Up@dawn 2.0

Thursday, August 8, 2019

Don't get stuck

Thanks again, MALA I & T class of 2019!

Here's an image to help you retain the memory of our course, and hence (as Shelia showed us) that part of your identity.

It was a good class, raising important and sensitive issues... but your civility and good humor made it fun every step of the way.

So, one more bit of advice: Don't get stuck in the books!



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I wrote a little commemoration of our course and my summer Friends Weekend...
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Another next-read suggestion, after you finish David Brooks's The Second Mountain...
Wish I Were Here: Boredom and the Interface by [Kingwell, Mark]Are you bored of the endless scroll of your social media feed? Do you swipe left before considering the human being whose face you just summarily rejected? Do you skim articles on your screen in search of intellectual stimulation that never arrives? If so, this book is the philosophical lifeline you have been waiting for. Offering a timely meditation on the profound effects of constant immersion in technology, also known as the Interface, Wish I Were Here draws on philosophical analysis of boredom and happiness to examine the pressing issues of screen addiction and the lure of online outrage. Without moralizing, Mark Kingwell takes seriously the possibility that current conditions of life and connection are creating hollowed-out human selves, divorced from their own external world. While scrolling, swiping, and clicking suggest purposeful action, such as choosing and connecting with others, Kingwell argues that repeated flicks of the finger provide merely the shadow of meaning, by reducing us to scattered data fragments, Twitter feeds, Instagram posts, shopping preferences, and text trends captured by algorithms. Written in accessible language that references both classical philosophers and contemporary critics, Wish I Were Here turns to philosophy for a cure to the widespread unease that something is amiss in modern waking life.
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For the record, at Shelia's request:

Identity and Truth exam, August 2019 NAME:

above, Anglo-American, beliefs,  below, borders, Buddhist, China, class, condescending, cosmopolitanism, cultural, customs, Charles Dickens, George Eliot, ethnic, European, familiar, fracturing, Frege, gender, Ghanaians, habitus, homeland, identities, identity, income, Islamic, Jains, Karachi, Lahore, language, laws, Leibniz, London, Malcolm X, mascot, Medussa, midwest, Muslims, nationalism, nationality, negative, nobility, passport, patriotism, positive, prejudicial, pretensions, protectionism, Quakers, race, Russell, self-aggrandizing, Singapore, south, Anthony Trollope, traditions, truth, visa, H.G. Wells, west, Michael Young, 100; 500; 1,000

1. Who introduced a distinction between sense and reference? Frege

2. Who proposed a law known alternately as the identity of indiscernibles and the indiscernibility of identicals? Leibniz

3. Philosophers in the _____ tradition do not assume that the world’s secrets are accessible to us, or that individuals are of primary importance. Buddhist

4. Sadiq Khan, whose heritage is part Pakistani, is mayor of  what city? London

5. Lifestyle and consumption patterns came to supersede _____ as a determiner of social identity. class

6. The United Nations has declared the goal of providing everybody on earth, by 2030, with a legal what? identity

7. So-called "digital natives" touch their smartphones more than ____ times a day, on average. 1,000

8. So-called "identity apostles" most fear fluid and shifting _____. borders

9. English novelist _____ viewed identities as utterly particular and personal. George Eliot

10. Contrary to popular belief,  ____ do not typically wear a cloth to avoid killing insects by ingesting them. Jains

11.  We are more likely to accept a generic “essentializing” claim about a group if what it says is something _____. negative

12. When Europeans used labels like "German" and "Italian" in the 19th century, they were thinking about individuals with a language, culture, and _____ in common. traditions

13. Many of the former British and French colonies avoided conflict by retaining the colonial what? language

14. Italo Svevo’s legacy rejects  a forced choice between globalism and _____. patriotism

15. Appiah says  the key elements of middle-class status have to do with a style of speech and behavior called _____. habitus

16. A 2012 survey of occupational prestige ranked professors and lawyers _____ working and middle class. above

17.  The term "fan" originated in the _____. midwest

18. Intra-city sports rivalries (Cubs-White Sox, Yankees-Mets etc.) exemplify a phenomenon Tarver calls _____.  fracturing

19. The function of a _____ is to facilitate the collective agreement and attachment of fans. mascot


20. Whose favorite teacher told him it was unrealistic to think he, or anyone who looked like him, could become a lawyer? Malcolm X

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