Yale Students Tell English Profs to Stop Teaching English: Too Many White Male Poets

Reason ^ | June 1, 2016 | Robby Soave

[C19fan]

Some Yale University students are demanding changes to the English Department curriculum: specifically, they don't think it should feature so many English poets who were straight, white, wealthy, and male.

"It is your responsibility as educators to listen to student voices," the students wrote in a petition to the faculty. "We have spoken. We are speaking. Pay attention."

[Little Pig]

The problem is that the class is not “Poetry”, it’s “English”. Since English is the language of an ethnic group generally termed “white”, the vast majority of authors are going to be white. If the students want poetry from non-white authors, then they should be taking an actual poetry class where they can study works such as the epic Mahabharata and the sublime poetry of the Orient. There’s very little non-western English poetry of any note, and most of it is too recent to be contributory to the English language core body of works.

[HiTech RedNeck]

It's so little.

[ganeemead]

I believe that the lack of real grammar in English is the main reason for the general lack of meaningful poetry in English i.e. there simply isn't any large body of words in English which rhyme in any sort of a natural way. English generally uses prepositions and word order in lieu OF grammar and that also makes trying to write poetry sort of like trying to do athletics in a straight jacket.

Simplest way to read good poetry is to learn some language which has it.

[AEMILIUS PAULUS]

No, it is not that they are anti-intellectual it is that they lack enough capacity to understand. They are diverse ones.

[HiTech RedNeck]

True... The Literature Of The Orient if they want that race, The Literature Of Africa (to the extent it exists) if they want output of that race, etc. They would complain about the non-diversity of water, because it does not represent dryness.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Nobody told William Shakespeare.

[Little Pig]

Hey now, GM bailout notwithstanding, Cadillac has managed to get somewhat interesting again. They’re not quite “The Standard of the World” yet, but they’re a long way from the Cimarron and the 8-6-4 of the 80s. About the only thing they’re still missing is a true full-size flagship sedan to compete with the Mercedes S,the BMW 7, and the Asian luxury marques.

[Iron Munro]

[jpsb]

It is your responsibility as educators to listen to student voices

I guess we are not in Kansas any more. Higher education is not what it used to be, that is for certain. There is a certain enjoyable irony in seeing these liberal professors roasted in the fire they started.

[grobdriver]

It is your responsibility as educators to listen to student voices

Where did you get that stupid idea, child?

Teacher.
Student.
You (or your parents) paid for it, now sit down and shut up.

[ladyjane]

When students are made to feel so alienated that they get up and leave the room

Yale is admitting morons who are unable to sit in a room for a 50 minute lecture. Not only are they admitting them, they are giving them full rides in order to keep their affirmative action admissions up. Non AA admits are paying full tuition so these ungrateful freeloaders can drag down what used to be a good school.

[CapitalistCrusader]

That should be “C-I-L-L mah lantlort”

[RansomOttawa]

I believe that the lack of real grammar in English is the main reason for the general lack of meaningful poetry in English

Seriously? I'm pretty sure no one has argued with a straight face that English is an inferior language for literature since around the 15th century.

[ganeemead]

Shakespeare was the world's greatest dramatist but a mediocre poet at best.

...Borne aloft on ebon wings,
a raucous note his song he sings
CAW CAW! CAW CAW!!, a cry of fear,
unpleasant to the farmer's ear....

You call that poetry??

[bigbob]

“And gib us our A grades for participation”

[ProtectOurFreedom]

All through Junior High, High School, and College, not once did I stop and think if the author was male or female, straight or gay, or purple or green. In literature, it matters not one whit. It was kind of like “On the Internet, no one knows you’re a dog.”

I was probably in my 30s before I knew George Eliot wasn’t a man.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

I was reading our local paper at breakfast and came across this "Peek Into The Past." It's enough to make me weep. No delicate snowflakes. Western Civ was celebrated, not scorned. Women were the "Queens" on the float, not the men. Men were men, and women were women -- anybody who was "gender confused" was properly ostracized. We celebrated Unity, and knew our nation's strength came from being unified. Nobody had thought of the ugly term "diversity," much less pretended it was our strength. Men and women knew which bathroom to use and men defended womens' honor.

What we've lost...

[Gritty]

Yale University is quickly becoming Fail University...

[JimRed]

The inmates want to run the asylum.

[Ohioan]

I think you are focusing on the wrong thing here. Someone needs to review the high school English departments, at the schools from which these brainwashed dysrons graduated, and ask some very pointed questions.

Obviously, Yale has accepted a very inferior group of matriculates; but the question goes to how many were born stupid; how many were led astray by cause seeking peers; how many were simply denied qualified teaching as to the beauties of English literature. etc..

Yes, certainly Yale English Professors need to flunk these students--you cannot make it a debatable subject whether you purge your course material to suit a species of anti-intellectual anarchists. Yale's credibility dictates that they be flunked. But who is to blame--if anyone--for their demonstrated absurdity?

(Now do not ask whether I believe the Yale faculty will have the moral compass to flunk these students? I am simply addressing how a conscientious English Department should respond.)