward indoctrination into a certain “worldview” that includes a lot of poisonous ideas about gender, race, politics, and so on. This divide has gotten rather contentious, and those of us who vary from the Gender Essentialist, Young Earth Creationism, Women should stay home with the kids, Television is evil, and on and on tend to not fit in so well.

In fact, even posting this review in 2011 earned me a rather violently disapproving comment from a person I won’t name, because he/she had been alerted that the book didn’t have an “orthodox” reading of the meaning of Animal Farm. Because Bauer tends to reject the hyper-conservative, libertarian, anglo-centric view of the world that many believe to be a central tenet of the Christian faith, she is very much outside of the circle of “acceptable” authors within this worldview.

I’ll also note as a follow up that we have continued to use Ms. Bauer’s history curriculum and have found it to be quite good. (It avoids both the “Manifest Destiny” crap and the made up “facts” of so much of Christian history curriculum these days (hello, David Barton) and also the  ever changing and “trendy” focus that exists in much mainstream curriculum to justify selling a new edition every couple of years.)

***

Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to his nephew, Thomas Mann Randolph Jr., advised him regarding his plans to take courses at the university. In this letter, Jefferson stated that while lectures were useful in the sciences, most knowledge was best acquired by a course of reading.

It is with this in mind that literature professor and home school mother Susan Wise Bauer wrote The Well Educated Mind.

I became acquainted with Ms. Bauer after my wife ordered her history curriculum, The Story of the World. Some fellow homeschooling friends of ours have started using them, and found them useful. My wife then borrowed The Well Educated Mind from the library. We liked it so much that we bought several copies for gifts.

The intention of this book is to assist those who wish to become familiar with the classics of Western thought without having to spend years and tens of thousands of dollars pursuing a specialty degree in literature. Bauer is correct that the classics used to be considered a necessary body of knowledge for any well bred (or well read) person. Unfortunately, they seem to be rarely taught at the undergraduate level, let alone in high school. The result is that the vast majority of ostensibly educated Americans (and others) lack the basic knowledge and skills to read and understand the great works of our cultural heritage. (Obviously, there are exceptions, but it is often disappointing to discover how few classic books otherwise well educated people have read.)

Bauer divides her book into two sections. The first is a primer on preparing for a classical education: skills such as reading at basic to advanced levels, the trivium (grammar, logic, rhetoric), and note taking. The second is her list and summary of the most important works in each of five basic genres: the novel, autobiography, history, drama, and poetry.

I agree strongly with Bauer as to her basic approach. To some degree, I have been using similar techniques to educate myself since my teens. In following my mother’s lead, I have read voraciously since a child; I have taken notes here and there, particularly since passing age 30.

I also agree that much of this part of education is best done outside the classroom. Too little of modern education focuses on the great works anymore. Either they are considered too difficult and therefore uninteresting for the average student, or they are dismissed as relics of a distant and bigoted past. 

Unfortunately, this means that so many of the best thoughts man has had since the dawn of time are now being forgotten by all except a few specialists.

The second part of the book is interesting both in what it includes and what it omits. Bauer attempts to distill the list to the essentials. For the most part, I found I agreed with what she includes, but tended to wish she included additional selections. Of course, for the literarily minded, this is at least half the fun. Amanda and I spent hours discussing what we wanted to read from the lists, and all of the books we would recommend adding to it. This discussion could go on all day, but I would say the bottom line is that a person could do much worse than reading the books on the list.

A further benefit of the lists is that Bauer has identified inexpensive and quality editions of the works listed. In books requiring translation, she has recommended accessible and worthwhile translations. I did find myself leaning toward the more traditional (and therefore “outdated” translations. For example, I am fond of the Robert Fitzgerald translation of Homer. On the other hand, her quotations from the Seamus Heaney translation of Beowulf and the Robert Pinsky translation of Inferno are sufficient for me to consider adding these to my collection.

Certainly, I intend to use these resources in continuing my autodidact lifestyle. I would consider this book a good starting point for anyone who wishes to continue to learn after formal education has ended.

Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts by Clive James

Source of book: I own this.
Date originally published on Facebook: August 4, 2010

This review is one of my early ones, and has been a jumping-off point for the discovery of other works. (Thy Hand, Great Anarch is one.)  I would say that Cultural Amnesia remains one of the top five non-fiction books I have ever read. I highly recommend it to all who care about freedom, totalitarianism, history, morality, or the arts.

This book has been my non-fiction project for the last 6 months. I originally discovered this book because Slate.com published a few excerpts. I was fascinated, and decided to buy the book myself. I was certainly not disappointed, but have enjoyed the journey, discovering a significant list of books to read in the future.

What kind of book is this? An unusual collection of essays? What is the theme? That is harder to say, as any attempt to do so would leave out at least one key facet. Perhaps it is best to say that it is Clive James’ musings on the totalitarian disaster of the 20th Century, as seen through key figures in thought and art. But even that falls short. An Australian by birth, James has spent the better part of 40 years writing and reading in numerous languages, and perhaps exemplifies the modern international renaissance man. He doesn’t just write about historical figures, he has read their works in the original language, and more often than not succeeds in linking them by ideas and history across borders of geography and era.

There are a total of 107 essays, all on individuals, arranged alphabetically across 851 pages of fairly small print.

The names range from the familiar: Louis Armstrong, G. K. Chesterton, Sigmund Freud, John Keats; to the infamous: Trotsky, Hitler, Mao; to the names you probably should know: Anna Akhamatova, Raymond Aron, Miguel de Unamuno; to the truly obscure: Sophie Scholl, Golo Mann. There are heroes, such as Albert Camus, and villains such as Sartre. All the essays include at least one memorable quote from the individual.

The essays are not biographical sketches, nor do they stick strictly to the topic. They use the person, an idea, a quote, as a leaping-off-point for a discussion which rarely fails to draw the reader in, leaving him with a new perspective.

A key element of the appeal of this book is James’ command of the language. He writes well, very well: the book would perhaps be fun to read for the language alone, even absent the ideas. However, the ideas themselves are the heart of the book.

James recognizes that civilization itself survived two great threats in the last century: Nazism and Communism. What shook James to his core was that many of the figures of culture, learning, and art not only failed to see the threat, but cooperated with it. In most of those cases, the end was the destruction of the art and usually the person with it. Such a despicable character as Sartre survived only because the Allies rescued France.

I feel that words fail me to describe this book in a way that makes it sound as good as it is. I would list it in the top 5 non-fiction books I have ever read. I quoted sections to my long-suffering wife on nearly a nightly basis.

Here are few of the quotes, both from the subjects and the writer:

“[M]ore recently, there have been rap lyrics distinguishable from the “Horst Wessel Song” only in being less well written.” (From the introduction)

“When we talk about the imponderables of life, we don’t really mean that we can’t ponder them. We mean that we can’t stop.” (Introduction)

“Solitudeinem faciunt, pacem appellant.” ~Tacitus (They make a desert and they call it peace.) Perhaps one of the best statements of the results of totalitarianism ever written.

“Tyrants conduct monologues above a million solitudes” ~Albert Camus

“’Better to be wrong with Sartre than right with Aron’ is still meant to be a slogan testifying to political seriousness, rather than to intellectual suicide. (From the essay on Raymond Aron)

“In the course of the last forty years, the only part of the world that has enjoyed peace is the continent divided between two zones of political civilization both of them armed with atomic bombs.” ~Raymond Aron, in The Last Years of the Century.

There is much, much more, including whole paragraphs to lengthy to quote here on the philosophy of art, music, and so much else.

I will end with the opening of his excellent essay on Trotsky.

“After being murdered at Stalin’s orders, Lev Davidovich Bronstein, alias Leon Trotsky (1879-1940), lived on for decades as the unassailable hero of aesthetically minded progressives who wished to persuaded themselves that there could be a vegetarian version of communism. Trotsky could write, orate, loved women, and presented enough of a threat to the established Soviet power structure (admittedly showing signs of rigidity by then) that it should want to track him down to his hiding place in Mexico and rub him out. It followed, or seemed to follow, that Trotsky must have embodied a more human version of the historic force that sacrificed innocent people to egalitarian principle: a version that would sacrifice fewer of them, in a nicer way. Alas, it followed only if the facts were left out. “

Buy or borrow this book. Read it, and see if your perspective on the 20th Century is not expanded and enlightened.

Mr. Gallion’s School, by Jesse Stuart

Source of book: Borrowed from the library
Date originally posted on Facebook: June 20, 2010.

Note: I love Jesse Stuart's short stories, and enjoyed his autobiographical The Thread that Runs So True. Among other attractions, that book contains one of the best butt-kicking scenes of all time, when the author wipes the floor with a larger, recalcitrant adult student. He also gets points for introducing me to both the Faith Holiness movement and the Free Will Baptists. Although I didn't love this book, I highly recommend his other works, particularly those with snakes in them.

"I am firm in my belief that a teacher lives on and on through his students. Good teaching is forever and the and the teacher is immortal." - Jesse Stuart

Jesse Stuart (1907-1984) is one of the unfairly neglected authors that I need to put on a list some day. Stuart was born in Kentucky, and lived there much of his life. This is not to suggest that he had a narrow range of experience or vision. However, his best writing is about Appalachia, and it always seemed to have held a place in his heart.

Stuart was a teacher by trade, and wrote what may be the best autobiography by a teacher, The Thread that Runs So True. His first assignment, a one room schoolhouse recently vacated by his elder sister, who was beaten up by an older student, came at the old age of 17. In one memorable scene, he is accosted alone in the schoolhouse by the bully, who attempts to do the same to him. Stuart lays him out, and leaves a bloodstain on the new pine floor which serves as an unspoken disciplinary tool.

Unfortunately, Mr. Gallion’s School is not one of his stronger books. It resembles, to me, an odd and uncomfortable hybrid between a novel and a polemic. The title character comes out of a medical retirement to take over a troubled high school he had once led. In the course of a year, he makes significant, but incomplete progress in restoring the school to order. The plot itself tends to get bogged down in the extended soliloquies. These can be interesting as a discussion of educational philosophy, but tend to then in turn be interrupted by the development of the plot.

The philosophy itself is fascinating, coming at that point in time when the optimism of John Dewey met the crumbling of civil society that began in the 1950s. Stuart, like many, believed that the salvation of the world would come from education, that ignorance was the true root of evil. On the other hand, he received much criticism for his advocacy for corporal punishment, even of high school students, as an alternative to expulsion. Whether you agree or disagree, there is no denying that Stuart was an involved educator at each level of responsibility, taking a personal interest in each student, and practicing exactly what he preached. I would have loved to have taken one of his classes.

What is truly sad is that Stuart seems to have been forgotten as an author. His fiction probably lacks the requisite pessimism necessary to succeed as a 20th century author. What it lacks in pessimism, it more than makes up for in an eye for realistic detail, an abiding love for nature and the mountains, and a kind heart toward the eccentric people he lived among.

I would recommend My Land Has A Voice (Short Stories) or The Thread that Runs So True as a good introduction.

How to Write A Sentence and How to Read One by Stanley Fish

Source of Book: I own this

I am a grammar snob. I freely own it. I might even be an insufferable grammar snob.

My library contains a number of reference books. Not one but two unabridged dictionaries, not one but three quotation reference books. And, of course, the venerable Strunk and White. (The Elements of Style, for those outside the circle.)

 Just some of my books on writing and style. 

Note how worn my High School reference book is these days.

How to Write a Sentence and How to Read One is the latest addition to my collection. It isn’t a reference book, and it isn’t meant to answer specific questions of grammar, usage, or style. Rather, it is meant to go beyond the rote answers of Strunk and White to the actual construction of a good sentence. I reference The Elements of Style regularly, and Fish acknowledges its reputation and usefulness, to a point.

“No doubt this praise is deserved if the person using the book already knows how to write; already knows, that is, what a sentence is.”

As Fish elaborates, knowledge of the parts of speech and other grammatical building blocks is insufficient. A person must instinctively know how to build the sentence structure, or the rest is incomprehensible. The key, according to Fish, is to understand how the sentence brings the words into relationships with each other.

“A little while back I observed that many people are put off writing because they fear committing one or more of the innumerable errors that seem to lie in wait for them every step of composition. But if one understands that a sentence is a structure of logical relationships and that the number of relationships involved is finite, one understands too that there is only one error to worry about, the error of being illogical…”

In my experience writing, and in editing, this is true. While many errors can be said to violate rules – and they do – they also violate some logical relationship. In the very worst sentences, the writer has lost all sense of how each part of the sentence relates to the others. It becomes incomprehensible.

This is why Strunk and White can mislead. Following the stylistic suggestions accomplishes nothing if the writer applies them without an eye toward the relationships within the sentence.

“The first thing to ask when writing a sentence is ‘What am I trying to do?’”

Fish then proceeds to work through some ideas for “practice” sentence structures. These examples are useful, in my opinion, to gain a knowledge of the skeleton of certain effective sentences.

Generally, I recommend that anyone who wishes to write must read. In particular, one must read well written writing. Alas! I know several self-proclaimed “writers” who read little if anything beyond formulaic page-turners: their writing betrays that fact.

Fish makes a good point, though, that it is helpful to understand the underlying structure of effective writing, and to practice the use of that structure.

In addition to the specific sentence forms, Fish explores the difference between the subordinating style and the additive style. (The subordinating style relates the elements within the sentence in terms of hierarchy, relationship, and time. The additive style tends to run from one idea to another within the sentence, without attempting to relate them.) Fish makes the interesting point that the difference is, in a certain way, theological. The subordinating style assumes a certain ability to control the world (at least within the writing itself), whereas the additive style assumes that the world is bigger and stronger than the author’s attempt to organize it.

“In a world created and presided over by an omnipresent God who fills all the available spaces, the distinctions between things, persons, and events are illusory, a function of a partial, divided, and dividing consciousness.”

It certainly is an interesting concept, and Fish quotes amazing examples of each style from a wide range of authors.

The book also spends a few chapters discussing first and last sentences. I was reminded of the genius of Milton, Donne, James, and Conrad; and introduced to delicious sentences by Martin Luther King, Jr. and Anthony Powell which will bear quoting in other contexts in the future.

A deliciously enjoyable book, and an excellent addition to my collection. As Fish summarizes it, “[I]f you know how sentences are put together in the abstract – as formal devices for delivering a nonformal payoff – you will be that much better able to engage with them, to take their measure in full, to receive what they have to give.”

Reading With my Kids: The Phantom Tollbooth

Source of book: I own it. 

What if “jumping to conclusions” was more than an idiom? What if you actually jumped, and found yourself on an island named “conclusions”? These and other phrases are interpreted delightfully literally in this children’s classic by Norton Juster.

Written in 1961, and inspired by Lewis Carroll and the Marx Brothers, it is a modern fairy tale filled with puns and unexpected developments. I remember my mother reading this to me the first time, when I was fairly young. I’m sure some of the figures of speech had to be explained to me then, but I still found it hilarious. I re-read it several times, as a child, as a teen, and even as an adult. It really is one of those books that can appeal to any age – assuming of course that the reader has not been robbed of his sense of humor or sense of wonder by the Senses Taker. See, I cannot resist making a reference to the story even now.

Since the plot is part of the fun, I will avoid spoilers. Milo is a chronically bored boy, who thinks nothing is worth doing, nothing is worth thinking, and nothing is really important. He comes home from his boring day at school to find a tollbooth in his room. He jumps in his toy car and sets out – he has nothing better to do anyway. He meets a host of odd characters, finds a quest, and sees it to its end.

My kids are (currently) 8, 7, 6, 3, and 1. Obviously, the younger two have a limited understanding. They are at the “listen to Daddy read” stage, however, so they get to sit in whenever they wish. The older ones are clearly able to grasp much of the humor. They were particularly fond of King Azaz’s advisers, who say everything in five different, largely redundant ways.

            “Do all of those words mean the same thing?” gasped Milo.

            “Of course.”

            “Certainly.”

            “Precisely.”

            “Exactly”

            “Yes,” they replied in order.

They also liked the Everpresent Wordsnatcher, a dirty bird who comes from Context, but is never there.

“Let me try once more," Milo said in an effort to explain. "In other words --"
"You mean you have other words?" cried the bird happily. "Well, by all means, use them. You're certainly not doing very well with the ones you have now.”

There is much more, of course, which makes this book one rewarding for both parents and children. I therefore recommend that you not let your children read this one on their own. Far better to share it than let the kids have all the fun.

***

Update April 2020: I read this one to the two younger kids now that they are old enough, and it was a hit. My 11 year old particularly got the wordplay and puns and humor, and laughed all through it. My 9 year old had to have a few things explained, but she had fun as well. This is still one of my all time favorite kids' books, and it has aged well. The ideas of rhyme and reason ruling our world, knowledge and wisdom prevailing over ignorance and prejudice, and the necessity of seeing things from others' points of view are timeless - and particularly timely in our current era of aggressive and intentional ignorance, disdain of knowledge and expertise, and celebration of bigotry. 

Literary and Musical Highlights from this Christmas

When I was a kid, there was one present that was sure to please me, regardless of size or cost: Legos. If you wanted to be sure the gift would be loved, that was the easiest way. The other sure-fire gift was that of books. While not all books would be equally loved, it was not hard to find me a book I would like. Aunt Patty, I still remember Watership Down – I even wore out the original copy.

Now that I am mostly grown up, my kids get the legos (don’t ask who plays with them), but I still get the books. Music can also be a good gift, now that Amazon wish lists are available to determine which titles are not already part of my collection. (That’s the hazard of buying music for a musician.)

This Christmas demonstrated that my family knows me pretty well. A few new additions that I am particularly excited about this year:

[Note: this post has been updated with links to my reviews of these books.]

1. Gitanjali (Offerings of Song) by Rabindranath Tagore

 Technically, this is a birthday present, not a Christmas present. It just took my brother until Christmas to remember to bring it. This is Tagore’s most famous collection of poems, the one best known to the Western world. He became the first non-European author to receive the Nobel Prize in literature as a result. The book itself is a gorgeous small hardback, illustrated with paintings by Mark W. McGinnis. I’m really eager to read this, but it is one of those books that are fun even to hold.

2. Inferno by Dante, translated by Robert Pinsky

 My beloved wife knew I had been lusting after this book. I already have two versions of the complete Divine Comedy, each of which is completely different and interesting in its own way. I am already a huge fan of Pinsky both for his own poetry and his ongoing efforts to bring the discussion and love of poetry to a wider audience. When I read a small sample of this translation, I was hooked. If the small taste is an indication of the whole, this will be an exciting adventure.

3. How to Write a Sentence by Stanley Fish

I already have Strunk & White (if I have to explain, you probably wouldn’t care anyway), and a host of other books on writing and style. Grammar snobs across the literary world have lauded this book. Thus, it belongs on my shelf.

4. England Under the Stuarts by G. M. Trevelyan

 This book is one in the History of England series by Trevelyan. My wife, who knows library sales like none other, found this used (but probably unread) Folio Society hardback for next to nothing. Another beautiful book just begging to be savored late at night with a glass of claret or port. Although, since the Stuarts were from Scotland, perhaps a fine scotch would fit better.

5. Lux Æterna by Morten Lauridsen

 This one is music, not reading. Lauridsen is a modern, but not modernist, composer. Lux Æterna is a choral work, almost, but not exactly, a requiem. I hope some day to write a longer blog post on requiems. They fascinate and speak to me in a powerful way, which I would love to explore in words. This CD also contains Les Chansons des Roses, Ave Maria, and Mid-Winter Songs. I am not familiar with these works. Something new to go with something beloved. Thanks to my sister-in-law and her husband for this one.

The Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations by Charles Harrington Elster

Source of Book: I own this – library sale find

One of the big pitfalls for the avid reader is that of learning words from reading and not from speaking. In our glorious language of English, where the spelling of words is remarkably disconnected from their pronunciation, this can lead to mispronounced words. I certainly have been guilty of this, and have heard plenty of violations from others.

This book is a significant aid in overcoming that problem. Elster combines his two previous pronunciation guides, Is There a Cow in Moscow? and There is no Zoo in Zoology in one larger volume.

This book has been a very long term project for me. I have read little bits here and there for the last two years. A little at a time is best anyway, at least if the intent is to remember what has been read.

One of the first things I realized when reading this book is that pronunciations vary with time and place. Language tends to evolve over time, and many pronunciations from 100 years ago would sound absurd now. It also became obvious that, Henry Higgins notwithstanding, our neighbors across the ocean are as bad as we are. Not only have we adopted British pronunciations, often as a pseudo-sophisticated affectation; they have done the same with our peculiarities.

Also interesting to me were the words that appear to be in transition. The ostensibly correct pronunciation has been nearly lost, and a formerly unthinkable one has risen to prominence. This means that I disagreed in a few cases with the author.

In other cases, I discovered some incorrect or at least sloppy mispronunciations of my own. A few arose from hearing them mispronounced by others, but most came from lack of use in actual speech. I simply imagined what they would sound like from seeing the words on the page.

I particularly liked Elster’s explanations of common pronunciations, either correct or incorrect. For example, he introduces the concept of syncope (SING-kuh-pee), which is the loss of sounds or letters from the middle of words. This has occurred in very old words, such as Worcestershire (WUUS-tur-shur); and in common, everyday words like family and chocolate. In many cases, the compressed pronunciation is quite correct. However, this has led to errors in spelling as the omitted letters are actually omitted.

Elster also details which words should have all of the sounds pronounced. A lawyer, for example, would use subsidiary, and pronounce it suhb-SID-ee-ER-ee.

There are other interesting tidbits here and there, such as word history and origin. English has borrowed from many languages, including Latin and French. Some of these thefts occurred hundreds of years ago, so attempting to pronounce the words in the original language is incorrect, and pretentious. In other cases, the theft is recent, and the word itself may not have fully crossed over to and anglicized pronunciation. Elster particularly condemns using “pseudo-French” or “pseudo-Latin” by mixing the original and the anglicized pronunciation in the same word.

And then, there are the cases where the two are in conflict. I had a bit of a dispute with a cousin of mine regarding the unforgettable knight of fiction created by Miguel de Cervantes. Don Quixote is correctly pronounced kee-HOH-tay or kee-HOH-tee. If you can manage the actual Spanish pronunciation, even better. Despite being a figment of fiction, he is a “real” person, and should have his name pronounced as he would wish. By contrast, the adjective quixotic is pronounced kwik-SAHT-ik, as the term has been anglicized for centuries.

I also should mention two entries that particularly stuck in my mind.

First is the word “zounds”. (Rhyming with rounds, by the way.) I assumed this word originated in the 1960s along with groovy. So much for that theory. Elster traced it to a contraction of a profanity first seen in print in the 1600s. (It is shorthand for “by God’s wounds”. Who knew?) Why this one survived and ’sblood didn’t is one of the mysteries of life.

Second is synecdoche (si-NEK-duh-kee), which I had observed in print, but lacked the confidence to say in public. I thus avoided it in writing for fear that I might be asked about it and misspeak. Now that I know without a doubt, I intend to use this word in future reviews and essays. You have been warned!

This book is an excellent addition to the reader, writer, and speaker’s bookshelf. It shall reside on mine with other favorite reference books: Strunk & White, Eats, Shoots, and Leaves, and a few by Richard Lederer.

Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know, by E. D. Hirsch, Jr.

Source of book: Lent to me by Peter Wonderly

For those of my friends and/or followers who know Peter, he is one of the best educated persons I know, either in spite of or because of his colorful history. Peter has devoted a significant portion of his life attempting to impart education to continuation students, a seemingly hopeless job.

I would venture to say he lent me this book because he figured I would be one of the few in his acquaintance to truly care about cultural literacy and its decline. If that was the case, he was correct.

This book discusses, obviously, cultural literacy. The author defines this as the body of knowledge which educated (that is, literate) adults know and take for granted in everyday speech and writing that others know as well. For example, in a typical newspaper article, the author assumes that the reader is familiar with the three branches of government here in the United States. Unfortunately, these assumptions are increasingly incorrect as applied to the population at large.

Hirsch identifies this decline in literacy, this decline in shared knowledge enabling communication, as stemming from an educational philosophy first articulated by Rousseau. (Note at this point that I have assumed that my readers are familiar with Rousseau. And with the concept of educational philosophy.) This idea was that education should not be the memorization of a set list of facts, but rather the learning of the process of learning. This was popularized in the United States by John Dewey in the form of an educational emphasis on learning the mechanics of reading, critical thinking, etc., with the idea that learning these abstract skills will then translate to the ability to learn the facts in any area of knowledge.

Hirsch argues persuasively that the facts themselves are necessary to even learn, much less use, the raw skills. Particularly in the area of reading, the mechanics of understanding the words is less useful than understanding what the words mean in the context of the culture. A reference to Shakespeare will only confuse a reader who can recognize the word, but not the man or the concepts evoked by him.

So far, this idea, although perhaps radical in our time, is well defended by Hirsch. I certainly find myself in his camp on this issue. Critical thinking and reading with comprehension are so tied up with the background facts that both need to be developed simultaneously. I find myself in my conversations with my children having to focus on the basic building blocks of knowledge. We have laid some basic foundations in biology, physics, and chemistry in order to discuss the world around us. This applies to my 5 year old as much as to my 8 year old. Electricity is mysterious unless the structure of the atom is understood.

Where I tend to part ways with Hirsch is in two vital areas. First, what is the cause of the decline in cultural literacy? Second, what is the cure for the decline?

Hirsch argues that the decline in cultural literacy, although its philosophical roots date back to Rousseau, truly accelerated in the 1970s. Since I lack the knowledge or resources (or memory, for that matter) to determine the issue for myself, I will accept this as fact. Certainly, by the time I was in high school in the 1990s, I felt like an alien among my peers because I was literate in this sense.

Hirsch attempts to blame the decline on the change in educational philosophy. (Rousseau and Dewey, again.) The problem with this argument is that these ideas really were implemented in large part one or two generations prior to the decline. Perhaps the knowledge took a few generations to disappear. Or perhaps the schools were not as important to the transfer of cultural knowledge as he thought.

This ties in, of course, with his proposed cure. He suggests, like plenty of educational theorists, that a change in curriculum is necessary. (So far, I can see his point) However, he also argues for a longer school day, longer school year, taking children away from their presumably ignorant parents for longer periods of time.

This is an easy, knee jerk reaction. (Again, notice that I assume you understand the reference.) To his credit, Hirsch is working with what he has: the ability to influence the educational establishment. However, he misses what I consider to be the fundamental point. Back in the “golden days” of shared literacy, school days and years were shorter. Thus, perhaps the time spent in school was not the determining factor.

Cultural literacy, like many other important facets of education, is not primarily learned in school. This is similar, of course, to the debate about the ever increasing obesity among Americans, which also gained significant momentum in the 1970s. Good nutrition, like shared knowledge, is primarily gained at home, through interaction with multiple generations of adults. What has disappeared is the one-on-one transfer of values and knowledge.

In my previous review of Sweetness and Power, I noted that the increase in sugar consumption was tied, not to its cheapness, but to its ease of preparation. It was a quick source of calories that did not require preparation time, thus being more convenient for a working parent to serve. I would argue that knowledge transfer has undergone the same transformation with the increasing employment of both parents, the loss of multiple generation households, and the decline of time spent communicating across the generations. Just as sugar was and is a quick source of calories, television and other less literate forms of entertainment require less work and time than the transfer of cultural knowledge.

I do not want to sound like I am discounting the contributions of teachers. Indeed, they play an important role in the transfer of knowledge. However, the system of education will never be sufficient for all that is needed. Each of us learns through all of our interactions. If we hear something at school that is not reinforced and expanded as we communicate to others, we forget what we heard. If we do not practice our literacy, it fades into distant memory at best. It is that constant honing of our background knowledge that transforms it from facts for the next test to a commonality of shared literacy. It is this that enables us to communicate with other literate individuals, though we may be separated by race, culture, location, or even time in history.

As a final note, the last 65 pages or so of this book list what the author has deemed a basic list of concepts necessary for cultural literacy. He developed the list with a few others specializing in other areas of knowledge, and then circulated the list for refinement to a large group of literate acquaintances. The author clearly indicates that this list is meant to be a start, not the final product, and solicits additions and subtractions.

I found this list to be interesting as a list of concepts to be mastered. I do, however, have a few cautions. First and most important, I would urge fellow home school parents to avoid panic. This list is best suited to college graduates, not elementary school children. This is the eventual goal, not that goal for your precocious 3^rd grader.

Second, this list is well suited to an adult. I found it a good gauge of the concepts I still needed to look at myself. I am, of course, in middle age. I learned plenty of these ideas after graduation. Learning is more of a lifelong process, not a final destination completed with a diploma or a degree.

I have no doubt that a person who learns the concepts in this book will be able to better communicate with other literate persons. In that light, I would recommend this book as a doorway to better knowledge, and an alternative to the Rousseau/Dewey educational philosophy.

Thoughts on Acadamia and The Life of the Mind

My higher educational experience was directed at the goal of obtaining my law degree, with the goal of having a career as a lawyer. To a degree, I regretted that my path did not allow me to explore the many other areas of knowledge that interested me. What had I missed?

 I have considered going back and taking some college classes, but found that I would have to take too many lower level classes to be "qualified" to take the ones that really interest me. For example, I would love to explore literature, but the classes that appear interesting are final year or graduate level classes. I have no interest in suffering through second year English - and others - just to get in the class I wanted.
I was reminded of this by a recent article in Slate.com on Humanities Grad School.

http://www.slate.com/id/2300107/

The article highlights the problems inherent in higher education these days, particularly in the humanities. There are a limited number of decent jobs one can get with such a degree, and these are primarily, if not exclusively, within academia itself. (There are other good points in the article regarding the use of student teachers, etc.) Considering the cost and the time commitment required, is it even worth pursuing studies in the humanities? As the article rightly concludes, only those with independent resources who will not be needing jobs to support themselves later can really count on a good return.

This ties in with my self-education project, of course. On the one hand, education in the humanities is overpriced for its monetary value. On the other, the system itself makes it difficult for those who wish to study for personal enrichment to do so while earning a degree in a more practical field.

Fortunately, it is possible to gain knowledge outside of the classroom, although it requires additional effort to plan one's own education. For practical reasons, the future of study and knowledge in the humanities lies primarily outside of academia. As things are now, few can truly afford to devote themselves to a degree in these areas, and few outside of these programs have more than a passing knowledge. If we as a society are to have hope of retaining a shared knowledge and love of history, literature, philosophy, languages, and the arts; we are going to have to acquire this knowledge for ourselves.

The closing line of the article states it best:

As more and more people are learning, universities do not have a monopoly on the "life of the mind."