Notes From the North Country

There it is, the book on my shelf from college: Rationalism in Politics and Other Essays, by Michael Oakeshott.

Not long ago, I was standing in my home workshop, thinking to myself: “I really need to get serious about dust collection,” when it occurred to me how far I have come.

One of the interesting things I’ve noticed in the last few years is that some of the most astute and interesting analyses of modern Critical Theory (CT) – whether podcasts, articles, or even books – actually come from the Christian right.

Years ago, as a student teacher, I was faced with the chore of having teaching high school juniors a book that I absolutely hated as junior: The Scarlet Letter.

I read many of the Platonic dialogues in college, and I read The Republic several times, but I’d never read Meno, known to be one of Plato’s most influential dialogues on the field of education.

“We should, however, give to our children a vision of the possibilities which lie ahead and endeavor to enlist their loyalties and enthusiasms in the realization of the vision.” – George Counts, Dare the School Build a New Social Order?

It’s not unusual that some of the most ardent school reformers are former educators.

Several years back, in a flurry of activity, I set out to read the fundamental books in the social contract tradition.

Years ago, when I was first a teacher – which is to say, back before I had time to read books about teaching – a coworker recommended Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner’s Teaching as a Subversive Activity.

Years ago, when we were in high school, a friend of mine read Ayn Rand and started claiming that self-interest was the fundamental motive behind every single human interaction.