Recently in Literature Category
The Erasure of Islam -- The Philosophers' Magazine
What Enlightenment? It may have been good for Europe, but for the rest
of the world in general, and Islam in particular, the Enlightenment was
a disaster. Despite their stand for freedom and liberty, reason and
liberal thought, Enlightenment thinkers saw the non-West as irrational
and inferior, morally decadent and fit only for colonisation.
The Russell-Einstein Manifesto
Issued in London, 9 July 1955
...Here, then, is the problem which we present to you, stark and dreadful and inescapable: Shall we put an end to the human race; or shall mankind renounce war? People will not face this alternative because it is so difficult to abolish war.
The abolition of war will demand distasteful limitations of national sovereignty. But what perhaps impedes understanding of the situation more than anything else is that the term "mankind" feels vague and abstract. People scarcely realize in imagination that the danger is to themselves and their children and their grandchildren, and not only to a dimly apprehended humanity. They can scarcely bring themselves to grasp that they, individually, and those whom they love are in imminent danger of perishing agonizingly. And so they hope that perhaps war may be allowed to continue provided modern weapons are prohibited...
Issued in London, 9 July 1955
...Here, then, is the problem which we present to you, stark and dreadful and inescapable: Shall we put an end to the human race; or shall mankind renounce war? People will not face this alternative because it is so difficult to abolish war.
The abolition of war will demand distasteful limitations of national sovereignty. But what perhaps impedes understanding of the situation more than anything else is that the term "mankind" feels vague and abstract. People scarcely realize in imagination that the danger is to themselves and their children and their grandchildren, and not only to a dimly apprehended humanity. They can scarcely bring themselves to grasp that they, individually, and those whom they love are in imminent danger of perishing agonizingly. And so they hope that perhaps war may be allowed to continue provided modern weapons are prohibited...
Once upon a time, four blind men were walking in the forest, and they bumped into an elephant...
Leaving Literature Behind - ChronicleReview.com
The good news is that we've created a discipline: literary studies. The bad news is that we've made ourselves rulers of a realm that has separated itself almost completely from the rest of the world. In the process, we've lost many of the students -- I'd say, many of them men -- and even some of the professors. And yet still we teach literature as if to future versions of ourselves -- not that there will be many jobs for them. The vast majority of students don't even want to be professors: They'd like to get something from a book they can use in their lives outside the classroom. What right have we to forget them?
Students get something out of a book by reading it. Love of reading was, after all, what got most of us into this business to begin with. We are killing that experience with the discipline of literary studies, with its network of relations in which an individual work almost becomes incidental. But it's the individual work that changes lives.
The good news is that we've created a discipline: literary studies. The bad news is that we've made ourselves rulers of a realm that has separated itself almost completely from the rest of the world. In the process, we've lost many of the students -- I'd say, many of them men -- and even some of the professors. And yet still we teach literature as if to future versions of ourselves -- not that there will be many jobs for them. The vast majority of students don't even want to be professors: They'd like to get something from a book they can use in their lives outside the classroom. What right have we to forget them?
Students get something out of a book by reading it. Love of reading was, after all, what got most of us into this business to begin with. We are killing that experience with the discipline of literary studies, with its network of relations in which an individual work almost becomes incidental. But it's the individual work that changes lives.
Why Islam Is Unfunny for a Cartoonist -By Andrew Higgins - WSJ.com
The arrest of a controversial Dutch cartoonist has set off a wave of protests. The case is raising questions for a changing Europe about free speech, religion and art.
On a sunny May morning, six plainclothes police officers, two uniformed policemen and a trio of functionaries from the state prosecutor's office closed in on a small apartment in Amsterdam. Their quarry: a skinny Dutch cartoonist with a rude sense of humor. Informed that he was suspected of sketching offensive drawings of Muslims and other minorities, the Dutchman surrendered without a struggle.
Literacy Debate - Online, R U Really Reading? - NYTimes.com
Children like Nadia lie at the heart of a passionate debate about just what it means to read in the digital age. The discussion is playing out among educational policy makers and reading experts around the world, and within groups like the National Council of Teachers of English and the International Reading Association.
As teenagers' scores on standardized reading tests have declined or stagnated, some argue that the hours spent prowling the Internet are the enemy of reading -- diminishing literacy, wrecking attention spans and destroying a precious common culture that exists only through the reading of books.
But others say the Internet has created a new kind of reading, one that schools and society should not discount. The Web inspires a teenager like Nadia, who might otherwise spend most of her leisure time watching television, to read and write.
'The Dumbest Generation' by Mark Bauerlein - Los Angeles Times
In the four minutes it probably takes to read this review, you will have logged exactly half the time the average 15- to 24-year-old now spends reading each day. That is, if you even bother to finish. If you are perusing this on the Internet, the big block of text below probably seems daunting, maybe even boring. Who has the time? Besides, one of your Facebook friends might have just posted a status update!
More Colorado Follies By Stanley Fish ~Think Again~ -The New York Times
I've just returned from New Zealand and find that in my absence the University of Colorado - the same one that earlier this year appointed as its president a Republican fund-raiser with a B.A. in mining and no academic experience - has gifted me again, this time with the announcement of plans to raise money for a Chair in Conservative Thought and Policy.
Why? The answer is apparently given in the first sentence of a story that appeared in the May 13th edition of the Rocky Mountain News: "The University of Colorado is considering a $9 million program to bring high-profile conservatives to teach on the left-leaning Boulder campus."
Embedded in this sentence is the following chain of reasoning: The University of Colorado, Boulder, is left-leaning and therefore it is appropriate to spend university funds (technically state funds) in an effort to redress a political imbalance.
The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online - University of Cambridge
This site contains Darwin's complete publications, thousands of handwritten manuscripts and the largest Darwin bibliography and manuscript catalogue ever published; Darwin Onlinealso hundreds of supplementary works: biographies, obituaries, reviews, reference works and more.
Almost all is online only here: such as 1st editions of Voyage of the Beagle, Zoology of the Beagle, Descent of man, all editions of Origin of species (1st, 2d, 3d, 4th, 5th & 6th); important manuscripts: Beagle diary & field notebooks, Journal, transmutation notebooks and Autobiography.
Was there a time or place in history in which censorship did not exist? Was there ever a group of human beings that was able to survive without censure? These questions precede and introduce The File Room, and locate censorship as a complex concept ingrained in our conscious/subconscious reality. Despite the impossible nature of attempting to define censorship, The File Room is a project that proposes to address it, providing a tool for discussing and coming to terms with cultural censorship.
CNN To Launch Bureau in Second Life Virtual World
As news organizations slash budgets and scale back bureaus, CNN is expanding--except not in real life.
In the week of Nov. 5, the news giant is set to open a news-gathering outpost in Second Life. And unlike news service Reuters, which embedded a real reporter in the online virtual world last year, CNN will rely on Second Life "residents" to do all the legwork.
The Online Books Page -- University of Pennsylvania.
Listing over 25,000 free books on the Web
Children's Books Online: the Rosetta Project, Inc.
This online library of illustrated books is a volunteer-driven project. It has grown slowly since 1996 from the work of a single man and a handful of books, to a vibrant volunteer-driven organization publishing new books and translations every week.
British Library - Showcases :: Landmarks in literature, art, history and printing
The British Library contains many millions of books, manuscripts, maps, newspapers, magazines, patents, music scores, sound recordings, photographs and stamps. Choose a showcase to learn about some of the most important and beautiful books in the world or hear historic and unique sound recordings.
Fifty (50!) Tools which can help you in Writing - lifehack.org
Fifty (50!) Tools which can help you in Writing
Update (24/07/2006): Replaced the links with archive.org.
Roy Peter Clark from Poynter Institute has posted up 50 tools that can help you when you do any kinds of writing. This is a extensive list of writing tools, but by no mean you need to apply all of them when you do any writing. There are the Writing Tool links:
