Conscientious Objections
Stirring Up Trouble About Language, Technology and Education
Published on 8. June 2011
224 pages
978-0-307-79731-5 (ISBN)
Description
In a series of feisty and ultimately hopeful essays, one of America's sharpest social critics casts a shrewd eye over contemporary culture to reveal the worst -- and the best -- of our habits of discourse, tendencies in education, and obsessions with technological novelty. Readers will find themselves rethinking many of their bedrock assumptions: Should education transmit culture or defend us against it? Is technological innovation progress or a peculiarly American addiction? When everyone watches the same television programs -- and television producers don't discriminate between the audiences for Sesame Street and Dynasty -- is childhood anything more than a sentimental concept? Writing in the traditions of Orwell and H.L. Mencken, Neil Postman sends shock waves of wit and critical intelligence through the cultural wasteland.
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Book
03/1992
Vintage Books
€17.00
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Neil Postman
Conscientious Objections
Book
08/1988
Alfred A. Knopf
€36.52
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Person
Neil Postman was a University Professor, the Paulette Goddard Chair of Media Ecology, and the chair of the Department of Media, Culture, and Communication, all at New York University. Among his 20 books are studies of childhood (The Disappearance of Childhood); public discourse (Amusing Ourselves to Death); education (Teaching as a Subversive Activity and The End of Education); and the impact of technology (Technopoly). His interest in education was long-standing, beginning with his experience as an elementary and secondary school teacher. He died in 2003.
Content
- Intro
- Other Books by This Author
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Preface
- Social Science as Moral Theology
- Defending Against the Indefensible
- The Naming of Missiles
- My German Question
- A Muted Celebration
- The Parable of the Ring Around the Collar
- The News
- The Educationist as Painkiller
- Etiquette
- Megatons for Anthromegs
- The Conservative Outlook
- Remembering the Golden Age
- Columbusity
- Alfred Korzybski
- The Disappearance of Childhood
- Future Shlock
- Safe-Fail
- My Graduation Speech
- About the Author
