“Felski proposes a pragmatic approach to reading literature. Opposing the exclusive focus on otherness in contemporary literary theory, she offers a correction by balancing otherness with the acknowledgment of the presence of the self in reading literature.” (Choice Reviews, December 2008)
Oh for the (drawing) pen of Max Beerbohm.
” Genetic research finally makes its way into the thinking of sociologists” is a short piece in The Chronicle of Higher Education describing a special edition of the American Journal of Sociology.
An article by Allan Horwitz, of Rutgers, and Brandeis’s Sara Shostak, takes what might be called a traditional sociological approach, discussing the social construction of depression and homosexuality. Whatever the genetic basis of those conditions, they explain, one has been intensely “medicalized,” while the other, thanks to the efforts of activists, is now largely considered to be part of normal human variation. In short, there is no truth “in the body.”
So one day soon all the people who thought their depression an illness will discover that their experiences are ‘part of normal human variation’ and can come out proud and strong and Reclaim the Day.
Pupils are being rewarded for writing obscenities in their GCSE English examinations even when it has nothing to do with the question.
One pupil who wrote f*** was given marks for accurate spelling and conveying a meaning successfully.
His paper was marked by Peter Buckroyd, a chief examiner who has instructed fellow examiners to mark in the same way. He told trainee examiners recently to adhere strictly to the mark scheme, to the extent that pupils who wrote only expletives on their papers should be awarded points.
Hat tip to Ben Goldacre’s Bad Science.
Swift would have enjoyed Buckroyd.
Forged from the precious metals of the opulent age of the Czars, and tempered in the crucible of Communism, the orchestras of the former Soviet Union occupy a position in world culture that is truly unique. It is a privilege to be the first American record company to have captured the essence of these great orchestras in their native city.? (Waterlily Acoustics)
Now that’s what I call revisionism.