Re: What makes a progressive student (was David Harvey's anomie)

["Fellows, Jeffrey" <jmf9@xxxxxxx>]

Maggie's post about students not appreciating having their
preconceptions challenged struck a familiar chord. It brings up an issue
I think all progressive academics are concerned with, namely can and do
professors substantially transform students' attitudes about society, or
do they largely provide a framework that makes sense to students'
established world view? Also, is there any sense that exposure to
progressive ideas leads to attitude changes that are sustained over long
periods, with or without what I could call ideological booster shots?

Jeff
 ----------
From: MScoleman
To: pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: David Harvey's anomie
Date: Thursday, April 30, 1998 10:06PM

In a message dated 98-04-29 21:32:47 EDT, you write:

<< Hmm, really? My own recent tours of campuses, and conversations with
 academics, combine to present a less pretty picture of the U.S. college
 population. They seem, for the most part, poorly educated and don't
seem to
 give a fuck about much of anything. Am I just being too gloomy once
again?

 Doug >>

I recently had my classes read pieces of Edin and Lein's "Making Ends
Meet"
which is a comparison of the lives of welfare women and low wage women,
and
how they feed their kids with not enough money.  The reactions of all my
students, save one, before they read the material was that welfare women
are
all lazy and promiscuous.  AFter my lecture and reading the material,
most of
them were not particularly happy with having their perceptions blurred
-- but
that's about as progressive as most of them are (at least in my
classes).
maggie coleman mscoleman@xxxxxxx