Oxford Facultyy proposes removal of Homer and Virgil from compulsory Classics syllabus

[Anonymous No.14754739]

https://www.oxfordstudent.com/2020/02/17/94749/

>The Oxford Student has been notified about a proposal by the Classics faculty to remove the study of Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid from the Mods syllabus, a decision which has surprised many across the faculty.

>This proposal forms part of a series of reforms aimed to modernise the first stage of the Classics degree, known as Moderations (Mods), which take place during Hilary term of second year for all students taking Classics courses across the university.

>The new decade presents the degree with new challenges, with Classicists saying it must adapt to a constantly evolving demographic of students and their needs.

Also here
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/02/19/oxford-could-remove-homer-virgil-compulsory-classics-syllabus/


What is your opinion, /lit/?
Which other works should universities drop because they are too hard for students? Should they be replaced by books about more modern themes?

[Anonymous No.14754886]

> adapt to a constantly evolving demographic of students and their needs.

You know exactly ((who)) and ((what)) they're going to be replaced with.

[Anonymous No.14754894]

Do they mean because black people don't want to read it?

[Anonymous No.14754937]

>>14754739
>modernize the Classics degree

[Anonymous No.14754966]

>Modernize classics

Hole up

[Anonymous No.14754988]

>>14754739
I firmly believe the current academic period will produce close to zero quality thinker, and absolutely none that will have any kind of significant impact outside of their own echo chamber. We're living in a, overall, mediocre time, in design, architecture, engineering; but most importantly: ideologies.

This will end up in the death of traditional academics, and I'm glad we have the opportunity to move on to something else.

[Anonymous No.14754997]

>>14754739
It's incredible that there are still people in /lit/ that don't believe we're in the Kali Yuga.

[Anonymous No.14755006]

It's bound to happen unless there's some serious changes like a fascistic revolution. They're just going to keep chipping away at classical education. I think it started with them doing away with the languages. There's no reasoning with the people advocating it so if this bothers you then get serious.

[Anonymous No.14755012]

>>14754997
You're right, the fact that non-priestly castes are allowed to read sacred texts is extraordinarily blasphemous, let alone the fact they're admitted to the temples of learning. We will only return to the golden age when all the peasants are illiterate again and properly grovelling at our priestly feet.

[Anonymous No.14755020]

>>14755006
>There's no reasoning with the people advocating it
The reasoning can be summed up as
"dead white men don't matter"

[Anonymous No.14755022]

>>14754886
>>14754894
This has nothing to do with identity politics this time; it has to do with class and state schools not offering Latin/Greek A-Level. Oxbridge are being forced to increase the number of state school pupils by year, who generally don't want to apply for Classics because they know nothing about it/too difficult, so they need to make the course more accessible to prevent it from dying out.

[Anonymous No.14755033]

>>14754739
>boomer leftist professors who still dont realise that universities are intrinsically conservative institutions

[Anonymous No.14755055]

>>14755012
Don't be daft. It is true that peasantry has, as you said, been admitted to the temples of learning. However, this has utterly failed in educating the masses, but at the cost of undervaluing millennia of serious academic study and contributing to a ridiculous amount of demagogues, pseuds and midwits

[Anonymous No.14755062]

>>14755055
*remove "but at the cost" and add "instead"
Don't know what came over me

[Anonymous No.14755092]

>>14754988
I think the next great thinker will probably be a monk, not someone in academia.

[Anonymous No.14755096]

#panic
#moral_panic

if you're going to oxbridge you should have read homer and virgil before you left high school.

#shock_horror

[Anonymous No.14755097]

There's no reason to get rid of Greek Classics obviously.
But I also see no harm in extending it to include the Bhagavad Gita, The Epic of Gilgamesh, or any other epic poetry from any number of other areas.

[Anonymous No.14755108]

>>14754739
What's the point of obtaining an "impractical" degree like Classics if it doesn't enable you to read Homer and Virgil? Seems like a waste of time.

[Anonymous No.14755119]

>fringe oxford group says "boo homer!"
>4chan takes it seriously.

Have any of you ever actually had sex/

[Anonymous No.14755122]

>>14755097
People who want to get rid of the Classics don't want the Bhagavad Gita or The Epic of Gilgamesh.

[Anonymous No.14755126]

>>14755097
that's what specialty "__ studies" fields are for.

[Anonymous No.14755128]

>>14755022
Why don't they retain it as a requirement, but allow students to fulfill it in the second or third year? Why is the choice presented as mandatory-1st-year versus optional-later-year?

[Anonymous No.14755142]

>>14754739
How many of you seething incels in this thread can read Homer and Virgil in the original language? Probably zero. I find that fact amusing.

[Anonymous No.14755144]

>>14755128
they fell for the 'start from the greeks' meme

[Anonymous No.14755150]

>>14755119
Stages:
[ ] it is not happening
[x] it is just a fringe group
[ ] this will not affect you personally
[ ] this will affect you, but it is not a bad thing
[ ] this is a good thing
[ ] you are a nazi if you have any complaints about this

[Anonymous No.14755153]

>>14755122
You're probably right, but they could probably be convinced.

[Anonymous No.14755159]

>>14755097
The Classical Studies are a very narrow field of literature, a course that included Gilgamesh or vedic hymns should just be called a bronze age literature course.
And absolutely those should be taught but groups who want to discard the classics are inevitably pseudo-progressives seething that their area of interest isn't as traditional as hellenic literature.

[Anonymous No.14755180]

>>14755153
They couldn't, anon.
And frankly, Western universities should give their students an education in Western culture.
It is fine to study the Chinese, Indian, Japanese, etc classics too. But they should be supplements for those that want it.

[Anonymous No.14755187]

and for no reason at all

[Anonymous No.14755437]

>>14755142
Well, seemingly graduates of the classics which hold degrees in the subject will not have had read Homer or Virgil in their original language either.

[Anonymous No.14755446]

>>14755108
It seems to me the main benefit would learning Greek and Latin, which would enable you to read whatever you want.

[Anonymous No.14755457]

>>14755096
Except this is clearly a move to make the subject more “accessible” to exactly the kind of people who wouldn’t have read either Homer or Virgil before leaving high school.

[Anonymous No.14755464]

>>14755446
>enable you to read whatever you want*
*except Homer and Virgil

[Anonymous No.14755473]

Pretty surprised at the people in this thread defending this suggestion. I thought this was a literature board? Also, the notion of a classics education that doesn’t include either is pretty absurd.

[Anonymous No.14755478]

>>14755464
Well, if you read greek and latin you could obviously still read them on your own if you want is what I meant.

[Anonymous No.14755482]

>>14755097
Iceberg Slim - Pimp

[Anonymous No.14755500]

>>14755478
No. Homer and Virgil present particular challenges due to the archaic nature of the language used. That's the whole point of the change being considered. Read the articles.

[Anonymous No.14755501]

This is pretty detestable, but shouldn’t come as a shock to anyone. If you believe that anglophone institutions of “higher learning” are actually about providing an education in 2020, you’re very naive. These institutions are businesses out to make money. Enrollments are dropping and the most wide open consumer demographic is the diversity enrollment. They will continue to push this stuff not just because they hate you and hate the classics (they do) but because it makes money.

[Anonymous No.14755522]

>>14755457
Very few have read all of Homer and Virgil in the original before leaving high school, even those who took Greek and Latin A-levels.

[Anonymous No.14755536]

>>14755500
I did, but I didn’t see that part. I just read that it was being considered because they wanted diversity students who didn’t take latin and greek in A levels, which I would’ve thought it would’ve been Oxford’s job to educate them anyway but I’m an American and know only a bit of latin and greek so I don’t know that much about this. I would’ve thought you could read them on your own if you knew the language well enough.

[Anonymous No.14755755]

>Anglos

[Anonymous No.14755800]

>>14755055
Serious study like how many angles can fit on a pen point? Nothing has changed in academic quality.

[Anonymous No.14755814]

>>14755473
if you're reading translated "classics" then you're not reading the classics at all
learn latin and greek, then actually read the works

[Anonymous No.14755818]

>>14755055
It's certainly true that educating the northern barbarians has been a total disaster.

[Anonymous No.14755822]

>>14755800
>Nothing has changed in academic quality.
Lol

[Anonymous No.14755831]

>>14755814
How is that a response to this post or a defense of what the Oxford faculty are proposing?

[Anonymous No.14755844]

>>14755536
>diversity students
By "diversity students" you mean students -- like yourself -- whose high school competence in ancient Greek didn't allow them to read Homer in the original without difficulty.

[Anonymous No.14755850]

>>14754739

[Anonymous No.14756111]

>>14754739
>NOOOO NOT MY EPIC OLD MAN BEDTIME STORIES!!!! NOT MY MY AWESOME CANON FANTASY LORE!!! IDIOCRACY WAS A DOCUMENTARY!!!! NOT MY BORING POETRY!!!
the reasons behind the decision might be absolutely retarded, but nothing of value will be lost. "Start with the Greeks" is a meme in any context except philosophy

[Anonymous No.14756136]

>>14755850
we literally have machines on Mars and a woman led the team who developed the first picture of a black hole. She also programmed the most essential parts of the algorithm. Meanwhile you're still shitposting on 4channel. seethe harder

[Anonymous No.14756149]

>>14755012
This... but seriously.

[Anonymous No.14756150]

>>14755844
Yes. Are you asking? What is your point?

[Anonymous No.14756204]

>>14754739
Based.

If the classics cannot take stock of its white supremacy then I hope it dies as a field, dies as swiftly as possible.

https://youtu.be/lcJZCVemn-4

[Anonymous No.14756242]

>>14755128
Imagine reading all your basic texts in those Loeb translations or the Student’s Catullus and thinking you got the gist of what they meant, then on your penultimate year finally starting to learn Latin or Greek. It takes years for even a committed student to gain enough mastery of these languages to crawl through ancient texts with a good dictionary in hand, even when you follow the Dowling method. They should be grasping the fundamentals even before they enter college.

[Anonymous No.14756245]

>>14755150
Congrats on accurately summarizing the stages of culture sliding.

[Anonymous No.14756252]

>>14755187
one day

[Anonymous No.14756259]

>>14756136
>a woman led the team who developed the first picture of a black hole. She also programmed the most essential parts of the algorithm.

[Anonymous No.14756263]

>>14755119
Not fringe. This shit is all over academia and ruining the classics.
Its most outspoken voices don't believe Western civ even exists and that you're a sexist if you promote reading the Greeks.

[Anonymous No.14756272]

>>14756136
>we literally have machines on Mars

[Anonymous No.14756273]

>>14755096
Reading a classic in high school isn't the same as studying it at a tertiary level, you dumb cunt.

[Anonymous No.14756282]

>>14756242
>even when you follow the Dowling method
Is that you, Will?

[Anonymous No.14756284]

>>14756136
>a woman led the team who developed the first picture of a black hole. She also programmed the most essential parts of the algorithm

Lying to advance your agenda, how original. But don't believe me, ask a less attractive woman from the team:

https://twitter.com/SaraIssaoun/status/1116304522660519936

"There are more of us. Katie's algorithm, despite the media's stance, was not used to produce this image. There were three algorithms used and combined to form the final image, and a team of 40 scientists part of that aspect of the project (including myself and more women)"

And here's the github of the code if you want to check yourself, with the source contributors:

https://github.com/sao-eht/eat/graphs/contributors

[Anonymous No.14756289]

I'm honestly all for this. Classics studies should be an elite endeavor; the fewer people that come into contact with it the better. Most of these people attending these institutions and putting forward these initiatives are not the type that deserve to study the classics.

[Anonymous No.14756309]

>>14756289
Except, let's be real: you're a typical /lit/ shitposter who knows nothing about anything. If I'm mistaken, tell me how I'm wrong in Homeric Greek.

[Anonymous No.14756316]

>>14756136
Mars missions are fake retard.

[Anonymous No.14756363]

>>14756309
>you're a typical /lit/ shitposter who knows nothing about anything
Where did I claim otherwise? I come from a poor family, I didn't have a cultured upbringing, consequently I lack the requisite knowledge and temperament that should (in an ideal world) grant me the right to study the classics in an elite, formal setting; the most I will ever do is enjoy them casually. I know my place, you should know yours too.

[Anonymous No.14756420]

>>14756363
>I come from a poor family, I didn't have a cultured upbringing... I know my place.
Is it possible you are overestimating the competence of so-called "elites"?

[Anonymous No.14756429]

>>14754739
I've become convinced that all of our greatest material is going to be effectively lost to us within the next 200 years unless something unforeseeable happens. The sheer amount of information available to us now completely drowns out everything but the most current and topical trends. The zoomers and onward have literally no reason whatsoever to see all forms of literature and entertainment as anything but completely disposable blips on an infinite carousel of stimulation, and that's exactly how they view it. More and more shit gets added, everything gets pushed further to the back, and the people who are supposed to be conserving the standouts are too busy caving in to the herd to do their fucking jobs.

[Anonymous No.14756461]

>>14755180
>And frankly, Western universities should give their students an education in Western culture
Thank god there are still people with common sense

[Anonymous No.14756509]

>>14756429
I agree with this take for the most part. Art is being splintered into progressively smaller subcultures, each with its own bleacher section. In the future we might "study" shakespeare in high school before moving onto the shill of the month novelist as selected by the bachelor's-educated teacher. However, I think some greats will rise to the top and become embedded in cultural consciousness for at least a few decades each, much the way IJ has been read the past 20 years.

[Anonymous No.14756786]

>>14756429
ok boomer

[Anonymous No.14756792]

>>14754739
Wellwellwell seems I made the right choice not applying there

[Anonymous No.14756844]

>>14756263
I’m a grad student at an elite university. I went to an event on campus where the speaker, a classics PhD (not a prof... yet), said unequivocally that defending the existence, just the existence, of western civ was white supremacy. Not one person contended this.

[Anonymous No.14756890]

>>14756844
Except, you don't know shit.

[Anonymous No.14756933]

>>14756844
I am in a similar situation. I seems like half the teachers got brainwashed into leftist progressive propaganda, but also a good quarter of the teachers remains very critical about it, but don't say it outloud.

[Anonymous No.14756939]

>>14755187
Hitler wasn’t elected dummy

[Anonymous No.14757081]

>>14756429
>>14756509
Ah, took the ol “start with the greeks” and went straight to “bitch about feckless youths ruining the world” as your diatribe? Push that rock, anon! You can make it! Just like be happy bro.

[Anonymous No.14757400]

>>14754988
Yes. This isn't the first time either. All of the great revolutions in thinking of the 17th century happened outside of established academia. Only at the very end of it did a few notable thinkers (originally independent) join established institutions, say Newton.
Descartes, Pascal, Leibniz, Malebranche, Berulle, Bossuet, Locke (terrible but relevant), etc hated the academia of their time.
At least at that point academia was knee deep into aristotelism, not progressivism.

[Anonymous No.14757405]

>>14755755
Not even once.

[Anonymous No.14757416]

>>14756136
It was team of dozens of scientists. The media photographed and publicized one woman, deceiving the public, because she was exemplar of the image they want people to believe.

[Anonymous No.14757421]

>>14757081
Marcus Aurelius had a much harder and more stressful life than anyone here.

[Anonymous No.14757428]

>>14754739
Aethiopica > Aeneid, I fully support the removal of the later.

[Anonymous No.14757429]

Remember, we share a board with those people:

>>14755096 >>14755119 >>14755142 >>14756111 >>14756890 >>14757081

People who defend this shit. But then, I'm sure some of those posts are by the same poster.

[Anonymous No.14757432]

>>14754739
Aethiopica > Aeneid, I fully support the removal of the latter.

[Anonymous No.14757436]

>>14755033
Progressivism is conservatism in the current year.
This is another reason why boomer conservatism 'why not freeze things as they were in 1985' is dead before even starting.
The boomer leftists in academia are perfectly fulfilling their roles in enforcing conservatism.
A real defeat of progressivism can only come from a 'revolutionary' (anti-conservatism) movement, no matter if the revolutionaries fight for property or aristocracy or decentralization or white people.

[Anonymous No.14757441]

>>14756289
They are actually watering down the study of Classics for the "elite students" in order to be more democratic and enrol more people in it.
They are doing the opposite of what you think.

[Anonymous No.14757463]

>>14755097
>Bhagavad Gita
Even more at odds with their ideology than Homer. Besides, there are already indianist in these institutions. The 'classics' are obviously the classics of the western canon, this is their domain. You may as well say that electrical engineers have to study chemical engineering, or that indianist must study Greeks. Of course there is nothing wrong with studying both.

[Anonymous No.14757467]

>>14757429
The worst post in this thread is:
>>14755096
It is by far the most pseud thing here.
He attempts to establish superiority by assuming fallacious propositions (that this was in any way influenced by access of the classics in high school). And then, he both conflates it with a so called "moral panic," and presumes moral panic BAD.
This is not a media panic. It is a straightforward news story in which the content itself is enough to stir passions, which show it's the content and not the way the story is being contextualized.
Morality is a perfectly appropriate thing for this conversation, because it's about deciding on the better course of action as it relates to human virtue by use of higher reason.
I hate it when people just presume "moral panic = bad," because it's ironically the equivalent of why they think it's bad. They take poorly contextualized narratives from years past (McCarthyism and the Satanic Panic), and assume they were botched scenarios that made much noise over nothing. Ergo anything similar to it is wrong.

[Anonymous No.14757470]

>>14756136
>woman led the team
Top kek, the most useless member of a big team. A code monkey that scored a single commit on the git.

[8 No.14757471]

>>14754739
Good.
If they do this then these works become the property of the right.

[Anonymous No.14757483]

>>14757467
>They take poorly contextualized narratives from years past (McCarthyism and the Satanic Panic), and assume they were botched scenarios that made much noise over nothing. Ergo anything similar to it is wrong.
Yes.
There is a similar thing that happens when they claim "people always complained about their times compared to the past".

[DoctorGreen !DRgReeNusk No.14757535]

>>14754739
>constantly evolving demographic of students and their needs
nonsense.
It is the ever decaying student aparatus the ones who must evolve or adapt their logos (if any) to study (Homer and Virgil) Classic Lit.

[Anonymous No.14757560]

>>14755850
Not that you're wrong about diversity, but the USA never landed people on the moon. (Only mechanical contraptions.)

[Anonymous No.14757561]

>>14755022

no its just jews pandering to niggers.
currently have an ethics course at uni and the jewess professor was angry she couldnt change the curriculum and we still had to learn about ''old white men''.

[Anonymous No.14757595]

>>14757467
In a roundabout way (that I'm sure he didn't intend), he has a point, though.

Not even that long ago, most people who went to university left high school with an intermediate knowledge of Latin and a basic knowledge of Greek. Even in my country, sometimes you can encounter heavily annotated editions of Latin works (the Aeneid being the most common) from the beginning of the last century, intended for high schoolers. Some anon also linked to Harvard (I think, it was some university from the USA) entrance exams from the same period a couple months ago. It had plenty of Latin with some Greek (like, Anabasis tier) exercises in it.

Admittedly, that was a time when the number of people in higher education was about the tenth of its current amount, but still. People who want to study the classics shouldn't start their major with 0 knowledge of either Latin or Greek.

[Anonymous No.14757658]

>>14757561
Read the article retard we are tired of your shitty memes

[Anonymous No.14757672]

>>14754739
How about the zoomers adapt to something for once?

[Anonymous No.14758291]

On this topic, does anyone who knows what they’re talking about have advice in regard to self teaching for someone who wants to learn greek or latin well enough on their own to read authors like Homer or is that just too tall of an order?

[Anonymous No.14758417]

>>14754739

Who cares? The “Classics” have been rediscovered time and time again. The average classically trained musician in the late 18th-early 19th century wouldn’t have even known who Bach was. The Greeks became the “classics” after over a millennium of obscurity. Even the “Classics” fall into obscurity again (which will hardly happen due to the way information works nowadays), that doesn’t prevent them from being revived yet again. I can assure that whatever concern is keeping the classics down now, won’t be a concern in a hundred years.

[Anonymous No.14758440]

>>14758417
This is like telling some Roman, "well, Rome will fall, but in a few hundred years a Germanic guy called Charlemagne will revive Civilization, so nothing of value will be lost".

[Anonymous No.14758532]

>>14758417
> The “Classics” have been rediscovered time and time again.
Actually put yourself into the situation of someone "rediscovering the classics." You need to take the oversaturation problem into account, as mentioned here: >>14756429. That's the best case scenario. Worst one is that since we're clearly migrating toward storing virtually all of our information digitally, a sufficient catastrophe doesn't even have to brick everything for us to lose our entire history, it just has to keep the lights off long enough for anyone who could recover it to die. Imagine medieval monks struggling to get Virgil off an old hard drive.

[Anonymous No.14758568]

>>14755012
this but unironically

[Anonymous No.14758581]

>>14754739
I don't mourn whenever a woman is murdered or raped because they are the ones who enable these kinds of things. It's right to hurt those who wrong us all.

[Anonymous No.14758826]

>>14755142
Ρούφα μου τον πέο ακουσίως αγάμητη κωλόχοντρη καρακάξα.

[Anonymous No.14758842]

>>14755500
I'm Greek and I can read Homer fine. The distance between Bronze age Greek and modern is pretty small, we just had an infuse of Italian, Slavic and Anatolian words over the past millenia.

[Anonymous No.14758880]

>>14758532
Except our physical storaging is at a point that is hard to beat. Old manuscripts are well kept and protected yet more accessible than ever. The Classics aren’t suffering from funding, or preservation, they’re just losing popularity, and even that’s disputable since more people read the Classics now than was ever possible. They’re just not the standard for aesthetics or art anymore.

>>14758440
Im just offering perspective that may lighten your panic. The Classics are more than likely not going to be lost forever, but by waning in influence, it provides the opportunity for society and culture to grow in a distinct direction that may rewarding, maybe allowing for new and distinct classics to arise that may not have been possible otherwise. Yet, none of this denies the possibility of the “classics” to remerge.

[Anonymous No.14758886]

>>14754739
>modernise the first stage of the Classics degree
>modernize the classics degree
I'm sorry. What?

[Anonymous No.14758901]

>>14758532
>Imagine medieval monks struggling to get Virgil off an old hard drive.
Not to mention the quality of work. Printing and library space was at a premium so only the good stuff was circulated and preserved. Now Virgil gets wedged and lost in-between Ready Player One and zettabytes of old porn.

[Anonymous No.14758903]

>>14757467
^Get a load of this assblasted pantywaist.

[Anonymous No.14758915]

>>14758886
You heard me bitch boy.

[Anonymous No.14758981]

Imagine doing a literature degree when you can in fact do STEM, but also read the Greeks and other great pieces of literature in your spare time or later in your life.
You actually get a degree in something that will provide you with a future, but you also become versed in humanity's core beliefs.
You may not grasp the finer details, however everything is drilled into you by classes anyway, it's simply best to discover everything by yourself without outside influence.

Universities unfortunately got bumfucked by schools that teach tunnelvisioned education within very specific parameters to fit very specific job descriptions. The entire premise of schools that teach you old texts will be likely lost or diminished within the next hundred years. The entire argument in OP is just the start of the decline.

[Anonymous No.14759005]

>>14758981
The thing is that many people here want to become writers (or artists of some sort), not just readers or experiencers of art, so your observation works for people who only want to ready or study literature but not for aspiring creators. Me? I'm in computer engineering precisely because I was born poor and this was the only way out (even more so in my third world nation), but had I been born rich, I'd choose art and literature over economic security every fucking time.

[Anonymous No.14759031]

>>14758880
>it provides the opportunity for society and culture to grow in a distinct direction that may rewarding
Lol, right.

[Anonymous No.14759032]

>>14759005
Well, obviously, but that was my point. Most people don't have future financial security without a degree depending on demand (it's usually STEM) or at the very least deep seated knowledge in a craft.

[Anonymous No.14759058]

>>14759032
Oh, alright. Are you in STEM as well?

[Anonymous No.14759071]

>>14759005
I could have written this myself. I definitely feel closer to the humanities at heart, but since I was born to relatively poor parents, I have no other choice but to become a cog in the bugman machine as an IT guy if I don't want to starve.

I'm not confident enough in my skills/talent (if I have any) to risk the starving artist route. I don't see myself ever having a family due to various circumstances, so I plan on saving up as much as I can and calling it quits as soon as possible to dedicate myself to my one true love, l'art.

[Anonymous No.14759107]

>>14759058
Geotechnical engineering. I was a math GOOD, classic literature BAD guy back when I had to choose what to do at 18.

That's another problem of our society, we are forced into one particular education, and by definition we have to cancel all the other possible ones at the height of our stupidity, as far as age goes.

[Anonymous No.14759137]

>>14755150
Based

[Anonymous No.14759380]

>>14754739
Yep, this is indeed the Kali Yuga...

[Anonymous No.14759391]

Fuck niggers.

[Anonymous No.14759732]

>>14759107
Be happy you went with STEM. At least there’s a level of intellectual rigor and integrity there. Some of us got tricked into business or some other meme shit. I have an IQ of 145 with a business degree with a 2.0 GPA like useless retarded consumer bug.

[Anonymous No.14760194]

>>14756844
Should've very noisily and very slowly left the room.

[Anonymous No.14760205]

>>14755150
Shizos are predictable, more news at 11.

[Anonymous No.14760956]

>>14756844
I teach film. Occasionally my students make a comment that alludes to some deeper, highly objectionable belief like the bullshit you're describing, but it's never overt enough for me to address it without completely derailing the class. The ones that care at all have very rehearsed and moralistic opinions about films, despite consuming nothing but Disney blockbusters and having no knowledge at all of great cinema. They have no interest in watching something older than themselves and act like the suggestion the world didn't begin with them is an insult. The only other professor who encourages them to watch such films does so for the sole purpose of opening up discussions about how bigoted they are. I'm amazed that some frustrated professor hasn't shot up a university yet.

[Anonymous No.14760961]

>>14759732
lmao same

MBA/CS 148

[Anonymous No.14760971]

>>14760956
>i'm amazed that some frustrated professor hasn't shot up a university yet
reaching a professorship weeds out the schizos

[Anonymous No.14760989]

>>14754739
>Which other works should universities drop because they are too hard for students?
At this point just scrap the humanities in general. People who are genuinely curious to learn them will do it themselves. People who want a piece of paper to say they learned them can be left in a room to play with crayons for 3 years and get their piece of paper. People who want to make money will study STEM.

[Anonymous No.14761003]

>>14755020
dem ol greek homos aint white doe??

[Anonymous No.14761007]

>>14756429

[Anonymous No.14761041]

>Jan Preiss, a second-year Classicist at New College, and the President of the Oxford Latinitas Project, has set up a petition to prevent the proposal from being considered further.

[Anonymous No.14761059]

>>14760956
Keep in mind that these are kids who literally decided to study FILM in college. They've got to be pretty low on the IQ scale.

[Anonymous No.14761100]

>study classics
>don't know latin and greek
ebin :D

[Anonymous No.14761127]

>>14760956
where's that gif from?

[Anonymous No.14761131]

>>14760956
That gif is spooky

[Anonymous No.14761169]

I feel nothing but unquenchable fury.

[Anonymous No.14761213]

>>14759071
That's a noble pursuit. I wish you the best, Anon.

[Anonymous No.14761216]

>>14761127
>>14761131
Glitched footage from Nosferatu. Very much still worth the watch these days. Has a very stilted, unnatural vibe to it now.

[Anonymous No.14761224]

>https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/oxford-data-reveal-disciplines-admissions-equality-divide
>Classics courses, which admitted the smallest proportion of students from financially disadvantaged areas, 5.2 per cent, or from state schools, 28.9 per cent.
There's your reason btw.

[Anonymous No.14761227]

>>14754739
universities will do anything to retain the slew of uninterested goofs, even if it means collectively winding all the syllabus down for the pass rate to remain high (therefore seductive for a class of dunces)

[Anonymous No.14761273]

>>14755020
Any time one of my female professors is forced to delve into anything historical she throws in remarks about how it's boring because it's "just old white dudes." Gets annoying after the first few times.

[Anonymous No.14761275]

>>14758581
the only reason women are the way they are is because men allow it so.

[Anonymous No.14761660]

>>14761216
Thanks. I’ve clearly gotta re-watch that film since I didn’t recognize it

[Anonymous No.14762692]

>>14756259
>implying more commits = more important
the brainless grunt work is left to junior devs. This argument is completely invalid if you've ever actually programmed.
>>14756284
>actually, it wasn't this woman but other women!
it was a bunch of women* there, thanks for improving my post and proving my point
>>14756316
cope

[Anonymous No.14762811]

>>14754739
>Professor Jonathon Prag said to The Oxford Student that the department, “aims to offer a course which is equally stimulating and engaging for all types of applicant, in line with the University’s commitment to recruit and support students of outstanding potential at all levels, whatever their background.”
IT IS ALL SO TIRESOME
>Prag - Surname Origin
>An Ashkenazi Jewish surname, given to the Jewish based on where they were located (Prague, Czechoslovakia). This is common since Jewish last names were more of a newer practice, therefor they used surnames based on location or occupation.
EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. /pol/ is ALWAYS right

[Anonymous No.14762893]

>>14754739
One should just visit oxford and the reason for this change will be self evident. Most students at oxford are not white british or european, most are asians, why would asians be interested in homer or some other european thinker. Oxford like any other higher learning institution is a for profit organisation and will provide what paying customers want.

[Anonymous No.14762900]

>>14762893
So just all Amy Tan soon?

[Anonymous No.14762908]

>>14762900
Pretty much

[Anonymous No.14762915]

the state should take control back from universities or at least have them under guardianship, they are not free speech places anymore and they sellout to rich foreigner kids.

[Anonymous No.14762944]

>>14762915
Who will pay them then? The state aka taxpayers? Fuck that

[Anonymous No.14762973]

>>14762915
It's a free market you communist piece of shit. Back to the gulag you love so much.

[Anonymous No.14762981]

>>14762973
well enjoy being banned from everything, lad

[Anonymous No.14763008]

>>14757463
>>14755126
>>14755159
That segregation is dumb as fuck though. Maybe not so much in reference to "Classics" specifically, but in terms of generalist literature and history courses it sure as fuck is.

>>14755180
>>14756461
There's a difference between focusing on the material most relevenant to your culture in question, but it's another to have a totally western-centric education to the point where the average person going through schooling is barely educated on history and cultures outside of those areas. The whole relevancy argument even has some flaws itself: It's really impossibly to objectively say that X or Y event from centuries or thousands of years ago was more relvenant then the other to modern day society outside of specific obviously massively influential examples due to butterfly effect: For all you know, yes, a random war between two kingdoms in Medivial Thailand might be more influential or as much so as many of the minor conflicts and events we teach about European history.

Honestly the situation isn't too bad in reference to the Near East or East Asia, with South/Southasia being ignored more then it should be, but the real issue is the Americas: There's fucking hundreds of complex civilizations across Latin America and contrary to what people think (since, again, none of this gets fucking taught), we DO have records on a fair amount of them: There's hundreds of documents writen in the Aztec language surviving to this day from the 16th century for example, from poetry to detailed historical records to specifics on their judicial systems and the like, etc; see pic.

It's especially bullshit since the Conquest of Mexico itself is one of those giant, insanely influential events which paved the road for modern European global cultural supremacy with it's success causing the exponential snowballing of colonial efforts elsewhere in the Americas and the world in general; and that Conquest was frankly as much if not moreso the results of the kings and armies of Mesoamerican states as it was the Spanish: The political context, norms, and histories of those socities is EXTREMELY relevant to global society and history, and NOT teaching about it leads to people losing out on understanding a great deal of the factors of why events played out how they did and operating based on flawed frameworks of modern history and related topics as a result.

Pretty much every World History textbook ever will devote, at most, like half a page on these socites before going "and then they got conquered, moving on" with no specific information about their societial practices, the rules of specific kings, wars, etc. The average history major would be totally unable to tell you the name of ANY Mesoamerican or Andean (the civilizations down in Peru and such, the most famous being the Inca) politician, general, poet, etc beyond Montezuma II.

[Anonymous No.14763030]

>>14755012
They're NPCs. Just order them around.

[Anonymous No.14763155]

>>14762893
If you don't want to have a Western Education, don't to a Western University. Education is not McDonalds.

>>14762973
Communism is better than the destruction of Civilization and Culture. If Capitalism results in that, I would rather be ruled by Stalin.
But then, Mao did an enormous damage to Chinese culture.

>>14763008
>but it's another to have a totally western-centric education to the point where the average person going through schooling is barely educated on history and cultures outside of those areas

They don't even know Western Culture. What percentage of people educated in Western Universities had read and understood Gorgias?
The bare minimum for students in Western Universities should be to learn Western Culture. If they want to learn other Cultures later fine, but the most important thing is to learn your own.

[Anonymous No.14763160]

Cont.

>>14763008
>The average history major would be totally unable to tell you the name of ANY Mesoamerican or Andean (the civilizations down in Peru and such, the most famous being the Inca) politician, general, poet, etc beyond Montezuma II

This is much less important than having an understanding of Western Culture. Which the vast majority of students don't have.

[Anonymous No.14763313]

>>14763160
Its all well, you have your opinions but the majority dont share them. So you can sperg as much you want, people are just going to ignore you. Paying students dont want to learn about european and western cultures in western universities and you can do nothing about it. If you want to change that demanding people must and have to do this and that is not going to work.

[Anonymous No.14763331]

>>14754739
As usual, Europe is well behind America.
Yale already scrapped their western art class.
>Too white
>Frightening
https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2020/01/24/art-history-department-to-scrap-survey-course/

[Anonymous No.14763372]

>>14754739
There is just a small minority of college kids pushing this sort of thing. It'll die down soon. It's a nothingburger. We should focus on more important things.

[Anonymous No.14763407]

>>14762915
>>14762944
In the United States, the government sets the policies which incentivize Universities to import massive amounts of students overseas who get educated for free. These students are subsidized either by the other students are paying tuition or by taxpayers. There are entire departments, mostly STEM fields, at public state and land grant universities which are populated by H1B visa holders, mostly from China and Southeast Asia. The state incentivizes this.

[Anonymous No.14763443]

Some of you are completely misinformed. British universities have in recent years been offering places to students from low-income areas. These students do not have any training in classics, Latin or Greek. They may have some basic English lit qualification but nothing more. The purpose of this move is to make the first year more of a transition year, to make it fairer for those that haven't already had two years' education on these topics.

People like >>14762893 are spouting outright lies. This is not about money or appealing to their "customers". Oxbridge have no choice over who they accepted, demographically, since all applications are completed through UCAS and others can see their stats. This is simply a response to the system change. What are they gonna do, fail all disadvantaged students?

[Anonymous No.14763455]

Who cares? If you go to the university these days, and it's not for a STEM degree, as far as I'm concerned you are mentally retarded and do not deserve to read Homer to begin with

[Anonymous No.14763520]

Fuck the academies. Only a fucking retard or a nigger cares about them or wants them to succeed. Which one are you?

[Anonymous No.14763526]

>>14763372
jew rat

[Anonymous No.14763555]

>>14756136
What do you mean "we"?

[Anonymous No.14763622]

>>14755006
Yeah don't worry, they would just burn them instead.

[Anonymous No.14763661]

>>14763313
Are you a moron?
I'm making a moral argument in those posts. I'm not pretending they will do what I'm saying in practice or that I'm Britain's Education Minister and I have the power to order British universities around. I don't even know if the British Education Minister has this power.

I'm saying what Universities should be doing to their students. What would be the morally right way of teaching.

Oxford is a non-profit university. It is not a restaurant or telephone company. They should not be in the business of catering to the whims of their clients. They should be educating their students. Students are not their masters, they are there to learn.

You have a shallow view of education and a shallow view of society. Maybe you should have read the Classics.

[Anonymous No.14763666]

>>14763443
>What are they gonna do, fail all disadvantaged students?
Yes.

[Anonymous No.14763690]

>>14763443
>This is not about money or appealing to their "customers".
Yes. Oxford is a non-profit organization.
"They are doing this to please their clients" is a pretty idiotic take. It shows a lot of ignorance on how society works. A shallow view of capitalism.

And I wonder when the left started using those libertarian arguments for the destruction of culture. Back in my day they didn't consider "companies are maximizing their profits" a good excuse for morally bad actions.

[Anonymous No.14763979]

Americans are probably misguided here. This may not be a money play to appease paying customers in the case of Oxford and UK Universities because as someone mentioned the UK system doesn’t work like America, but I can say definitively that this does take place in American Universities to a significant degree. I actually just saw a presentation give by the President of a very large, well-known, and fairly well-respected public University which basically just distilled down to encouraging the watering down of educational material to appeal to a changing demographic. Enrollments are declining drastically in the US and this is 100% a money play as it always was in the US. Frequently, you’ll hear University administrators speak about their “selling degrees” as if it were a for-profit business selling a product and not an education, let alone a quality education. Universities are starting to hit the panic button and as a result they’re looking at all sorts of data and metrics to try to capture new domestic markets who traditionally haven’t gone to college especially since they’ve already tapped out the technical immigrant market and tuition is all but guaranteed thanks to government loans. They’re happy to water down the curriculum and expand the course offerings to complete garbage in order to boost enrollments and in turn, revenue. Ironically, the only metric that I’ve never seen paraded around is the satisfaction levels of graduates, which is really the only thing that matters and probably why American educational institutions, especially in fields like classics, are largely a joke if they’re held to the standard of being an educational institution.

[Anonymous No.14763990]

>>14754739
>it must adapt to a constantly evolving demographic of students and their needs.
In other words, low IQ shitskins that got accepted for diversity quota. Modern academia is absolute trash, you're a fucking retard if you send your children to public school or public uni in current year

[Anonymous No.14764067]

>>14763979
This is something I don't understand about American universities.
Other than some exceptions like DeVry, aren't most American universities non-profits? And in your case, it is a public university even. Why would they care about this? Similar to expensive sports facilities in American universities. Why spend so much money on it? Why get underqualified students just because they are good at playing a sport for competitions?

Why are morons that run universities as if they were for-profit companies or sports teams in charge of those universities?

[Anonymous No.14764083]

>>14764067
>Why get underqualified students just because they are good at playing a sport for competitions?
because muh NFL

[Anonymous No.14764086]

>>14756136
Imagine being dumb enough to believe that we ever broke through the firmament.

[Anonymous No.14764092]

>>14764086
>>/x/

[Anonymous No.14764190]

>>14755022
>make the course more accessible
So we finally got to the point where even Oxford has to sell out, huh? God, that's really sad. If they're really going to lower their standards, why not add an additional year with a more introductory syllabus? Dumbing down your course seems like the worst decision to be made in a scenario like this.

[Anonymous No.14764245]

>>14756136
Please, refrain permanently from intellectual discussions.
>she also programmed the most essential parts of the algorithm
If you said it to Kate herself, she'd tell you you're wrong

[Anonymous No.14764532]

>>14763331
>problematic
The word for heresy in the church of the new left?

[Anonymous No.14764576]

>>14760956
Why should anyone listen to you when you're posting one of the the worst Murnaus? I swear film academia is worse than any other kind. Heartless, polemic bugmen with no sense for aesthetics or beauty.

[Anonymous No.14764585]

>>14754739
>Modernize classics

[Anonymous No.14764609]

>>14764576
It's an interesting gif. Try to be less of a pathetic sperg.

[Anonymous No.14764625]

>>14764067
They’re really non-profits in name only. What ends up happening at the large public Universities is much of the funding comes directly from the federal or state government, a portion from research if its a research university (usually from government agencies so still public money), then tuition, but the thing is the most option is almost entirely government loans so it’s guaranteed money. All they have to do is sell enrollments to students and they get paid, then the student pays off the debt and in the meantime the cost of tuitions increases because it’s so easy for enrollments to get funding. There’s also sports and such which can be a giant or relatively small source of funding. That’s why you see humanities departments be the first to go in American Universities. Usually, they have little to do with research funding so they rely entirely on enrollments, which as I mentioned are dropping. The reason they want all these students that don’t really belong there academically is because they’re a source of revenue via tuition or sports sales or whatever, which is really all it boils down to in America. In the case of sports. Maybe at one point you could get a solid education as a by product of the degree-as-admission-ticket-to-a-job and the 4 year vacation you’re buying, but that’s less and less the case in my opinion. I had lectures in excess of 300 students to 1 professor. It’s impossible to get anything of educative quality out of that. You’re really just a number attending something to a check a box at that point. Private schools like Ivies and Liberal Arts colleges are a bit different but in general that’s how the American Uni system is.

[Anonymous No.14764639]

>>14764067
>>14764625
Also, the morons who are in charge run them like businesses and sports teams because that’s basically how our system functions. We have a system in America where the people who can bullshit the most and accumulate the most letters while maximizing profits get lifted to the top of the hierarchy. It’s really the same with professors. Corporate striver type ass kissers get faculty positions. People with integrity often don’t. Colleges sell student loans just like any business sells a product. They just do it in very clever ways that allow them to masquerade as non-profits.

[Anonymous No.14764653]

>>14757658
>my fellow /lit/ posters, we are sick of this guy’s memes!

[Anonymous No.14764665]

>>14758581
the jews push hard for women’s suffrage retard

[Anonymous No.14764734]

>>14764625
>>14764639
But where do the profits go? Non-profits don't have shareholders demanding return for their capital

[Anonymous No.14765052]

>>14754988
Your sentiment is correct but the conclusion? Not necessarily. The push-back against the current trend is already starting to become quite noticeable in society and as we have learned from the history of the Soviet Union - it is censorship, oppression and though policing that pushes rebellious minds to create the most thought provoking, rich, satirical and critical content. I am somewhat hopeful.

[Anonymous No.14765082]

>>14760971
You clearly have not been hanging around academics.

[Anonymous No.14765089]

>>14761216
Silent era movies are still the best. It is incredible how with all the innovation Faust (1921) still caries more emotion than the absolute majority of modern cinema.

[Anonymous No.14765242]

>>14764609
Very thoughtful rebuttal. Thanks for proving me correct!

[Anonymous No.14765301]

>>14765242
Make better posts if you want better replies. You took the offhanded use of that gif as an excuse to compulsively vomit up an irrelevant opinion. There is nothing to debate. Calm down.

[Anonymous No.14765316]

>>14765089
I don't have any particular hard on for them, but I do enjoy them, especially the ones where everything was clearly shot on a stage. Every inch of them is always filled with such craft. The sets, the props, the acting- everything looks artificial, but there's something special about knowing that every inch of what you're seeing was constructed and not just incidental.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CkXlXc0lA9c

[Anonymous No.14765353]

>>14765316
I don't have a particular dislike for modern cinema, but I do think I think German Expressionist cinema is quite underrated. And I have seen Haxan, it's great!

[Anonymous No.14765363]

>>14757658
How do I give this most epic user some 4chan gold?

[Anonymous No.14765550]

>>14765052
Other than /pol/ who else is pushing back against this?

[Anonymous No.14765564]

>modernize the classics

[Anonymous No.14765570]

>>14754988
I also think this is the case. Academia is just about getting a job nowadays. Great thinkers will appear anyways though. You can’t stop greatness. That’s what makes it so great.

[Anonymous No.14765621]

>>14764734
Well, that’s the thing. After they pay the salaries of the football coach and all of the mid to high level college administrators, who can number in the hundreds and have compensation from the mid six figures to millions, they pay a massive amount of money for overhead, facilities, that sort of thing. Then, the biggest chunk goes to marketing and things related to marketing or any one of hundreds or thousands of overbloated budgets with staff that aren’t needed buying stuff that’s not needed, and all kinds of stuff like scholarships, events, whatever. In the end, there isn’t really any “profit” hence the non-profit designation, but everyone still makes out like a thief except for the student.

[Anonymous No.14765636]

>>14765621
In short, universities have as their (non-stated) aim to give money to their admin staff?

[Anonymous No.14765641]

>>14754739
>adapt to a constantly evolving demographic of students
Doesn’t actually mean anything. Void of sense. It’s English but also nonsensical. It also implies that this year, humans are fundamentally different from those 10 years or 100 ago.

[Anonymous No.14765740]

>>14763661
>I'm making a moral argument in those posts
For what reason? I think everyone here on /lit/ and 4chan in general knows this. There is no need to repeat it or present like its something new.

[Anonymous No.14765815]

>>14763155
>If they want to learn other Cultures later fine, but the most important thing is to learn your own.

Part of my point is that, even if that's true, at times what cauised your own culture to develop the way it did is in fact the contributions and interactions from other cultures as well.

>>14763160
>This is much less important than having an understanding of Western Culture.

Broadly? Sure, but there's definitely some Mesoamerican historical figures, states, etc who are more or as influential then Western figures people ARE taught about.

For example, Tlaxcala was a kingdom in Central Mexico, inside an enclave of the Aztec empire. It was ruled by a unified republic of 4-city states with a collective senate: The Tlaxcalatec beat Cortes, his Conquistadors, and the allied army they received from the Totonac city of Cempoala; and only spared Cortes and co at the last minute when two of Tlaxcala's leaders, Xicotencatl the Elder, and Maxixcatzin, persuaded another, Xicotencatl the Younger; to do so so they could use Conquistadors against the Aztec, who had been invading and blockading them to wear them down for conquest for decades.

Tlaxcala would then act as the Conquistador's primary allies, well before any other local city-states and kingdoms joined with them against the Aztec captial of Tenochtitlan, and even after that point continued to provide the majority of troops used in the siege on Tenochtitlan. And in many cases, it was the Tlaxcalatec leadership who were actually calling the shots, at times manipulating Cortes into targetting the cities and towns they wished to for their own political interests.

Tlaxcala and it's leaders have way more of a direct impact on the state of Modern Western culture (by virtue of greatly enabling the Spanish Conquest of Mexico, which, it playing out how it did, set the stage, created the practical opportunity and economic interest for further colonial efforts in the Americas) then a lot of Iron age and Classical European individuals and minor city-states people still learn about, though obviously not the major ones like Homer, Athens, etc.

[Anonymous No.14766119]

>>14765636
I don’t know if I’d say that’s their aim, but that‘s one of the things that ends up happening.

[Anonymous No.14766538]

>>14764067
Tax payer money its that simple