 |
| - Raskolnikov who? Dude, have you read the Song of the Lord? |
Shocking, right? Maybe, maybe not. First, what is the cause of this phenomenon? Is it really just smart phones, or the fact that high schools no longer assign whole books to read? Perhaps the cause is more deep-going. Autism and ADHD, perchance. Or lower IQ levels?
But another thing also struck me when reading the article: it´s bizarre elitism. What on earth is *the point* of reading "Crime and Punishment", "Pride and Prejudice" or "The Iliad"? And somewhere mid-article, a more rational reason for not wanting to read dusty old novels creeps out:
>>>Some experts I spoke with attributed the decline of book reading to a shift in values rather than in skill sets. Students can still read books, they argue—they’re just choosing not to. Students today are far more concerned about their job prospects than they were in the past. Every year, they tell Howley that, despite enjoying what they learned in Lit Hum, they plan to instead get a degree in something more useful for their career.
>>>The same factors that have contributed to declining enrollment in the humanities might lead students to spend less time reading in the courses they do take. A 2023 survey of Harvard seniors found that they spend almost as much time on jobs and extracurriculars as they do on academics.
Indeed. Of course it´s a bad thing that students can´t or won´t read books. However, the real question might be: Which ones should they read, then?
No comments:
Post a Comment