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Last night, my beloved daughter was ranting about how she can't do the kind of "bullshit" they want her to do in her history/literature Classic Mythology class -- that is, interpret Greek vases and writings -- because it's all made up and bullshit and it's not like math! How the hell did I raise two kids who say crap like this? I'm an anthropologist by training, damn it! And I did lots of art and literature interpretation in my time!
Anyway, this morning she sent me this link (though, dear, you must have hand typed the link, because I had to correct it to get there). It's a fun link.
I'm trying to figure out how to explain explication and interpretation -- she still has three more gen ed classes of this type to get through after this in order to graduate.
It's not bullshit, except when it is, for starters. When it is bullshit, it's bullshit for the same reason that bullshit science is bullshit: bad faith manipulation of the source material. Leaving out important investigative steps that are there to safeguard the honesty of the process. That kind iof thing.
There is more fuzziness to humanities, but there is fuzziness to all interpretations of observations. The greater fuzziness in humanities is partly due to the fact that there is fuzziness in the boundaries between object, subject, medium, information, method and reporting. But you know what else is fuzzy? The boundary between humanities and science, and most certainly the boundary between humanities thinking and science thinking. Don't give me that "two cultures" crap. For one thing, the two cultures crap irritates me because it marginalizes me personally yet afuckinggain. I'm in the margin for everything else, and it gets old.
Okay, now I have to go make lunch.
On another front: I did get to the touchscreen/ballot scanner class last night, though late, because if you have to go to something at the Emeline county buildings complex and you don't have really precise directions you have to give up and go home and get the really precise directions. I did find out there is a back way out of the complex, besides the really creepy narrow route under Highway One: it's the really creepy frontage road that follows Highway Seventeen and eventually takes you to one of those cult ghost towns. And there's no place to turn around in the dark till you get to the entrance ramp to Highway Seventeen.
However, I am pleased to announce that our federally-mandated electronic voting machines are state-mandated to have nearly ungameable paper trails, and have other honesty-checks built into every step of the way. They're also not connected by ethernet or whatever, so they can't be gamed from outside in real time.
When I first moved to this county, election fraud was a way of life. Ballot boxes would disappear for hours. Precincts would be counted with more Republican votes than there were voters. All that kind of stuff. Yes, in small stakes Santa Cruz county. Then there came the University and the Progressive Revolution -- I was a pollwatcher long before I was an election clerk.
So, anyway, no rain today. And forty-three pounds for sure, it's held for several days.
Anyway, this morning she sent me this link (though, dear, you must have hand typed the link, because I had to correct it to get there). It's a fun link.
I'm trying to figure out how to explain explication and interpretation -- she still has three more gen ed classes of this type to get through after this in order to graduate.
It's not bullshit, except when it is, for starters. When it is bullshit, it's bullshit for the same reason that bullshit science is bullshit: bad faith manipulation of the source material. Leaving out important investigative steps that are there to safeguard the honesty of the process. That kind iof thing.
There is more fuzziness to humanities, but there is fuzziness to all interpretations of observations. The greater fuzziness in humanities is partly due to the fact that there is fuzziness in the boundaries between object, subject, medium, information, method and reporting. But you know what else is fuzzy? The boundary between humanities and science, and most certainly the boundary between humanities thinking and science thinking. Don't give me that "two cultures" crap. For one thing, the two cultures crap irritates me because it marginalizes me personally yet afuckinggain. I'm in the margin for everything else, and it gets old.
Okay, now I have to go make lunch.
On another front: I did get to the touchscreen/ballot scanner class last night, though late, because if you have to go to something at the Emeline county buildings complex and you don't have really precise directions you have to give up and go home and get the really precise directions. I did find out there is a back way out of the complex, besides the really creepy narrow route under Highway One: it's the really creepy frontage road that follows Highway Seventeen and eventually takes you to one of those cult ghost towns. And there's no place to turn around in the dark till you get to the entrance ramp to Highway Seventeen.
However, I am pleased to announce that our federally-mandated electronic voting machines are state-mandated to have nearly ungameable paper trails, and have other honesty-checks built into every step of the way. They're also not connected by ethernet or whatever, so they can't be gamed from outside in real time.
When I first moved to this county, election fraud was a way of life. Ballot boxes would disappear for hours. Precincts would be counted with more Republican votes than there were voters. All that kind of stuff. Yes, in small stakes Santa Cruz county. Then there came the University and the Progressive Revolution -- I was a pollwatcher long before I was an election clerk.
So, anyway, no rain today. And forty-three pounds for sure, it's held for several days.
no subject
But I've thought about the question of "why are the humanities important?" quite a bit. And my best answer is this if people are looking for a hard sounding reason (as if simply being able to appreciate cultural works better isn't enough!) is this: we are surrounded by people who tell us a lot of things with words and images. Politicians and advertising rates very high on the list of people who cleverly manipulate us with words and images. To learn to meaningfully interpret words and images helps us deconstruct the hidden meaning behind malicious political and business speech. To not be fooled by clever lies. To get specific, I often give the example of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. There aren't any. Anyone who actually listened to what was said, instead of the filthy rhetoric of warmongering politicians knew it, too. It was said by the chief UN weapon's inspector in Iraq, Hans Blix, and his predecessor, Scott Ritter. But most of the US believed the government's manipulation and carefully crafted images designed to instill fear in our hearts for the purpose of enacting a specific agenda. Even if your daughter saw through the bullshit of Iraq and WMD, there's something out there that is manipulating her, or something that will, something important, and the ability to analyze words and pictures is a vital defense against that sort of manipulation.