The True Confessions of a Teacher's Pet

The most Notebookish of my Index columns so far considers the possible causes of lackluster class discussions and students' reluctance to answer certain questions. I also wrote but did not draw the notebook-scribble info-graphic below the column, which I feel like I should have made either more simple or more obnoxiously complicated. (It's a Catch 22!)

What's So Funny 'bout Literary Theory?

The next time I try to explain, apologize for, defend, rationalize, criticize, or otherwise talk about literary theory (that often misunderstood boogie man of academia) with someone less familiar with its goals, I plan on repeating more or less word-for-word Louis Menand's introduction to his piece on Paul de Man. At any rate, it's better than mumbling something along the lines of:  "Derrida ... class struggle ... subaltern ... objet petit a! Anyway, it's something we should all care about."

"The idea that there is literature, and then there is something that professors do with literature called “theory,” is a little strange. To think about literature is to think theoretically. If you believe that literature is different from other kinds of writing (like philosophy and self-help books), if you have ideas about what’s relevant and what isn’t for understanding it (which class had ownership of the means of production, whether it gives you goose bumps, what color the author painted his toenails), and if you have standards for judging whether it’s great or not so great (a pleasing style or a displeasing politics), then you have a theory of literature. You can’t make much sense of it without one.

It’s the job of people in literature departments to think about these questions, to debate them, and to disseminate their views. This is not arid academicism. It affects the way students will respond to literature for the rest of their lives. But it’s also part of an inquiry into the role of art in human life, the effort to figure out why we make this stuff, what it means, and why we care so much about it. If this is not the most important thing in the world to understand, it is certainly not the least."

Active Nonviolence in Crimea

For those seeking a look at Crimea that considers the situation in relatable human terms, I highly recommend Patrick Reevell’s article, “No Bloodshed in a Standoff at an Airfield in Ukraine,” published in the New York Times this morning. It demonstrates Ukrainian soldiers using active nonviolence to protest the Russian soldiers’ occupation of their airfield Tuesday.

The Ukrainian soldiers' leader, Col. Yuli Mamchur, was acting against orders from the Ukrainian naval command, “who had ordered them to hand over their weapons to other Ukrainian units” that had defected to the pro-Russian government of Crimea. (The leader of the Ukrainian navy himself had defected.) Col. Mamchur chose to oppose the Russians’ occupation and the Crimean government’s cooperation by “order[ing] his men to meet the Russians unarmed, hoping to force a peaceful resolution.”

This is exactly the method of nonviolent protest: forcing a peaceful resolution by demonstrating dissent while refusing to use violence. By challenging the goodwill of the oppressor, the tactic denies the oppressors any excuse to use violence and gives them no option but to either become the wrongdoer through illegitimate violence or to give in to the protesters’ demands, which is what happened here. I will let you find the rest of the thrilling and bizarre details in the article (at one point during the standoff, a soccer game erupts). My point is that this action demonstrates the effectiveness of active nonviolence, a method of dissent that continues to have a low reputation and understanding. I’ve been met with giggles for using the phrase in the past, which is somewhat disturbing. However, this event shows how it is ultimately the most effective response to violent oppression. Furthermore, it shows how media attention can take an incident far from our view and whose participants may have never expected to gain recognition and bring it to the forefront of public discussion. International attention enforces the consequences of the use of violence by either side.

For more on active nonviolence, the technique pioneered by Gandhi and other 20th century protest leaders, you should check out at least the introduction of A Force More Powerful: A Century of Nonviolent Conflict by Peter Ackerman and Jack DuVall. The chapters contain more fascinating stories much like what happened at the Crimean airfield yesterday.