Story One:
Harvard approves biggest curriculum change in 30 years
Western civilization took another hit last week when Ivy League member Harvard University, one of the leading institutions of higher learning in America, overhauled its curriculum to place a higher emphasis on discussing "societies of the world" and the sciences (and the moral implications of advances in science). This is merely a continuation of the progressive philosophy of American education that is already so prevalent in our failing public schools. Call it what you will, but the moves by Harvard University are moves toward Multiculturalism and Scientism in higher education.Multiculturalism centers around the idea that Western Civilization has failed as a model for society and so modern societies should seek values and ideas from other cultures to fill this void left by the West. As Wikipedia puts it, "Multiculturalism is the idea that modern societies should embrace and include distinct cultural groups with equal social status." The only true difference in these definitions is my part about the failure of the West, which is an assumption of Multiculturalist thought.
The idea of considering ideas from other cultures doesn't sound too bad on the surface, but its implications on American education are huge. The trend of American education today says that we should teach our students to be, above all things, tolerant. It teaches students about other cultures under the presupposition that all cultures are equal. So the West is as good as the East, African culture is as valuable to us as Irish cultures, and the Jewish faith has accomplished exactly as much as Buddhism. The world is nothing more than a smorgasbord of equal cultures and all the modern student must do is have his fair share of each to be "educated."
This is obviously wrong. All cultures are not alike, nor are all cultures equal. The religion of China and the religion of the West are not the same nor comparable. The Irish have not accomplished as much in their history as the English or the Greeks. We live in a world of unique, individual cultures just as we live in a world of unique, individual people. If teachers are to teach children to be American citizens, they must become, above all things, experts in American history, and the history of America is not found in Africa or Latin America or the East, but in the West.
The effects of Multiculturalism already are apparent today as American students today leave schools with less knowledge of their country than ever before. However, what's most dangerous is that they leave school skeptical of their own heritage. Sure, every history has its dark moments, just as all people have fallen short of the glory of God, but that does not mean we throw the baby out with the bathwater; despite our efforts to eliminate our heritage, America is a product of the West.
I will leave Scientism for another day, but briefly, I will lay out the following argument. When we begin to emphasize the sciences in school, it tends to endorse the philosophy of materialism - that all we are is that which we can observe. While scientific observation is a way to better understand God's created order, it has its limits, especially in the realm of faith, ethics and morality. Science does not leave room for morality or religion. There is no quantitative measure for God or morality. If educators teach education outside its Christian context, science becomes an excuse to endorse a purely materialistic way of life. And I don't want to carry out this argument now, but this endorsement of materialism makes education's purpose purely utilitarian; that is, a materialist view of education makes students believe that the only purpose of education is to help them in getting more material wealth in the future instead of education being the means by which students become well-rounded people capable of being active citizens in their respective communities.
Stories Two and Three:
Louisiana school district sued over Bibles in school
Advocacy groups sue to halt Bible classes in Texas schoolsThere's nothing more refreshing than reading yet another story about the ACLU defending American "Freedom" from the poisons of Christianity. The American Civil Liberties Union has sued an eastern Louisiana school district for distributing Bibles on school property. As the story goes, students were instructed to pick up copies of the New Testament near the school's office. The fifth-grade student (whose parents filed the suit at the bidding of the ACLU) soon found herself in line with her class waiting to receive their Bibles from two men. Said the ACLU representative Joe Cook, "With her classmates and teachers looking on, Jane accepted the Bible out of a feeling of coercion and fear that she would be criticized, ridiculed and ostracized." This is the fifth time in thirteen years that the school district has been sued over religious issues.
In regards to this story, it's about time we get those nice gentlemen handing out Bibles out of our schools so we can concentrate our attention more fully on the secular humanist philosophies we cling to so dearly. I love this story. It's an example of a public school district (a parish school district at that) sticking it to the man by ignoring laws in order to teach the truth as they see it. And this isn't even the first time they've done it!
The only reason the ACLU cares is because the school took time that would normally be spent proclaiming its agnostic views in favor of Christianity. This is not an issue of freedom or about adherence to the constitution, it's an issue of a school not fitting into the standardized mold the government has put in place.
Did you read the quote from Mr. Cook?! Poor Jane was "coerced" into accepting a Bible from two men with her teachers and peers looking at her every move. You could make up a similar story about a Christian child in public schools being forced not only to accept but to read a Biology textbook proclaiming evolution as truth! But you will never hear of the ACLU fighting against the Scientism and Secular Humanism so prevalent in schools because its exactly what they want.
Jane may have accepted the Bible because the rest of her peers did, but no one made her read it. Not an ounce of Biblical teaching was disseminated during school hours and Jane still has her religious freedom. What this Louisiana school district does realize though, and unfortunately more school districts do not, is that it's what inside those Bibles that offer freedoms reaching above and beyond any freedoms man himself could ever legislate.
And now the third story. This one, another ACLU gem, is about two advocacy groups who have sued a Texas school district for offering a Bible course as an elective. The ACLU and the American Way Foundation (what euphemistic names!) have hailed the Bible course as "basically a Sunday School class within the walls of a public school."
This is a sticky subject. It is first necessary to recognize that the Bible class is an elective. Students attending the school are not required to take the class and can opt to have nothing to do with it. For that reason alone, this law suit will fail.
The real issue to me is if the Bible ought to be something taught in public schools or in private schools without Christian affiliations. I find it hard to make a judgment for all schools; that is, I would probably leave it in the hands of the parents, teachers, and school board members of each individual district and school to determine the best course of action.
Obviously, I would love Christian morality and Biblical teaching encouraged in a school setting. The Founding Fathers of our nation even thought that this was the best course of action in our schools. But the teaching would have to have a rherotical approach, meaning that the teacher would have to be laying out the thesis that Christianity or the Bible is indeed true. Many secular universities today offer courses on Christianity and the Bible, but the professors are adamate atheists or agnostics. They teach religion and Bible courses using a dialectic approach, laying out every religion as equal, every Biblical teaching as something Christians believe. Their approach is "here are the facts, but that's all you need to know so that you can interact with those people if the moment arises." Does this remind you of Multiculturalism? If schools are to teach the Bible, they must start with the presupposition that the Bible is true. If teachers desire to instill Christian morals in their students, they themselves must believe Christian morality is true and necessary.
Thanks for muscling through this series of essays. Please comment and raise counterarguments and I will answer on this forum.
Posts
2 comments:
story one:
Criticism. You describe multiculturalism as being tolerant, including and granting equality to distinct cultural groups, and then state that it is"obviously wrong." Are you implying that tolerance, inclusion, and equality are wrong? You lump together culture and religion as if they were one and the same. The history of America is in fact found in Africa and Latin America and the East, since American citizens come from all over the world. The fourth paragraph, while you don't explicitly say this, gives me the impression that you feel there is some sort of hierarchy of world cultures, and American culture is the best or close to it. you imply that as a whole, Americans are abandoning Western Civilization as a model, but aren't scientism and perhaps multiculturalism the fruit of western thinking? Just things to consider.
Not to advocate "multiculturalism" as I don't really know what it encompasses, but the idea of treating all cultures as equals is a good thing. Labeling one culture as inferior to another has historically been a terrible move, and promoting one heritage over another will lead to racism, ethnocentrism, and other bigotry in a world that is becoming increasingly globalized.
I don't mean to say that you're wrong, as you've obviously spent more time on this sort of topic than i have and probably have a more complete view of things. But to me it seems like a stretch to go from "discussing 'societies of the world' and the sciences" to "the idea that Western Civilization has failed as a model for society." I agree with some of the problems you identify, but i don't think that you've identified the source of them.
stories two and three:
Wow, hell hath no fury like a Tippy reading about the ACLU. As a counter-argument, i guess the ACLU doesn't like the bibles and the courses in the schools because it violates the separation of church and state. And even though the students can choose not to participate, because the state can't play favorites, it would have to allow every religion (even the crazy ones) to give out their writings and potentially have elective courses.
p.s. Does the assistant manager at the pretzel gourmet have the power to give me free pretzels this summer?
-Austin
I agree with a lot of what you’re saying, but I think that in your discussion of Multiculturalism you are running the risk of “throwing the baby out with the bathwater” as well.
First, while I agree that an understanding of American history, law and government is absolutely critical for the education of good citizens, I think you underestimate the value of studying other histories and cultures. At one point, you say that “since we live in America we ought to primarily study American history rather than concern ourselves with history of places we will most likely never have to deal with.” However, a simple glance at the news refutes that statement. What is the biggest story in the news today? The war in Iraq. It is every citizen’s duty to be informed about current events, and yet for even a basic grasp of the issues at stake in that conflict, one needs to know something about Islam and the history of the Middle East. Alternatively, consider some of the nations in which America has fought wars during the past century: Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Korea, Japan — even, at the beginning of the 1900s, the Philippines. In terms of history, language, and culture, these countries are nearly as different from each other as they are from the United States; each of them, at one time or another, has probably been a place most Americans thought we would “never have to deal with.” If nothing else, the need for a complete understanding of American history demands that students turn their attention to other parts of the world.
Second, I believe that you have overlooked important non-Western influences on even the parts of American history that do not concern U.S. involvement in conflicts abroad. In your response to one critic’s statements, you say that “The great men of American history did not come from Africa, Latin America or the East, they were from the West (namely, Europe). To my knowledge, none of the Founding Fathers were from these regions and no President has been from those regions. Even so, today's culture is not shaped on culture from those areas.” I think the most obvious and important exception to this statement concerns the millions of Africans who were brought into this country as slaves, as well as their descendents. The importation of slaves has shaped the entire economy, history and culture of the American South, as well as that of most of our major cities. And of course, the cataclysm of the Civil War, hinging on the slavery issue, almost destroyed America as we know it. Additionally, the influence of people of African descent on American history does not stop at merely passive, involuntary, or symbolic involvement. While the Founding Fathers may have given us the foundations of our cherished system of rights, it was the black civil rights movement that worked to expand the definition and application of many of those rights into the more just, more inclusive form that we adhere to today.
Finally, I think you are taking a too-narrow view of “the West” and the scope of its influence. America shares a “Western” colonial legacy with countries all around the world; the modern political map would look completely different were it not for the efforts of many Western countries to create overseas empires during the past 500 years. When you say that “the history of America is not found in Africa or Latin America or the East, but in the West,” you are ignoring that fact that the history of the West itself is now found in all of those places. Consequently, I contend that the study of world history serves another purpose, subtle but vital, in American education: the purpose of comparison. You say that “the West is what has made America great,” but it’s also true that Western civilization (if such a monolithic structure exists) has not always produced such great successes elsewhere. Why did the colonial legacy that created relative peace and democracy in the United States and Canada also give rise to military dictatorships and economic turmoil elsewhere in the world? I think that investigating this question is crucial to understanding Western civilization as a whole. By studying “the West” only as it relates to America, you inevitably miss out on a bigger picture; it’s like trying to learn botany by studying the plant life of just a single climate. If we are to understand and be sure of our own heritage, we must have a clear idea of what that heritage is and what it means — in all its incarnations. The aim is not to “prove” that the West has "failed" but to provide students with a fuller understanding of the civilization of which they are a product. I believe that such an education would not only create people with strong convictions, but also give them the ability to defend those convictions and to perceive and respond effectively to the real problems of society.
On a separate but related note, I think you should be careful that you don’t go too far in conflating Christian morality and the principles of good citizenship. While I don’t doubt that there is significant overlap between the two, I think that at a couple of points in your discussion of education, you fail to make a distinction between civics and religious education. For example, you say that “If educators teach education outside its Christian context, science becomes an excuse to endorse a purely materialistic way of life.” This would tend to suggest (and I know this isn’t exactly what you meant) that non-Christians cannot learn to be moral, dutiful citizens and vice versa. This is obviously untrue; the belief that we owe something to our fellow man and must work together to create and govern a just, educated and peaceful society (which I see as the essence of good citizenship) is one that is indigenous to many cultures and religions. Consequently, it is important to remember that a “Christian context” is not the only alternative to materialism in education. In our public schools, where Indian-American Hindus rub noses with Korean-American Buddhists and Latin-American Catholics, I think a thorough grounding in civics — which encompasses the study of history, ethics, law and government, among other fields — is the key to counteracting the crass utilitarianism that has seeped into much of modern education.
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