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Russell's avatar

I would also consider as a potential factor here the ongoing attempts to 'Diversify' and 'Decolonise' the Eng Lit curriculum. I know from ten years as a secondary English teacher in the UK that these initiatives are having an impact on what students are taught and how the subject is presented to them right from the moment you would expect them to begin getting stuck into challenging literature texts - year 7 or 8. The upshot of this is that texts that were previously picked for their heavyweight status as classic works of literary brilliance that we once believed all young people had a right to inherit from us, are now being ousted for their whiteness, straightness and maleness. In some cases, these precious curriculum slots are then being filled with thin and unsubstantial 'modern' texts like verse novels where the majority of the study time is dedicated to discussions about racism and misogyny and class divide and the literary skill of the writer pales in comparison to your Orwells, Steinbecks and Millers. If this is the experience of literature for 11-16 year olds, taught by a teacher who apologises for and criticises the subject rather than advocating for and selling it to future students, then it's no wonder huge numbers of young people don't value it or view it as something worth studying post-16. Don't get me wrong, I think you CAN make a legitimate case for 'critiquing the Canon' from a 'diverse voices' perspective, but not until you teach the Canon to young people in the first place and give them all a fair crack at taking it apart from a variety of perspectives once they reach a certain level of expertise (at age 16). At this stage, they will have the disciplinary and substantive knowledge of the subject and can begin to pick up the various critical lenses that are- from what I can work out- virtually inescapable at A-Level and undergrad level. But whilst 12 and 13 year olds are experiencing the subject as just another tedious extension of the Culture Wars, a select few will be extremely interested while many, many others will feel disillusioned, disaffected, excluded, and bored to tears.

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Gogs's avatar

We seem to be falling into a binary world where there is no "grey area" and opposites are not complementary, as in yin-yang, but antagonistic. Science is supposed to be an ongoing process, but we are told "this is the science" ie it is fixed, and there's nothing to be discussed. Much of the latter is cynical and designed to manipulate us, but people do seem to have more black and white attitudes, which is regressive IMHO and really not healthy for individuals and society. The humanities, I think, open us to those grey areas, and to the actual "reality" of the world being in a state of becoming, as recognised by the great philosophers. And I'm no expert, but no doubt studying maths and literature will use different parts of the brain, which seems good "exercise" to me. I'm not innumerate, but maths is more or less another country. I only got so far in my attempt to read and understand Fermat's Last Theorem, but at least I tried! In any case "proper" reading is being forced to one side by the smartphones and the like, and the majority of people don't have the time and/or are losing the ability to read short stories let alone novels.

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