engl1302.docx · Web viewEnglish Grammar & Composition II Dr. John Harris Office: BUS 207a. ENGL 1302 h: 903-566-4985

English Grammar & Composition II  Dr. John Harris       Office: BUS 207aENGL 1302                                              h: 903-566-4985Spring 2013 w: 903-565-5701                   Office Hours:

MWF: 9-11 TTh:  9-9:30

Required Texts/MaterialsReal Texts: Reading and Writing Across the Disciplines, ed. Dean Ward and Elizabeth Vander Lei (ISBN 13: 978-1-256-44282-0).

ObjectivesThis course is intended to make students more effective readers as well as writers. From both directions of the literate endeavor, it will equip the student to deal with advanced texts such as he or she will encounter throughout the college experience. While texts in upper-division classes of the student’s major will pose the greatest challenge in terms of specialized knowledge and “insider” stylistic conventions (and will therefore be the focus of this course’s preparation), students will also have exposure to other disciplinary practices covered by the “liberal arts” umbrella.

RationaleIn the past, students have typically been expected to absorb new kinds of writing—both as readers and, slightly later, as writers themselves—while working their way into their academic major. Even if they chance to master the habits and manners of their chosen discipline, they have often derived little benefit from their exposure to the core curriculum because of insufficient preparation in how to address various texts beyond their special interest. English 1302 is a deliberate response to a significant but suppressed need, therefore. The content of this course overtly rehearses the student in handling idiosyncratic styles covering the spectrum of academic discourse, and also trains the student to minimize in his or her own writing the loss of general comprehension too often incurred when specialists compose technical papers.

Required Work/Grading

Reading-Response Papers (40%): These brief and frequent writing exercises form a large component of the grade simply because we will be spending almost half of the semester utilizing them to prepare for more protracted and involved writing. In them, you will assess the rhetorical effectiveness of various readings, primarily from Real Texts, and also rehearse several simple stages involved in composing a long scholarly paper. Over the semester’s first seven weeks, we shall break ground by considering several types of writing. “Type” refers not just to the subject matter or discipline (Nursing, Chemistry, Sociology, etc.), but also to the audience targeted by the writer. Specifically, we shall distinguish between an “inner circle” audience of those well initiated into a given field’s practices and the much broader public to which most of us usually belong. The first two assignments aim at getting you accustomed to thinking rhetorically about what you read. Thereafter you will write a series of “contrastive commentaries” (seven altogether) whose intent is to describe how the “high” and “low” registers (i.e., the formal, “insider” style and the “general public” style) differ within several disciplines. You are not expected to have profound knowledge of these distinctions: my expectation, rather, is that the typical 1302 student

will make a thoughtful and sincere effort, as a college freshman, to identify probable distinctions. Answers are not judged by whether or not they are right or wrong in an absolute sense, therefore, but rather by how observant and thorough they are. The contrastive commentary should consider these three points:

What differences separate the “high” and “low” registers (i.e., the formal academic paper and the article in a popular publication)? Examples: vocabulary, citation, method of address, personal references, length, assumptions about readers’ values.

Which piece do you “trust” more, and why? (Do you think the academic piece is hiding behind stuffy rhetoric, do you find that the popular piece takes too much for granted and offers too little evidence, etc.)

Can you identify any qualities that distinguish both pieces from writing in other disciplines that you may be familiar with (e.g., degree of reliance on previous research or on personal anecdotes, degree of “clinicity” or familiarity in style, presumptions about the nature of reality and truth)?

These are not formal essays, and need not even be composed in an essay format. To assemble an answer in three independent short paragraphs is entirely satisfactory. Once you become habituated to the process, we will do other activities at the same time as we analyze texts. Furthermore, I will allows you a pair of options in the discipline from which you wish to draw reading material during the last three weeks of February. Among the other things we’ll be doing concurrently is writing up interviews. These interviews (there will be two) will be conducted during class. In the first instance, I shall pair students together; and in the second, I shall begin the process of grouping students with others who share their academic interests. In both cases, I want you to follow the same steps: a) take notes; b) write up a summary of the interview; c) assess the reliability of your source, or—in the second interview—the relative reliability of your several sources (supplying reasons for your judgment); and d) identify the single best item of information you received from your source or sources. Here, too, you are not expected to produce a formal essay. Your write-up may take the form of a four-part short-answer exercise. By my count, this produces a grand—and awkward—total of eleven assignments in the Reading Response category. I do not conceive of any one exercise as being more important than the others, so one might conclude that each assignment is worth 3.64 points. I prefer to reiterate that the overall category produces 40% of your final grade. Judging a piece of writing is an inexact science. I’ll be looking more for clear patterns and tendencies than for distant decimals.

Individual Project (40%): Your project will consume approximately the second half of the semester. Its graded portions are broken down as follows.

Proposal (2%): Just before Spring Break, I shall expect you to have decided where you want to focus your efforts for the semester’s second half. The Proposal is a brief statement (about a page) of what discipline you intend to write within and what particular subject you intend to tackle. You should try to be fairly specific: your speculations about where the paper may take you are not binding at this point. A working bibliography is part of the proposal: both items must be submitted before Spring Break.

Synopsis (2%): A synopsis is similar to a summary (in fact, the two words are Greek and Latin alternatives for the same kind of exercise). This is another brief bit of writing (again, just a page or two). It will actually come after the long Specialized Paper. Its intent is to start you down the road of deciding upon that paper’s major elements of general interest. You will work outward from the synopsis in composing the final essay—your General Paper.

Specialized Paper (18%--9% each draft): Many of you will be composing this essay in a field where you are much more knowledgeable than I. You should try to observe the standards of evidence and the methods of proof that garner respect in your particular discipline—not present only those arguments that I or another layman might understand. Dazzle me with your intense research! If charts and spread-sheets are appropriate, use them. If surveys of random citizens will advance your discussion, perform them. If photographs are respected evidence, insert them. You will have an opportunity to rewrite this essay, both to improve its content and—especially—to polish its grammar. Each draft will be worth 50% of the total grade.

General Paper (18%--9% each draft): As important as it surely is to be able to build a paper that you might submit in an upper-division class within your chosen major, reaching a broader audience—the general public, so to speak—is also a vital skill. Some of the world’s most brilliant minds have never acquired this skill, and their ideas consequently never achieve the kind of currency they deserve. In your final essay, you will attempt to dress up (or should we say dress down?) your insight-rich Specialized Paper into a piece suited to wider consumption. You are allowed and even encouraged to be somewhat informal, humorous, and—in a word—entertaining in this paper. You should never distort the truth for easy digestion by shallow minds… but careful consideration will usually open paths to simplifying complex observations. Again, this paper will be rewritten as a final draft, special attention being paid in the rewrite to grammar. Both drafts are worth 50% of the total grade.

Class Participation (20%): College-age adults should be capable of collecting the instruction they paid for without duress. I view attendance as a measure of the student’s maturity, and hence I also view professorial “whip-cracking” as somewhat demeaning to both teacher and student. This course, however, relies heavily on discussion as an integral part of the writing process—and good discussion is not possible without substantial attendance. I therefore and hereby offer fair warning that attendance and participation are worth 20% of the total grade. Miss few or no classes and you should receive a boost, especially if you contribute verbally; miss every third class and you should expect to repeat 1302. In fact, I claim the right to fail any student who misses more than ten classes (or the equivalent of about a month).

Schedule of Readings and Assignments

All assignments are in Real Texts unless otherwise stated. The assignments should be completed by the date when they are listed (i.e., they are homework from the previous meeting).

January11 Introduction to class: check your UT email for a download, “Progressivism on Trial.”15 Read 2-15 and 27-39 (cursorily: you will not be tested over details). Be prepared for in-

class writing that will relate material in this assignment to “Progressivism on Trial.” 17 Read essay attached to this syllabus: “Different Answers to the Question ‘Why’.” In-

class writing: what constitutes evidence or truth in your chosen field?22 Read Bellah (83) and Michaelson (105). No writing to submit at this point: we will

discuss in class how to compose your contrastive commentary.24 Submit contrastive commentary on previous reading assignment. Personal interviews

during class, with note-taking.29 Read Tach, Mincy, & Edin (113) and Coontz (138). Submit summary and analysis of

previous class’s interview by end of this class.31 Submit contrastive commentary on previous reading assignment. Group interview during

class.

February5: Read Conway and Toeniessen (152) and PUB South Africa Dept. of Science & Tech

(172). Submit summary of previous class’s interview by end of this class.7 Submit contrastive commentary on previous assignment. Preliminary declaration of

special interest (i.e., the disciplinary focus of your Individual Project).Complete either of following week’s assignments: not both.

12 Thomas (186) and Shalof (208) and submit commentary: class discussion of conclusions. 14 Read Layne (220) and Owen (250) and submit commentary: class discussion of

conclusions.Complete either of following week’s assignments: not both.

19 Read Gabbett (262) and Holloway (279) and submit commentary: class discussion of conclusions.

21 Read Garland-Thompson (296) and Sontag (321) and submit commentary: class discussion of conclusions.

Complete either of following week’s assignments: not both.26 Read Alexander (332) and Carson (346) and submit commentary: class discussion of

conclusions. 28 Read Villanueva (366) and Hirsch (385) and submit commentary: class discussion of

conclusions.

March5 Read Steelcase Corporation (402) and Steen (417) and submit commentary: class

discussion of conclusions. Submit general proposal for your project.7 Submit a working bibliography for your proposal: i.e., a list of works which you have

decided after a preliminary search may be helpful to consult.9- S P R I N G17 B R E A K !19 In-class report on state of your research (brief oral presentation from everyone). Counts

as Class Participation.21 Submit detailed outline of project (i.e., have a thesis or objective, isolate major areas to

be covered, indicate logical transitions between these areas, indicate kind and amount ofillustration or exemplification). Counts as Class Participation.

25 Last day to withdraw from class.26 A writing day—no formal class: I will be in my office all morning for conferences.28 Submit rough draft of Specialized Paper: be prepared to read a selection to the class.

April2 In-class review of grammar and proper formatting preparatory to submitting final draft.4 Discuss composition of synopsis.9 Submit final draft of Specialized Paper.11 Submit Synopsis of project.16 In-class discussion of how to create more general presentation from Synopsis.18 A writing day—no formal class: I will be in my office all morning for conferences. 23 Read selections from General Paper to class: peer criticism.25 Submit rough draft of General Paper.30 In-class review of grammar and proper formatting preparatory to submitting final draft.

May 2 Submit final draft of General Essay. You have now completed all the required work for

this class!

Different Answers to the Question “Why”: Vital Coordinates for the Student Writer I. Aristotle’s Four Types of Cause

Aristotle noted a long time ago (in Metaphysics 5.1013a) that an object or condition may be said to have more than one kind of cause. Take a bronze statue. What causes it—why is it standing there in the middle of the plaza? Well, the reason is the bronze, which doesn’t melt away like soap or slowly crack and split like wood. Aristotle would call this the material cause of the statue.

But no (you say), I do not mean what causes it to be a durable object. I mean how did it get there? Where did it come from? How did the bronze come to take the shape of a man? Well (says your informant), it came from the sculptor’s shop, and the sculptor’s hands gave it a shape which his mind had conceived. This would be the statue’s efficient cause (from efficere, “to make, bring to completion”).

Now you are somewhat more satisfied, but still curious. So you ask further, Why a statue, though—why this statue of Pericles? If a need to have some large object in the plaza’s center was perceived, why not just a large block of uncut marble with ingenious, abstract swirls cut into it? The new answer might be that, once the decision was made to erect a statue, the object had to resemble something from the “real world.” The convention among sculptors is not to create casts of abstract fantasies, for the perceiving mind would not know how to process such thing—but rather to produce artificial objects in imitation of familiar ones. This is the statue’s formal cause: it is required to assume a certain form in order to be recognizable as a statue.

But why (you say) does this convention exist? You are quite happy to see the elegant Pericles instead of a crude mass of metal… but what ever inspired sculptors to subscribe to their imitative convention, in the first place? The answer now acquires yet another twist. It is your happiness, or pleasure, or delight: the statue imitates an animate being because humans delight in viewing reproductions of nature. This is the object’s final cause. As an art object, it exists for the purpose (or finis) of pleasing the beholder.

One can quibble with particular explanations of cause, to be sure, and even add further types of cause to Aristotle’s list (as the Roman playwright and philosopher Seneca suggested). The brilliance of the essential idea is unaffected by dubious applications of it. Let us extend Aristotle’s broad insight to matters current in today’s academy. You need only visit the website or thumb through the catalogue of any college or university to notice immediately that the offerings are divided into arts, sciences, business, education, various technical spheres such as engineering, and so forth. All of these endeavors have proponents who would describe them as purposive—for why would you devote valuable time to any labor without a purpose? Greek myth represents the tormented Sisyphus as forever rolling a huge stone up a steep slope only to have it forever slip away from him just before he reaches the summit. To struggle at a task with no purpose, no meaning—no cause—is truly to reside in Hell!

Nevertheless, the explanation that each college professor would give of his or her discipline’s purpose would have qualities distinct to that discipline. The music teacher would not likely propose that we must create or understand music in order to survive from day to day, but rather that our long-term survival will degenerate into that of a beast if we deny our mind and spirit access to the “free play” of the arts. The engineer would counter that refinement of the spirit is all well and good—but that if our sewer system ceases to function and our bridges fall in, we will find little solace in a flute or guitar. The “pure scientist” will stake out a position which partakes of these two yet has a character all its own. He or she will argue that we need free and open scientific inquiry in order to discover new avenues into old problems—perhaps new cures for hitherto incurable diseases or new sources of energy with no toxic by-products; but that even if such unfettered investigation leads to no instant and tangible advantage, its pursuit remains a duty for us as rational beings.

A Nursing major might explain the purpose of his or her study as helping human beings in urgent physical need. A Pre-Law student might say that, whatever the exigencies of body or soul in individual human beings, the human collective requires sound, fair rules if it is to maintain a civilized state of living. The Education major might observe that all of these objectives are worthy, but that they can only be achieved if a properly taught adult is built upon a properly taught child—and that reaching children effectively with instruction demands technique as well as content.

None of these people is really denying or slighting the importance of what the others do, yet all have a somewhat different perception of the job to be done. The same statue will end up appearing in the same spot in the same agora, but some are primarily concerned about its materials, others about its shape, others about its position relative to the broader space… and others about artistic convention, others about the statue-viewer’s psychology, others about the pay and maintenance of sculptors.

II. The Three Realms of KnowledgeThese many views of cause or purpose should not lead to the conclusion that no purpose

really exists—that we are all Sisyphus without knowing it, since we fail to perceive that the multitude of proposed destinations for our stone strongly implies an absence of real destination. In the past, teachers of composition have indeed tended to exude such an aura of cynicism. (And the teachers of this school go very far back: in ancient Athens, they were called sophists.) Too many textbooks have created the impression that writing is largely a matter of gauging the mood, attitude, and background of one’s audience and then indexing that information to one’s desired end. A written composition, in other words, was an advertisement—a seduction, a come-on. Its author calculated your likely weaknesses and then set about exploiting them in order to elicit a behavior from you which you would not normally display. This was called persuasion. It reeked of the notion that people only and always act from self-interest, and that mastery at writing consists of manipulating a readership into believing that its selfish objectives are nearly identical to one’s own. No higher sense of truth enlightened the tug-of-war between interests: no criterion existed to suggest that one argument should prevail over another simply because it was more just or valid. The very concept of justice implicit in this approach is, at best, a kind of “fair play” principle whereby the dominant side should flip over and let the other side dominate from time to time. No reference point external to the struggle is possible, these sophists seem to say. (But then, is not the appeal to fair play the last-ditch rhetorical maneuver of the side that cannot otherwise throw the adversary off his feet?)

The diversity of causes in any worldly endeavor, once again, need not lead to this outlook. In fact, causes (or purposes) are not really innumerable at all, or even as many as the people who bring their selfish concerns into the debate. Instead, they basically reduce to three kinds: the aesthetic, the ethical, and the empirical—or, if you prefer the more familiar terms of Roman philosophy to these Greek-derived words, then the artistic, the moral, and the scientific. To be sure, sub-categories may be—and probably should be—named under three such broad headings. Nevertheless, most of the things one might say about our statue would involve how nice it is to look at (the aesthetic), how its contemplation affects behavior (the moral), and how it is physically generated and positioned (the empirical). Should it have been made of marble rather than bronze? That question would require scientific analysis if the “should” reflects a concern about available materials or about the durability of material in an uncovered setting. It could be an artistic question of the concern is over the material’s degree of responsiveness to the artist’s hands. It could even be ethical if certain city elders feel that a bronze Pericles will better inspire the kind of virtue desirable in good citizens than a marble statue.

Within the empirical question, attention might indeed be focused primarily on whether or not enough marble were available locally; or the focus, rather, might center on how well marble withstands rain, or whether the crush of traffic in the agora is apt to break it, or whether a bronze statue would be more likely to draw lightning. These are all questions for a scientist of one kind or another. The artistic issue, likewise, might revolve less around the particular statue’s graceful curves than around its appropriateness for the chosen setting or its conformity to or rebellion against the conventions of statue-making. Ethical problems might arise if the statue were felt to be encouraging a hero-cult, if its genre were seen as proper only for religious statues, or if the marble quarry were getting a lucrative contract unfairly in order to choke off the ore-miners’ business. We have already sketched out about a dozen causes for speeches and editorials on the subject of one lonely statue!

Virtually any discipline can be carved up in this tripartite fashion: that is, such that its interests or objectives are sorted into the empirical, the aesthetic, and the ethical. We should not be so naïve as to believe that all the sciences have exclusively empirical interests, the arts aesthetic, and so forth. (What would constitute the ethical interest, by the way? The study of law? But the truism, “You can’t legislate morality,” has passed into proverb! Religion? But many professional clerics

become vexed when moral issues occupy center stage, and warn, “God’s ways are not our ways!”) The human spirit is a slippery kind of animal. Like the Greek god Proteus, with whom Menelaus grapples in the Odyssey, it can change forms radically even as we hold tight to it. Even dryly scientific issues can turn ethical or aesthetic at the bat of an eye. The current controversy over global warming is an excellent example. Are average temperatures around the world rising above the values we would expect from cyclical fluctuation? Is the degree of aberrancy sufficient to indicate a real break in the cycle? Has it been sustained long enough to suggest that no pendulum-swing in the direction of cooling off is likely to follow? Perhaps most importantly of all, if the answer to the previous questions is “yes”… is the cycle’s disruption the result of human activity? If so, what activity? Has the disruption proceeded for too long to be diminished in the hope that the pendulum might reverse course—or would a radical change in lifestyle now be too little too late? Would such a change invite panic or political posturing, either of which would likely induce grave economic hardship?

All of these questions except the last are scientific in nature: they clearly belong to the realm of the empirical. Yet the controversy has grown heated precisely because certain social groups and political forces recognize a moral urgency to the issue so pressing that the wait for the science to “catch up” strikes them as unendurable. Obviously, valid scientific data in this matter would take decades to amass. What if we really are heating up the earth in a disastrous manner? By the time climatologists delivered the proof to us, the reversal that we might effectively begin at this moment would perhaps truly serve no purpose. Therefore, the best course is to begin now. Why play with a gun on the assumption that it isn’t loaded? Why not assume it to be loaded, and not play with it?

Such a moral stance seems compelling. It is immensely and intricately complicated, however, by what may fairly be called aesthetic concerns. Many of us would not be very attracted to car traffic even if it should be exonerated of creating a planetary greenhouse. We already loathe the noise and smog that envelops our cities and towns, and the daily dose of rush hour strains our nerves, fouls our mood, taxes our heart, and—by the way—keeps us captive that much longer in a sedentary lifestyle conducive to obesity and other disorders. Of course, ethical concerns are now filtering into these matters of ugliness and tastelessness—for surely one has a moral obligation to cultivate an even temper and to keep one’s body fit. (Ethics is also denominated the “practical realm by ancient philosophers because it involves what we choose to do [praxis, “a deed”]—and nobody can do much of anything from a hospital bed.) Ironically, the preservation of old towns in their pristine form and the promotion of time-honored standards of personal conduct would seem to be conservative causes; yet in the political arena, forces that advance the bulldozing of neighborhoods into highways and the unshackling of narcissistic driving behavior tend to brand themselves proudly with a “conservative” label. Whether or not less driving conserves the planet, it certainly helps to conserve communal coherence and a faint dusting of good manners.

The “debate” over global warming has thus become a Gordian Knot of clashing values masquerading—on both sides—as a scientific exchange. Better yet, it resembles a pair of wrestlers locked in a to-the-death struggle so intense that neither combatant is conscious of all the feints and reversals he executes in a bid to throw his opponent. As this example dramatically illustrates, failure to understand the kind of argument one has undertaken—empirical, aesthetic, or ethical—can release chronic, even tragic animosity. The scientist must be keenly aware of the point beyond which his or her research is no longer pure science. The architect must fully grasp that at some stage his designs cross over from being nice to look at and begin to dictate people’s practical choices. The priest or preacher must honestly answer (in his or her heart, if not publicly before the congregation) to what extent an inner conviction of goodness can be expected to yield to the socially pacifying or sentimentally reassuring routine of traditional practices.

III. Academic Disciplines: A TaxonomyThis brief introduction (which now risks no longer being brief) must conclude with the

humblest of suggestions about how various academic disciplines might be divided according to the kind of cause that they emphasize—not serve exclusively, but emphasize. A list such as this could well embrace over a hundred fields. Its restriction to the entries below is plainly arbitrary: the intent is to illustrate a way of establishing categories rather than to imply superior merit or value.

The sciences (Empirical Studies) are identified directly with Aristotle’s material cause, because “pure science” is precisely and narrowly interested in physical cause and effect—not with

different human attitudes toward a given perception or with the intent or end of human or other intelligences.

Likewise, the arts (Aesthetic Studies) correspond to Aristotle’s formal cause at the purest level, for the single relevant datum about a beautiful perception is that, thanks to its formal properties—the signals it transmits to our senses—it produces satisfaction (the “ah!” effect). Our earlier example involving a bronze statue of Pericles identified the sculptor’s intention of giving pleasure as the final cause, as indeed it was. The artist’s intent is irrelevant in a strictly aesthetic context, however: as we consider an art work all by itself, its form is what produces a unique impact of the perceiving mind. Frankly, even the audience’s cultural conditioning is far less relevant than academics regularly claim. The Grand Canyon was not created by or for any intelligent mind, and yet people from all over the world (i.e., from every cultural background imaginable) come to admire its beauty—or its sublimity, as eighteenth-century philosophers would have said.

Aristotle’s efficient and final causes bring out an ambivalent quality in the remaining category: Ethical Studies. A deed or praxis would be termed in Latin a factum, from the verb facere: “to do, make.” Our word “effect”—literally “something brought to pass [= done] from” something else—is of course based upon the same word. Yet a deed can be done for two very different reasons, if an intelligent agent is behind it. In the case of a natural event, where no such agent exists (at least from the scientist’s perspective), no reason at all other than the material cause drives the occurrence: we can dispense with the final cause. But persons have reasons: and their reason or end ( finis) in any given case is either self-interested or self-surmounting. The efficient cause of a painting is the painter; and we may say that the cause of his creating the work was both formal and final, in that he placed a beautiful form upon the canvas and, in doing so, he intended to make the world a more beautiful place. We have already covered objects of beauty. Yet why did he have this beautifying desire? We have not fully determined the ultimate end of his act—the final cause. If it was to be paid handsomely, then his end was self-interested: if it was to produce an uplifting joy in the hearts of others, then his end was self-surmounting.

The former end is “practical” in the sense that we commonly bestow upon the word: “advantageous,” “realistic,” “convenient.” The latter end is highly impractical in this sense. It suggests the activity of disinterested moral principles whose advantage or reality is purely idealistic: i.e., absolutely removed from the realm of material cause.

Academe designates no discipline at all entirely to the study of the “self-surmounting final cause.” It’s not hard to understand why: such a field would have no objective subject matter. At most, a Philosophy class in Ethics may address certain idealist thinkers. Nevertheless, several of the disciplines below are tinged with idealism in surprising ways and at surprising points.

Empirical Studies (focused on material causes and effects)AstronomyBiology (Botany, Oceanography, Zoology, etc.)ChemistryMeteorologyPhysics

Secondary emphasis on practical concerns (stability, longevity, efficiency, affordability)Engineering

Competing emphasis on aesthetic concernsArchitecture

Secondary emphasis on practical concerns (attitude, motivation, etc., of human subjects)MedicineNursingPsychology

Aesthetic Studies (focused on creating pleasant effects in the human perceiver)

Mathematics (inasmuch as laws/rules are not inductive but purely constructed of logical pattern)

No other discipline is purely aesthetic: a class in Art Appreciation might be so

Secondary interest on practical concerns (ability to perform: secondary because the student’s grade in these academic fields rarely depends on perceptible excellence in achievement, which is felt to result somewhat from innate genius)

Art (painting, sculpture)MusicCreative Writing

Secondary emphasis on historical, cultural, and moral causesLiterary Studies

Secondary emphasis on practical concerns (health, affordability, standards of decency)Culinary ArtsFashion design

Practical/Ethical Studies (focused on human habits and customs)BusinessLawForeign Language Study (when pursued to acquire spoken fluency for use in contemporary affairs/travel)

Secondary emphasis on empirical qualities (tendency to accept deterministic notions or “laws” about human behavior)HistoryPolitical ScienceSociology

Competing emphasis on aesthetic qualitiesForeign Language Study (e.g., in Greek, Latin, and Sanskrit, where objective is to read classic literature)Marketing/Advertising (where pleasant perceptions are designed to produce specific behaviors [e.g., buying] to which pleasure is irrelevant)Competing emphasis between two aspects of the practical: pragmatism and moral duty (“what works” versus “what’s right”)EducationJournalism

This taxonomy should not be interpreted, of course, as implying that biologists are cold, heartless people while grade-school teachers are saints in the making. A person can be very tasteful and spiritual and still design aircraft. If you are likely to be transported in one of his inspirations one day, you don’t really care if he is a good or bad human being morally: you only want him to be a good engineer. A spiritual guru may also turn out to be a shyster—perhaps he is a worse person than most, indeed, for having posed as somewhat better. Yet his teaching may have a certain therapeutic value to his clients, despite his personal insincerity. His “field” may deserve praise, even though he himself deserves a slap in the face.

What you study is not the measure of your value as a complete individual. Rather, having chosen a particular field of study, you owe it to that field to observe the standards of truth that operate within it. Think of it this way: a truly moral person may be morally obligated to cut his religious devotions short if he is also a doctor and receives an emergency summons. Good people concentrate their energies within the specialty that they have chosen.