192. Pragmatist:
Mike,
What’s wrong with writing a paper of the oppression of women and minorities in American History? It has happened.
Is there any other US history you might be interested in ? This was 1/3 of her grade. It was not a sociology or women’s studies class. This is basic US history; core curriculum course.
You’re obviously OK with that.
Your knee-jerk reaction to PC nonsense disregards the fact that the paper can be one that compares and contrasts a history of oppression by white males versus a history of white males who supported things like universal suffrage and the abolition of slavery.
No, it couldn’t. The textbook was this book. Read the reviews. There is nothing good about white males in that book or in that class.
This is US History !
If she took sociology or some similar course, it would be what I would expect.
History is the study of decisions made my humans and delving into the record to extrapolate their reasons and motivations.
Critical thinking is the key and while overly PC TAs can be irksome, do they teach your daughter to be a critical thinker?
No, I teach her that. One of the last sessions of the class before the final, the TA spent most of the hour talking about how Reagan had been an actor and he was just acting a part as president and anything good that happened during his presidency was an accident.
Then she announced that, since her laptop had been stolen and all the grades were in her laptop, everybody needed to bring all their papers in for her to record their grades again. If anyone didn’t bring in their papers, their grade would be based on the last paper only plus the final exam.
Since she got an A on the Smith paper, she and everybody else in the class forgot to bring their old papers in.
The final exam was half essay and the choices were two. The one my daughter chose was “The Silent Majority.” The instructor had told them that the silent majority was racist because they opposed the Civil Rights Act. In fact, the Silent Majority was Nixon’s term for those who supported the Vietnam war. It had nothing to do with the Civil Rights Act but these kids could not say or write that.
It was an easy course as long as you knew that whites are racist and white males are always bad.
People wonder why college educated people are voting for Democrats now. My daughter knows better but has to spout the line or fail. They are cynical by the time they finish the freshman year.
Her English class was all about movies. They don’t read anymore. I was an English major while I took pre-med as electives. It is really sad to see what has happened to the Humanities.
