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Michael Dolzani's avatar

I nowhere talked about "the classroom as activism." I talked about liberal education as the expansion of the mind through the awakening of the imagination and the critical intellect. That in itself is transformative, and may lead to social change. Neither Frye nor I have ever talked of the classroom as an indoctrination center, but we both believe in "liberating" as the root meaning of "liberal." Read the last chapter of The Educated Imagination. Do you think he was not interested in the effect on society of the study of literature? Reread the interview responses where Frye talked about how Fearful Symmetry was spurred by the menace of Nazism and fascism. You have confused some kind of preachy "woke" stuff with liberal education. It is true that Frye would have wanted nothing to do with that--he despised the student demonstrators--and I don't either. And those young people are about to see the results of their vote.

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Michael Dolzani's avatar

Thanks for the "like," Doug, but I'm not sure what you mean. Obama did say that and WAS clearly pretending for pragmatic political purposes. My students were babies then, and have no idea how fast attitudes have changed. If you're saying it's indoctrination to imply that acceptance of gay and lesbian people is a good thing, well, I disagree. Baldwin Wallace severed its ties with the Methodist Church a few years ago when the Methodists condemned homosexuality, and I was proud of us. That isn't "woke," that's common decency. Liberal education isn't a relativism detached from all values--it has values, but believes in critiquing them even as it holds them. That's what we teach. As for what Frye would have thought, I think he would have felt that acceptance of people's sexual identity is part of primary concern. Granted it can be hard to separate secondary, ideological concerns from primary concerns, but accepting people as human beings no matter what the hell their sexual identities are is pretty basic.

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