In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the controversy surrounding Nobel Peace Prize laureate Rigoberta Menchu constituted one of the most interesting--and acrimonious--academic debates to take place in recent decades. It may seem that not much new can be said about it now, for most every single person weighing in on the subject has already spoken,…

In this article, the author reports on an awareness of controversial incidents on campuses around North America surrounding "politically correct" speech codes and thought control measures instituted at the behest of faculty and students of this ideological persuasion. It seems that critical theory is going beyond "critical…

Since the seventeenth century, there have been two narratives about modernity in general and America in particular. The author uses the term "narrative" to include (a) facts, (b) arguments, and most important, (c) a larger vision of how one sees the world and chooses to engage the world. The first and originalist narrative is the Lockean Liberty…

If one intends to speculate about the effects of the bursting of the higher education bubble, one can gain some insight by examining universities that are already shrinking. The University of California (UC) system's state appropriation, for example, has decreased by almost a billion dollars since 2007-2008. In this article, the author talks about…

This article presents the author's interesting experiences relating to the ideological indoctrination taking place on college campuses. The author suggests that the philosophical and ethical foundations of both the United States and the modern American university are being undermined by the ideology of collectivism, with its dogmatic hatred of…

Race preferences and the postmodern version of multiculturalism have always triggered opposition in academia, but it has seldom come from the political left. Now things are changing. Growing unease in the academic "priesthood" over preferences and multiculturalism may herald their end. Longstanding opponents of racial discrimination and identity…

Someone possessed of conventional thought processes shouldn't even try to discuss opinions with poststructuralists. Derrida, Barthes, and Foucault couldn't care less about contradictions. P and "Not-P" can exist comfortably together as true premises of an argument that for them is perfectly deductive, and in the name of whatever revolutionary…

Classicist Steven J. Willett is amazed at the president of the Philological Association, who wants to abandon the "metanarrative" that has always supported our culture. Apparently, the Greek and Roman origins of Western thought are merely an "old story that won't work any longer." Professor Willett's answer to this is a stinging indictment of the…

In our summer 2006 issue, we ran a comprehensive overview of how postmodernism has degraded composition on our campuses. Steve Kogan enlarges that indictment and charges that the movement has deliberately corrupted every area of English instruction--from the acquisition of skills and knowledge to the more fundamental mission of developing in…

Small programs can make a big difference on college campuses. At Duke University, a few dedicated people, with the support of college administrators, exploited the all-too-evident liabilities of curriculum fragmentation, political correctness, and the lack of direction felt by undergraduate students to create intellectually valuable and…

Theorists have usurped English composition. They have banished great literature as the residual oppression of dead white males. They control groups like the NCTE and MLA, which announce that exercises in grammar and the mechanics of writing are "deleterious" for students tantamount to "malpractice." Nan Miller reminds those…

University of Chicago literary critic W.J.T. Mitchell claims that his contribution to the cultural interpretation and hermeneutic understanding of dinosaurs is every bit as valuable as archeological discoveries. Indeed, he holds that, because of his new way of looking at dinosaurs, the title "scientist" should aptly apply to him, too.…

George Orwell, in the essay "Politics and the English Language," criticized pretentious doublespeak and technobabble that numb the consciousness and hide political power plays. Judith Butler defends the "nuanced" prose of her fellow postmodernists as necessary to convey the complexity of their thoughts. Stephen Roney contrasts the two and…