A Charles Lipson, professor of my acquaintance, kindly shared this with me:
[David Benson]A student who knows my love of clear prose and my hatred of pretentious academic writing just sent me this. I thought you would enjoy it.
After re-reading Orwell, I came across this quote about an upcoming course at NYU
“OWS as a topic of study offers prismatic opportunities to consider the changing shape of inequality in our society and the dynamic processes of repertoire change in social movements globally, from the picket line to the sit-in, to the consideration of life course trajectories, among other themes central to the sociological apprehension of the modern context,”
Heck, how else to earn that big money and perqs?
Professor Lipson adds:
Fabulous.
In the old days, our parents used to say, “If you can’t say something nice about someone, don’t say anything.”
Today, lots of professors think, “If you can’t say something intelligent, at least say it with enough obscurity that people will think it is.”
Should have said “dynamical” instead of “dynamic”. Sounds more dynamicalish.
You would probably enjoy Richard Mitchell’s book Less Than Words Can Say quite a lot!
Personally I like to see “hermeneutics” tucked into every bit of academic blather. But that’s just me.
First, create a “need,” then offer a “solution.” Tenure for me but not for thee.
That’s not pretentious that’s Jethro from “The Beverly Hillbillies.”
…life course trajectories, among other themes central to the sociological apprehension of the modern context,
An elevator that doesn’t go all the way to the top of its own glass house?
“life course trajectories”
That is repetitvely redundant, no?
– want to diagram that sentence.
Hey, how about some pretentious academic book titles?
Dreams from My Father
and
The Audacity of Hope
WTF do those mean?
I’m just wondering who the f. would pay money in order to acquire a “sociological apprehension of the modern context.” Me, I’d keep the money and find my own ways to be an utterly useless human being.
Sadly, many utterly useless human beings make fat salaries as travelling blathermeisters, visiting all sorts of fun venues on your and some university’s dime.
Taking a crap in public, the shit-in, a life course trajectory, with full credit, practicum in the park.
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maybe . . .
Geez,
It’s like trying to make sense of a fragment of a Gnostic Gospel, dug out of some ancient cave in the Negev.
If you cannot dazzle them with brilliance
Baffle them with BU11 $#IT;
So, we had a Highly Successful Tea Party experience that the Mainstream of Liberalism hated, but the rest of the country seemed to go right along with November of 2010 and there are no courses what-so-ever regarding the Social Implications of Real People accomplishing Real Things.
Then we have an OWS movement that annoys everone they come in contact with – even folks that support them – and we’re going to have a college course to study all about them?
Stop the World – I want to get off!
Tsk, tsk, jb, to any ordinary person–like you or me– OWS has been a failure. It takes an academic genius to see that it is a significant movement worthy of study.
This is so stupid it takes an intellectual to believe it.