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1,004,342 | LUKAS SEELY
Follow me.(Click Icons)
Lukas Seely started comedy back in his hometown of Billings, MT before relocating to Seattle,WA in 2004. Lukas soon became a crowd favorite in Seattle Comedy scene and had since moved to Los Angeles, California where he regularly performs at The Hollywood Improv, The Comedy Store and many other venues.
The comedic poise he brings to the stage is impressive. His contagious laugh makes audiences feel as if they were sitting at home in front of the fire place. His hilarious stories about his life in a country city and other life experiences make his performance a knock out punch.
He was nominated as an Emerging Comic in the New York Underground Comedy Festival. Recently he opened for Bill Burr on the "Billy Red State Tour." Lukas has also worked w/ such names as Dane Cook, Damon Wayans, Russell Peters, Bobby Lee, Sarah Silverman, Ron White, Greg Giraldo, Daniel Tosh to name a few.
Lukas performed his stand-up on FOX's "Laughs," and Showtime's "Louie Anderson Presents" currently on Hulu.com. His cooking skills were on display on TNT's "On The Menu" with Emeril Lagasse.
For the 2015 NFL season his is the 49ers Official Goofy Weather Man for the Series " The Faithful Forecast." on 49ers Studio.
Lukas Seely is rising star you must catch!
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1,004,344 | History of Labour in the United States, Volume 2
Oleh John Rogers Commons, David Joseph Saposs, Helen Laura Sumner, Edward Becker Mittelman, Henry Elmer Hoagland, John Bertram Andrews, Selig Perlman
and Charleston, Massachusetts. During 1864 stores were opened in Providence and Woonsocket, Rhode Island; in Springfield and Fitchburg, Massachusetts; in Albany, Troy, Ilion, Brownsville, and Schenectady, New York; and farther west in Cincinnati, Ohio and Detroit, Michigan. The following year witnessed the spread of distributive co-operation from Biddeford, Maine, to Carondelet, Missouri, with new stores announced also in Worcester, Pawtucket, Bridgeport, New York, Trenton, Baltimore, Pittston, and Evansville. The agitation continued and in the early months of 1866 stores were added in Lowell, Chelsea, Taunton, Cohoes, St. Clair, Cleveland, Kensington, and Chicago.
There was continued writing and speaking on the subject during the following year, and the movement had extended until practically every important industrial town between Boston and San Francisco had some kind of distributive co-operation. Disastrous failures, however, toward the end of 1865 foreshadowed the end of the movement in the sixties. With the fall of prices immediately after the close of the War, accompanied not only by a lessening of interest in co-operative grocery stores but also by the failure of strikes, there developed suddenly, as we shall later see, a pronounced movement toward productive co-operation.
THE NATIONAL TRADE UNIONS, 1864-1873
Causes and General Progress. Effect of the nationalisation of the market, 43. National trade unions in the thirties, 43. Effect of national labour competition, 44. Effect of employers' associations, 44. Effect of machinery and the division of labour, 44. Organisation of national trade unions, 1861-1873, 45. Growth of their membership, 47 The national trade union — the paramount aspect of nationalisation, 48.
The Moulders. The epitomisation of the labour movement, 48. Activities during the War, 48. Beginning of employers' associations, 49. The lull in the organisation of employers during the period of prosperity, 49. West and East, 50. The American National Stove Manufacturers' and Iron Founders' Association, 50. The apprenticeship question, 50. Strike in Albany and Troy, 51. Withdrawal of the Buffalo and St. Louis foundrymen from the Association, 51. General strike against wage reductions, 51. Defeat of the union, 52. Restriction on strikes by the national union, 52. The turn to co-operation, 53. Sylvis' view on the solution of the labour question, 53. The co-operative shops, 53. The Troy shops, 54. Their business success but failure as co-operative enterprises, 54. Disintegration of the employers' association, 55. Revival of trade unionism, 55.
Machinists and Blacksmiths. Intellectual ascendency of the machinists in the labour movement, 56. Employers' associations, 56. Effect of the depression, 57. Effect of the eight-hour agitation on the union, 57. Revival in 1870, 58.
Printers. The National Typographical Union, 58. "Conditional membership," 58. National strike fund, 59. Persistent localist tendency, 59. The Northwestern Publishers' Association, 61.
Locomotive Engineers. Cause of nationalisation, 61. Piece work, 62. Brotherhood of the Footboard, 62. Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, 62. Charles Wilson, and his attitude towards public opinion, 63. Strike on the Michigan Southern, 64. Railways' blacklist, 64. Brotherhood's attitude towards incorporation, 66. Brotherhood's conservatism, 65. Discontent of the local branches, 66. Wilson's incorporation move, 66. Failure in Congress, 67. Growth of the opposition to Wilson, 67. His removal from office, 67. P. M. Arthur, 67. The benefit system, 68. Cigar Makers. The effect of the War revenue law, 69. Growth of the international union, 1864-1869, 70. Introduction of the mould, 71. Strike against the mould, 72. Attitude towards the mould of the conventions of 1867 and 1872, 72. Failure of the anti-mould policy, 73.
Coopers. Effect of the machine, 74. Martin A. Foran, 75. Career of the International Coopers' Union, 75. Robert Schilling, 76. Co-operative attempts, 76.
Knights of St. Crispin. The factory system, 76. "Green hands," 77. Aim of the Crispins, 77. Crispin strikes, 78. Their principal causes, 78. Attitude towards co-operation, 79.
Sons of Vulcan. The puddler's bargaining advantage, 80. The sliding scale agreement, 80.
Restrictive Policies Apprenticeship. The beginning of restrictive policies, 81. Effect of the wider market on apprenticeship, 81. Effect of the increased scale of production, 81. The "botches," 82. Sylvis' view, 82. Limitation of numbers, 82. Policies of the national trade unions, 83. Regulation of apprenticeship in the printer's trade, 83.
CAUSES AND GENERAL PROGRESS
In a sense every period in the industrial development of a country may be called a period of transition. However, this characterisation would apply with greater strength than usual to the sixties. At the present time, when Marx and Sombart have been popularised, we generally think of technical evolution alone when we speak of the evolution of industry. Yet we forget that no change in technique, not including even the utilisation of steam as a motive power, has ever had so simultaneous an effect upon all industries as had the sudden extension of the market due to the railway consolidation of the fifties, an effect which awaited only the years of prosperity of the sixties to be come visible. Steam had revolutionised the textile industry at an early date, but for a long time it had left the other industries almost unaffected. The creation of a national market fundamentally changed the price-fixing forces in the majority of the industries, and therefore could not help producing a most thoroughgoing effect upon the struggle between industrial classes.
In the field of trade unionism the nationalisation of the market gave birth to the national trade union. To be sure, there had been some attempt at "national" trade unions during the thirties, such as the national conventions of the printers and cordwainers. It is nevertheless true that it was only dur ing the sixties that labour organisations began to think and act on a lasting national basis. Moreover the "ration " over which the unions of the thirties had spread their activities was, properly speaking, nothing more than a region of neighbouring towns such as the "greater industrial New York" of to-day.
There were four distinct sets of causes which operated during the sixties to bring about nationalisation: two grew out of
changes in transportation, and two were largely independent of such changes.
The first and most far-reaching cause, as illustrated by the stove moulders, was the competition of the products of different localities side by side in the same market. Wherever that was the case, nationalisation was destined to proceed to its utmost length. In order that union conditions should be maintained even in the best organised centres, it then became imperatively necessary to equalise competitive conditions in the various localities. That led to a well-knit national organisation to control working conditions, trade rules, and strikes. In other trades, where the competitive area of the product was still restricted to the locality, the paramount nationalising influence was the competition for employment between migratory outof-town journeymen and the locally organised mechanics. This describes the situation in the printing trade, where the bulk of the work was still newspaper and not book and job printing. Accordingly, the printers did not need to entrust their national officers with anything more than the control of the travelling journeymen, and the result was that the local unions remained practically independent. The third cause of concerted national action in a trade was the organisation of employers. When the power of a local union began to be threatened by an employers' association, the next logical step was to combine in a national union. Thus it transpired that the numerous local employers' associations which sprang up during 1864 and 1865 gave the impetus to the nationalisation of the labour movement.
The fourth cause was the application of machinery and the introduction of division of labour, which split up the old established trades and laid industry open to invasion by "green hands." The shoemaking industry which, during the sixties had reached the factory stage, illustrates this in a most striking manner. Few other industries experienced anything like a similar change during this period.
Of course, none of the causes of nationalisation here enumerated operated in entire isolation. In some trades one cause, in other trades other causes, had the predominating influence. Consequently, in some trades the national union resembled an
agglomeration of loosely allied states, each one reserving the right to engage in independent warfare and expecting from its allies no more than a benevolent neutrality. In other trades, on the contrary, the national union was supreme in declaring war and in making peace, and even claimed absolute right to formulate the "civil" laws of the trade for times of industrial peace.
Although some nationals were organised before 1864, it is at this time that an appreciable movement started towards nationalisation. Four nationals were organised in this year as compared to two organised in 1863, none in 1862, and one in 1861. A call was also issued from the tin, sheet iron, and copper workers, the upholsterers, and house painters, but there is no evidence that these unions met. The nationals organised before the War took a leap forward. The National Typographical Union at its session of 1864 reported 14 new charters issued, against 6 reported in 1863 and 1 in 1862. No convention was held in 1861.1 The Iron Molders' Union reported in that same year (1864) 46 new charters and a total membership of 6,778 as compared to 3,500 in 1863.2 The Machinists and Blacksmiths' Union was the only national that did not recover the strength it enjoyed prior to the War, having 87 locals before the War commenced and reporting in 1864 a smaller representation than in former sessions.3
This process of nationalisation once started, lasted for ten years, the number of nationals cropping up and the number of members gained by those already in existence varying with the prosperity or depression in business during that time. During the period of intense business activity which lasted from 1863 to 1866, caused by the inflation of greenbacks and the demands of the War, ten national unions sprang up in two years: the Plasterers' National Union, National Union of Journeymen Curriers, the Ship Carpenters' and Caulkers' International Union, National Union of Cigar Makers in 1864, and the Coach Makers' International Union, the Journeymen Painters' National Union, National Union of Heaters, Tailors'
1 National Typographical Union, Proceedings, 1864, including the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth sessions, held at New York, Cleveland, and Louisville, Ky., May
5, 1862, May 4, 1863, and May 2, 1864. 2 Iron Molders' International Union, Proceedings, 1865.
8 See above, II, 9. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,345 | Put your hand up, if the idea of having some wood oven pizzas at a discount really entices you. I am really excited that Pizza Festival is coming up in September. For the record, I think Que Pasa bar and bistro is underrated!
Have you been to Que Pasa? It is located in the heart of Karen just at the shopping center. I believe it should be one of the 'it' joints in Karen, but there is usually just countable people every time I have visited them.
These are some of the reasons why I love going to Que Pasa.
Que Pasa doesn't give that impression of a spacious place from the outside, but it is. You can choose to sit at the counter, at the bar area with the high chairs and stools facing the wide screen catching some Rio action, at the restaurant area with the formal dinner setup or at the little intimate seating upstairs overlooking the place. You can tell that the place was well thought out in terms of ambiance from their choice of colours, pieces of art hanging on the walls, statuettes on the shelves and the lighting.
Their starters average Sh850, main course between 1200-Sh1650 and their desserts Sh600. Their Pizzas also costs between Sh800- Sh1200.
I love their pitchers! Especially when they had the buy 1 get one free pitcher; cocktail heaven. I had a Jamaican rum punch pitcher for Sh2000 last time I was there. There are other options to choose from mocktails, classic cocktails, beers, coffee etc.
Que Pasa has some of the best hosts I have interacted with in bars/restaurants in Nairobi. Always jovial, chatty, swift service and very attentive to detail. It's never a dull moment.
Guess what? With my DisCoucher booklet I got to enjoy 2 pizzas for the price of 1. If you love your pizza meaty, then their spicy sweet and sour meat lovers pizza forSh1200 is what you should order.
I didn't pay for my German sausage pizza which was my second selection thanks to DisCoucher. I saved Sh1050! I will def be back to Que Pasa because I still have 1 more DisCoucher voucher left.
Get your copy of your DisCoucher booklet HERE, it's still 50% off and save on food and drinks from all your favourite restaurants. There are still 5 months left to enjoy your DisCoucher booklet as the vouchers expire on December 31st. Order your copy today.
P.S: Work was a bit cray on my end but I am back to regular posting!!!! | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,346 | Holidays are the perfect occasion for switching off and recharging your batteries. It's known that during this downtime we are more alert to the world around us and it's in these moments that the best ideas are likely to come along. Vanessa King, author of 10 Keys to Happier Living – A Practical Handbook for Happiness, tells us how to make the most of our holiday. Who knows, maybe this could be the holiday that offers up a great idea?
Vanessa King , author of 10 Keys to Happier Living – A Practical Handbook for Happiness, shares with us her tips for using your holiday as a time for creative thinking and reflection.
"Ever had the experience of a great new idea popping into your head on holiday while you're on the sun lounger or out pottering?
When we're in a good mood – feeling relaxed, happy and content – we are more open to trying new things and we see more possibilities around us – ideas that in the busy day-to-day life might slip by unnoticed. When our normal routine has been abandoned for some pure me-time, we become more flexible and that helps open up our minds. Apart from being enormously enjoyable it can fuel our creativity. Ideas happen when our sub-conscious connects two seemingly unrelated things. It doesn't need conscious effort – our minds are there working in the background.
There's something about having the space to let our mind wander and make new discoveries – that's why holidays are a potent source of creative thinking potential.
What do you like to explore on your holiday? A pile of new books, the local cuisine, adventure into nature, art and culture, or a new sport or activity? Psychological research shows that curiosity doesn't just lead to ideas, it can help us enjoy life more and find it more fulfilling. It may even and help us live longer.
When you're out walking on holiday, take the time to pause and absorb the minute details of your surroundings.
So how can we spark our curiosity and creativity while we're away? How about going for a slow, mindful walk – noticing what's new or different, taking time to meander, looking up and around as well as down – after all, there's no rush. When something catches your eye, get interested – question why it is like it is, how it got there or how it was made. Strike up a conversation with someone locally about it.
When you notice something beautiful, sit and savour it. Notice its details – textures, colours, sounds or taste. Luxuriate in having more time than you get back at home. You could even prolong your enjoyment by making it a daily holiday practice to reflect back each day on what you've enjoyed and found most curious.
Vanessa King's book, 10 Keys to Happier Living – A Practical Handbook for Happiness is out now in paperback and ebook for £12.99.
Do you find yourself coming up with great ideas and enjoying a happier temperament while on holiday? Learn how to tap into that feeling when you're back home and bring that holiday happiness into your everyday life. For more evidence-based ideas on what enables us to enjoy life more, Vanessa King's new book 10 Keys to Happier Living – A Practical Handbook for Happiness (from Headline Publishing, priced at £12.99), is a perfect holiday read and available to buy in trade paperback and ebook now. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,347 | Fugitive arrested, charged in felony drug sale and use of mace
James William Graham, 39, of Mora faces two felony charges in connection with two separate incidents in 2017 and 2018.
Fugitive arrested, charged in felony drug sale and use of mace James William Graham, 39, of Mora faces two felony charges in connection with two separate incidents in 2017 and 2018. Check out this story on sctimes.com: https://www.sctimes.com/story/news/local/2019/01/31/fugitive-arrested-charged-felony-drug-sale-use-mace/2727037002/
From Staff Reports Published 8:34 a.m. CT Jan. 31, 2019 | Updated 2:52 p.m. CT Jan. 31, 2019
James William Graham, 39, charged with felony first-degree drug sale and possession/use of tear gas compound. (Photo: Stearns County Jail)
ST. CLOUD — A fugitive wanted by the Minnesota Department of Corrections was arrested this week and is charged in three separate incidents dating back to November 2017.
James William Graham, 39, of Mora faces three felony counts on suspicion of first-degree drug sale and possessing or using a tear gas compound, according to three Stearns County criminal complaints. He also faces one gross misdemeanor charge on suspicion of giving a peace officer a false name.
The most recent incident happened about 2:15 a.m. Wednesday in the 1100 block of Division Streed when a Waite Park police officer stopped a car driving without its headlights on.
A man later identified as Graham got out of the car and tried to get into a nearby home as the officer ordered him to get back in the car. He eventually gave the officer a false name.
The complaint said the officer did a weapons search of Graham, which revealed his real identification along with a can of tear gas and two knives.
A second complaint said on Sept. 7, 2018 law enforcement responded to the 500 block of St. Germain St. in St. Cloud to a report of someone who had been maced.
A witness told police he saw the man get into a "verbal altercation" with a man with Graham. The witness said Graham took out a can, later determined to be bear mace, and sprayed the man in the face. A video showed officers a can of mace where Graham dropped something.
The first incident was Nov. 17, 2017 when investigators with the Violent Offenders Task Force met with an informant who made arrangements to buy drugs from Graham.
Officers watched as the informant exchanged money with Graham for 7.38 grams of methamphetamine. A similar exchange happened again on Dec. 17, 2017. According to the complaint, the VOTF purchased 22.8 total grams of meth from Graham through the informant.
The complaints said Graham is a fugitive wanted by the Minnesota Department of Corrections. According to Stearns County Jail logs, he was arrested at 2:20 a.m. Wednesday.
Read or Share this story: https://www.sctimes.com/story/news/local/2019/01/31/fugitive-arrested-charged-felony-drug-sale-use-mace/2727037002/
St. Cloud man accused of raping woman
Sartell boy badly hurt in crash on Highway 15
Woman accused of threatening man with knife
Board asked to make Sherburne 2nd Amendment sanctuary
St. Cloud airport inches toward new leadership
St. Cloud man pleads guilty to breaking into residences | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,348 | Alphonso Taft
United States Minister to Russia
September 3, 1884 – July 31, 1885
Chester A. Arthur
William H. Hunt
George V. N. Lothrop
United States Minister to Austria-Hungary
June 30, 1882 – August 25, 1884
William Walter Phelps
John M. Francis
34th United States Attorney General
May 22, 1876 – March 4, 1877
Edwards Pierrepont
Charles Devens
31st United States Secretary of War
March 8, 1876 – May 22, 1876
William W. Belknap
J. Donald Cameron
(1810-11-05)November 5, 1810
Townshend, Vermont, U.S.
May 21, 1891(1891-05-21) (aged 80)
San Diego, California, U.S.
Fanny Phelps (1823–1852)
Louise Torrey (1827–1907)
6, including Charles, William, Henry, Horace
Yale University (BA)
Alphonso Taft (November 5, 1810 – May 21, 1891) was an American jurist, diplomat, politician, Attorney General and Secretary of War under President Ulysses S. Grant. He was also the founder of an American political dynasty, and father of President and Chief Justice William Howard Taft.
As Secretary of War, Taft reformed the War Department by allowing commanders at Indian forts to choose who could start and run post traderships. While serving as Attorney General, he strongly held that African Americans must not be denied the right to vote through intimidation and violence.[1] Attorney General Taft coauthored a bill to Congress, signed into law by President Grant, that created the Elections Commission that settled the controversial Hayes-Tilden election.[2]
Taft was appointed as minister to Austria-Hungary by Chester A. Arthur in 1882. He served until July 4, 1884 and was then transferred by President Arthur to Minister of Russia, and he served in St. Petersburg until August 1885. Taft had a reputation for serving political office with integrity and character.
2 Marriages, family, estate
3 Cincinnati attorney and career
4 Secretary of War
5 U.S. Attorney General
6 Bid for office
7 U.S. Minister
8 Family dynasty
10.1 Books
10.2 Biographical dictionaries
10.3 Newspapers
Alphonso Taft was born in Townshend, Vermont, the only child of Peter Rawson Taft of the powerful Taft family and Sylvia Howard, on November 5, 1810.[2] He was descended from Robert Taft Sr. who had migrated to America from County Louth, Ireland.[3][2] His mother Sylvia was either of Scotch or Irish descent.[2] While the Taft family was of substance and education, they were not considered wealthy.[2] Taft attended local schools until the age of sixteen. He then taught school to earn money to attend Amherst Academy. During his time at Amherst, he and Samuel Colt would steal a cannon belonging to General Ebenezer Mattoon and shoot it at their school. [2] Taft entered Yale College in 1829 and he graduated four years later in 1833. Taft helped create the secret society known as Skull and Bones in 1832 with William Huntington Russell.
Upon graduation, again to earn money, Taft was an instructor at Ellington, Connecticut from 1835 to 1837.[2] He subsequently studied law at the Yale Law School and was admitted to the Connecticut bar in 1838. While studying law Taft held a tutorship at Yale. Taft had no desire to remain in New England, and he stated to his father Peter in a letter written on July 22, 1837 that Vermont was a "noble state to emigrate from." Taft did not want to practice law in New York because he believed people were under the corrupting influence of wealth.[2] In 1839 Taft migrated to Cincinnati where he was a member of the Cincinnati City Council, and became one of the most influential citizens of Ohio. He was a member of the boards of trustees of the University of Cincinnati and of Yale College.[4]
Marriages, family, estate[edit]
Alphonso Taft was married twice. His first wife, Fanny Phelps (born 8 March 1823), whom he married in 1841 and with whom he had five children three of whom died in infancy) was the daughter of Judge Charles Phelps, of Townshend, Vermont:
Charles Phelps Taft (December 21, 1843 – December 31, 1929).
Peter Rawson Taft II (May 10, 1846 – June 3, 1889).
Mary Taft (November 24, 1848 – November 29, 1848).
Alphonso Taft (May 12, 1850 – March 2, 1851).
Alphonso Taft (December 22, 1851 – June 22, 1852).
Fanny Taft died on June 2, 1852, a few days before her last child's death. On December 26, 1853, he married again to Louisa Maria (née Torrey) (1827–1907), his fourth cousin twice removed, and the daughter of Samuel Davenport Torrey, of Millbury, Massachusetts. They also had five children, one of whom died in infancy:[5]
Samuel Davenport Taft (February 1855 – April 8, 1856).
William Howard Taft (September 15, 1857 – March 8, 1930).
Henry Waters Taft (May 27, 1859 – August 11, 1945).
Horace Dutton Taft (December 28, 1861 – January 28, 1943).
Frances Louise "Fanny" Taft (July 18, 1865 – January 4, 1950).
The estate of Alphonso Taft and his family, in Mount Auburn, one mile north of downtown Cincinnati, has been restored to its original appearance. It is open to the public and is now called the William Howard Taft National Historic Site.[6]
Cincinnati attorney and career[edit]
Alphonso Taft was a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1856, and also that year made an unsuccessful run for the United States House of Representatives against George H. Pendleton. Taft did not serve in the Union Army during the Civil War. He was a judge of the Superior Court of Cincinnati from 1866 to 1872 when he resigned to practice law with two of his sons.[7] He was the first president of the Cincinnati Bar Association, serving in 1872.
In the court case Board of Education of Cincinnati vs. Minor (1872), Taft dissented against the decision made by the Superior Court of Cincinnati regarding the reading the Bible in public schools.[8] Taft asserted that the school board was within its rights to stop the practice of reading the Bible in public schools, arguing that religious liberty demands that "The government is neutral, and, while protecting all [religious sects], it prefers none, and it disparages none."[9][10][11] Taft's dissent helped to sway the Ohio Supreme Court, and they ruled in favor of the school board, overturning the Superior Court ruling. In his discourse, Taft specifically referenced Jewish groups opposed to the reading of the Bible in public schools. As taxpayers, Taft argued, Jews also had the right to take advantage of a public secular education.[12] In addition, religion was a matter of the home and protected by the Bill of Rights.[12] To suggest that the Bill of Rights only reflects Protestant values was inappropriate, according to Taft, as religious liberty was give to all religious denominations and Christianity "is not to be regarded as sectarian under our constitution."[9]
Many believe that Taft's opinion was the cause of much opposition to him, and contributed to his 1875 loss of the Republican nomination for Governor of Ohio to Rutherford B. Hayes. However, the opinion that defeated his nomination was unanimously affirmed by the Supreme Court of Ohio.[7] The independence of Taft's opinion commanded widespread respect, a sentiment freely expressed when President Ulysses S. Grant in March 1876 made him Secretary of War and three months later Attorney General of the United States.[7]
Taft was elected a member of the American Antiquarian Society in October 1876.[13]
Secretary of War[edit]
Secretary of War Alphonso Taft
When President Grant's Secretary of War William W. Belknap resigned in 1876 over receiving profit money from the Fort Sill Indian tradership, Grant needed to find a replacement. Initially, Grant had Secretary George M. Robeson run both the War Department and the Navy Department. [14] Robeson, however, had told Grant that the two Cabinet positions were difficult to manage by one person. [14] Grant then asked Taft to be Secretary of War. After consultation, Taft, who was of good reputation, accepted the position and was confirmed handily by the Senate without objection. Taft found that as Secretary of War he was very busy and was unable to attend a convention in New York. The U.S. military was fighting the Great Sioux War when Taft became Secretary of War.
Taft made a series of reforms to the War department to restore its reputation and entanglements caused by Belknap's humiliating resignation. [14] Taft reversed the War Department policy by having commanders at U.S. military forts in the West to choose who would run post traderships.[15] Additionally, Taft ordered his Bureau and Commandant Department heads to lower their military expenditures. [16] The old ways of letting things go under Belknap and Robeson were over under Taft and he was well received by the press. [17]
U.S. Attorney General[edit]
Grant appointed Taft U.S. Attorney General after he had made a Cabinet shift by appointing Edwards Pierrepont Minister to England. Taft was replaced by J. Donald Cameron as Secretary of War. In October 1876, after the highly contested Hayes-Tilden presidential election, Attorney General Taft supported President Grant's use of the military in South Carolina and Mississippi to suppress violence against African Americans in the South. Taft gave a lengthy speech in New York outlining the atrocities committed by Southerners against blacks in the South. In order to prevent the U.S. from fighting a second civil war, Taft supported a bill, signed into law by Grant, that peacefully settled the 1876 election with an Electoral Commission.
Bid for office[edit]
Taft was again an unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Ohio in 1879, this time against Charles Foster.
U.S. Minister[edit]
Taft was appointed by President Chester A. Arthur as U.S. Minister to Austria-Hungary (1882–1884) and to Imperial Russia (1884–1885).
Family dynasty[edit]
Taft was the first in the Taft family political dynasty. His son, William Howard Taft, was the 27th President of the United States and the 10th Chief Justice of the United States, and was a member of Yale's Skull and Bones like his founder father; another son, Charles Phelps Taft, supported the founding of Wolf's Head Society at Yale; both his grandson and great-grandson, Robert A. Taft I (also Skull and Bones) and Robert Taft Jr., were U.S. Senators; his great-great-grandson, Robert A. Taft II, was the Governor of Ohio from 1999 until 2007. William Howard Taft III was ambassador to Ireland; William Howard Taft IV worked in several Republican administrations, most recently that of George W. Bush.
Alphonso Taft and his family were members of Cincinnati's First Congregational-Unitarian Church; he served as one of the congregation's trustees for many years, and was for a time the chairman of the board of trustees. Although government business kept him out of town and thus frequently away from the church in his later years, he remained in contact with the church's minister on the occasions that he was able to return to Cincinnati.[18] At a famous 1874 Taft family reunion at Elmshade, at Uxbridge, Mass., Alphonso delivered an impassioned speech on his family history and his father's origins in this community, as recorded in his biography.[19]
^ New York Times (October 26, 1876)
^ a b c d e f g h Pringle 1936, p. 264.
^ "Robert Taft, I (1640-1725) - Find a Grave Memorial". Find a Grave.
^ Religion and the Law in America: An Encyclopedia of Personal Belief and Public Policy. Vol. 1. (Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2007), 149.
^ Ancestry of William Howard Taft, Library of Congress (Archive.org)
^ "William Howard Taft - National Historic Site". National Park Service. February 23, 2010. Archived from the original on August 28, 2010.
^ a b c Wilson, J. G.; Fiske, J., eds. (1889). "Taft, Alphonso" . Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. New York: D. Appleton.
^ Mark A. Noll, A Documentary History of Religion in America since 1877, 3 ed. (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2003), 49.
^ a b Mark A. Noll, A Documentary History of Religion in America since 1877, 3 ed. (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2003), 52.
^ Vile, Jon R. "Board of Education of the City of Cincinnati v. Minor (1872)". The First Amendment Encyclopedia. Middle Tennessee State University. Retrieved June 8, 2019.
^ Dierenfield, Bruce J. (2007). The Battle over School Prayer. Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas. p. 30. ISBN 9780700615261.
^ American Antiquarian Society Members Directory
^ a b c Leonard 1920, pp. 159-160.
^ Leonard 1920, p. 159.
^ Leonard 1920, pp. 156,158.
^ Leonard 1920, pp. 158-159, 161-162.
^ "Taft Once Unitarian Fairy", The New York Times (August 4, 1908; A3).
^ Leonard, Lewis Alexander (1920). The Life of Alphonso Taft. New York, NY: Hawke Publishing Co. Retrieved February 24, 2017.
Books[edit]
Leonard, Lewis Alexander (1920). Life of Alphonso Taft. New York: Hawke Publishing Company (Incorporated).
Biographical dictionaries[edit]
Pringle, Henry F. (1936). Dumas Malone (ed.). Dictionary of American Biography Taft, Alphonso. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. pp. 264–265.
Newspapers[edit]
"The Rebel War Claims Speech of Hon. Alphonso Taft". The New York Times. October 26, 1876.
"Alphonso Taft". Secretaries of War and Secretaries of the Army. United States Army Center of Military History. 1992. CMH Pub 70-12.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Alphonso Taft.
Works by or about Alphonso Taft at Internet Archive
"Taft, Alphonso" . Encyclopedia Americana. 1920.
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1,004,349 | Enjoying our honeymoon. Hurricane Bob passed. The ship was tilted sideways all night and rocked like the Sea Dragon ride. They strung ropes to pull ourselves around. Lots of puke, broken limbs, a heart attack – but it's calmer now and the square dancers are back on deck. Headed to Quebec!
The longer version by Diane goes like this: My actual 1991 honeymoon cruise from New York to Montreal aboard the Regent Sun, which was rudely interrupted by Hurricane Bob. The captain thought he could outrun the storm, but he was wrong. The hurricane overtook us as the captain attempted to head out to sea, tilting the ship precariously on its side. Men in yellow rubber suits nailed boards over the windows, while senior citizens broke arms that were casted by the ship's doctor, a helicopter airlifted a heart attack victim from the ship, and we were detained by the Coast Guard to search for a missing pleasure boat. But the surreal highlight had to be that the cruise was the annual trip for a national square-dancing club. A mutton-chopped caller would set up a portable record-player with an attached microphone throughout the trip and suddenly boom, "I need a 4 by 4. Come on now!" and older ladies and gentlemen dressed in full square dance regalia would appear from nowhere and dance on the various decks. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,350 | A top view Gauntlet style shooter. It's simple, fast and a heck of a lot of fun, especially in two player mode. First, you use money to buy different weapons. Then you walk through different areas collecting items and killing guards. It's more fun than it sounds when I describe it, especially considering the small size of the zipfile. :) Its sequel, C-Dogs, is also available on DOSGames.com, and adds several new features.
Cyberdogs. Added to website: 2017-11-06. All copyrights, trademarks, etc, are property of their respective holders. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,351 | Why do consultants keep advising management and boards to consider cyber risk as if it is separate from all other business risks? Managing any single source of risk in a silo is almost certainly going to lead you to make incorrect, uninformed decisions.
Cyber is only one of many sources of risk that can affect the achievement of an enterprise objective initiative, program or project.
As I keep saying, it is not about managing risk — it's about managing the organization and its success.
The article goes on to correctly note the investments companies are making to counter cyber risk, but also points out the absence of an "effective, integrated approach" to management and reporting in these efforts. Efforts to educate boards and committees are also ramping up, but again, not without issues. McKinsey points out that boards are "swamped with reports" but these reports are "often poorly structured ... with inconsistent and usually too-high levels of detail." Board members complained that these reports failed to convey the risk in terms of business processes. Poor writing and technical jargon also put off executives, leaving them struggling "to get a sense of the overall risk status of the organization."
I especially enjoyed this anecdote: "At a recent cybersecurity event, a top executive said: 'I wish I had a handheld translator, the kind they use in Star Trek, to translate what CIOs [chief information officers] and CISOs [chief information security officers] tell me into understandable English.'"
But then the article goes down the silo path, recommending chief risk and information security officers "create a list of critical assets, known risks, and potential new risks" and noting "The chief measure of cyber-resilience is the security of the organization's most valuable assets."
True, this approach is consistent with guidance from ISO 27005: 2018 and NIST, but it puts the focus on information assets and not on the achievement of organizational objectives and success.
Why can't they ask a simple question: "If we had a cyber incident, how could it affect the business?"
There's going to be a range of potential consequences, each with a different likelihood. They could identify the level of harm that would be unacceptable and its likelihood.
Cyber is just one source of business risk. Businesses need to measure and discuss it in a way that enables it to be considered alongside other business risks, including legal, market, compliance, safety, culture, third party, and other sources of risk.
When management and the board are setting objectives and making strategic and tactical decisions, they need to see the big picture, all the things that might happen (risk). Looking at cyber risk separately from other sources of risk is simply wrong.
Why do people think cyber is risk #1 when they are not assessing how it could affect the achievement of key business objectives? What is the likelihood that a cyber incident would cause the organization to fail to achieve its earnings per share, market share, and other targets?
A new piece from PwC is no better. "How your board can better oversee cyber risk" doesn't have a single question about what would happen to the business if there were a breach! Instead, it focusses on data and other information assets.
Until we consider cyber the same way we consider other sources of business risk — in terms of how an incident might affect enterprise performance, value creation and the achievement of objectives — management and the board will continue to make uninformed decisions. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,352 | Pretty Interesting News for the Luxury Market
Although luxury real estate has experienced somewhat of a "softening" recently (particularly in more remote locations where sellers sometimes wait years for their properties to sell and often at steep discounts or through an auction) in the last few weeks we are starting to see a little surge in interest in many luxury communities and properties. Buyers are now finding that they can work "from anywhere" and are looking for healthy communities with a lot of open space - Montecito and Santa Barbara here we come! Thinking of Buying or Selling a Home? No matter your price point, if you are a buyer or seller in today's real estate market, shopping for a home and selling is suddenly done differently - virtual showings, gloves, masks and safety protocols, e-signing documents and lots and lots of communication. But despite the new normal, we are seeing a lot of real estate activity, listings and showings are increasing everyday and the "experts" are even predicting that real estate will lead the economic recovery. The luxury market has suffered along with the rest of the real estate industry, but that suffering has not been distributed equally. Already we know, for example, that demand for remote listings has risen while interest in places like Brooklyn has fallen off. But as the country slowly lumbers toward reopening, numerous real estate professionals believe that luxury, in particular, isn't going to just bounce back to what it was before. Instead, agents who spoke to Inman envision the pandemic fundamentally reshaping both the locations that luxury buyers are willing to consider, as well as the types of properties they want to inhabit. Everything, from the parcels to the finishes is experiencing a sea change. And while the pandemic may be temporary, its reshuffling of the luxury real estate world very well may not be. Semi-remote, amenity-rich housing may come out ahead Probably the most apparent trend to emerge out of the pandemic is a growing interest among luxury real estate consumers to look for properties in attractive areas that are at least somewhat removed from major population centers. "The Hamptons are going crazy," Craig Hogan, Coldwell Banker's vice president of luxury, told Inman. "They've got agents getting 15 calls a day." Virtually everyone who spoke to Inman for this story described some version of that pattern. "I have had so many New Yorkers call me about this listing because I think they want to get out of the city right now," Kristin McFeely, a Compass agent in the Philadelphia area, said of an 11-acre country estate that she currently represents. "I'm feeling like buyers now want a little more space." Nash offered a similar take, pointing to Quail Creek as an example of the kind of property that has become even more appealing during the crisis. "I think people who are stuck up north right now are saying, 'if I'm stuck I'd rather look out the window at palm trees," he explained. This trend may seem obvious, but the way real estate professionals actually see it playing out is less so. For example, it doesn't mean that everyone wants a bunker in the middle of nowhere. Quite the opposite, in fact. "I think everyone right now loves the idea of community," McFeely said. She went on to say that the kinds of luxury properties that may thrive could end up falling somewhere in between urban and remote. They'll have nearby restaurants and walkability and good schools and a sense of community. They just won't be in some of the denser parts of the country. Carrie Wells — a Coldwell Banker agent working in Aspen, Colorado — strongly agreed, saying that out-of-state buyers are gravitating to her market right now but many want to be in town rather than in a more remote setting. "I hear it from my clients," she said. "They're really looking forward to being able to be with others. People get excited to see one another." Along those same lines, many agents who spoke with Inman expect to see high-density units suffer. Nash, for instance, believes that the Florida market will thrive as the pandemic winds down, but expects Miami condos to take a hit. "I don't think that the condo market goes away, but I think there may be a pause," he said. "Because people have been quarantined in such a small space and it seems like there's been such a concentration in those big dense metropolitan cities, those buyers might be leaning towards not duplicating a purchase down in Florida in a dense building." Michael LaFido, a consultant and broker with properties in the Chicago area, made a similar observation about his own market. "I think you're going to see some negative effects there," he said of urban apartment and condo units. "I think you're going to see supply that's currently on the market sit." Perhaps ironically, McFeely also thinks suburban tract housing — which dominates some wealthy markets — may also lose ground because it lacks the walkability and amenities that people long for while in isolation. "I do think those McMansion neighborhoods are less appealing now," she added. Many agents who spoke with Inman also expect the rise in telecommuting will accelerate these trends, potentially allowing more people to leave pricey metro areas and move to smaller cities or towns. "That hedge fund manager, or that corporate attorney has now adapted and has been just as productive as they were sitting in an office with 200 people. I think this has proven that you can be productive and not be in Manhattan." Nash said Read the full Inman article here. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,353 | The Colorado Department of Agriculture's Industrial Hemp Program regulates only the cultivation of industrial hemp. The Department also administers a certified seed program.
The Industrial Hemp Program does not have jurisdiction over the processing, sale or distribution of industrial hemp. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,354 | Robert J. Ratliff was the creative force behind Agco, creating a new global company.
It's not often you meet someone who will change a bit of history, but Robert J. Ratliff was that guy. I first met him soon after he became President of Deutz-Allis – remember them? The German Company Klockner Humboldt Deutz had bought the former Allis Chalmers and it wasn't going well. They brought Ratliff in to fix it.
He brought in a couple other players, and over time he started making changes in that corporate culture. Back then Allis-Chalmers orange was tossed in favor of Spring Green (that was the official color), and the company rolled out a lot of product under that brand. Ratliff, however, was leading a company that was in sore need of a new direction.
The answer was to create a new company. Ratliff led the management team that purchased Deutz-Allis Corporation in 1990 to form Agco. Who was this new company? What was Agco tractor? Corrected: The Agco-Allis brand ran form 1990 to 2001.
But he was in no way finished. Ratliff, who had a long history with International Harvester's truck division (now known as Navistar) took early retirement and eventually ended up at Uniroyal. Later he was tagged to run Deutz-Allis, and once he and the management team bought the U.S. firm from KHD they took bold strategic actions – looking for acquisitions that could beef up the line. Where to turn?
Remember this was just 5 years after the 1985 farm depression, and it turns out some venerable brand names were available – perhaps at distressed prices, but I won't judge that. In 1994, Agco bought the worldwide holdings of Massey Ferguson, a leader in global tractor sales.
Another milestone purchases included Fendt in 1997. This company had long been recognized as a tech leader. When Caterpillar decided to spin off its track tractor business and step back from agriculture, Ratliff was there with a checkbook to buy the business and create the Challenger brand. Until that time Challenger had been a tractor model designation at Cat. The first Cat track tractor was that Challenger 65.
And in 2004, Agco tied the knot on the purchase of Valtra, boosting its position in Europe and South America. I talked to Ratliff (who preferred being called Bob) about that Valtra purchase. He had long been acquiring companies but Valtra had a division that at the time observers didn't feel was a fit for Agco – that Sisu engine division.
Ratliff told me that early on he and the management team looked at the potential for spinning the engines out. This was very early on. Then he found out what Valtra had in that engine division, including the tech investment the company had made. Today, the Sisu engine works makes those Agco Power engines that offer the muscle for a lot of machines in the company line. It was an example of one of the treasures Ratliff saw in the market.
He was known as a hands-on leader, never afraid to talk to media – which I of course enjoyed – and he reached out to dealers a lot too. His time at IH Trucks gave him some good retail insight that he brought to Agco, which was no easy job after years of Allis-Chalmers decline; and the turmoil at Deutz-Allis before he came on board.
During his tenure Ratliff guided Agco through 21 acquisitions as it grew sales from $200 million in 1990 to more than $5.4 billion in 2005. He retired as chairman in 2006. But during his tenure he did move Agco from its legacy location in West Allis, Wis., to Duluth, Ga., where the company now sells product to more than 150 countries.
Covering this industry has put me in touch with a range of great characters and historic figures in this industry. Ratliff stands out as a visionary. At a meeting one time, during the height of an acquisition binge in the 1990s, there was discussion of mergers bringing a lot of companies together. Someone asked jokingly: "Wonder what you would call that?" And the answer from someone in the room: "Agco!"
While Agco didn't take over the farm equipment market, on a global scale it is a force to be reckoned with and it was Ratliff's efforts that laid the groundwork.
Current Chair Martin Richenhagen, made a comment in the formal statement about Ratliff's passing: "Bob Ratliff's commitment to excellence and complete dedication to Agco, our customers, dealers, employees and shareholders helped our company become what it is today. The board of directors, management team and our employees worldwide are very grateful for his vision, leadership and dedicated service. He will be greatly missed, and our thoughts are with his wife Gini and his entire family."
Those who knew Bob Ratliff may want to attend the Celebration of Life service at the Atlanta Athletic Club, Johns Creek, Ga., on Saturday, May 20, 2017 starting at 4 p.m. EDT. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,355 | Chuck eyes can be great if the butcher does their job properly.
Yep, your right, the cook has to do their job too.
I'm just mad at our local hack & pack guy.
didn't have chucks, but I got a sirloin.
It you poke at it and it don't bleed or Mooooooo ... you done overcooked it.
Seriouslly, I just use my Edlund tongs, and give it the middle finger to base of thumb rule. (Actually I don't use the hand thing anymore... I can tell by the tongs... Took a while to get it right tho). | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,356 | Александровський Іван — український мовознавець і перекладач
Александровський Іван Федорович — російський художник, фотограф, інженер і винахідник | RedPajamaWikipedia | test |
1,004,357 | Aston Martin Varekai to be the name of new SUV?
We know Aston Martin is working on a new SUV/crossover, and we know it will go on sale some time in 2019. It looks like name of the model might not be much of a mystery either, with some indications suggesting it will be called the Varekai.
The news stems from a trademark application which has just been found, registered by Aston Martin Lagonda. According to a recent Auto Express report, the trademark has been filed under 'passenger cars and racing cars and parts and fittings'.
This does seem like a name Aston would use, switching from the concept car's name of DBX. Although DB has commonly been used on its staple sports car models, referencing founder David Brown, its other models have been given a name starting with the letter V.
Recent models to adopt a V name include the Vantage, Vanquish, Vulcan, and, more recently, the Valkyrie hypercar. It's understood the word Varekai is a Romany word that means 'wherever', which would suit the model's multi-terrain capability.
As for the design, it's set to adopt Aston's latest styling language as seen on the DB11 and the new Vantage. The traditional grille opening at the front is expected, with peeled-back headlights, curvaceous body panels with few crease lines, and some degree of ground clearance for driving off the tarmac.
Power is expected to come from the 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8 AMG motor that was introduced with the new Vantage, and has since become an option in the DB11. The flagship 5.2-litre twin-turbo V12 from the regular DB11 isn't likely, but if Aston Martin really wants to make a statement it could be on the cards. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,358 | Practical rucksack with 2 main compartments, one of which is padded for a laptop. The front compartment consists of an organiser for small items. Features padded shoulder straps and a padded back for extra comfort. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,359 | Asheville Spartan Race looms large for runners in the quarry
Asheville Spartan Race looms large for runners in the quarry Asheville Spartan Race looms large for runners in the quarry Check out this story on blackmountainnews.com: https://www.blackmountainnews.com/story/sports/2019/07/24/asheville-spartan-race-looms-large-runners-quarry/1775427001/
Fred McCormick, Black Mountain News Published 10:28 a.m. ET July 24, 2019
Jennifer Olinger, right, and Tara Mitchell are two of the thousands of athletes who will take the Asheville Spartan Race when it returns to Grove Stone & Sand on July 27 and 28. (Photo: Fred McCormick)
Usually the hardest things in Grove Stone & Sand Co. in Black Mountain are the massive rocks pulled out of the hillsides in the 65-year-old quarry.
But on Saturday, July 27 and Sunday, July 28, when thousands of endurance athletes test their physical and mental limits in the Asheville Super and Sprint Spartan Races, the grueling obstacles they face will feel like a much heavier load.
The task ahead loomed large over more than a few of the runners who showed up to get a glimpse of the course during a group run less than two weeks before the Spartan returns for its fifth year.
"This will be my fourth Spartan Race and fifth event," said Jane Dean, who made the drive from Mills River for a practice run hosted by Grove Stone. "I ran races in Charlotte, Fayetteville, Maryland and I ran the Hurricane Heat in Dallas."
Dean will run the Asheville Sprint, which will take place on Sunday. The three-mile race contains 20 obstacles ranging from a vertical cargo net climb to treks through rushing creeks.
As the site of Western North Carolina's sole Spartan event, the Asheville Spartan gave Dean the opportunity to compete close to home.
Jane Dean, who will run the Asheville Sprint Spartan Race at Grove Stone & Sand on July 28, makes her way through the quarry during a practice run on July 16. (Photo: Fred McCormick)
"To complete the Trifecta you have to run a Sprint, Super and Beast within the same year," she said. "This race will be my first race toward completing my Trifecta."
Most of Dean's training has taken her to the trails in DuPont State Forest but the practice run at the quarry was an opportunity she didn't want to pass up.
"I wanted to come out here and get a look at the terrain and familiarize myself with the terrain and run a few miles," she said.
The practice runs at Grove Stone originated as a way for runners to prepare for the Rock the Quarry Trail Challenge 5K, an annual fundraiser for Black Mountain Home for Children and the Asheville Museum of Science. Jon Neumann, the vice president of sales for Hedrick Industries, which owns Grove Stone, organizes the race that attracts more than 350 runners each year. Rock the Quarry will return for its 12th year on Saturday, Sept. 14.
"It's such a unique place to run," Neumann said of the quarry, "so we like to hold a few group runs before the Spartan and Rock the Quarry to give people a chance to experience it."
The course takes runners along wooded trails and over streams before climbing high above the valley below and descending through the mouth of the quarry. It's a route Amanda Stackhouse, a Lenoir resident who ran the Asheville Sprint in 2017 and 2018, has come to know well. This year she's set her sights on the Super, an eight-mile race featuring 25 obstacles.
"I've been doing a lot of trail running, so I feel like I'm pretty prepared for the elevation gain," she said of her preparation for the Spartan Race. "I've also done a lot of upper-body work because I don't want to fail many obstacles."
Amanda Stackhouse, who will run the Asheville Super on July 27 and the Sprint on July 28, descends into the quarry at Grove Stone & Sand during a group run on July 16. (Photo: Fred McCormick)
Spartan runners are required to complete 30 burpees before moving on after failing to complete a challenge.
"It can add up to a lot of burpees," said Stackhouse, who will run the Super on Saturday before taking on the Sprint with friends on Sunday. "Since I'm running two days in a row so I'll be trying my best to avoid those."
Having already completed a Sprint this year, Stackhouse will focus most of her effort on a strong showing in the Super.
"I plan on approaching it much more competitively," she said. "My goal for this race is to pass all of the upper-body obstacles like the multi-rig, twister or rings. I want to fail less obstacles than I have in the past."
Dean will compete in the Super in the West Virginia Spartan Race in August before taking on the Beast in the Carolina Spartan Race in November.
"I'd like to win my age group in the Sprint," she said.
Jennifer Olinger and Tara Mitchell aren't sure exactly what to expect when they run the Sprint, the first Spartan Race for each of them.
"It's definitely going to be a challenge," Olinger said. "I've run triathlons but never an obstacle course."
Completing the Sprint would allow her to check something off of her bucket list, she said.
"My 15-year-old daughter is a gymnast and she does a lot of athletic stuff so it would be nice to show her that I can do this," Olinger said.
She enlisted Mitchell, who will be running her second obstacle race.
"I don't think they're that intimidating," Mitchell said. "We're going out there to have fun and experience it, so there's no need to stress out about it. If you have to walk some of it, you walk."
Amanda Stackhouse, left, and Jane Dean get ready to run the trails at Grove Stone & Sand as they prepare for Asheville Spartan Race on July 27 and 28. (Photo: Fred McCormick)
Olinger was eager to get a look at the quarry where the Spartan would take place.
"I personally prefer to go into them blind and not know what to expect," Mitchell said. "But I came out here to support (Olinger) and run with her."
Olinger and Mitchell have the same goals heading into the race.
"We just want to survive, not get hurt and have fun," Mitchell said.
Those are "good goals," said Neumann, who himself has participated in several of the Spartan races.
"This can be a tough course," he said. "But that is a big part of what makes this race so popular."
New faces in new places for the Warlassies
Warhorses expect to add pieces to the puzzle
Mikayla Roseman heads to Cullowhee
Warhorses are onto the second round
Gibbs eclipses 1,000 yards for Shaw
Owen sends off seniors with a big win | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,360 | You are here: Home > Shopping > Bells Bicycles
Bells Bicycles
4 George Street, Hastings, East Sussex, TN34 3EG
Tel+44(0)1424 716541
Bells Bicycles is a boutique bicycle shop and online retailer that believes cycling is an entire lifestyle choice, a fashion statement, a way to transport us from place to place, and something to be proud of. A cornucopia of elegance and engineering in the heart of Hastings Old Town, at Bells we love our bikes, and our customers do too. Bells offers a range of classic and vintage inspired bikes with contemporary engineering for sale and hire, stunning cutting edge accessories and the very best in stylish bicycle bags, panniers and helmets. Just a few minutes by the sea, a trip to Bell's bicycles can be combined with fish and chips, a stroll (or even a bike ride) by the sea, taking advantage of the fabulous new cycle path to Bexhill. Come and choose a bike and we will deliver it, so you don't have to carry it home. Or go home with a new shiny bell! Whatever you need, just make sure you leave the time to come and have a look at our beautiful range of bikes and accessories and see how cycling is becoming both an essential mode of transport and a style statement too.
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Fragmentary remains of Norman Castle built on West Hill after William the Conqueror's…
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Maritime museum with 3000 years of historic treasures from local shipwrecks. Audiovisual… | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,361 | University Graduate School Bulletin 2016-17
Programs by Campus
University Graduate School » Programs by Campus » Bloomington » Telecommunications » Telecommunications
Departmental URL: http://mediaschool.indiana.edu/
Departmental E-mail: ttheodor [at] indiana [dot] edu
(Please note that when conferring University Graduate School degrees, minors, certificates, and sub-plans, The University Graduate School's staff use those requirements contained only in The University Graduate School Bulletin.)
This legacy program is no longer accepting new applicants. Please see the 2016-2017 Media School entry for new program requirements related to this area of study.
Master of Arts, Master of Science, Joint Master of Arts or Master of Science and Doctor of Jurisprudence (jointly with the Maurer School of Law), Joint Master of Arts or Master of Science and Master of Business Administration (jointly with the Kelley School of Business), and Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D. telecommunications track in the Mass Communications Program).
Special Departmental Requirements
(See also general University Graduate School requirements).
Master of Arts Degree
The M.A. in Telecommunications is designed to train students for academic careers in communications and related fields. Graduates will be prepared to enter a Ph.D. program, teach at small colleges, or accept analytical and research positions in media and creative industries.
Bachelor's degree or international equivalent;
Verbal and quantitative GRE scores above 152 and analytical score above 4.0;
Statement of purpose;
Three letters of recommendation;
An academic writing sample;
Paper TOEFL score greater than 600, computer-based TOEFL score greater than 250, or Internet-based TOEFL score greater that 100 for international students;
A curriculum vita.
Applications from students who have not majored in communication at the bachelor's level are welcomed. If admitted, these students may be required to take supplementary courses.
B (3.0) average or above. Any semester's work averaging less than B will result in the student's being placed on academic probation. Accumulation of two individual course grades of C (2.0) or lower for graduate credit will result in dismissal of the student from the program. The school evaluates each student's progress toward the degree every year.
Each student will receive initial guidance from a faculty member assigned by the Director of Graduate Studies. By April 15th of her or his first year, each student will select an Advisor and nominate a three-member Advisory Committee. At least two members of the Advisory Committee must be from the Media School. Students who fail to file an approved Program of Study before the start of Fall semester in the second year of their studies will be considered out of good academic standing.
M503 Media Theories and M502 Media Research, with a grade of B (3.0) or above;
Thesis (up to cr. 6 of T800 taken after an approved thesis proposal) or comprehensive examination (written and oral, administered by the Student's Advisory Committee);
Program of Study listing all courses toward the degree, approved by the student's Advisory Committee;
No more than 6 credits of independent study.
At least 21 credit hours must be taken within the Media School.
Oral defense required, administered by the student's Advisory Committee.
Master of Science Degree
The M.S. in Telecommunications is designed to prepare students for professional careers in media design, production, and management.
At least a B (3.0) average in an undergraduate program;
appropriate level of performance on the Graduate Record Examination General Test (all scores above 500 or verbal and quantitative scores above 500 and analytical score at or above 4.0 or equivalents for verbal, quantitative and analytical scores as per conversion tables provided by Educational Testing Service for the new GRE scoring system) for all MS applicants except those focusing on new media design and production. Students focusing on new media design and production could provide either GRE scores or a portfolio of creative work;
an academic writing sample; and
paper TOEFL score greater than 600, computer based TOEFL score greater than 250, or internet based TOEFL score greater than 100 for international students.
B (3.0) average or above. Any semester's work averaging less than B will result in the student's being placed on academic probation. Accumulation of three individual course grades of C (2.0) or lower for graduate credit will result in dismissal of the student from the program. The department evaluates each student's progress toward the degree every year.
Each student will receive initial guidance from a faculty member assigned by the Director of Graduate Studies. During the second semester, each student will select a three-member Advisory Committee that will be responsible for approving the student's Program of Study, administering the final exam, and other requirements toward the degree. At least two members of the Advisory Committee must be from the Department of Telecommunications. Students who fail to select an Advisory Committee or construct a Program of Study by the end of the second semester in the program will be considered as making inadequate progress toward the degree.
A minimum of 36 credit hours, including
T505 Media Organizations, with a grade of B (3.0) or above;
other core course(s) corresponding to a chosen concentration area, with a grade of B (3.0) or above:
Design and Production Concentration: T580 Interactive Storytelling and Computer Games
Management Concentration: Two of the following: T502 Introduction to Research Methods in Telecommunications, T504 Introduction to Telecommunications Policy Studies, T522 Managing the Creative Process, T532 Economics of Media Industries, T571 Cognitive and Emotional Psychology, T610 The Networked Society;
completion of approved creative media project (design and production concentration only)
At least 18 credit hours must be taken within the Department of Telecommunications.
T800 Thesis: Telecommunications, T540 Special Projects in Telecommunications (independent study), and T575 Directed Group New Media Design Project may each be taken for up to 6 credits. Combined, degree-applied credits derived from these three courses should not exceed 12 total credits.
Students must pass a comprehensive written and oral examination, administered by the student's Advisory Committee. The exam consists of:
Design and Production Concentration: written questions on coursework, written questions on an approved media design project and an oral defense
Management Concentration: written questions on core coursework, written questions on other coursework and an oral defense
Joint Degree: Master of Arts or Master of Science in Telecommunications and Doctor of Jurisprudence in the Maurer School of Law
To be eligible to receive the degrees of Doctor of Jurisprudence and Master of Arts or Master of Science in Telecommunications, which must be received simultaneously, a student must:
complete 79 semester credit hours in the Maurer School of Law including all of the required course work;
complete 27 credit hours in the Department of Telecommunications, including all of its required course work;
earn a cumulative grade point average of at least 2.3 on all work taken in the Maurer School of Law and at least 3.0 on all work taken in the Department of Telecommunications.
Joint Degree: Master of Arts or Master of Science in Telecommunications and Master of Business Administration in the Kelley School of Business
To be eligible to receive the degrees of Master of Business Administration and Master of Arts or Master of Science in Telecommunications, which must be received simultaneously, a student must:
complete 42 credit hours in the Kelley School of Business, including all of the required course work;
complete 27 credit hours for the Master of Arts in Telecommunications or 33 credit hours for the Master of Science in Telecommunications, including all of the required course work;
earn a cumulative grade point average of at least 3.0 on all work taken in the telecommunications program and a cumulative grade point average of at least 2.75 on all work taken in the Kelley School of Business;
be in residence for six semesters (or their equivalent of full-time resident study; three of these semesters must be in telecommunications and three must be in the Kelley School of Business).
Doctor of Philosophy Degree in Mass Communications: Telecommunications Track
The Department of Telecommunications, in conjunction with the School of Journalism, offers a doctoral program in mass communications.
Master's degree from a recognized institution;
at least a 3.5 grade point average in a master's program;
appropriate level of performance on the Graduate Record Examination General Test (all scores above 500 or verbal and quantitative score above 500 and analytical score at or above 4.0 or equivalents for verbal, quantitative and analytical scores as per conversion tables provided by Educational Testing Service for the new GRE scoring system);
paper TOEFL score greater than 600, computer-based TOEFL score greater than 250, or Internet-based TOEFL score greater than 100 for international students;
writing sample.
Applications from students who have not majored in communication at the master's level are welcomed. If admitted, these students may be required to take supplementary courses. Consult the Director of Graduate Studies as to whether graduate credit might be granted for a non-communication master's degree and if supplementary course work is necessary.
Each student will receive initial guidance from a faculty member assigned by the Director of Graduate Studies. During the second semester, each student will select an Advisory Committee consisting of at least two members from the major area and one from another. Students who fail to select an Advisory Committee or construct a Program of Study by the end of the second semester in the program will be considered as making inadequate progress toward the degree.
the core consisting of T501 Philosophy of Inquiry in Telecommunications, T502 Introduction to Research Methods in Telecommunications, T503 Telecommunications Theory, and T504 Introduction to Telecommunications Policy Studies with a grade of at least a B in each course;
T600 Proseminar in Telecommunications Research for four semesters;
12 credit hours in a methodology area;
a minimum of six courses in the Department of Telecommunications if student is transferring 16-30 credits, eight courses if transferring 1-15 credits, and 10 courses (at least four completed after receipt of the M.A.) if student has an M.A. from this department;
completion of a minor as required by the minor department;
no more than 6 credits of independent study;
no more than 15 credit hours in the dissertation,
Program of Study listing all courses toward the degree, approved by the student's Advisory Committee.
Within these requirements, students design a rigorous and coherent individualized plan of study with the help of their Advisory Committee. This program is to be approved by the student's Advisory Committee, the Director of Graduate Studies (with the advice of the Graduate Committee), and the Department Chair by the end of the second semester of course work.
Consistent with University Graduate School policy, each student must have at least one minor subject. Course work in the minor must be approved by the student's Advisory Committee and must meet the requirements of the minor department.
Research Skill Requirement
12 credits of appropriate research skills courses approved by the student's Advisory Committee (see number 3 under "Course Requirements" above).
Qualifying Examination
Written and oral, covering the methodology area, the core, the minor, and the student's individualized areas of specialization.
Oral, primarily a defense of the dissertation.
Ph.D. Minor in Telecommunications
Doctoral students from other departments may choose telecommunications as an outside minor. A minimum of 15 credits in the department at the 500 level or above is required, including T501, Philosophy of Inquiry in Telecommunications. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,362 | Khao San Road and the backpacker trail – snackettes.
Khao San Road. It's over-developed; it's touristy; it's almost certainly changed since its original establishment as the backpacker haven of Southeast Asia over 3 decades ago. I came to Bangkok expecting to hate it. But like most good travel adventures, it surprised me in a way that I never expected.
From the moment you step onto Khao San Road, you know that you have stepped into an odd mix of young and disheveled backpackers, aging expats that just never seemed to be able to pick up and leave, neon signs and posters blaring at you from every angle, and a fascinating history at the interface of East-meets-West culture. Banana pancakes, pad thai, and an array of crispy bugs roasted over large woks can all be had for less than a dollar. A large bookstore sells used books in English (hard to find outside of Bangkok), ranging from Neitzsche to Chopra that have been passed down through the years by countless backpackers before us.
The problem that I had with Khao San Road before even seeing it is that I have generally found that hanging around other travellers ruins the experience of a place, makes it lose its authenticity. More recently, I've begun to appreciate that it's still worthwhile and even enjoyable to accept a place for what it is—expats, other travelers, indigenous people– everything. In fact, this realization only came to me while strolling down Khao San Road—perhaps the most over-touristed backpacker strips in the entire world, which I really couldn't help but find fascinating.
I had considered getting a fake Harvard ID at the booth that manufactures any fake ID that you could want in under 20 minutes, but I already had a real one! (I tried to take a picture of all of the the available IDs for purchase, when I got shooed away by a man saying "no photos…").
Interestingly, we decided to undergo the fish treatment only due to its complete and utter weird factor, but we ended up loving it. Initially, the experience was horribly ticklish; I kept jerking my feet out of the tank and ruining the massage experience of the woman near me with my shrieking. By the end, my feet that had been aching all day from walking all across Bangkok felt incredibly relaxed, like I had not stood on them for a week. Also priceless were the horrified looks we got from other tourists walking by and looking at our feet—unfortunately we did not get any pictures.
Just another example of how something so commonplace—a little rain shower—can be transformed by this crazy but somehow charming place. And myself? I now understood the appeal of backpacker ghettos after years of writing them off so quickly. Khao San Road, I love you. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,363 | Anxious for the release of Lily Allen's second album? Well, so is she!
The singer – whose first CD, Alright, Still, was released in 2006 and produced the breakout hit "Smile – took to her blog recently to vent about her record label, EMI.
She says her sophomore album – tentatively titled Stuck on the Naughty Step – has been delayed thanks to a major staffing shakeup at the label, which has been purchased by a private equity firm.
"I'm sure everyone will find their feet soon enough," she concludes optimistically. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,364 | This would also be great info to capture, I know there are some users out there but I don't think it's very discoverable at all. Going to jot that down..
Where we really need to focus next is better build tooling. I think the next edition will be focussing almost exclusively on this - zero-config bundling, integration with the wider ecosystem, template imports and SFCs, etc.
I imagine they'll make 3.11 if we accept them tomorrow. We can also definitely put together polyfills for them, since they're pretty straightforward APIs!
Good to know! I'll amend that, was the original modifiers RFC submitted? | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,365 | Locating and Tracing Matrimonial Assets
Our asset protection and matrimonial litigation lawyers are highly experienced in successfully locating and tracing hidden matrimonial assets, including assets that have not been disclosed by a spouse. If you are separating and contemplating a divorce, you must consider necessary steps to protect your wealth in future. This means both the immediate future (for instance, making or changing your Will); and considering the long-term implications of marriage, separation or divorce.
We have a strong matrimonial litigation practice at Rogerson Law Group, with vast experience in successfully locating and tracing assets hidden by a hostile spouse; and obtaining worldwide injunctions (freezing orders) to protect and recover those assets. The practice is built on years of solid international legal experience in both offshore and onshore jurisdictions. It is headed by asset protection specialist barrister and cross border advocate, Andrew Rogerson, who has an international reputation for his cross-border experience.
Less than transparent
If you divorce in Ontario, the general principle is that half of the increase in value of the assets between the date of marriage and the date of separation will be awarded to the less affluent spouse. The parties have a duty to disclose all assets on divorce, but in some instances a spouse may be less than transparent about the assets they own, or have an interest in. We can help determine what you may be entitled to by working hard to ensure all assets in the marriage are disclosed.
Before marriage
If you are preparing to marry, you may wish to take steps to protect your rights before your marry. We can help you by obtaining full disclosure from a potentially untrustworthy spouse-to-be, giving you peace of mind.
Cross border expertise
Our award-winning asset cross border litigation team also advises and represents Family clients involved in disputes over assets held abroad. This includes:
locating and freezing matrimonial assets
making spousal dependency and other claims where a spouse's assets include property and money owned abroad
claims involving overseas assets of the estate of a deceased spouse
We have solid, and wide-ranging experience in successfully accessing assets held in offshore trusts in tax havens for the benefit of our Family and other clients.
Asset protection on death
If you have separated and your spouse has died, we can help you protect your financial position by advising whether you are entitled to apply to court for spousal dependant support.
Representative Case
In a cross-border family litigation case, Andrew Rogerson successfully represented the wife in the case of Wang (Hong Wang (aka Jennifer Wang) and Wei Lin FS-12-377 681) an acrimonious family dispute in the Canadian courts which involved very wealthy spouses who immigrated to Canada from China. The judge had to consider critical issues about the authority of the Canadian court to rule in matters involving highly mobile and wealthy immigrants. The case involved millions of dollars held in overseas tax havens, significant bank accounts, expensive properties in both countries, as well as the couple's children. Andrew and his team obtained a freezing order on behalf of the wife to prevent her husband moving any assets beyond her reach in a future divorce settlement. This was followed by a similar order in the British Virgin Islands. Child custody issues also arose: Andrew successfully represented his client in resisting claims that she had removed her children from China.
In another important matrimonial case (Gillies-Smith v Smith), we secured a world-wide Mareva (asset freezing) order in the Ontario Superior Court. With time of the essence, we worked with our colleagues in the Cayman Islands to freeze assets there. Those assets consisted of diamonds, houses, a yacht and several large bank deposits. The judge's decision changed the law of the Cayman Islands and set an important precedent across the offshore legal community.
Award Winning Expertise
Rogerson Law Group has won many domestic and international awards as Asset Protection Law Firm of the Year. Andrew Rogerson is a regular lecturer and writer on the subject, both in Canada and overseas, particularly in Dubai.
He has a niche serving international airline pilots, protecting their offshore and domestic assets on divorce against hostile former spouses. Read here for further information.
Contact Us now at (416) 504 2259 to talk to an asset protection lawyer. Rogerson Law Group provides matrimonial litigation services in the entire Greater Toronto area including Toronto, Scarborough, Mississauga, Vaughan, Brampton, Richmond Hill, Etobicoke, Hamilton and Barrie with offices located in Downtown Toronto, Thornhill and Barrie. In addition, Andrew regularly sees clients across Canada and overseas; and visits clients in Dubai and London every two months. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,366 | Britain's Jessica Ennis-Hill has returned to training for the first time since giving birth to her first child.
The 28-year-old revealed in January she was expecting a baby, and therefore missed the whole of the 2014 season.
The heptathlete gave birth to Reggie in July, and has confirmed on Instagram that she is back in training as she prepares for the road to Rio 2016, where she will be hoping to defend the Olympic title she won in London two years ago.
"Back in the gym...building back into training," she wrote. "Exciting and slightly scary! My journey to Rio starts now."
During her absence, British multi-eventing has seen the rise of two young stars; Katarina Johnson-Thompson and Morgan Lake.
Johnson-Thompson, 21, won silver in the long jump at the world indoor championships, before setting a new personal best in the heptathlon of 6682 points - less than 300 behind Eniss-Hill's best score.
17-year-old Lake has also had a successful year, winning two golds at the World Junior Championships - one for the heptathlon and one in the high jump.
It's never easy to return from time out from the sport but, with two fellow countrywomen eager to impress, it will be even more challenging.
Ennis-Hill, though, was ranked number one in the world for four years up until injury at the end of 2012 meant she missed the 2013 world championships and, with her training underway on schedule, expect to see Ennis-Hill back to her best sooner than later. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,367 | Modern Installation Mobility/Autonomous Vehicle Proving Ground
Robotic Research > News Article > Modern Installation Mobility/Autonomous Vehicle Proving Ground
Local Motors Awards Autonomous Olli Shuttle To Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall
LtCol Brandon H. Newell led the development of an Autonomous Vehicle Proving Grounds aboard Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) Miramar in San Diego to expedite commercial Autonomous Vehicle (AV) innovation. This will increase Marine Corps understanding of emerging AV capabilities and their potential impact on installations and the battlefield. Due to his leadership, the autonomous and connected vehicle industry will be able to conduct developmental and operational testing aboard the installation. Both Urban and Rural routes at MCAS Miramar have been established to facilitate diversified options for industry. The Marine Corps will leverage lessons learned for development of AV operational views, requirements, and funding prioritization. SPAWAR Systems Command Pacific (SSC PAC), Tank & Automotive Research, Development, and Engineering Center (TARDEC) and Office of Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Operational Energy (ODASD OE) are collaborators in the effort.
Today, Qualcomm is utilizing the AV Proving Grounds for developmental testing as they shape future of AVs through the multitude of partnerships across the auto industry. This collaboration was facilitated by a SSC PAC Collaborative Research and Development Agreement with Qualcomm. Similarly, LtCol Newell has initiated an agreement with Uber for drone delivery in conjunctions with the FAA UAS Integrated Pilot Program in San Diego, CA. The Army Research Laboratory facilitated a CRADA with the ridehailing company, that will allow Uber to conduct developmental testing as part of the AV Proving Grounds. This effort represents the early stages of the Uber Elevate vision that will eventually introduce Urban Air Mobility in Dallas, TX and Los Angeles as early as 2023.
As the Marine Corps evaluates both air and ground unmanned systems in support of ongoing Unmanned Logistics Systems, it has received critical support from the Office of the Secretary of Defense. LtCol Newell leveraged his past experience in the Expeditionary Energy Office, to facilitate support from the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense's Operational Energy Office. Funding provided the Operational Energy Office facilitated the subject matter expertise of Robotic Research, to assist the Marine Corps in the development of safety protocols, route design, and feasibility reviews. The outputs of this collaborative effort will enable other Government agencies such as the FAA the ability to make informed decisions for updating regulatory guidance relevant to emerging unmanned technologies. In addition to the AV Proving Ground, a number of innovative mobility services have been developed in concert with local government and leading industry partners, including: Lyft, LimeBike and Waze.
LtCol Newell began his innovation journey by independently developing a "Future of Mobility" concept to cast a vision of how mobility services (car-sharing and ride-hailing) and autonomous vehicles can transform mobility on installations. Ideally, this plan would result in reduced costs for government non-tactical vehicle fleets, increased financial stability for young enlisted DoD members, a reduction in parking space requirements and gate delays. Installations would directly contribute to Command Priorities of combat readiness and resilience of DOD personnel by increasing safety and reducing DUIs through early adoption of mobility services.. The most important concept he promoted in his concept was holistically considering both official and personal mobility demand to create opportunities on installations.
Initially, LtCol Newell reached out to Lyft and Uber to discuss these concepts. Lyft scheduled a meeting at their headquarters in San Francisco. He showed up with nothing more than ideas he could draw on a dry erase board. Lyft was incredibly helpful in increasing his understanding of mobility services and how transportation is changing, but they weren't the only one. Due to the intrinsic benefit of Government and Industry partnership, many companies and government agencies accepted the nominee's cold calls and helped refine his ideas.
Since beginning the effort, the LtCol Newell's Mobility Transformation Strategy has progressed rapidly, including procurement negotiations with Lyft and LimeBike bikesharing for revenue-share demonstrations aboard Camp Pendleton and MCAS Miramar, respectively. Additionally, he worked with the San Diego Association of Governments and Waze Carpool to develop a dynamic app-enabled carpooling pilot for all military in the San Diego region.
In 2018, LtCol Newell's roll grew to creating partnerships for anything considered "smart cities". He now supports Installation neXt (IX), the Marine Corps Installation Command vision for future installations. IX has eight vector areas, such as Protection, Resilience, Community, and Maintenance. To date, LtCol Newell has helped create collaborations with Customs & Border Protection for surveillance systems aboard Camp Pendleton, Marine Corps Warfighting Lab for counter UAS aboard MCAS Miramar, Federal Aviation Authority for UAS operations, and the California Energy Commission for energy resilience efforts, to name a few.
Most recently, on October 25th, LtCol Newell facilitated the CoLab Modular Logistics Vehicle demo day at Camp Pendleton, as the co-lead for the effort. This project is funded by the Marine Corps Next Generation Logistics office and facilitated by Defense Innovation Unit. The CoLab effort incorporates crowd-sourced design open to a community of 200,000 designers around the world that compete for cash prizes. The iterative design process then focuses on 3D printed small-scale models and the construction of a full-scale rapid prototype. At the demo day, Marines were able to ride in a prototype vehicle designed to be modular from the outset. Marines experienced a vehicle chassis that disconnects from a carpenter module holding tools and lumber then moves to connect to an administrative module with networked computers. The CoLab team went from the original concept challenge to the demonstration of a full-scale prototype in less than ten months, highlighting the disruptive nature of this program.
Source: Naval Agility | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,369 |
Praise for _Trivium 21c_
Martin Robinson sets out on a quest to discover the kind of education he wishes for his daughter and we all learn a great deal in the process. I love his writing: wise, well informed, provocative, thinking-out-loud. Robinson engages his reader from first to last. A terrific feat.
**Melissa Benn, writer and author of _School Wars: The Battle for Britain's Education_**
Part reflective autobiography, part educational manifesto, _Trivium 21c_ is both a richly erudite and engagingly relevant exploration of the purposes and philosophies underlying the enterprise of education. From ancient Greece through to contemporary controversy, Robinson draws resonantly on his experience as a student and a teacher to demonstrate that the 'trivium', the 'triple way', of grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric, still lies at the heart of a 'good education', albeit in new forms. With refreshing realism, he recognises that teachers in their work in the classroom often transcend many of the political storms about education. Citing almost every contemporary protagonist from our own era, he advances an approach which he describes as 'progressive traditionalism'. _Trivium 21c_ is essential reading for all educators and observers of the seemingly endless public debate about education who wish to go beyond simplistic polarities and find a way to integrate and relate in a historical context seemingly contradictory approaches.
**Ian Bauckham Head Teacher and President, Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) 2013-14**
In schools today, a focus on contemporary relevance too often trumps educational depth. Martin Robinson makes a compelling case that turning instead to the tradition of the liberal arts can open the minds of a new generation.
**Marc Sidwell, co-author of _The School of Freedom_ , Managing Editor City A.M.**
This is a charming book which is fun to read; it is contemplative and self-reflective and at the same time it is well-researched, informative, and genuinely scholarly. What the book does very well is to unpick the tensions between educationalist progressives and traditionalists and it attempts to identify differences but also importantly to seek common ground. Indeed it is a historical tour de force examining the origins and development of the 'liberal arts' from the early Greeks through Shakespearian times to the present day. What makes the book so readable is that it is a journey of self-reflection on what it means to be educated from the point of view of the author as a schoolboy, a teacher, and then a parent seeking an appropriate school for his daughter.
The early part of the book looks at the author's own schooling and the frustrations he experienced. Learning appeared to be chaotic and many pupils were apparently left to 'fail' by not being equipped with the skills necessary to succeed at school. The book then traces his later employment and his experiences as a schoolteacher and how he changed the way he taught to make learning more meaningful and authentic for his pupils. His journey is one of becoming a teacher who adopts innovative approaches to teaching: teaching for meaning, values, and deep learning.
The argument of the book is for a 'trivium' of grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric. The three elements of the trivium would be developed simultaneously, and once mastered it is expected that a student would have acquired the knowledge, the reasoning skills, and the ability to communicate well, which would stand them in good stead for a good life. What Robinson is asking for is the building blocks for thriving at school, the underpinning principles of learning that many teachers assume that pupils already possess but which many do not. I am not convinced that this book will unite traditionalists and progressives in a mutual quest of school improvement, but for the open-minded reader there is much to learn. I agree with Robinson that for students to acquire a sound blend of knowledge, questioning expertise, and communication skills (i.e. the trivium) is the basis of a great education.
**Dr Jacek Brant, Head of Curriculum, Pedagogy and Assessment (CPA), Senior Lecturer in Business Education, Institute of Education, University of London**
Martin Robinson embarks on a highly engaging personal quest to discover what matters in education. By drawing not just on lessons and frustrations from his extensive experience as an educator, but also on the hopes and anxieties that he feels as a new parent, he transcends the often stale trench lines of many arguments about education between 'traditionalists' and 'progressives', recognising that rival important insights about the foundations of learning and knowledge need not be polar opposites. Robinson's own synthesis offers an ambitious vision of how to pursue an educational ideal as a practical project. Anybody interested in education, citizenship, or how we want our children to learn would find this a thought-provoking read.
**Sunder Katwala, Director of British Future, the independent think tank**
For Lotte
In 1842, a young Karl Marx wrote:
'It will become evident that it is not a question of drawing a great mental dividing line between past and future, but of realizing the thoughts of the past... it will become evident that mankind is not beginning a new work, but is consciously carrying into effect its old work.'
_In a letter to Arnold Ruge_
# Foreword by Ian Gilbert
It's difficult to read the news these days without seeing some story on education being played out in governments, think tanks, conference rooms, staff rooms, classrooms or even streets somewhere in the world. And rightly so. Education is both a mirror of society as it is now and also, crucially, a reflection of what that society will become. What we do with the minds of our young people today will come back to help us – or haunt us – for decades to come.
Or, in the words of Christa McAuliffe, the teacher on board the ill-fated Challenger space shuttle expedition in 1986: 'I touch the future... I teach'.
Often, though, when education is being talked about there is no agreement as to what, specifically, is actually being discussed. For example, when teachers talk about education, they are more often than not referring to a process in which they teach and children learn. All being well. When the politicians and strategists talk about it, however, they are often referring to the system within which that teaching and learning process operates. Parents may mean something else altogether, one perhaps more related to discipline, employment chances, and life skills. And the young people themselves? Well, often they never get the chance to voice an opinion about just what exactly they are spending the major portion of their first 20 years or so doing.
Yet beyond the world of processes and systems – or maybe underpinning them – there is another debate too, one that goes on often unnoticed and has vexed some of the greatest minds for millennia. It is the question of what we want schools and schooling to achieve for our children, of what having 'an education' entails, of what 'being educated' actually means?
It is a debate over which the ancient Greeks battled and that still fills the letters pages of national newspapers and the comments sections on news websites and blogs today. And it is a debate that is very much at the heart of this fascinating and important book.
Through a combination of extensive historical research, face-to-face dialogue with some of the main protagonists currently in the debate and his personal experience both as a teacher and as a parent, desperately trying to find the right sort of education for his daughter, Martin weaves a complex and compelling story. It is a journey that stretches back to the ancient Greeks and the 'fork in the road' they encountered that evolved into the Trivium of the medieval world and that rages in the 21st century educational diaspora of academies, charter schools, free schools, national and common core curricula, standardized testing and assessment, and practically every aspect of educational policy and discussion worldwide.
If you are involved in education in any fashion – from teacher to parent to governor to educator to inspector to policy maker – and you have an opinion about what 'an educated person' should look like, then you have joined the debate. What's more, that opinion means you will have taken sides, whether you know it or not. This book will help you make the right choices for the right reasons and, who knows, may even help us create the sort of consensus that will bring all sides together. In doing so, we can all help forge an education system and an education process that genuinely does what we want it to do – bring the very best out of, and put the very best into, every child.
Ian Gilbert
Hong Kong
# Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Epigraph
_Foreword by Ian Gilbert_
Introduction: An Unexamined Life is not Worth Living
1 A Trivial Pursuit?
2 The Trivium
3 Our Dramatis Personae: The Grammarians, the Dialecticians, and the Rhetoricians
4 The Liberal Arts: A New Curriculum is Born
5 The Rise of the Rational: The Fall of the Trivial?
6 Trivium: A Clash of Cultures
7 A Crack in Everything: The Imperfect Arts
8 Grammar: From Rules of Language to Cultural Capital
9 Dialectic: Logic, Dialectic, and _Logos_
10 Rhetoric: Communication, Citizenship, and Community
11 We Have a Montaigne to Climb
12 The Professors
13 The Grammarians vs the Dialecticians
14 The Contemporary Trivium
Postscript: A Bit of Trivia
_Acknowledgements_
_Bibliography and Reading List_
_Index_
Copyright
Introduction
# An Unexamined Life is not Worth Living
It is our moral obligation to give every child the very best education possible.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu
It has often been said that history is written by the winners. The same could be said about education. Articles, books, exams, courses, academic studies, textbooks, books on pedagogy, and even policies, are usually written by those who have a clutch of worthwhile exam results at secondary, university, and post-degree level. This, of course, makes a great deal of sense, but it does mean the system has a flaw. The voices of those who have not benefitted from schooling are not usually heard in the great education debate. If real change is going to happen, then those who have struggled in the system need to be heard; their experiences and ideas should be at the centre of the debate and not ignored at the margins.
I was what you would call a school failure. Yet somehow I ended up as an advanced skills teacher and an assistant head in East London. This introduction is not the story of how I arrived at those dizzying heights, but some background detail that explains why I have written this book.
## Failure
My parents moved house when I was 12 and I took the opportunity to reinvent myself. My first year at secondary school in a large comprehensive on the outskirts of Oxford had proved instructive. I had been a good student: I did my classwork and my homework and I played the violin. In 1974 this was not a good combination and I had been marked out as an easy target for those who, shall we say, had a slightly more philistine view of the world. Although they were not outwardly violent, the threat was sufficiently compelling to force me to cut the horsehair of my violin bow and to acquiesce to having my exercise books ripped to pieces and thrown out of the window of the school bus. Even though this wasn't the reason my parents decided to move house, I was glad that we did. I started at my new secondary school, a rural Oxfordshire comprehensive, with one thing on my mind: I did not want to be the target of any vitriol due to a love of learning and playing a musical instrument.
## Grammar School for No One
Luckily for me I wasn't challenged in my new school to do much study. It was 1975 and the school had recently become a comprehensive: a girls' grammar had amalgamated with a boys' secondary modern with predictable results. This traditional 'grammar school for all' hadn't bargained on the 'all'. The senior management team were almost entirely drawn from the girls' school and had no idea how to cope with boys, let alone those who'd had their expectations shaped by being confined to a second-rate education. It was glorious, awful chaos. As I was a new boy, untainted by any particular history, I was immediately put in the bottom set for everything, until they realized that perhaps I had 'potential', and I was then immediately moved into the top set for everything. Even though I had missed out a couple of months learning, no one thought to help me catch up. I didn't care anyway; I had already ingratiated myself with some of my fellow bottom-setters; two in particular had already asked me for a fight. One of them I dispatched with relative ease in the school washroom, and the other, who had challenged me on the staircase, foolishly from a lower position, was easily toppled. This was going to be easy!
The chaos of the school continued in the classrooms. Teachers who could hack it were OK; those who couldn't weren't. And there was never any backup for those in need. When it came time for the headmistress to retire, the school staff made it very clear what they wanted: a traditional, disciplinarian head who could sort out the boys. I was, by this time, coming up to my O levels and hadn't done much apart from cultivate a rebellious nature, so that when the new head arrived we were not destined to hit it off.
I was not the sort of rebel who would burn down the school; I was far subtler than that. I started a school newspaper, I set up a debating society, and I was trying to set up a branch of the National Union of School Students. In lessons I would ask questions and challenge what was being taught. I was most probably a proverbial pain in the posterior. Despite being put in detention on occasion, and even whacked with a slipper, no one seemed to worry unduly about my incomplete classwork and lack of homework. I sat my O levels and got three at grade A–C and one CSE grade one, which was an O level 'equivalent'. I stayed in the sixth form to do A levels and to resit some O levels; I achieved two more in November 1979. However, my attitude wasn't liked, my refusal to wear the newly introduced school uniform for sixth formers wasn't going well, and when I was told off for not wearing the new tie, I turned up the next day wearing the tie but no shirt. I was sent home.
## Rock 'n' Roll
This was all very wearisome, both for the school and for myself, but the roots went further back. At no point had I seen the purpose of this poor 'traditional' education I was being offered. Perhaps, had I arrived at the school five years later, the more ordered atmosphere that was being brought in would have inspired me to be the academic student I needed to be, but I shall never know. After a meeting with the headmaster at the end of 1979 I left 'by mutual consent'. I had five O levels and one grade one CSE. This was my winter of discontent. My education was to be found in the pages of the _NME_ , the lyrics of the Clash, Ian Dury, Elvis Costello, and the theories I had come across while researching David Bowie, piecing together learning based on a left-field look at the arts, resistance, and pop culture.
Away from the world of sex 'n' drugs and rock 'n' roll, I worked in Oxford Polytechnic Library, then spent a year trying to get A levels at the college of further education, a place where 'progressive methods' held sway in the arts and humanities. Looking back, I see another wasted year. I was incredulous at the behaviour of some of the lecturers who thought nothing of luring their young female students into bed. I even had the wife of one of these lecturers trying to do the same with me, though somewhat unsuccessfully.
My social life at 17 was far more important to me, so when I got a job at a market in the middle of Oxford selling joke items and novelties, this seemed to me to be far more useful. I worked six days a week, had money in my pocket, and was having fun. The stall's turnover doubled, as did the stall. I discovered I had a gift for retail and stayed there for two years, only leaving it for a job as a window salesman! Again, I was a success, and quickly promoted. However, I knew this wasn't the career for me, so I set up my own business promoting bands and, in between times, being a parcel delivery driver for Securicor.
## University: An Act of Belonging or Subverting?
Although I was often in Oxford, my only firsthand experience of the university had come from attending a party at a college where an acquaintance was studying. This was quite eye opening. A student came up to me, 'Where are you from?' I said, 'Oxford.' 'Oh,' he replied, 'which college?' 'Er,' I said, 'not the university, I am _from_ Oxford.' If looks could kill – he stared, incredulously, 'Oh...' And at that he walked off without so much as a by-your-leave – the town versus gown atmosphere of Oxford in the 1970s and early 1980s was so marked. My vision of what a highly educated person looked like and sounded like was shaped, indelibly, by seeing them walking around town as if they owned the place – maybe some of them actually did!
It was at this time that I saw an advert in _The Face_ for a degree course at a polytechnic in London, a course called cultural studies. It seemed tailor-made for me. The course director took a punt and enrolled me onto the course despite my lack of qualifications. At the age of 23 I was studying again, for the first time since I was 11 years old. I struggled at first: because I had no academic grounding to fall back on, I had no way in. My poly was an old cigarette factory in Stratford, East London. This was education that didn't look like education; this was education as subversion – just the sort I liked. Miraculously, I got a 2:1 BA honours degree, something I never thought would happen. In my spare time I set up an arts group with others, called The Big Picture, and we wrote, produced, directed, and performed in plays, including a punk musical I wrote that went on to be performed on the stage of the Theatre Royal Stratford East. Now, I was waiting for the world to open its arms and invite me into its inner sanctum. As it turned out, I became an advertising salesperson at _Marxism Today_.
Working in the hub of the Communist Party of Great Britain was fascinating, especially as I was the 'capitalist' wing. I loved the dichotomy. I sold more advertising space for the magazine than anyone else had done before. Strangely, _Marxism Today_ seemed to be employing the same Oxbridge types I had come across before, only these were lefty ones. I realized that no matter what your politics were, it was your education that held you in good stead. Yes, I could sell advertising space, windows, and novelties, but being a salesman wasn't going to satisfy me sufficiently; I needed to do something more positive. I was headhunted by a national newspaper – the sales manager had heard I was good at selling. I met him in a pub in London's West End, dressed as poorly as I could, looking like the worst sort of lefty nightmare someone in advertising could come across. It worked; I had broken my ties with that world. I resigned from _Marxism Today_ and applied to take a PGCE in that most subversive of subjects, Drama.
## Teaching
I did my teaching practice in what was called then a 'sink' school in Canning Town. I did well as a teacher and, at the end of the course, I got a job and spent the next 20 years of my life as a drama teacher. Early on, I also doubled as an English teacher, not that I knew how to teach English. In drama I was successful, becoming a head of department, head of faculty, advanced skills teacher, and assistant head teacher. Ofsted always judged my work to be outstanding. Yet, as I continued teaching, I became more aghast at what was happening to education. It had become the opposite of the sink-or-swim experience that I had grown accustomed to during my schooling.
Now, the whole system was so controlling of knowledge that pupils had become totally dependent on their teachers. Data followed each child; if any were in danger of getting a D they would be tracked mercilessly. The exams changed and became exercises in writing only what was deemed acceptable by the exam board. It was the awarding body who told teachers what they wanted to see, and who sold them the textbooks they had produced in order to do it. Successful schools seemed to be those that best played the system. Alas, the children who seemed to do well were those who acquiesced the most. I didn't want spoon-fed factory fodder. I wanted a flicker of rebellion alongside the ability to traverse within society as full citizens. I wanted creative sparks who could also contribute.
## Parenting
Then I became a father. Having seen what was happening in education, I now was wondering: what kind of education do I want for my daughter? Certainly not the one I'd had, and also not the systematized schooling that we educators are churning out now. Was there another way?
This then is my aim: I want my daughter and other children to have an education that will enable them to live 'a good life' and attain the necessary wisdom that will equip them for the challenges of the 21st century and yes, though it seems a long way off, beyond.
## The Quest
The purpose of education is to change people's lives. How it can best do this is the subject of this book. The question is: how do we want to see our young people change? This book examines some of the history of education to find out what is still valuable and explores how we might use the rich tradition of the trivium to help understand the roots of great teaching and learning. I hope that readers of this book – whether you are students, teachers, or parents – will find something of interest between the covers.
In the process of writing this book I found myself reading books I wish I had been directed towards at an earlier point in my education. I have explored philosophy, classics, art, science, literature, European studies, linguistics, logic, politics, and cognitive psychology, as well as revisiting areas from cultural theory, theatre, and pedagogy. I have been extraordinarily lucky on my journey to be able to count on people with real expertise in all these areas, who were most willing to enlighten me with their knowledge and thinking around the issues I was encountering, many for the first time. Without being able to talk things through with them, I would not have been able to attempt the book and my quest would have remained unexamined.
Chapter 1
# A Trivial Pursuit?
Ringmaster: ( _with a monkey dressed up as a man_ ) Roll up, ladies and gentlemen. Examine this beast as God created him. Nothing to him, you see? Then observe the effect of art: he walks upright and has a coat and trousers...
Georg Büchner, _Woyzeck_
## Drama Teacher
Those who can, do; those who can't, teach. With that hoary old adage ringing in my ears, at the age of 29, I entered the teaching profession. Good grief. What was I, an educational failure, doing here in the very profession that had managed _not_ to educate me all those years ago? But here I was, employed as a teacher of drama and English. I quickly went about ensuring I got my classroom survival sorted out: not smiling before Christmas and negotiating that bizarre relationship between one adult and 30 teenagers, based on 'Somehow, together, we have to get through this' and, well, generally, we did.
One thing became clear to me: my main subject, drama, was not really a subject in the usual sense of the word. Somewhere along the line it had become 'educational drama', a methodology for exploring sociological issues. On my PGCE I had been introduced to schemes of work covering homelessness, drugs, suicide, and all sorts of other explorations of the seamy side of life. This was drama as social commentary. I was introduced to 'freeze-frames' – where social relations between the powerful and powerless could be explored, and 'conscience alleys' – where two lines of children would watch the protagonist walk between them and they would call out what was in the protagonist's head (usually some utterance about misery due to homelessness, drugs, or suicide). It was deadly and strangely uncreative, and I struggled with this approach during the early stages of my teaching.
In the GCSE drama exam children had to work in groups to prepare, through improvisation, a devised piece of original theatre. I went to see what work schools were producing for these final exams. There would be many chairs, with kids sitting on them, talking of misery. Every now and then a character would die, usually at the denouement, and there would be much wailing and gnashing of teeth. Drama education seemed to be firmly stuck in the black-and-white social realism of the 1960s. Paradoxically, it was also extraordinarily unrealistic and it did not move me; its inauthenticity shone through. I decided then and there that this was not what I wanted to be teaching.
## Creative Liberation
My first move was to 'ban' chairs – a ridiculous act, but a liberating one. This was the time when physical theatre was all the rage and I wanted to embrace that energy. Instead of issues, I wanted physicality; instead of talking, I wanted activity. Theatre is a physical subject; I summed this up with the phrase 'Movement First'. Our drama lessons were physical because acting is the art of doing. In discipline terms, this became problematic so I introduced stillness too: the act of 'centring' where the actor stands still with their eyes closed for a period of time. This then became the beginning of lessons. I would wait until every participant had centred before the lesson would start. We were all actors, so we all had to 'act'. I got rid of unnecessary homework: writing about misery and colouring in pictures of misery, and replaced it with a notebook in which kids would be expected to collect fragments of writing, experiences, dreams, stories, poetry, lyrics, history, theory. You name it, they got it.
## Method in the Madness
This was to be the beginning of the work, 'Fragments of Movement and Fragments of Text(s)'. We would look at what we had to make sense of – the symbols, the text, the verbal and the physical ideas that seemingly had little connection – and we would try to 'sense' what connections there were. Both the students and I would search for links, no matter how abstract. We were alchemists. There might be connections of sound, physicality, coincidence, or juxtaposition, but mostly we would look for an emotional connection, for the sublime, the beautiful, the surprising, or the funny. We would delay knowing what the final piece would look like for as long as possible; we were looking for 'what the play is trying to say', in the same way a sculptor chips away at a piece of marble before determining its final form. This then was summed up with the word 'Emotion'. We would then use the idea of connecting up 'framed moments' and collect as many moments as we could. We would then perform them slowly, quickly, forwards, backwards, in differing orders, at the same time, or separately. We would then interrogate the piece that was beginning to emerge, looking for logical connections or arguments.
Once we got to know our pieces, then characters and a theme (or themes) would emerge. This we summed up with the word 'Intellect' – this was our thinking about the piece. We would research thoroughly, finding out about what we had and then finally we would pull the process together by honing it as a performance for the practical exam. 'What is your play trying to say?' became, 'If in doubt, spell it out!' We would then refine our pieces for performance. This then became the process: Movement, Emotion, Intellect, and Performance.
Each lesson began to take this basic shape, and then this shape was practised over increasingly longer periods of time, over days and weeks. But the mantra was there at its core – Movement, Emotion, Intellect, Performance – and the material transformed from fragments to connections. This became the clothesline on which the lessons were hung. We used this ritual, we used it repetitively, and the results were extraordinary. Firstly, literally, the results were extraordinary, but beyond that, and far more importantly, the exam pieces were at their best 'great art', as precise and as moving or funny, as Pina Bausch, Théâtre de la Complicité, or Peter Brook.
## Tradition
It was at this time that I launched an A level course in theatre studies, which became an altogether more difficult step for me. I had developed a ritual, a way of working, that was successful for devised theatre, but would it work for an A level? Indeed, the A level included a devised theatre piece, but it also included scripted work. Most challenging of all, there were two three-hour written papers on play texts, theatre practitioners, an 'unseen' piece, and a review of a play.
The results weren't great for the first cohort. I had to do something else, so I went about echoing the devising mantra: we would explore, research, and learn about the texts and practitioners; we would learn the language of the discipline; we would 'give Caliban his language' through the 'semiotics of theatre'. I had absorbed linguistics – how we understand theatre – and developed a shared language to ensure we knew what we were talking about. I then fed this language into the GCSE. Gone were freeze-frames and the concepts of the drama GCSE bubble; instead, in came terms from the rich history and traditions of theatre. We would go and see lots of theatre, from a wide range of performers, practitioners, and authors. I refused to take students to see things they would 'normally' see, so we never went to _Blood Brothers_ ; instead, we went to see Beckett, Berkoff, and Bausch. We saw Greek tragedy and comedy, Brecht, Complicité, and a writer and a play I fell in love with, Büchner's _Woyzeck_. Here was a moment of inspiration; this play had so much to offer it would become central to my teaching.
## _Woyzeck_ : Where Three Paths Collide
As part of the A level course we were expected to teach one practitioner. In those days there were no exams in Year 12 so I took the chance, and we began the course by teaching three practitioners under the general heading of 'Truth'. Each practitioner wanted to communicate their truth in very different ways: Stanislavski in a naturalistic way; Brecht wanted to communicate social truth; and Artaud – well, Artaud wanted a metaphysical truth based on the idea of the energy of life, necessity, or what he called 'cruelty', that we are most 'alive' when we realize our own mortality. Stanislavski helped hone the language of drama and acting; Artaud took my work to another level, the discipline of the art, of the physical, which became even more important; and Brecht helped refine the argument, the dialectic, not only in theatre but in our understanding of how to teach, learn, and challenge by seeing the world in a different 'scientific' way.
We looked at the works of Freud, Marx, Socrates, Saussure, Darwin, Gramsci, Breton, Chaplin, and Büchner to supplement our understanding of these approaches to truth. Artaud and Brecht both cited the play _Woyzeck_ as being of great importance, and the implicit naturalism in the play also encompassed the ideas of Stanislavski. Therefore, in _Woyzeck_ , the three great practitioners, with their conflicting ideas, had a place where they could 'agree' to congregate, to commune, to argue, and it is this that gave even greater significance to this play and to our studies.
## Socratic Method
Other influences came in from the texts we were studying: Sophocles, Shakespeare, Chekhov, and Dürrenmatt. These were weighty subjects; this was not dumbing down. The approach I took was: we would find our language, research our texts, look for ways in, and understanding(s). We would then take an unashamedly Socratic approach: questioning, arguing, and prompting. The kids would do the same with each other, which made our sessions lively and challenging. Finally, we would look at how to take our approach into the written exam, and also the viva and notebook which, at the time, were integral parts of the assessment. The exam was a celebration of our exploration; not a 'jumping through hoops' approach to getting grades. We had found a way to bridge the divide between practical and theory. That year I was told the A level results were among the best in the country, as were the GCSE results.
## Creativity
This approach became the basis for my involvement with education in a wider sense. Professor Ken Robinson was working on bringing 'creativity' into the curriculum, and I was invited along to the launch of his report. From this I was asked to become part of a delegation to Chicago to see how a form of 'creative partnership' was being used to educate 'downtown' kids in schools. This was a very odd experience: it was great to be in Chicago, but odd to see what comprised 'creative' teaching. Four actors were teaching science to a very unimpressed group of kids. The lesson was about energy transference and this involved actors pushing kids over (not all the way, Health and Safety...) and, I kid you not, that was it. There was no need for this to be done by 'actors', but I'm sure it ticked a box somewhere: yes, we were creative in science because we got actors in. This was a warning: creativity is neither the sole preserve of artists nor are all artists necessarily creative.
I began to take workshops in other schools and countries in what I was now calling 'creative drama teaching'. My work was controversial, especially in those drama departments where many of the teachers continued with their still images and social work themes. In 2004, _The Guardian_ described one of my sessions thus:
'This work is in the tradition of the kind of fragmented or cut-up expression associated with the work of William Burroughs,' he [me] explained as he armed delegates with 'statement cards' and invited them to find the person with the words that complemented theirs. Of course, there were no obvious pairings and we were off on an afternoon of free association and creativity that would have us dancing, moving, chanting.
Robinson explained how his preferred working practice was to encourage students to remain as intuitive as they could for as long as possible. He described how his students have become used to researching and bringing ideas, actions, music and other stimuli to their group's work while at the same time stalling the desire to define the work in hand for as long as possible. 'In the end, there always comes a time when we have to pause and say, what have we got here? And it is then that they can move on to create something formally for presentation and assessment.'
It was clearly a challenging session for some especially since, as Robinson explained, it relies entirely on the co-operation and commitment of his students – who are required to take wholehearted responsibility for their work. 'It is a sure-fire way,' he emphasised, 'of avoiding clichéd drama work. Of course, preparing the ground so that students are receptive and not alienated by such an approach takes time. But it is worth it – you don't get pastiche EastEnders after several weeks of this kind of exploration.' (Monahan, 2004)
## Advanced Skills Teacher
I was now an advanced skills teacher and being asked to use my skills to work with not just drama teachers but with teachers in a wide range of disciplines. The stated aim was: how can we get our staff and the lessons to be more creative? I had visitors to my lessons from Japan, the Czech Republic, and a number of organizations looking for hints about how to _be_ creative. Looking back, I'm not sure that the creativity in lessons movement in the UK was after quite the same thing as I was producing. I think many in the educational establishment basically wanted their teachers to be more entertaining because they thought that teachers were boring the kids. However, my view is that creativity is a disciplined process and can be quite contemplative and even boring at times. This difference in position meant that I was sometimes regarded as an outsider even in the creative education movement. No matter, I carried on developing my approach.
## Independent Learners
A visitor from the Good Schools Guide sat in on my lesson, a Year 11 class preparing for their GCSE. We chatted and watched as the 28 kids came in, centred, got into their groups, and followed the ritual of Movement, Emotion, Intellect, Performance. I said nothing, I didn't even acknowledge the kids; they were working, I was chatting. I learned a lesson that day: the mantra had allowed the kids to be truly independent, not at first, no, but by the end, when they needed to be, they were. I had never done this before and, though I didn't show it, I was just as amazed as the visitor from the Good Schools Guide who watched that lesson. We stayed there for two hours before I uttered anything, which was a 'well done' to the class. When the Guide came out later that year there was a special mention for the 'excellent' drama lessons. University professors came to watch my classes; they too mentioned how unusual it was that the methodology I had stumbled across had, in the end, enabled me to step away and for the students to work, successfully, in a manner that showed their ability to be truly independent.
## Constraints Can Lead to Creative Freedom
At this time, various gurus were all the rage in education land – and they were talking about how to be creative. These included the aforementioned Ken Robinson and the Six Thinking Hats and Lateral Thinking of Edward de Bono, amongst others. Some teachers interpreted creativity as an example of 1960s-influenced progressivism and the idea of free thinking, which was all about allowing freedom and the ethos of allowing a thousand flowers to bloom.
Although I could see where that was coming from, I was working with the great and eccentric theatre improviser and practitioner Ken Campbell, who had pointed me in completely the opposite direction. Creativity is about constraints, he would tell me. This became part of my mantra; limitations were indeed important, whether you were engaged in a piece of improvised theatre, trying to compose a symphony or a tune with the same eight notes, or making a cake with a list of ingredients. Ken was right: constraints are an essential part of creative expression and freedom. Other drama teachers asked me how we came up with such bizarre and varied work, because whenever they asked their pupils to think of an idea they always came up with the same old clichés.
## Competencies
A number of education theorists came to the conclusion that the way forward was to develop competency-based curricula, in order to cultivate within pupils a 'language of learning'. This was fascinating to me, as someone who had developed a mantra in his drama teaching that had enabled students to take control of their own learning; there was something in this. When I was at school I had never really thought about what was lacking in my own education. I just thought that I was belligerent or stupid and that academia was a locked room. I was attracted to competency-based curricula because I knew what it was to be incompetent. So perhaps competencies were the key.
However, there were so many different approaches on the market, all peddling different taxonomies, that it became difficult to know which one to choose and why. Schooling was changing rapidly. We were now examining kids in modular formats. We seemed to be examining and testing them all the time. We were being told to have lesson outcomes and objectives, and to assess them against these objectives. The exams began to define in detail what are called 'assessment objectives', which stated almost exactly what students were expected to write. This was a utilitarian approach to learning, allied to league tables, where departments would compete with each other to drain their pupils of the very fibre of their souls in completing coursework, mock exams, exams, tests, practicals, and controlled assessments. After-school activities became exam oriented, levels were all the rage, and C/D borderline kids were targeted to ensure they became C-grade kids. Against this very uncreative backdrop, I was being asked to look for creativity.
## QCA
A new curriculum was on the cards and I was invited by the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) to help in the assessment of Personal Learning and Thinking Skills – a kind of language of learning that had grown from the competency-based approaches of key skills and other formats. This I did, but I was suspicious of what lay behind it and of the language that was being used – the language of the committee and the bureaucrat. Surely there was something more?
## Customers
Most poignantly I was beginning to see the results of the changes in education: kids were more focused on exams, grades, and learning how to pass, and as a result were becoming less independent and less creative. My methods were going against the tide. This new breed of students were customers demanding a service, and the school was delivering this service to them. These customers sat at the table getting fat on the courses they were being fed, some of them force-fed. No longer were the students expected to enter the kitchen; rather they chose from a menu and expected it to be served up ready-cooked. This is the problem with spoon-feeding: the whole process devalues the making and concentrates on the service.
## Prospero Parenting
In 2006 my wife and I became parents. As a father, I did not want my daughter to become a 'customer of education'. I did not want to be regularly updated on what level she had reached, how globally aware she had become, or how good at teamwork she was. I wanted her to be able to talk about the things that matter; not to ignore the latest ideas, but to allow those ideas to emerge from an engagement with great works of culture, art, science, and the historical and literary achievements of... for example, Maurice Sendak, Lewis Carroll, A. A. Milne, and Greek mythology.
I began to consider a 'classical education' – having her engage with the works of the great and the good. But at the back of my mind was this nagging doubt: how do I give her a language of learning, a way of taking control of the process? Is this akin to me, as a parental Prospero figure, imposing a language on my Caliban of a child? Yet it is Miranda, not Prospero, who teaches Caliban to speak. This makes a difference because she has innocence, an ethereal quality, and a far more gentle approach to life. Caliban complains that she has, '... taught me language, and my profit on't is, I know how to curse.' Will this always be the relationship between teacher and pupil?
The utilitarian education establishment wants my daughter to develop the language of skills for the workplace. But surely there must be something greater than the language of the committee and the aspiration of middle management. If I look at language as representing culture itself, and if I consider all the great works from the past – those great creative, artistic, and scientific achievements – then there is a way into this which offers a key that I can give to my daughter so that she can unlock the door and continue to discover life's richness and complexity, long after I have fallen off my perch and shuffled off this mortal coil.
## Mantra
There was a clue to be found in something I had discovered in drama improvisation and in teaching theory. This was an approach to learning that could help my daughter process knowledge, relate to truth, and have the freedom to express herself. I began to search for constraints – a mantra that would assist her in her learning and allow her to develop her own voice. It was an attitude to learning that is at once based in knowledge, argument, engagement, belonging, and the capacity to make a difference. I needed to go back to the beginnings of learning inherent in my own conventional schooling. This was a tradition that had failed me because it was taken for granted that I had the key. I didn't.
But here I found it – a key that I only wished I had known about long before: the trivium.
Chapter 2
# The Trivium
O, had I but followed the arts!
Shakespeare, _Twelfth Night_
So says the character Sir Andrew Aguecheek in bemoaning the quality of his education. The arts he refers to would not have been the subjects that we would think of today as the arts, but the seven 'liberal arts' that were the mainstay of a grammar school education in Shakespeare's time. The seven liberal arts were divided into the quadrivium: arithmetic, geometry, music, and astronomy, which were more about number and _content_ ; and the trivium: grammar, dialectic (or logic or _logos_ ), and rhetoric, which were more about language and _ways of doing things_. The three arts of the trivium would be developed simultaneously, and once mastered it was expected that a student would have acquired the knowledge, the reasoning skills and the ability to communicate well that would stand them in good stead for the further study of the quadrivium.
If there were three ways underpinning my education I was blissfully unaware of them. I was not taught any meaningful grammar; I argued the toss but was not taught how to use dialectic, nor did I understand the purpose dialectic had as an integral part of the learning process; and, aside from a couple of performances in school plays, I was never taught how rhetoric – the need to communicate well whether in written or spoken form – would help me in my future. Perhaps I can join in with Aguecheek's anguish. I can only conclude that the trivium had passed by the teachers in my school.
The fact that in most of my 20 years of teaching I knew nothing of the trivium also makes me wonder why it disappeared from the curriculum. I was attracted to the trivium because it was a mantra, and I had found that a mantra can really help students work independently, creatively, and in a focused way. I was also drawn to this mantra because it was not devised by some learned professor with money to make. No, it was rooted in tradition. Some of the finest minds had learned through the trivium; it had been tried and tested. But – and this is a big but – it had also, obviously, been abandoned. This set me wondering: how and why did the trivium come to prominence in the first place? Why did it stop being the basis of our curriculum? Is there anything from the trivium that survives in our schools today? Should I consider it as the basis of education for my daughter?
I began my journey armed with a library card for the British Library, a list of websites and bookshops, and a gregarious and curious nature, determined to ask questions of people who might have some answers or at least be able to point me in the way of more interesting questions. I started with the question: what are the roots of the trivium, before it even came to be known as 'the trivium'?
I was lucky to hear the classics professor, Mary Beard, give a talk on rhetoric. Afterwards, I approached her and enquired nervously where I should begin my quest. She said, 'Books!' and recommended a couple. I opened the first, a rather large tome, with great trepidation; it smacked of the world of temples, porticos, dusty Oxbridge professors, and their all too confident students. For me, this was a journey into the hitherto unknown. I was apprehensive, but I was curious.
## Curiouser and Curiouser
It seems that curiosity, the ancient Greek idea that the world was a question to be answered, is the basis of the Western tradition of a liberal arts education. Sometimes referred to as the first scientist, the Greek philosopher, Thales ( _c_.624– _c_.546 BCE), asked, 'What is the world made of?' And although his answer, 'Water,' was misguided, his question inspired the idea that young people should be taught to ask questions rather than just be given information to memorize. Could this be the beginning of the trivium: grammar, the art of interpreting the world through foundational knowledge and skills, is joined by dialectic, a way of testing the world through questioning, dialogue, or argument? A nice story about Thales is that he was so curious about the stars, and spent so much time studying them, that while he was looking up at the sky he fell down a well! I don't know if this is the first example of a figure in education making an idiot of himself, but it does show that the pursuit of knowledge is not without its risks. My nervousness at engaging with this knowledge was clearly because I was scared of falling into that well. But perhaps Thales teaches us that wrong answers are an integral part of learning: curiosity, wonder, and uncertainty are as much part of education as answers, facts, and logic.
Pythagoras ( _c_.570– _c_.495 BCE) brought logical and mathematical thinking to the solution of practical problems. Ironically, as a leader of a religious cult, he saw no conflict between his beliefs in the metaphysical and the 'scientific' approach he introduced. This may have been because his questioning of the world brought such extraordinary, universal answers that he thought he was experiencing divine revelation. There is a beauty in the natural world that is akin to a religious experience – a sense of wonder that unites the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Dalai Lama, and Richard Dawkins – and as this beauty unfolds it can arouse the curiosity of any child. What did it for me was seeing the moon landings and that image of our Earth, so small and insignificant from afar. Others have found it in wildlife documentaries on TV, standing on a cliff in a storm, the Gothic splendour of a cathedral, a pin-point pass on the football pitch, a first view of the Rosetta stone, listening to Allegri's _Miserere_ , jumping up and down in a mosh-pit, falling in love, or even the first time one discovers the golden ratio.
Facts, questions, beauty, curiosity, and uncertainty; these are a lovely way to start my pursuit.
## It's All Greek to Me
Becoming a parent brings together a sense of awe and wonder with the need to take responsibility and build for the future. When my child comes across 'important' things for the first time, I need to develop the empathy to know why that something is significant. She needs to ask questions and make sense of that importance from her point of view; and then she needs to be able to develop the ability to communicate about it using suitable methods in an apt or surprising way to express her newly forming feelings and ideas. Zeno (490-430BCE) saw the third art of what, in the Middle Ages, would come to be known as the trivium: rhetoric as an open hand reaching out to others. It is this image that can, perhaps, best describe how a child can be encouraged to communicate their growing understanding effectively. I hold out my open hand and she holds out hers, and community is the result. This is how we begin to build our shared experiences, our shared culture.
It's not all nice though. Zeno, considered by Aristotle to be the inventor of dialectic, also saw dialectic as a closed fist. This is the dialectic that can be used to punch the pomposity that sometimes accompanies the teaching of Important Knowledge. It is a skill we all need, especially when we see the emperor's new clothes for what they are. Zeno used questioning in a way that seemed to reduce everything to the level of the absurd. There is clearly a tension between someone telling you what 'the truth' is, and then someone undermining that truth through diligent and persistent questioning. There is a balance to be struck in the art of dialectic: a certain amount of questioning can cause most things to collapse under the weight of absurdity – as any parent knows when they try to answer every 'why' thrown at them by a curious child in their indefatigable and destructive search for meaning.
The questioning approach was to find its zenith in Socrates ( _c_.469–399 BCE) and his desire to examine life in the search of a 'good' one. His endless questioning was to be the basis of not only Western philosophy but also, later, through Bacon, the foundation of inductive scientific empiricism. Unfortunately, Socrates' dialogues got him into trouble with the state authorities for his questioning of morality and his 'corruption of youth'. He was eventually put to death through the proffering of the hemlock cup, a punishment I have yet to see used in contemporary schools!
It is with the Greeks that we see the start of the trivium. We have the art of grammar, learning about the way things were or are; which is challenged by dialectic, questioning the way things were or are; and communicated through the art of rhetoric, showing how things could be. I present them here as though it was the most natural thing in the world that they would come together, but these ideas are not natural bedfellows; beneath them are very different ideas about how the world is organized and understood. Over the years, the three arts of the trivium have been in conflict, they have been responsible for their own decline, and, I will argue, they are still today at the root of many of the problems in deciding what sort of education we want for our children.
## Dichotomy: The First Sign of a Problem
If I am to be a good parent, I need to encourage the idea in my daughter that curiosity is not best served by prejudice. If I want her to be an independent and free-thinking individual, I must not model the closed mind of someone who thinks there is only one way to wisdom, one True Path that leads to the number 42 and the Meaning of Life (Adams, 1979: 152). I need to investigate ideas from across the ranges of opinion. The three arts of the trivium challenge because they are, fundamentally, different ways of seeing the world. Just as I saw Stanislavski, Artaud, and Brecht as seeing truth in fundamentally different ways, so do the three arts. It would be far easier to be a grammarian, a dialectician, or a rhetorician rather than being an advocate for the trivium, because such an advocacy requires embracing contradictions and living with uncertainty, even paradox.
Although some teachers want politics out of education, we need to note that education is essentially a political act, as is parenting. Do we want our children to be just like us, or do we want them to be different and thus end up challenging us? This uneasy relationship between control and freedom is played out in every nation, every classroom, and every home. This tension is implicit in the relationship between grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric.
So, how did this tension play out in ancient Athens? The Athenian city-state's impulse to be conservative and ordered was in conflict with Socrates' Promethean impulse to be rebellious and innovative. Socrates might have been killed, but his influence on Athenian life was profound. Was it the ability to hold two or more contradictory approaches to learning at the same time that made Athenian culture so great? In _Full Circle: How the Classical World Came Back to Us_ , the Conservative thinker Ferdinand Mount writes about how, in education, the progressive theorists and conservative traditionalists seem to re-enact the ancient falling out between Socrates and the needs of the Athenian state to prevent the corruption of the youth. With the progressives arguing for the importance of critical thinking to allow freedom of thought, and the traditionalists retorting that critical thinkers will end up educating people to be so cynical that they believe in nothing:
'True education does not consist in pumping children full of a mass of unexamined knowledge and prejudice, the critical theorists declare. On the contrary, without a deposit of knowledge and settled moral principles a human being is helpless, the traditionalists retort.' (Mount, 2010: 271)
The killing of Socrates is our metaphor for the battle at the heart of the trivium, the conflict between grammar and dialectic; it is the dichotomy, as Mount points out, between traditionalist and progressive educationalists, which is still relevant to this day. Grammarians were thought of as protectors of the language and sustainers of cultural continuity; dialecticians, such as Socrates, seemed to challenge accepted knowledge for destructive reasons. Maybe these are two distinctive approaches to education and, rather than being two sides of the same coin, they are completely at odds with one another. So, if grammarians and dialecticians have an uneasy relationship, what about rhetoricians?
## Classical Rhetoric
The Athenian state educated boys for citizenship through the orator's art: rhetoric. It seems that, possibly because of the battle for supremacy between grammarians and dialecticians, rhetoricians subsumed elements of dialectic ( _logos, inventio, disputio_ ; truth, invention, dispute) and 'good' grammar (including _doxa_ , probable knowledge, and _episteme_ , certain knowledge) into the art of rhetoric. At its best, rhetoric included a belief in ethics, sound argument, and an appreciation of the beauty of language. This was, seemingly, a version of the trivium, brought together in the name of rhetoric. However, even at this time, people could see that without substance rhetoric could become not only empty but, far worse, a dark art for persuading people to follow ethically unsound ideas.
Rhetoric came to the fore in the Roman world through its championing by Cicero (106–43 BCE). When he was young, rhetoric was not considered appropriate for a Roman to study, but Cicero had received his education in Greece, where he had learnt all the skills he would need to become a great orator. It was because of Cicero's oratorical success that Greek rhetoricians became popular in Rome; many made a living by educating young Romans in the art of rhetoric. Cicero's support for rhetoric included adding the vocational study of law to the Greek tradition and it was through his insistence that rhetoric was deemed to serve the 'common good'.
Education needs a purpose. However, what this purpose should be is still under discussion. Should it be to serve the common good, or should it enable someone to live a good life? Are these two objectives mutually exclusive? A nation state can define the common good according to its own needs, and we can define a good life according to the requirements of an individual. Without purpose, education, like rhetoric, can be empty. By clarifying its purpose we can make judgements about what to bring to the curriculum and how it is best measured. The arguments about exam passes, league tables, and 'evidence-based' education policies can only carry weight if we understand what we are trying to achieve. At the moment, the core of the argument seems to have deserted the visionaries and is mainly in the hands of bureaucrats and data-chasers.
Furthermore, in the 21st century, should we be looking forward and not back? Does our communication age need a formal education system at all? Perhaps the key to learning will become so personalized and so distant from the concept of a ritualized mantra that independence and creativity will be found in each individual rather than in any shared experience. Perhaps teachers will sell their wares over the internet, through blogs, YouTube, Twitter, or their more modern equivalents. Children might have a diet of subject-based and customized knowledge served up on plates, turning them into passive recipients who want nothing more than to know enough to get them an exam pass and a good job, in order to get a wage to pay for second and third helpings. Is this what we want? No.
## Can Opposites Attract?
If grammar is represented by the Athenian state, dialectic by Socrates, and rhetoric by citizenship and the future of the community, how can the trivium become a mantra that makes sense today? It clearly has the capacity to be very destructive. If I am right that grammarians seem to be the forebears of today's traditionalists and dialecticians of today's progressives, then part of my quest will need to bring both those traditions together. In order to contemplate this, I will need to know the grammar of the trivium: what were the three arts, how they changed through history, and where are they now? I need to embrace complexity. And I need to read more books.
Chapter 3
# Our Dramatis Personae: The Grammarians, the Dialecticians, and the Rhetoricians
From ancient grudge...
Shakespeare, _Romeo and Juliet_
## Where the Wild Things Are
I proffer my hand; she puts her hand in mine. I clasp it gently but firmly, not wanting to hurt her but not wanting to let go. She looks at me and smiles. 'Instead of going to school,' I say, 'today I am going to take you back in time to find out what sort of schooling you would have had if you were born hundreds of years ago.' She giggles and tells me, 'Don't be so silly, Daddy.'
Perhaps I am being silly, but as we walk we pass Victorian terraces, then on through baroque architecture, past trees planted in Tudor times, climb a hill to view a small relic of the Roman era, and gaze out over an ancient river and the temples of corporate modernity, it is clear that everywhere around us there are traces of the past, easily ignored but not too difficult to find. I tell her we are going way back in time to follow the tangled history of the three different types of teacher: the grammarians, the dialecticians, and the rhetoricians. We are going to find out who they were, what happened to them and their ideas, and how they have opposed and accommodated each other over the years. I say, 'I want to find out why and how this has happened and, by looking at their history, I want to answer the following questions...' She looks quizzically at me and runs off and climbs a tree.
Hmm, another approach is needed, maybe a bedtime story. That night, with her tucked up in bed, I begin, 'Once upon a long time ago there were three arts...' 'What, like painting, drawing and...?' 'Er, no. Three ways of teaching, um, three types of teacher...' 'Three?' 'Yes, three. The first group were the grammarians, who were like parents; the second type were the dialecticians, who were the Wild Things; and the third type were the rhetoricians, who were like priests, politicians, and the people in adverts.' 'What did they look like?' 'Oh, the grammarians were rather stern looking; they dressed very smartly and never had a hair out of place. The dialecticians were scruffy, constantly moving around and looking for a fight. The rhetoricians were well turned out, friendly, smiling types.' 'Who were the baddies, the grammarians or the dialecticians?' 'Ah, yes, well, in each group there were goodies and baddies, but as they didn't get on, each group thought the other two were baddies, and they would steal some of their best ideas.' 'Stealing is bad.' 'Yes, it is, and they would also do down one another, saying things like, "Grammarians are boring", "Dialecticians don't care about anything", and "Rhetoricians are big fat liars". But one day a man called Boethius brought them together and said, "Hey guys, you should get rid of your bad friends and work together and set up your own school. Grammarians can make the rules, dialecticians can make the kids think, and rhetoricians can help the kids communicate well." So they did that and it was very good.' 'Can I go to that school?' 'Well, no.' 'Why?' 'Well, maybe, one day.' 'Why not tomorrow?' 'Well, because the school closed.' 'Why?' 'Ah, well...' 'Perhaps there were more baddies than goodies?' 'I don't really know. Let's look at it in a bit more detail.' I turn the metaphorical page...
## The Grammarians
### Telling it How it is
Typically, when I begin to talk about grammar, her eyes glaze over and very soon she is asleep. Perhaps she is dreaming of a white rabbit grammarian looking at his pocket watch and muttering about being late – I think of grammarians as sticklers for time. But no matter, let us leave her to her dreams.
A few months ago, I decided to teach my daughter Latin. _Nunc est bibendum_ it says on my teacup; it was this bit of writing that started us off on our pursuit, 'What does that mean, Daddy?' I showed her the translation on the other side, "Time for a drink". 'It's in Latin,' I tell her. 'Would you like to learn Latin?' 'Yes,' she says. 'OK, I'll get some books.' As I sit down with my daughter to teach her and, of course, myself, Latin, all sorts of grammatical constructs become clear. As she learns to write and construct sentences in Latin, and translates them into English, we are both learning some fundamental rules, and both for the first time.
And, now, here I am learning about grammar and, thanks to my schooling, for the first time too.
Grammar, it transpires, in Western education, originally meant the study of Greek and only later Latin and Hebrew. It consisted of theory: the study of language; and the practical: the study of poetry. The intention behind the teaching of grammar in the ancient world was to enable people to gain a deep knowledge of literature. Dionysius Thrax (170–90 BCE) wrote the first surviving book on grammar. In it, he defines grammar by incorporating the work of the dialecticians and the rhetoricians. He believed that grammar had six parts:
1 Versification (trained reading)
2 Rhetoric
3 Dialectic
4 Etymology
5 Analogy
6 Drama and performed poetry criticism
If we include etymology and the learning of verse in grammar, analogy in dialectic and drama and performed poetry with rhetoric, we have the trivium. To Thrax, therefore, grammar is more than just 'telling it like it is'. He has included the contradictory and complementary traditions of rhetoric and dialectic _within_ the study of grammar. This is clearly not the image of the stern grammarian I had been led to believe in. However, in _On the Marriage of Mercury and Philology_ by Martianus Capella (fl. 5th century), grammar is offered by Mercury to his fiancée Philology. Minerva, listening to the equivalent of the PowerPoint presentation at a school's inset day, quickly interrupts Mercury's presentation saying, 'Stop! Because the Gods are bored!' Something clearly happened to grammar. Why is it often, perhaps unfairly, seen to be dull? Perhaps the answer lies in when grammar became synonymous with the writing down of language.
### Written Beginnings
It might come as rather a shock to those of us who love to read to discover that the root of written languages is not the work of the great writers. Writing arose as a utilitarian activity. Phoenician traders traded with the Greeks and introduced them to their alphabet; it was trade, not the desire for poetry, which drove the spread of writing. Poets, whose business was storytelling, might even have seen it as a threat. Plato quoted Socrates, for one, as asserting that writing would destroy memorization. Imagine writing considered as a sign of dumbing down! Religions and leaders, however, soon saw the potential of writing and used it to help establish their own mythology and rules. It was clear that the written word had power; due to its permanence it had become a symbol of authority. This meant that rules could become fixed; something is more difficult to challenge when it is written down. The accountants, bureaucrats, pedantic rule makers, authoritarians, and religious zealots were all early adopters of written language; the poets, dramatists, philosophers, novelists, and journalists were laggards. This monstrous conclusion perhaps could explain the problems that many have with the study of grammar. It is not that it isn't needed and doesn't exist in our utterances, but that the way it is taught – its rules and perceived lack of flexibility – is authoritarian. Some of us react with annoyance. As dialecticians, we hate being told what to do – we want to break rules!
### Boring Grammar
Boring rote learning, chanting repetition, ritual humiliation, and a swipe across the knuckles – grammar as learned through a dark, dismal dictatorship. In the western facade of Chartres Cathedral the Liberal Arts are presented in relief, probably dating back to 1145; Grammar is shown holding a book and an instrument of punishment, and two children are cowering at her knees. No wonder kids have traditionally entertained themselves in the dialectical pursuit of undermining their teachers' authority: doodling in their books or scratching graffiti on their desks that mocks their teachers' idiosyncrasies. The cheeky response to the power of the teacher seems to go back a very long way. There is an example of Mesopotamian writing from _c_.1700 BCE: on one side of a stone (the exercise book of its time) a schoolboy has carved whatever the focus of his lesson was and, on the other side, a rude caricature of his teacher. For some reason, the gatekeeper of knowledge, the teacher, always seems to be held in a degree of critical contempt by the person who is meant to receive this knowledge. 'Why should we learn this? It's boring!' could be the cry of a generation who want to make their own impact on the world. To the young, the times they are always a-changin'! Grammar provokes due to its relationship with authority.
### Grammar as Cultural Glue
Later in antiquity, grammar became perceived as the first step, the foundational knowledge, not only of language but also of culture. This took grammar away from being purely concerned with the workings of language into the area of our lived experience. In these terms, grammar becomes more contentious because it represents the underlying common fund of knowledge and, consequently, the cultural glue of society for the authoritarian ruling class. The power to decide what is worth knowing, and who should know it, has been contested ever since.
If my daughter is not taught what constitutes the common fund of knowledge, then what should she be taught? Should she be allowed to follow her own path and discover the things that she wants to know about? I am not allowing her to develop completely in her own way, of course. Should she want to run across a road, I restrain her. Should she want to stay up late, I put her to bed. Should she want to eat chocolate, I give her broccoli. I am feeding her cultural practices that I consider important; I am imposing a way of living that is the result of my (however limited) wisdom and experience. Sometimes this experience says, 'No, you can't,' and in others, such as learning ballet, playing piano, or writing poetry, it is, 'Yes, you can.' If we want our children to take part in society, they will need to be able to access certain knowledge and behaviours that will enable them to participate in this culture more easily. However, this relationship doesn't have to be one way and nor is it fixed. It could be argued that Bob Dylan is now part of the establishment that he did so much to undermine. Have the times changed so much that Dylan is now part of 'the old road that is rapidly ageing'?
There are children, schools, and families who respect order and discipline. The youngsters present themselves with their ties properly knotted, every hair in place, and ready to fit into the system. Other young people, on the other hand, who might feel like rebelling, already see the purpose of learning and flourish despite their environment; they are able to ignore some of the obvious contradictions and pedantry. At school, I was rebellious and questioned the whole chaotic system that had tried to impose a facade of order. Now, as a parent, I have to consider: do I want my daughter to be happy and accepting, passively absorbing knowledge as its torrents flow over her, or do I want her to have a rebelliousness that rejects the old with the 'shock of the new'?
## The Dialecticians
### Dialectic and the Art of Annoying People
Most nights, the bedtime regime goes like this, 'Time to switch the light out...' She is reading. I love the fact that she is reading, but now it's time to sleep. 'Time to go to sleep...' Usually she complies, sometimes she does so with a hint of belligerence, and sometimes, occasionally, defiance. This, as ever, is part of parenting. I represent authority, rules, and standards, and I want her to respect that. I have told her I do these things for her own good. How do I cope with rebellion? Don't I want her to have a bit of a creative, divergent, and belligerent spark? If she defies me, isn't that a sign of character? Hmm, maybe, but not tonight. Tonight is not the moment to explore her burgeoning character development, 'No debate,' I say. 'Good night, love you!' 'I love you too,' she says, and my heart melts.
### Ignorance
I bet as a young kid Socrates was a nightmare at bedtime. Perhaps it was a childlike quality that made him approach the art of dialectic from the standpoint of one who knew nothing, and to question people who professed to 'know everything', thereby exposing the contradictions and gaps in their knowledge. He insisted he was assisting in 'the birth of new ideas', rather than annoying some rather self-important people. He thought he was the wisest man in Athens, not because he knew everything but because of his self-confessed ignorance, which, paradoxically, was a very wise thing to realize.
### The Dichotomy: Grammar and Dialectic
The dichotomy between grammar and dialectic is at the root of a fundamental and fascinating relationship in education. On the one hand, we have the grammarian idea that education means to pass on knowledge from one generation to the next and, on the other, the dialectician's notion that education can help in the birth of new ideas. Grammar is tradition; dialectic is modernity. Perhaps we can take this further into two views of what an educated person is: the first is the educated person who knows everything and passes all their exams; and the second is the person who professes to know nothing but asks awkward questions and gives birth to new ideas. Confusing? The dichotomy is an old one. Is education about 'putting things in' or 'drawing things out'? Hang on, though: drawing things out implies there must be something in there in the first place in order to be able to draw it out. Did Thales' well have water in it?
I asked Natalie Haynes, the comedian, writer, critic, and classicist, what she thought of Socrates and how he fitted into the education of his time:
_Socrates refused to call himself a teacher. He proudly boasts that he's never taken a fee for teaching because he's not a teacher. This makes him differ from the Sophists of the time, some of whom, grammarians, were teaching the right name for things, and rhetoricians, who were teaching rhetoric – both of which they would charge huge sums of money for. If you read Aristophanes' play,_ The Clouds, _Socrates is presented as the über-Sophist who runs the Thinkery, which, in the play, teaches you to be completely immoral. In the play, like the word,_ educere, _to lead out, Socrates would be leading people out of their delusion, but he didn't know where he'd be leading them. The end goal for Socrates was to prove that we all know nothing. He was quite nihilistic, although occasionally that was not true. Mainly he was very negative, very critical_.
This is fascinating; our characters are coming alive. The three different types of educator are becoming clearer: the grand style of the rhetorician, whom I can imagine with a resonant and fruity voice; the fact-finding pedantic grammarian; and the most dangerous underminer of all, the person who refused to see himself as a teacher, Socrates, who perhaps saw himself as an enabler. We can also see the debate enfolding about the role of the teacher: we have the grammarian passing on knowledge, the rhetorician passing on skills of oratory, and the dialectician questioning you to the point of ignorance. Socrates used a question-and-answer approach, _stichomythia_ (a term from Greek drama in which characters converse by single lines only, a kind of uttered tweet), which was later turned by Lucian ( _c_.125–after 180) into satire. I like to think dialectic has been much loved by radicals, revolutionaries, and cheeky school kids ever since.
### Dialectic is the Word
Dialectic, though, is not as simple as I have so far made it out to be. Over its long history, it has been variously referred to as _dialectic, logic_ , or _logos_. If these words all meant the same thing there would be no problem. However, they are not interchangeable because their meaning has altered over the years. So, which word should I choose? Is that dictionary of etymology going to help me?
_Logos_ is often translated into English from the ancient Greek as 'word'. That seems simple enough. The word _logikos_ , or logic, came from the word _logos_. Logikos was about the breadth and depth of all thought and reasoning. It was associated with any spoken thought that grew into narrative, even if this covered the meaning of works of art or myths, and anywhere an idea or opinion is given full rein. The word dialectic comes from the Greek _dialektos_ , which meant discourse or even conversation, which seems almost mundane. _Logos_ , on the other hand, lends itself towards a religious or metaphysical interpretation of 'truth'. In the first century, the Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria ( _c_.20 BCE–50 CE) said it was _Logos_ ('the Word') that organized the creation of the world under instruction from God. As it says in the Bible:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Christians used _logos_ to mean 'universal truth'. It was the root of creation and was also Christ: the prologue to John's Gospel states that the Word ( _Logos_ ) is 'made Flesh'. The apostle equates Jesus with truth, with _logos_. This stems from the Platonic idea of _logos_ = truth = good.
At root, the three words – dialectic, logic, and _logos_ – are quite different and carry very discrete power. _Logos_ is the ultimate creator, the 'truth'; logikos is lesser but still represents all thought but seems more human; and dialektos is that most human of activities, a chat. Apparently, it was St Paul's ( _c_.5– _c_.67) suggestion that truths in the Christian faith might be superior to truths in rational argument that really opened up a Platonic and Aristotelian schism in _logos_. Now, what on earth does that mean? I think I'm going to have to look at how the two great philosophers, Plato and Aristotle, differ. I warn you, this gets messy, because the words dialectic and logic become interchangeable but, by the end, I hope to have a definition of dialectic, _logos_ , and logic that works for me.
### Plato vs Aristotle
Plato ( _c_.427– _c_.347 BCE) believed that when dialectic is used as an approach to critical self-awareness it could attain insight into one's higher reality or self. As Natalie Haynes put it, 'Plato came along with "the forms", realizing there was a big gap in the core of Socratic thinking, that there isn't an answer, there are just more questions. Plato used the idea of the forms as an answer to that: that we, as "pre-born" people, learn about truths.'
This is one of Plato's key ideas. Maybe the reason that we know how to pick up language, how to feed, breathe, recognize our mothers, and all sorts of other things that seem innate, is because our souls existed before they were planted into our bodies at birth. The rest of our learning is about rediscovering or drawing out what our souls already know. Plato used the word 'dialectic' to describe the ultimate part of the process that leads us to 'the truth' – rediscovering the true, universal essence (for example, the perfect redness of red, the perfect horseness of horse).
Natalie continued, 'In some ways I am quite Platonic. I do, slightly, believe in some things, that there is the perfect answer somewhere. I am not a cultural relativist. I think, for example, advertising is based on a belief that subconsciously, somewhere in our souls, is the Platonic ideal.' Dialectic in this sense is far from destructive. Plato thought dialectic was a way to uncover the greatest truths of all. _Logos_ points to higher truths; it is what Heraclitus referred to as the universal, everlasting idea – the cosmos that exists within and without and where _even opposites come together_. Part of this art is how we get from dialogue to _logos_ – the holding together of differing views.
Aristotle (384–322 BCE) wrote extensively about logic and turned dialectic into a formal art. Aristotle believed dialectic was a useful approach in everyday discussion about important subjects where certainty was not always possible. He wanted words to describe reality as experienced. Does this mean Plato is rooted in the idea of certainty and ultimate truths, and Aristotle engaged in the cut and thrust of debate on a human level and happier with uncertainty and doubt?
In order to help me answer this question I needed to understand how Plato and Aristotle's ideas have affected philosophy down the years. Some philosophy books divide philosophers into two types: those who are mainly Platonic and those who are mainly Aristotelian. As we have seen, Plato believed that there is universal 'true' knowledge or intelligence ( _noesis_ ) that comes from before ( _a priori_ ). Therefore, philosophers who believe in universal truths or solutions that are timeless and beyond what happens in day-to-day life have tended towards a Platonic view. In contrast, Aristotelian philosophers would not philosophize in universal, a priori ways; they would start in the 'real' world as experienced and take an approach more akin to an _a posteriori_ (what comes after) view. This is messier and engages with uncertainty, and thus is more likely to go with the flow.
Both Plato and Aristotle are open to the other's way of thinking. Plato wrote about Socrates and his engagements with 'not knowing'; Aristotle wrote extensively about logic and trying to get near to 'truth'. But, generally, the dialectic between Plato and Aristotle is one of _certainty_ versus _uncertainty_ , the _universal_ versus the _particular_. This, I suppose, is typical of dialecticians – they are prone to argue amongst themselves. In order to have a simple way of differentiating these three parts of the dialectical art, I will categorize the Socratic approach as dialectic; the Aristotelian as logic – an analytical or scientific process; and the Platonic process as _logos_ (for example, as witnessed in the famous dialogues where Plato uses Socrates as an interlocutor who enters into chats (dialectic) to find truth ( _logos_ )).
Can our schools be establishments that embrace complexity and uncertainty? On the whole, they tend to be places where certainty rules, 'Write this down, in this way and you get an A. Get an A in this and that and the other, then go to this university and get a good job,' and so on. Do I want my daughter to believe in the certainty that Father Christmas exists, or should she entertain the possibility that he might not? The grammarian will tell it like it is, either by agreed practice or imposed rules; the Socratic dialectician will ask about it until it is no longer; the Platonic dialectician will discuss it until 'ultimate truth' is revealed; and the Aristotelian dialectician will use an approach that should uncover possible truths with differing degrees of probability.
## The Rhetoricians
### Now You're Talking: The Art of the Orator
The formal teaching of rhetoric seems to be missing from my daughter's schooling; it lives on in the idea of performance. I have seen my daughter perform in nativity plays, music recitals, and dance shows. At home, she has put on her own plays and performs the parts of the three witches in _Macbeth_ with frightening authenticity. Performance is an important part of our relationship: it gives her a point of focus and it gives me an opportunity to pause and listen to her expressing herself formally at a given moment. In this instant, she expresses something of herself within a given discipline – she has learnt the 'grammar' of rehearsal and now performs her part.
Cicero (106–43 BCE) highlighted the importance of rhetoric in _On the Orator_ ( _De Oratore_ ). In this work he emphasized that by placing the art of oratory in the 'right' hands, rhetoric becomes the highest form of the expression of humanity. Cicero believed that proponents of the specialized arts of philosophy, logic, mathematics, cultural studies, literature, and music were numerous and could reach any target they wished to set themselves, yet would rarely achieve mastery. For Cicero, it was the rarity of great orators that set the art apart. He implied it was the character of cultured and ethical men that enabled them to speak great truths. For him, to be a great orator you needed a formidable quantity of knowledge, the ability to arrange and choose words well, to understand every emotion, have a good sense of humour, be 'appropriately' cultured, quick yet sensitive, and have a great memory. Rhetoric reflects the good and virtuous person who has truly mastered knowledge – the cultured individual, the 'great man'. Do I want my daughter to be a 'great man'? Hmm, there is a lot to unpick here.
Is rhetoric an art to which only a few can aspire? Cicero expands this idea in _On Obligation_ ( _De Officiis_ ), in which he sees the search for, and scrutiny of, truth as obligated to wisdom and prudence. For him, community cohesion is essentially part of decency and decorum; justice and beneficence come to be virtues, as do kindness and generosity. Proper behaviour is obligated through the desire for knowledge, and ignorance should be something to be ashamed of. This would make a possibly controversial school motto, 'It is shameful to be ignorant.' For Cicero, dialectic and research are essential but we are obligated to public service, where thinking will be taken up by projects for a good life or through advancing learning and knowledge. Education is tied to virtue and ethics, particularly the idea that the pursuit of knowledge is proper behaviour and that to even contemplate ignorance is reprehensible. Oh, that we keep this wisdom in sight: to be wilfully ignorant is an evil unto yourself; for a school, or any institution, to hide knowledge or make it difficult to obtain is similarly wicked.
Cicero absorbed dialectic into rhetoric through the idea of a debate which presented both sides of an argument. He generally liked to leave these dialogues unresolved, allowing readers and listeners to make up their own minds – something that could be seen as a precursor to a more open-ended dialogic approach. In contrast, the Socratic approach had as its aim the defeat of the interlocutor. Again, this is the idea of dialectic as dialogue, with its etymological roots in _logos_.
### Can You Teach Virtue?
Ancient Greek, Roman, and Chinese societies all saw the need to educate young people in the ways of morality and to prepare them for a role in civic society. The first question that Meno asks Socrates is whether virtue is acquired by teaching or by practice. Sophocles seems to be open as to whether it is taught, practised, or even a gift from God. Later, in a dialogue with Protagoras, Socrates seems to say that virtue is based on knowledge and is in fact made up of four virtues: courage, justice, temperance, and wisdom. When, at his trial, Socrates is accused of 'corrupting the young', he retorts that all of society teaches virtue, so it wasn't his fault because, by implication, if the young are corrupted, then we have all had a hand in it.
This defence did him no good, but it is an important consideration. If we are surrounded by crime or anti-social behaviour, do we all have a responsibility for it or can we just wash our hands and blame our schools? Can you have a good school in a bad society? Can you have a good class in a bad school? Can you have a good student in a bad class? Can a good action come from a bad student? Schools can't solve all the ills of society, but they can contribute to them. As a parent, I want to know what are the virtues upholding the school my child attends, what is the ethos, and how are they expressed? This is because, if I know what a school's values are, I can work with them as part of the greater community.
### Why Bring the Three Arts Together?
We have the authoritarian grammarians with their 'valued' knowledge and rules. We have the communitarian rhetoricians with their great oratory, who bestow citizenship and are interested in the development of virtuous character. The former tell you what to do; the latter encourage you to get involved. Added to these we have the awkward dialecticians, those who want to enter into debate, dialogue, or even just have a chat. We have the scientifically thinking logicians, all reason and slightly removed. We also have the Platonic dialecticians ( _logos_ ), the believers in higher truths – perhaps they are quasi-religious types or have artistic 'vision'. I might even suspect that they are prone to megalomania. Whatever they do or believe, they operate on a different plane. In the interest of education for wisdom and a good life, all of these come together under the umbrella of the trivium.
However, I can also see how by bringing all these contradictory ideas together we might possibly have the root of the destruction of the trivium. Is it inevitable that the trivium can't work because people are unable to see their way to accommodating different ways of thinking about and seeing their world (especially when you are a school student with no idea about how to articulate some of these differing worldviews, let alone all of them)? In my own case, as a schoolboy, I was unprepared for any of this thinking.
Chapter 4
# The Liberal Arts: A New Curriculum is Born
And Prospero the prime duke, being so reputed
In dignity, and for the liberal arts
Without a parallel; those being all my study
Shakespeare, _The Tempest_
## The Spread of Christianity and its Grammar
Throughout the early Middle Ages, the so-called Dark Ages, Christianity proliferated rapidly throughout Europe. At this time, Christian texts were written and memorized in Latin. There was an urgent need to educate people in religious ideas, so it was necessary for them to learn Latin in order to read these sacred writings. Consequently, the learning of Latin and Christian doctrine used up most of the time on the curriculum, and instruction came from didactic grammarians who taught in repetitive and boring ways. The Church frowned upon the idea of two-way dialogue, preferring the one-way catechism (literally 'to sound into ears') by which the master instructed his pupil. Even the word 'dialogue' was understood as a one-way tool for transmitting 'truth'. In order to teach Christian dogma, grammar became the main art of learning. Significantly, the study of grammar was not only used for the literal and allegorical interpretation of the Bible but also a few other classical texts. And thus began the canon of the great Western tradition.
Although much maligned by modern-day progressives, a canon brings together the concepts of rules, the sacred, and the authentic with ideas of quality. How a text enters the canon is controversial. It can be accepted because it is genuine or because of its accuracy or value. Once a text has entered the canon, it is treated as authoritative. A respected canon is certainly useful because it makes the teaching of children much easier. All a teacher needs to say is, 'Here is a work of quality. Now sit there and realize why. And if you don't, then you are at fault for not having the necessary taste and sensitivity to accept or understand quality.' Can this one-way process truly be called an art? And can teaching be a one-way street? Perhaps, in the Middle Ages, it was possible because what was being taught was new, exciting, and 'the truth', and mainly was taught to boys as a vocation. My daughter, however, is not being brought up within a vocation, or in a world where one book dominates, or where the 'truth' goes unquestioned. She is faced not with simplicity but complexity.
## Augustine's Argument on Dialectic
When instructing children, you soon realize how complicated even the simplest things can appear. The pulpit approach to teaching works to a degree, but the neo-Platonist, Augustine of Hippo (354–430), thought that complex spiritual ideas needed to be taught in different ways. A fraught relationship with faith led him to pray, 'Lord make me chaste, but not yet!' Augustine believed it was possible to know things; he was not a sceptic. He thought about the use of language and whether it was simple or complex. He defined a simple word as meaning 'one thing' and a complex word as meaning 'more than one thing'.
By implication, the grammarian approach works reasonably well when language is describing simple things, but is found wanting as the level of complexity increases. Complexity, for the Milanese professor of rhetoric, meant there was a need for dialectic, which he described as the art of arguing well. Augustine's approach was to adopt Plato's idea of education as 'leading the truth out from within' rather than 'pushing it in from without'. In order to awaken what was already within the pupil's mind, he began with the familiar and moved on to the unfamiliar. He decided that students should be actively engaged in the learning process and he used the trivium in a flexible way, rather than just starting with grammar and shovelling it all in. This challenges the idea of the trivium as being used in a particular order. The ritual of the trivium, once understood, is infinitely adaptable.
In Augustine's time, the Ciceronian idea of the discrepancy between a writer's intention and his words became reinterpreted as the difference between literal and spiritual explanations. It is through this distinction that Augustine was able to connect classical Platonic thinking with Christianity. He thus brought together simple grammar and dialectic for more complex ideas, with the idea that rational thought served faith, but did not surpass it as God was always and ever will be 'truth'.
So, perhaps, the teacher can begin with didacticism: there are certain simple things that can be taught, but because the world is, and always has been, complex, there are ideas beyond the simple and these are dealt with through dialectic. We start with the simple that can be known, move on to the complex that can be discussed and investigated, until we reach another, more metaphysical understanding. This I take to be _logos_ – faith or universal essence – which is known or felt.
## The Seven Liberal Arts
Grammarians, dialecticians, and rhetoricians – along with astronomers, architects, and others – relied on Greco-Roman institutions to ply their trade, and this brought these different types of teacher together. The classical liberal arts education was on the rise. In classical antiquity, a variety of subjects comprised the liberal arts, but it is generally down to two men that the seven liberal arts came to the fore. These founding fathers were the neo-Platonist Roman philosopher Boethius ( _c_.480– _c_.525), who had translated Aristotle's work on logic (the only work of Aristotle to be translated at the time), and Martianus Capella ( _c_.430– _c_.500), who was responsible for _The Marriage of Philology and Mercury_. But even as some young people were beginning to be taught these seven arts, Boethius was imprisoned by a group of conspirators and wrongly accused of treason. While in prison he wrote _The Consolation of Philosophy_ , a book that, apparently, did nothing for his cause; he ended up being executed. Not much consolation there.
Other influences on the liberal arts were Augustine's _On Dialectic_ and Varro's ( _c_.116–127 BCE) _On the Latin Language_. Significantly, Varro also wrote nine books (now lost) on what he referred to as the 'disciplines'. The first three books were about grammar (which he also called 'literacy'), dialectic, and rhetoric; the others were arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, music, medicine, and architecture. The use of the word 'discipline' rather than 'art' is significant. Isidore of Seville ( _c_.560–636), who is known as the last scholar of the ancient world, drew on these works and others for his _Etymologies_ , in which he dropped the more vocational disciplines of medicine and architecture.
The first part of Isidore's _Etymologies_ , Grammar, starts by looking at distinctions between art and discipline. He explores the ideas that 'discipline' (drawn from the Latin for learning, _discere_ ) is where 'the whole thing is learned', and 'art' (drawn from the Latin _artus_ (strict) ) is defined by strict precepts and rules. Isodore also points out that the Greek word for virtue is ἀρετή ( _arete_ ), which is the word the ancient Greeks used for 'knowledge' and is another possible source of the word art. Art, for Isidore, who was influenced by Plato and Aristotle, was drawn from opinion, resembled truth, and meant that things can end up with a variety of different outcomes, virtues, or meanings. In contrast, the word discipline was based on 'true' arguments, meaning you could reach only one outcome or meaning. This distinction is vital. It allows for the possibility of the student either having to find their own way through the 'arts' or developing in a more rigid way by means of the 'disciplines'. The trivium, being the basis of the liberal _arts_ , is therefore a process in which a student begins a subject or topic by learning about its language – the rules and precepts. They then develop their own ideas and begin to express themselves in a variety of ways. The liberal arts are open-ended. A _discipline_ on the other hand would be illiberal by having pre-ordained outcomes. This brings out the reasoning behind the trivium: grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric are arts through which we are taught a way of thinking that is liberating. An art offers an open-ended approach, as opposed to a discipline where we are trained to follow one path, which is closed.
How do we want our children to be when they leave school: open to possibilities or closed to follow one path? Our Western cultural tradition chose to situate education in the liberal arts rather than the disciplines. The mantra that the trivium delivers is one that enables free thinking – its essence is creative. So, should schooling ever be about fixed outcomes, such as answering exams in 'correct' ways by responding to a limiting list of assessment criteria? Or should we be looking to our schools to encourage variable outcomes and to develop virtuous characters with mindsets that are creative, open to challenge, and able to change?
## The Trivium: Where the Three Roads Meet
Boethius and Martianus Capella defined the liberal arts as the four _calculating_ arts (arithmetic, music, geometry, and astronomy) and the three _philological_ arts (grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic). The word 'philology' meant a mix between literary study, history, philosophy, and linguistics. However, it was not until medieval times that the term 'trivium' itself would come to prominence and the seven liberal arts would be established as the basic curriculum. Perhaps it was the trivium that helped unleash the huge step forward in art, ideas, and literature in what is known as the Carolingian Renaissance ( _c_.800–900).
It was trade with the Orient (where ancient Greek heritage and manuscripts had been preserved) that brought further changes and challenges to Western European culture and, consequently, to education. In Islamic culture, Aristotle was known as the first teacher and his teachings had quite an impact. The excitement around such pagan texts was understandable, considering the importance of education in a modern, dynamic 12th-century Western society. When further of Aristotle's works were translated into Latin they caused great consternation in the Christian world: his ideas on experience and reason challenged Christianity's view of the fundamental truths.
The grammarian Hugo of St Victor ( _c_.1096–1141) proposed that secular learning was a necessary foundation for religious understanding. This meant that as well as the study of religious texts, grammar and the canon were being opened up to a number of secular or pagan texts. Hugo said that the purpose of the liberal arts was 'to restore God's image in us'. This is significant as he is suggesting that a worthwhile aim is to aspire for something beyond the particular, something more than ourselves. We need to see study as a restorative, a way of finding God within us – or, as we might put it in our rather more secular age, fulfilling our potential or allowing ourselves to be more than who we think we are. It is necessary, therefore, to consider what our aims and purposes should be.
## The Purpose of Education
The trivium was now becoming the foundation of all learning, so it is important to clarify the benefits of educating pupils in this way. John of Salisbury ( _c_.1120–1180) talked about the power of the trivium to create independent learners, 'Those to whom the trivium has disclosed the significance of all words... do not need the help of a teacher in order to understand the meaning of books and to find the solutions of questions.' He went on to suggest that grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric are arts because they 'delimit' the self: they nourish, they enable us to grow, they strengthen the mind towards wisdom from rules or virtue, all of which result in our 'liberation'. A laudable aim; this is the arts as cultivation, as the roots of culture. And, as we increase our understanding of the vast complexities of culture, so we will define what education is for.
Autodidacticism, the art of teaching yourself, is something we all need to be able to achieve. I do not expect my daughter to leave school knowing everything there is to know, but I would like her to acquire the habit of learning on her own, of having knowledge, processes, and criteria by which to judge what she is yet to learn. The trivium is a _way_ of learning rather than just the _what_ of learning.
In ancient Greece, the arts equated knowledge with virtue and gave a purpose to study for the good of all, not just the self. Plato's aim for education had been that it 'should be for its own sake' and result in freedom. But freedom for whom? Those to whom full citizenship was bestowed were men, not women, and were free, not enslaved. Socrates desired that these free men use their leisure time productively in thought. Aristotle made a further distinction between the superior pure forms of art and the more practical, inferior arts of designing and making. Thus the liberal arts became associated with a privileged education for the independent elite – another schism that abides to this day.
For my daughter, independence – an ability to understand and find solutions – would seem to be a good thing, and I would like her to love learning for its own sake. We are lucky to live in a culture that recognizes the rights of women to be educated as free citizens. I would like her to be educated to spend her spare time in worthwhile activities, including a pursuit of the pure forms of higher culture However, I would also like her to have experience and skills in the so-called inferior arts, such as an engagement with a craft in which the authentic experience of doing is as important as thinking.
This is a notion that I need to make clear: the breadth of study I am arguing for is not purely academic. Nor do I support the idea that the well-to-do should solely study the academic superior arts and the poor the inferior arts. If we are to retain private schools, they need to produce as many good bricklayers as bog-standard state schools produce Nobel prize-winning authors and scientists. Schooling is reflective of our civilization and our values. Schools are not places which absolve us of our responsibility for the education, care, and behaviour of all our citizens. Schools can help shape the future, but not without the help and examples set by all.
## The Conflicts Continue
With the trivium firmly in place it was perhaps to be hoped that the three roads would settle down in harmony with each other. The story of what followed shows that at times this was possible, but at other times contradictory tensions would rise to the surface.
## Abelard and the Importance of Dialectic: Castration and Scholasticism
In the Early Middle Ages, boys alone were taught in cathedral schools, unlike monasteries where both sexes were taught. It was at Notre-Dame Cathedral that the Aristotelian Abelard (1079–1142) was a teacher. Twice condemned for heresy, Abelard's preference was for dialectic over all other parts of philosophy, and this emphasis put him in direct conflict with older and more traditional grammarian teachers. Although his work resulted in a very masculine world of verbal sparring, later institutionalized in the universities, Abelard's best student was a woman. Her name was Heloise. It is thought that somehow she attended some of Abelard's lectures and they fell in love. Abelard, 20 years her senior, was appointed as Heloise's tutor by her uncle. They married in secret and had a son together, Astralabe. Abelard's role in the battle between dialecticians and grammarians was such that, it is reported, he shouted, 'Heloise, dialectics has made me hateful to the whole world!' One cannot be sure that it was Abelard's insistence on using dialectic that caused Heloise's uncle to attack and castrate him one night, or the anger her uncle felt about the seduction of his niece. Either way, Abelard's interest in Heloise's claims that passion led to devotion waned somewhat after the incident. This may have given rise to his coining of a new word, 'theology', by which he meant the use of rational argument to sort out acts of faith. This dialectical form of knowledge was now to be exclusively the preserve of men and definitely devoid of passion. Abelard's famous work, _Yes and No_ , listed the contradictions of the Church, using this as the basis for exploration rather than as a threat. Consequently, medieval thinkers began to embrace the plurality of truth and the importance of reason. Crucially, some universities were now able to operate as semi-autonomous centres of learning in pursuit of truth and rationalism, rather than just institutions of religious dogma. Into this atmosphere the new translations of Aristotle were welcomed with open minds.
Some universities in the 12th century excluded grammar from their teaching, relegating it to the new grammar schools, where it was taught to students in order that they would have the knowledge necessary to enable them to face the more challenging dialectical approach of the universities. However, these schools were few and far between. The idea that schools should teach the more simple grammar to prepare students for the more complex dialectic of the universities is something that, it could be argued, remains to this day. So, if my daughter doesn't attend university, does this mean she will have only a limited experience of the trivium? After all, attending a grammar school and learning 'stuff' turns you into a vessel, and by learning grammar alone this vessel is not balanced enough to navigate the complexities of the world.
What balance do we require? The idea that (grammar) school prepares you for university presupposes some kind of progression, a learning journey through which one moves from simplicity to complexity, from facts to wisdom. There is the danger that, if these stages can only be reached through formal education, and we leave education early on we will lack the tools to reach the next stage. I would advocate that _every_ stage of schooling should prepare students for becoming wise, knowledgeable, and virtuous.
## Aquinas and the Rise of Aristotle
Most universities were not so progressive. The study of Aristotle was banned in many, although some radical teachers ignored this ruling. Albertus Magnus ( _c_.1206–1280), a religious man who, like Hugo of St Victor before him, insisted on the importance of secular learning. Crucially, he was the teacher of Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274). It was because of his teacher's influence that Aquinas was able to create a Christian Aristotelian philosophy to defend the Church's doctrine and faith. This was to be of momentous importance in philosophy and education, and by doing so he helped set in motion a scientific revolution.
Aquinas thought reason was the highest state of being. This contradicted Augustine's more Platonic view that reason was subservient to faith. Aquinas felt that philosophy and religion are separate, but that it was through reason that man would find God, thereby uniting certain Platonic approaches with Aristotle's views. Aquinas thought that the highest ends were reached by humanity striving towards them.
Aquinas, who coined the term _tabula rasa_ (usually attributed to Locke) was in conflict with more conservative theologians who had reacted to the difficulty of uniting Aristotle's thinking to Christian grammarian orthodoxy and the dangerous outbreak of thinking that had occurred in some of the universities. He asserted that all of our knowledge of the world came from reflecting on our experience. Aquinas's thinking is highly empiricist. Despite the knowledge gained through our senses we cannot prove that God exists, and although we might see that things can and do change, those things were made by other things and not by God. However, if we were to keep going back we would find the first thing that occurred, the beginning, and that would be because of God. So to Aquinas, if we reason correctly, we cannot come to any other conclusion that there is a God. Aquinas's nuanced thinking brought together philosophical thought and Christian belief.
In December 1273 Aquinas had a breakdown, and in 1274 he was summoned by the Pope to explain his ideas, but he collapsed and died on the way. Was this a sign of God's anger? Four months previously, during mass, Aquinas had experienced such a cathartic episode that he said it made all his work seem like straw. What that experience was we shall never know. His death saw the Church revoke much of his teachings and widened the schism between the dialectical scientific thinkers and the more grammarian traditionalists. His work was condemned in the universities of Oxford and Paris, despite Aquinas having studied and been a master there.
The great contribution that Aquinas made was to set the mind free, allowing people to explore their humanity, whilst at the same time still holding onto their faith. The Church took time to accommodate Aquinas's way of thinking, as did some universities. Paris revoked its condemnation 50 years later, although Oxford has yet to take this step. The Church was now able to take on Aristotelian ideas, bringing together grammar and dialectic, faith and reason, but there was an inherent paradox. With the benefit of hindsight, it was this freeing of thought that ultimately enabled people to later challenge both the teachings of the Church and Aristotelian philosophy, and helped lead to the decline of the trivium.
## Common Good
To Aquinas, the common good of the community was superior to the common good of the individual, meaning that virtue was both outward looking as well as an intrinsic good. He took on Aristotle's idea of the virtues (although he changed the virtue of intuition to understanding) and went on to describe the superior cardinal virtues: courage, justice, prudence, and temperance, and the secondary virtues: art, science, understanding, and wisdom. He thought you could become a good artist or thinker through the secondary virtues but you could only become a good person through the cardinal virtues. Above these qualities come the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity.
This idea of the virtues reaching outward is inherent in the idea of rhetoric, for it is in community that we are most human, and it is in the conversation with humankind that we reflect most on ourselves. By taking on the idea of the liberal arts as arts we encompass an idea of virtue, although the arts liberate the idea rather than dictate the terms. If virtue is dictated to us as a set of behaviours which we cannot adapt or change then in itself it is not virtuous.
## Ockham's Razor and the Victory of Aristotle
The medieval age finally came to an end when the English philosopher William of Ockham ( _c_.1288– _c_.1348) applied his razor; that is, where there are competing theories the simplest answer is often right, thereby fully integrating Aristotelian philosophy and Christian theology in the 14th century. Universal ideas, said William of Ockham, were products of man not God. Nothing relies on anything else in order to exist: we can discover and know things from the application of grammar and logic. For William there were but two realities – empirical scientific truth and religious truth – and the two were separate, with no way from one to the other. In one swift cut, science and philosophy were free from theology and could become part of mainstream thought. The liberal arts tradition began to thrive.
This flourishing of learning led not only to Latin grammar being studied but also national languages. For example, the first grammar schools in France began teaching French grammar in the 1300s, and this practice soon caught on in other countries. National grammar schools began to spring up in most large towns, and they had a need for accessible teaching and learning materials. In the 12th century some grammar books had been written in verse (was this an early example of dumbing down?). By the end of the 14th century, thanks to these schools, students arrived at university far better prepared than before. This meant there was more time for students to study at a higher level. This scholasticism saw the liberal arts enshrined in the curriculum at the universities of Oxford and Prague, and both flourished as places where intellectual freedom was cherished.
## Renaissance, Petrarch, and the Return of Plato
Petrarch (1304–1374) saw the medieval emphasis on Aristotle as a period of decline in thinking, literature, and morality, and declared the previous thousand years to be a 'dark age'. He wanted to move beyond Aristotle, demanding that a wide range of classical works, including the work of Plato, should be studied on their own terms, without having to be 'Christianized'. Petrarch added to the great Western canon the works of Cicero, Virgil, Homer, and Plato, amongst others. Petrarch had begun a new education, reuniting grammar, _logos_ (as opposed to just dialectic or logic), and rhetoric. Added to the trivium was the _studia humanitatis_ (philosophy, history, and poetry), which, I argue, is also an extension of the trivium, with history pertaining to grammar, philosophy to dialectic, and poetry to rhetoric.
Petrarch also restored the ancient Greek creative tension between Aristotle and Plato: the particular and the universal, reason and imagination, exterior and interior. That this creative dialectic brought forth the Renaissance was also mirrored in the figure of Petrarch himself – his spiritual, psychological, humanist, and aesthetic approach to the world made him, arguably, the first Renaissance man. Petrarch also admired Socrates and was a major force in seeing his age as a rebirth of classical times. The Renaissance was to unite the intellect, the imagination, and the spiritual in a neo-Platonic combination of contradictory creative forces. Pythagoras was again in vogue, influencing Copernicus (1473–1543) to use mathematics to measure the world. This was history as cyclical rather than linear. Promethean man had returned, but now, significantly, it was divine genius that could drive a man to create wonderful things. No longer was divine creativity the sole preserve of God (or gods); truths were to be found in art and literature. The Renaissance shifted mankind towards exercising the critical faculties for uncovering greatness and universal truths, but these were now the truths of humanity rather than of the gods. Platonism saw beauty as an essential part of the search for truth. For example, the Renaissance humanists had a desire for rhetoric to be persuasive but also to be convincing through its aesthetic, its elegance, and its eloquence. This attitude led to a revitalizing of poetry – and grammar – in the reading of the great texts.
The Renaissance began in the 14th century in times of turmoil and economic depression. There was tension between East and West, corruption in the Church and State, violence and disease, the decline and rise of new nation states. Against this backdrop there were many new inventions, including that most transformative agent of change, the printing press. The liberal arts flourished. Cicero's work on the importance of good character, virtue, leadership, and versatility in times of change was rediscovered, and this led to the adaptable liberal arts coming to the fore in education.
In 1479, Rodolphus Agricola (1443–1485) set out a method for reading a text dialectically. In Florence, the trivium held sway and soon enabled a fertile breeding ground for contradiction and argument. In the 15th century, a fully fledged Platonic centre of learning was founded under the patronage of de'Medici family. The de'Medicis were famously a family close to the papacy, especially the Borgias; this comradeship brought the Church fully on board. The trivium had reached another high point, as evidenced by Thomas More's letter to his daughter in 1517 in which he wrote, 'I see... you have not left aside any of your usual pursuits, either in exercises of logic, in the composition of declamations, or in the writing of verses.' Now, if I were to write a letter to my daughter, what would I comment on? The usual pursuits in contemporary schooling do not lean towards logic and declamation.
Tensions, of course, remained. Erasmus (1466–1536), the Schoolmaster of Europe, wrote many books for use in grammar schools. An old grammarian, he was intent on re-establishing grammar in a world where dialectics and rhetoric held educational sway. The writer Rabelais ( _c_.1494–1553) attacked the humanist neo-Platonic curriculum as established by Petrarch and his followers, protesting that there was so much content in the course of study that pupils would have no time to think. For him, education meant liberation. Montaigne (1533–1592) agreed with Rabelais and wanted to educate the whole person, with the emphasis on understanding rather than simply knowledge. The trivium retains this debate at its core: the balance between what and how much to learn, how much time for thinking and criticizing, and how much for developing your own ways of communicating – how to be a free-thinking citizen. In other words, we have the eternal compromise between free individuals and the demands and mores of the community.
## Milton: Of Education
By the mid-17th century, Milton (1608–1674) had written, in _Of Education_ , that a virtuous and noble curriculum should include the study of Plato, Plutarch, Aristotle, Demetrius, Longinus, Hermogenes, and Cicero, and that the purpose of education was for the good of the state. He believed novices should start their educative journey to mastery with the laborious study of 'some good grammar'. They would then reach the more fertile slopes of the hillside, by reading some Socratic discourses, tempered by lectures and explanations that would 'draw them into willing obedience'. As they become 'enflam'd with the study of learning', by which they may 'delight in manly and liberall exercises', they would come to use eloquence and persuasion. They would then learn ethics and morality and the 'knowledge of personal duty'. Milton was a great believer in the importance of exercise, diet, music, and other activities, such as travel, in forming character, or 'breeding'. However, he did not think every teacher would have the wherewithal to teach this form of education, which was heavy on knowledge and included 'the queen of the arts', logic. Logic, he believed, was especially ill-served by poor teaching. Crucially, in _Of Education_ , Milton showed his idea of the journey of education – learning that progresses from sense experience through the abstract to citizenship.
## The Good Life
The three ways of the trivium – knowing, questioning, and communicating – had come together as the basis of a great education. _This_ is what I want for my daughter. I want her to know about things and how to do things. I want her to be able to question, both to find out more and also to realize that some things aren't known, can't be known, or aren't fully understood. I want her to communicate about things she has discovered, surmised, or created in the way of an open hand to the world. Finally, I want all this to have a purpose, which can be summed up by the phrase 'a good life' (because I certainly don't want her to have a bad one). When I look at the three arts of the trivium and the pursuit of a good life, I wonder why it was beyond the wit of my school to give me this grounding, and why it shouldn't be the grounding for a great education now. Surely, there is nothing that could stop the trivium from being the foundation of schooling for my daughter in the 21st century?
Chapter 5
# The Rise of the Rational: The Fall of the Trivial?
So throughout the world children are spoon-fed all the opinions under the sun before they are able to acquire the capacity to make judgements.
Voltaire
The trivium, as a child of philosophy, was enhanced both by the thinking that brought Aristotelian philosophy and the Christian religion together in theology, and by the burgeoning educational institutions. It was the other children of philosophy – science and rationalism – that would threaten the trivium, and then destroy it as the avowed basis of the curriculum. The modern era rejected many of the ways of thinking and communicating based on traditional classical or religious knowledge and reasoning. Added to this, the economic need for society to educate more of its citizens to ever higher levels would mean that what and how to teach would take on a more utilitarian purpose; that is, how to educate children to become productive, malleable workers and managers rather than independent thinkers.
Nowadays, education is almost wholly a ticket into the world of work. No longer is the emphasis on the idea that we are to be educated in order to attain wisdom or to live a good life. The focus has shifted from educating for your leisure to educating for your wallet. The liberal arts have become disciplines. Education is dominated by discussions around the right systems, subjects, and skills in order to achieve the closed outcomes of high test scores in a global marketplace. This has raised the question about whether there has been a decline in standards. Grammar, ethics, aesthetics, virtue, citizenship, creativity, character, contemplation, critical thinking, imagination, innovation, independent learning, and communication skills have all been neglected, at various times. The 'education debate' has become a topic of discussion, where politicians and educationalists let off steam to ease their frustration. Want a scapegoat for all of society's problems? The easy target is to blame schools or teachers for today's ills, from too many teenage pregnancies to the financial crash...
Behind all this is an important question: what is education for? Do we want our sons and daughters to leave education fully up-to-date with the 21st-century skills necessary for the workplace that we envisage and able to specialize in just one or two areas? Or do we want them to be polymaths, with wide and adaptable expertise, particularly ranging across the sciences and the arts, with an ability to think for themselves, and to be fully engaged citizens who live flourishing, virtuous lives on the way to achieving wisdom? Do we want our children to study hard traditional subjects or soft modern subjects? Do we want them to be trained in soft skills – such as empathy and working in teams – or to know their times tables and be able to use the possessive apostrophe? Do we want our young people to know key dates and events from history or to be able to use the internet to find out anything they want to know? Often referred to as false dichotomies, these choices are very much part of modern educational discourse and have become ever more urgent due to the perception that widening access to knowledge has completely changed what and how we should educate our young people.
There is no doubt that technology has inexorably altered our lives. Perhaps by being interconnected on the internet our children have access to the democratic wisdom of crowds, which gives more importance to knowledge emanating from a popular authority than that acquired through expertise. In our social media age, information comes from sound bites, aphorisms, and rhetorical flourishes rather than by recourse to any particular authoritative body of knowledge. The ignorant become just as respected as the wise, and in many cases far more influential. For example, in January 2013, James Argent, from the popular television series _The Only Way Is Essex_ , had more than a million followers on Twitter, whereas the controversial scientist Richard Dawkins had to make do with less than half that number, and the popular philosopher, Alain de Botton, about a quarter. If each tweet is a portion of the knowledge of our age, democratically accessed from computer or mobile phone, which knowledge has the most effect? Without hierarchy do we have a democratic levelling of knowledge where every brick can be perceived as great art?
This means that the trivium is relevant because we live in a more democratic, scientific, technological, and culturally relative age. Does the trivium need the cultural authority that comes from a limited Christian and classical canon and access to 'truth', but which has also rendered it useless in the march to modernity? What were the main challenges to the trivium that eventually led to its downfall? It was the modern age that was to see the decline of the trivium. An increasingly secular age, believing in the power of science to discover truth and measuring value through the market, would not be satisfied with the old ways of learning.
## The Republic of Letters, the Challenge to Aristotle, and the Triumph of Science
Harking back to Cicero's ideal of a _respublica literaria_ (the equivalent of a Facebook group of interested and engaged people), an international community of learning uses written rhetoric to knit its community together. The Republic of Letters (dating between the late 17th and 18th centuries) included many Renaissance polymaths and others who had been enriched by a liberal arts education and the trivium. In their number were philosophers and early scientists: Copernicus, Galileo (1564–1642), Bacon (1561–1626), Descartes (1596–1650), Locke (1632–1704), and Newton (1642–1727). Throughout the modern era, science would challenge the authoritative knowledge of the Church. Galileo, inspired by Pythagoras and Plato, and in opposition to Aristotle, was imprisoned by the Church for his heresy in questioning one of the basic tenets of faith – that the Earth was the centre of the universe. This argument between belief and knowledge threatened the basis of a classical liberal arts education. Copernicus's publisher saw the danger and tried to save the liberal arts by claiming that the sun-centred universe was but a set of 'novel hypotheses'.
Paradoxically, this scientific thinking was also threatening the very philosophy of those who had been at the forefront of the epistemic approach: Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. As reason and rationality became the new buzzwords, it was the trivium's link to Christian theology and education that was trivializing it. But why did this happen? Is the trivium really only of use in a time where knowledge is fixed and authoritative, where there is but one God, one Book, and one set of transcendent values? If dialectic is used to prove one 'truth', to reach one 'true' conclusion then, indeed, the trivium does become problematic in a world of uncertainty.
## The Trivium in Decline: The Trivial, Grandmothers, and Sympathy for the Devil
Evidence that the trivium was in decline during the 16th century can be seen in the literature and vocabulary of the period. For example, in _Doctor Faustus,_ Marlowe (1564–1593) ensures that Faustus dismisses logic on his way to making a pact with the devil.
Settle thy studies, Faustus, and begin
To sound the depth of that thou wilt profess;
Having commenced, be a divine in show,
Yet level at the end of every art,
And live and die in Aristotle's works
Sweet analytics, 'tis thou hast ravished me!
(Reads) Bene disserere est finis logices.
Is, to dispute well, logic's chiefest end?
Affords this art no greater miracle?
Then read no more; thou hast attained that end.
Marlowe was educated at Cambridge in rhetoric and dialectics, and there is much in the play that reflects Marlowe's education. Could Faustus's pact with the devil be an allegory of the demise of the trivium? Probably not, but it is clear that belief in the trivium and its component arts was on the wane. In the 16th century, rhetoric first began to be regarded as artificial or ostentatious, and the whole of the trivium itself became associated with the modern interpretation of the word 'trivial'. In 1589, the first use of 'trivial', meaning ordinary or common, is recorded and, soon after, Shakespeare reflected a further decline in the status of the trivium: in _Henry VI, Part II,_ the first recorded use of trivium meaning 'insignificant' occurs. In Act 3, Scene 1, Suffolk says, 'And yet we have but trivial argument'. For the trivium to be seen as trivial, in its modern sense, is devastating. Both the idea that it is common and that its study leads to nothing of any particular importance, ensures that it is open to further adjustments and attacks.
## The Advancement of Learning: Knowledge is Power
Was the trivium dead or was it adapted for new times? Science would slowly outgrow philosophy and, eventually, to all intents and purposes, make a land grab for all of philosophy's concerns. In his work _The Advancement of Learning,_ the grammarian Francis Bacon, considered by many to be the originator of scientific method, refashioned the trivium for the modern scientific age. He was concerned with rational knowledge and how to transfer it to others. This was an inductive, logical way of thinking, drawn from the pre-Socratics, which linked philosophy and mathematics. This undid much of the medievalists' work linking theology with the trivium. He called this rational knowledge 'tradition' (in effect, the trivium renamed). The three component arts were Organ, Method, and Illustration. Organ was speech, including gesture and words, and is more akin to our contemporary understanding of grammar. Method was no longer dialectic or _logos_ but 'empirical logic'; that is, teaching a form of argument in order to secure reason (not to be confused with abstract principles), or moving from deductive methods to inductive ones. (Deduction is reasoning from the general to the particular; induction from the particular to the general.) Illustration was to fill the imagination with reason and to communicate in such a way as to adapt to your audience – in other words, rhetoric.
Bacon was so distrustful of the dialectical model that he said it should only be used to remove pre-judgements, and not to administer doubt and dispute. He believed there was a moral imperative to secure emotions to reason, implying that reason was far more important than emotion. He felt that emotion should not distract man from the pursuit of wisdom. Bacon thought that the followers of Aristotle knew how to collect data, but they didn't know how to read it. He asked that people take the same empirical approach, no matter what the subject matter. He disliked the way that different types of proof were sought in different subjects, saying that, 'the rigour and curiosity in requiring the more severe proofs in some things and... contenting ourselves with the more remiss proofs in others, hath been amongst the greatest causes of detriment and hindrance to knowledge' (Bacon, 2002: 229).
Bacon wanted to focus on facts and wished to avoid theorizing, 'analyse experience, take it to pieces and by a due process of exclusion and rejection, lead to an inevitable conclusion' (ibid). He is suggesting that an inductive, empirical approach that avoids abstraction will lead to rational conclusions. He thought that by beginning in doubt, one ends in certainties. This reflects a belief that the world can be categorized and understood, and that empirical science can bring us to certain truths. So, although the movement from deduction to induction is significant, Bacon inhabits a world where we might begin a quest with uncertainty but end it with certainty. Even results that showed a hypothesis was wrong were of interest to Bacon: if something was proved to be false it could be dismissed. It was this idea, perhaps, that would be of greatest interest to a man who would be influenced by Bacon's ideas and who will come into our story later, Karl Popper. By 1672, traditional grammar had become the object of Molière's (1622–1673) satire. In _The Learned Ladies_ ( _Les Femmes Savants_ ), he continued the long line of those who enjoyed satirizing the grammarians. _Grammaire_ had now become _grand-mère,_ a grandmother whose offspring would grow up and live in a very different world than the one she recognized. This issue is still very current in the 21st century, where modernity seems to remake the world with alarming rapidity; one becomes a grandmother all too easily. As technology and culture change, it doesn't take long for us to become out of touch or to hanker for a past that has already passed us by.
For the trivium, there is a problem with a world that seems to be changing ever more quickly. For example, how can grammar – which needs a certain amount of stability and authority – retain relevance in a world where capitalism, technology, globalization, and mass communication threaten its claims to correctness, rule making, and belief in tradition? In an ever-shifting world, the young are more likely to look to each other as travelling companions, rather than listen to the sage-like advice of grandmothers sitting at home telling them how things were better in her day.
## I Think, Therefore I Don't Know
It is from the Enlightenment that the challenges to the ideas that underpin the trivium – authoritative knowledge and dialectic leading to certainty, and rhetoric communicating that truth – would now come thick and fast from philosophy, science, and commerce. Using the scientific method, Descartes wanted to learn whether there was anything we could actually be certain about. He argued that anything based on our senses and beliefs are open to doubt except one, and that is, 'I think, therefore I am'. Reason was the only way to acquire knowledge, which he called rationalism. Descartes thought that dialectic could contribute nothing to the discovery of truth and declared that it should be a branch of rhetoric. Dialectic was only be used to explore truths that were already known; everything was to be in doubt until one found certainty through deductive reasoning.
Conversely, Locke thought that we are born with our mind a blank slate or _tabula rasa_ , and although we have innate capacities, we do not have innate ideas. He judged that everything we know is gained from experience: a pure empiricism. Newton, who believed that we stand 'on the shoulders of giants', thought that the real reason we could see further was because of the enlightened, rational approach – and this would bring about the triumph of science. His scientific method was to harness both the induction beloved by Bacon and deduction revered by Aristotle.
David Hume (1711–1776), however, echoing Locke and reaching back to the ideas of Sextus Empiricus ( _c._ 160– _c._ 210), believed that we should be sceptical and opened up 'the problem of induction'. Hume viewed human perception of nature as intrinsic to our understanding. He understood it as our first perception, the strongest perception. This awareness comes before, and connects ideas through, memory, imagination, or reflections. Influenced by Bishop Berkeley (1685–1753) – who thought that if empiricism was fully taken on board then this would mean that all things exist in the mind rather than outside of it – Hume stated that impressions come first and ideas second, and are experienced as a faint copy of the impression.
Hume's greatest contribution to philosophy is his theory of causality. What causes these impressions? His answer was chaos. He thought chaotic whirlwinds of sensations leave impressions, and from these impressions ideas are formed, which occur as they are ordered in the mind. The fundamental importance of this view is that our ordered ideas come from our imagination, rather than a relationship to any truth beyond those impressions. Hume's fork separates reason and enquiry into two prongs: _relations of ideas_ and _matters of fact,_ something _demonstrable_ and something _probable_. In mathematics, we can demonstrate 2 + 2 = 4, which is an example of a priori, deductive logic. To Hume, these relations of ideas are worked out in thought and need not tell us anything about our existence. We can only demonstrate whether matters of fact are probable if we provide empirical evidence for them. Now, this is taken a step further when Hume looks at the way we infer things from evidence in the past. Just because something has always occurred when an event is observed, does not mean it always will, and this becomes the problem of induction. For example, if every swan you see is white, it does not mean logically that the next one you see will also be white and not black.
Hume's theory of causality means induction, and therefore science itself becomes difficult to justify. In order to deal with this, Hume argues for a 'mitigated scepticism' where common sense tempers the excessive scepticism, or Pyrrhonism, which holds we cannot ever know truth. These opinions are ordered in our minds into narratives that become our worldview. We rationalize that view, and by seeing the world from our viewpoint, we convince ourselves that our thinking is based on reason. This reason becomes our custom, our way of doing things – which, of course, can be wrong. Custom and tradition are important as they shape our worldview and also, thanks to this conservative philosopher, we can also see that we need to question our traditions, our grand narratives, and be sceptical about how we view the world.
Rousseau (1712–1778), who famously wrote, 'Man was born free, yet everywhere he is in chains', thought that education corrupted man's nature and perpetuated the evils of modern society. He believed that education should be guided by the senses rather than thought: heart not head. Some see Rousseau as the harbinger of the progressive education movement and all that is wrong with modern education methods.
## The Challenge from the Specialization of Labour
Education during the Enlightenment was to be based on pure reason. Adam Smith (1723–1790) wrote about rhetoric, describing it, at its best, as a form of communication that expresses the thoughts of its author precisely. And the model for rhetoric was to be found in trade. For Smith, rhetoric was a necessity because of the need to communicate about new inventions and through more complex trade relations, just as had been the case in earlier times. He thought that beauty should still be central to rhetoric, but that this could be found more in the simple than in the ornate; that is, less is more. This is a very clear break with the rhetorical flourishes beloved of the classical and Renaissance eras.
Another challenge to the ideals of a classical education was Smith's philosophy on the specialization and division of labour. These were the opposite of the ideal of the Renaissance man or polymath. Smith recognized that early specialization in education would not produce fully rounded human beings. Although he dismissed the study of Latin and ancient Greek languages as 'primitive', he understood the need for a Greco-Roman style liberal arts tradition, which would be provided by a truly national education system, available to all, through small local schools.
## Kant Criticizes Pure Reason
After the salvoes from Bacon and Descartes, dialectic was to suffer a further setback from Kant (1724–1804). In his _Critique of Pure Reason_ , Kant posits a problem with dialectic as, possibly: 'The logic of illusion'. How many times have we heard or been involved in a dialectic or argument that seems to love the sound of its own voice more than it has anything to do with 'fact'? Again, Kant: (dialectic, for the ancients was...) 'a sophistical art of giving to one's ignorance... the outward appearance of truth.' (Kant, 2007 [1781]: 92). Troubled by Hume, and drawing on Plato's work, particularly on that which was related to metaphysics, dialectical criticism was, for Kant, essentially exposing the contradictory character of knowledge, especially when shown in the light of a single principle. Metaphysics was, therefore, beyond reason. For example, we will never be able to prove or disprove the existence of God.
Kant's synthesis of rationalism (the idea of reason leading to knowledge) and empiricism (knowledge comes from experience) led to his concept of transcendental idealism (both reason and experience are vital for knowledge). For Kant, what we are conscious of is always evolving. This would, in turn, lead to a rebirth of dialectic through Hegel (1770–1831). One of the main results of Kant's work is that 'pure reason' would come to be viewed as more subjective and relative. Relativism would go on to become the great enemy of the authoritative, classical Western tradition.
By the 19th century, rhetoric had lost its place in the curriculum – it was viewed suspiciously as an (unscientific) art of persuasion. With its demise went the last vestiges of dialectic. However, a significant change in the dynamics of the educational world appeared at this stage – the intervention of the state into mass education. This was driven by the needs of the industrial age and the desire for a suitably educated workforce, and would bring a new tension to the education debate: how to educate the masses rather than just a privileged elite? The utilitarian desire for the greatest good was split between the Benthamite ideas of relativism and Mill's belief that there was a hierarchy of knowledge and skills.
Utilitarian arguments still echo in educational discussions today. Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832) believed in 'the greatest happiness for the greatest number', regardless of the quality of the pleasure. Learning about authoritative, high culture – the canon of the Western tradition, for example – could be as important as eating a Big Mac; all knowledge and skills were as important as each other. Education is now seen as a journey towards employment rather than wisdom, and is clearly distinguished from the idea of a liberal arts education for its own sake. Grammar, in its widest sense, loses its authority based on quality and tradition. It becomes, at its core, a more democratic ideal: culturally relative and reflects the practices and interests of the young. A curriculum without any sense of value or authority is no curriculum at all. Some people bemoan this lack of hierarchy, as well as the utilization of knowledge for the means of succeeding in a capitalist world – rather than in the more thought-provoking, but less economically viable, pursuit of, for example, reading and appreciating the great 19th-century novelists. Another utilitarian, John Stuart Mill (1806–1873), argued that 'education for all' would improve general happiness, but he differed crucially from Bentham in that he believed in a hierarchy of pleasure, with the higher intellectual pleasures more important than lesser ones. Mill advocated the idea that pleasure can either be immediate or worked towards, and that, of the two, delayed gratification offered the greater and higher form of enjoyment. This idea of difficulty as a way of accessing greater pleasures might give succour to high-minded intellectuals whose work is often perceived by the general population as inaccessible. But it might not be welcomed by those who make more populist art, with its more immediate and emotional connection, which could be regarded as easier to access and therefore somewhat lacking. The 'T. S. Eliot is better than the Beatles' argument is worth having in education, because what to teach is always, at root, about our attitudes to culture and values, and how they relate to who we are.
We need to be able to enter into that debate, but are we able to have a similar discussion in areas where knowledge is more fixed? Where is the room for doubt with a priori knowledge, where the truth is predestined and imbued with authority? Or in extreme fundamentalist religions, where it appears there can be no doubt? The same might be said for mathematics. Mill even argued that experience was at the root of the 'necessary' truths of maths and logic, which meant, rather controversially, that arithmetic, for example, is a posteriori rather than a priori. This is extreme empiricism, indeed, but it opens up certain areas in logic for doubt to be encompassed. Although challenging the trivium and its adherence to vestiges of truth, it does provide the space for challenge and change even in the most disciplined of forms.
## The Disappearance of Grammar
The 1944 Education Act (in England and Wales) guaranteed access through the 11-plus – to all students who could pass it – to a kind of liberal arts education in grammar schools; meanwhile, more vocational, manual 'illiberal' studies would occur in secondary moderns. The use of the word 'grammar' emphasizes that these schools tended to put great store by one aspect of the trivium and taught it through the learning of Latin and its grammar, as well as through traditional English grammar. Later, as comprehensive education came to the fore, Latin began to disappear from the state sector, as did the teaching of traditional English grammar. Comprehensive schools, first devised in the 1920s, came to prominence in the 1960s. Fuelled by the modernity movement and the 'white heat' of technology, the promise of a more meritocratic age enabled the 'comprehensivization' of schools to continue apace.
Between 1965 and 1975, virtually all state secondary schools in the UK went comprehensive. Offered a chance to knock down the old class barriers, most people saw that the stuffy grammar schools (which seemed to represent an outmoded tradition and had failed to keep up with the times) and the 'dumping ground' of secondary moderns (which had failed to fulfil the ambitions of many parents for their children) were both ripe for renewal. But there was more to the revolution than simply types of schooling. Comprehensive schools became places where progressive educational ideas would take root. If grammar schools were the preserve of the grammarians and authoritarian traditions, then comprehensives, instead of being 'grammar schools for all', would soon be seen as the preserve of the progressives, and would offer an alternative view of what an education should or could be. This shift echoed ideas from Rousseau. The progressives wanted to challenge society and the stifling chains it wrapped around the young. The chances are that if you were educated in an English comprehensive between the 1960s and 1990s you were not taught traditional grammar at all, and other parts of the canon were under a relativist attack: why study stuffy old classics when there was rock 'n' roll?
## Political Divide: Stability Versus Change
Do the traditionalists of today have their forebears in the Athenian state and grammarians of yore? Are our contemporary progressives the sons and daughters of Socrates and the dialecticians? Over the years, each has borrowed from the other, and although both sides find adherents across the political spectrum, it can be broadly held that traditionalists are from the right and progressives from the left. The grammarian traditionalists value a world of rules, stability, and examinations that measure worth in terms of our ability to absorb the knowledge and narratives of the past. On the other hand, the dialecticians seem to delight in the language of change and see the need for a new paradigm in education to cope with the new challenges of the 21st century. The grammarians trust the methods of the past and are sceptical of academic intellectuals, whom they accuse of dominating the educational establishment. The progressives, however, look at the traditionalists as representing the knowledge of a bygone age that has no relevance to the needs of today.
With the changes that happened to dialectic from Francis Bacon, Adam Smith, and Jeremy Bentham onwards, we also have the progressives (along with libertarian conservatives) finding an accommodation with science and vocational and soft skills, and seeing these as a worthwhile way of enhancing the market and our country's ability to compete internationally. With the traditionalists looking on doubtfully, the progressives' language is all about skills, creativity, vocational and technical qualifications, and the need to educate young people for the world of work in a high-tech future. They also have faith that advancing technology will disrupt the need for a hierarchy of knowledge and, in some instances, the need for knowledge at all. They assume that information will be picked up as and when it is needed. Old-school traditionalists regard this with horror, wondering why what was deemed good in the past, all of a sudden, has no purchase in the present. The data set they cling to is the highly academic exam with its emphasis on reproducing knowledge. And, as far as they are concerned, standards are falling. The progressives, with academic data technologists on their side, point instead to evidence-based approaches that 'prove' that the new ways are best. So, although both sides borrow each other's ideas from time to time, the two cultures in education are as far apart as they have been through most of history.
As we have seen, the trivium tends to divide opinion. The three arts are incompatible with each other, and there is no simple way of bringing them together. The grammarians hark back to an age of authority, the dialecticians see only the never-ending modernity implicit in scientific thinking and the rhetoricians find themselves split down the middle. On the liberal side they lean towards ideas of citizenship and the importance of communication technology; the traditionalist rhetoricians tend towards promoting the learning and recitation of approved poetry and the idea of character-building activities.
There are some individuals in the 20th and early 21st centuries on whom we can draw. Some were rooted in one of the trivial arts, others saw beyond the conflict and in reinterpreting the trivium they showed how the arts and the trivium could be relevant to our age. However, their ideas have not become part of mainstream educational practice. The reason is probably political. There is a large and almost unbridgeable divide at the heart of education: both sides wish to treat schooling as a simple ideological battle; they are unwilling to embrace the resulting complexity that emerges when the competing sides are brought together.
I need to find out if it is possible to refashion the trivium in the modern age in a way that unites right and left, traditionalist and progressive. For without accord, education will continue to be knocked around in the maelstrom of politics. To avoid or minimize such a buffeting, education needs to absorb the political world into its workings. This means our schools need to embrace a culture that is at once traditionalist _and_ progressive.
Chapter 6
# Trivium: A Clash of Cultures
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night.
Matthew Arnold, _Dover Beach_
By the end of the 17th century, the trivium was struggling to compete with the new enlightened and progressive science, and its ability to unearth and deal with 'true' knowledge rather than superstition. The call was, 'We need 17th-century skills!' The trivium had been formed in an age when religious beliefs had a stronger hold on the transmission of knowledge and the concept of truth. That was now beginning to change.
A similar argument is occurring now. Some argue that the 21st century is so different from previous periods, in terms of its technology and fast-moving culture, that it requires a completely new way of educating young people. This challenge arises because, in these days of globalization and mass communication, information is no longer protected by gatekeepers of knowledge. In their place the internet – with its new gatekeepers, Google, Wikipedia, and so on – has democratized knowledge. The skill of finding out has become easier; a more 'trivial' way of learning has replaced the traditional methods that required making an effort to access a particular body of knowledge, whether through books, libraries, lectures, or courses. Instead, lots of 'stuff' is now available on a device you can carry around in your pocket or bag.
This dialectical challenge to institutions, authority, even to knowledge itself, is seen by some as a threat to our very culture. Instead of facts stored behind closed doors, we access knowledge on our smartphone or tablet computer. The modern-day progressives say that all we need to know are the skills of accessing knowledge; we don't need to 'know' anything else. This attitude has been responsible for numerous moral panics, and the traditionalists have fought back to protect our culture from the liberal attack. So, out goes skills and in comes Our Island Story; out goes enquiry learning and in comes a body of knowledge including good Victorian stalwarts like Florence Nightingale and Kings and Queens. At least, that is how the spin in the tabloids goes.
As we have seen, this argument between traditionalists and progressives has a long pedigree. However, if we perceive culture as a battleground between two worldviews, where one side must win, do we really want to accept the destruction to the 'losing' side that this would entail? Can we really envisage all schools being progressive schools where only skills are taught, or all schools being traditional schools where only knowledge of the distant past has dominion? What would be the relationship between our schools and our society if one side were to 'win' the education game? This debate is not just about our schools; it is about our very culture – and our culture thrives on the tension between the two.
## Grammar, Dialectic, Evolution, or Revolution?
Throughout its history, dialectic was often problematic for those in authority, in that it enabled inherited ideas to be questioned and turned in new directions. Dialectic can challenge the traditional with the force of the modern. The German philosopher Hegel rejected some of the ideas of the Enlightenment thinkers, such as Descartes and Kant. In particular, Hegel believed that the way we experience the world changes; not only in terms of what we experience, but that our consciousness itself evolves, and it develops in a dialectical way. Dialectic for Hegel (and also for Marx, Engels, and Darwin) is similar to the Greek concept, but it differs from Latin, medieval, and Renaissance ideas.
Hegel revelled in dialectic's 'ability to cause change'. His dialectic, as expounded by Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805) works like this: firstly, an idea is given the appendage of truth (Hegel called this _thesis_ ). The thesis is then tested with an equally logical _antithesis_. Although these opposite views are seemingly incompatible, Hegel thought that we should look for a _synthesis_ , and it is through this process that we are on our way to gaining knowledge. Each synthesis becomes a new thesis, and thus the dialectic keeps going until 'ultimate knowledge' ( _Geist_ ) is reached. Hegel believed that the search for _Geist_ was what drove history, and although we couldn't control it, we are always driven by the 'spirit of our age', the _Zeitgeist_.
Hegel influenced two other greats: Karl Marx (1818–1883) and Charles Darwin (1809–1882). Marx, along with Friedrich Engels (1820–1895), revered dialectic because it not only allows change, thanks to its Socratic ability to expose contradiction, but because it can cause conflict and therefore function as the 'motor of revolution'. Darwin saw dialectic as development that keeps on going – the 'motor of evolution'. For Marx, however, the _Geist_ should be fought for and would result in victory for the revolutionary class and 'an end of history' in the form of a communist state. That went well.
The Hegelian dialectic gives an insight into how the arts of the trivium might relate to each other – with grammar as thesis, dialectic as antithesis, and rhetoric as synthesis. So, it seems there is yet another process at work in the relationship of the three arts; for Hegel, this is how history moves. In the trivium, therefore, grammar represents the past, dialectic the challenge of the present, and rhetoric is synthesis, bringing the other two together to make the future. This is the trivium as conflict and resolution.
## Dissenting Voices: The Challenge to Utilitarianism
In the 19th century, as the state began to educate more children, the ever-present dissenting voices became louder. This dissent was anti the status quo and it was rooted in cultural and political values. The questions – How should we live? What values should we have? What should we know? What skills should we have? – all became vitally important. Increasing state involvement in education led to a greater need for accountability and assessment. If government invests money, it wants to know immediately how its investment is doing. This, in turn, led to objections about how education was no longer serving the greater good, but had started to serve the needs of commerce. The Industrial Revolution seemed to be mirrored in industrial schools. Cardinal Newman (1801–1890) talked with despair about the birth of the 'exam factory', and John Ruskin (1819–1900) wrote that the creature can be made into a tool or a man, but cannot be made into both. These more 'romantic' voices included Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881), who came up with the term 'industrialism'. Carlyle, championed a grammarian pragmatism, suggesting that the alphabet was 'the indispensable beginning of everything'. To this he added, hinting at the ancient trivium, 'The beginning of merest logic... to impart the gift of thinking to those who cannot think' (quoted in Williams, 1958: 82), and he wanted all this to be provided through popular education.
Crucial in this movement against industrialism and materialism was Matthew Arnold (1822–1888). He was the chief inspector of schools and the son of the famous headmaster of Rugby School, Tom Arnold. Arnold wanted to spread 'sweetness and light' instead of what he saw as the inadequate education of the barbarians (the upper class) and the philistines (the middle class). He wanted to strengthen the liberal arts tradition, perceiving culture as a civilizing agency that, through its pursuit of perfection, would enable people to leave the world a better place. Arnold thought that education should be about the study of 'the best which has been thought or said'.
This idea that learning should be qualitative and improve people's lives is a persuasive one. After all, no one wants learning that is damaging. Although Arnold understood that rational, scientific knowledge should be a part of education, he thought it should be included alongside literature and should never be the main focus. This was education as cultural capital for all, cultivating character as well as intellect in order to help eradicate human misery, rather than unleash anarchy in society. Arnold's thinking was to find support from both traditionalists and progressives, and his critique of industrialism is an almost quintessential British sensibility. Our national character distrusts the 'dark satanic mills' of technological change but has a romantic view of the rural idyll, 'the green and pleasant land' of our collective cultural memory.
That this view of our rural past seems to ignore poverty is not the point here. Our 'myths' can be highly significant, rooted in a collective and contested idea of the essence of the past. They might not be real in a factual sense, but they are genuine in how they feel. The myth of St George and the dragon is as much part of our history as the Battle of Agincourt. The Edwardian children's history book, _Our Island Story_ (Marshall, 1905), starts with mythology: the story of how Neptune made his fourth son, Albion, king of this island. How much of our collective past is in fact 'fact'? Perhaps the greatest myths of all are the stories of King Arthur and Robin Hood. We even communicate an idea of 'Britishness' to the rest of the world through fictional characters such James Bond and TV series such as _Downton Abbey_. Education is a fundamental part of how we perceive our shared culture and values; how we view culture, and write and rewrite our myths and narratives, makes education intrinsically political.
Education in England continued to evolve, shaped by Matthew Arnold's romantic and anti-utilitarian desire to ensure individuals are touched by the best that has been thought or said. Albert Mansbridge (1876–1952) established the Workers' Educational Association (WEA) with this very much in mind. He wanted the working class to 'imagine the rivers of learning and purity in the world and bathe yourself in their living waters'. As one of his tutors, R. H. Tawney (1880–1962) put it in his essay, 'An Experiment in Democratic Education' (Tawney, 1914), the WEA provides a university education in difficult circumstances. Tawney wrote disparagingly about the '[b]ad utilitarianism, which thinks that the object of education is not education, but... professional success or industrial leadership' (quoted in O'Hear and Sidwell, 2009: 186). Tawney looked on admiringly at the workers 'who pursue knowledge with the passion born of difficulties' (ibid: 187). For him, this knowledge should always be for its own sake. What this information should be was not really questioned; it was generally accepted that people knew what the best that has been thought or said was, and by teaching the workers about high culture their lives would be improved.
The romantic view of culture and education also seemed to downgrade the sciences. Grammar schools were for everyone who passed the 11-plus. In practice, that meant mainly the middle classes, so grammars would teach sweetness and light to the sons and daughters of the well-to-do. Secondary modern schools would teach lower-level technical and vocational skills and subjects to the horny-handed sons and daughters of the hoi polloi. Science and engineering struggled to find a foothold: the third part of the tripartite system was intended to be secondary technical schools – where scientists, engineers, and highly skilled technicians would be educated – but few of these actually saw the light of day. The root of this issue goes back centuries; the 'grammarian' schools mistrusted the progressive 'modern' skills training. The grammar schools, although they embraced mathematics, taught science in a way that seemed to mistrust the logician's approach of enquiry and concentrated instead on rote learning of the principles. When practical demonstrations occurred, these were to be precisely noted down and learned by heart. Inevitably, a purely grammarian approach to science ignored the scientific method. This cultural attitude towards science triggered a very significant spat that still has echoes to this day.
## The Two Cultures
In 1959, Charles Percy Snow (1905–1980) gave the Rede Lecture at Cambridge University. C. P. Snow was a chemist and novelist; from this viewpoint he straddled the two worlds of science and the arts. In his famous lecture he proposed the thesis that, intellectually and practically, Western society had been split into two opposing factions. On one side were the literary intellectuals, and on the other were those from science. Both sides, he posited, had a mutual dislike and incomprehension of the other.
Snow noted that scientists had very little interest in the arts, apart from music, and, conversely, that traditionalists – the literary intellectuals – had the attitude that their culture was _the_ culture and therefore tended towards developing a superiority complex. Snow argued that the two cultures needed to clash along together rather than view each other with suspicion from afar. He contended that creativity is produced through the clash of the two cultures.
Snow went on to say that, in terms of the history of education, we see a chronicle of increasing specialization. He argued that our education system was trying to produce a tiny elite who had been educated in a narrow range of academic skills, whether that was mathematics, classics, or natural science. He claimed that, at 18, the young English elite knew more than their contemporaries about science, for example, but knew very little else. In the United States, he asserted, the opposite was true. They had a looser and more general education system that lacked a certain thoroughness, especially in the sciences. But, at a higher level, say PhD, the US suddenly kicked in with far more rigour. He saw literary intellectuals in the UK, and to a much lesser extent in the US, as natural Luddites, and suggested that if we were to bridge the gap between rich and poor, we would need to bring both cultures together more closely, especially in education. Our most basic needs, he argued, were served by scientific revolution. Snow also maintained that scientific logic needed to be as widely understood as the 'logic of language'. Snow was arguing for a change in education and society, with science as a more progressive and meritocratic force being brought in alongside the more conservative and traditional force of the literary elite.
Frank Raymond Leavis (1895–1978) was livid with Snow's assessment of the problems of the two cultures. Leavis saw Snow as a utilitarian of the Benthamite sort, interested in 'the quantifiable, the measurable, the manageable' (quoted in Collini, 1998: xxxiii). Stefan Collini, in his introduction to the 1998 edition of Snow's _The Two Cultures,_ says that not only is the animosity between Leavis and Snow about the romantic versus the utilitarian clash very familiar in British cultural history, but Leavis couched his comments in literary terms (he was a literary critic, after all) and bemoaned the quality of Snow's work rather than addressing its arguments. _What to learn_ is central to any argument about education, and so is _how to learn_ and _for what purpose._
## Pedagogy of the Oppressed
In _Pedagogy of the Oppressed,_ Paolo Freire (1921–1997), a Brazilian neo-Platonist and Marxist, differentiates between the qualities of knowledge learned through cultural ideas and norms, _doxa_ , and that learned through _logos_. He describes the ownership of knowledge, where the knowledge of the teacher and the society they represent is learned by rote in order to preserve the dominant culture. But, he says, this is not true culture. That should be explored through dialogue and 'critical co-investigation', 'The role of the problem-posing educator is to create, together with the students, the conditions under which knowledge at the level of the _doxa_ is superseded by true knowledge at the level of the _logos_ ' (Freire, 1970: 62). Indeed, this is a return to Plato, giving _logos_ an authentic level of 'truth' beyond that of the lesser truths, which are, basically, a way of preserving the status quo. Like Plato, he saw dialectic as a way to go beyond the truth of accepted cultural practices into the higher and authentic truth of _logos_.
Now, progressive dialecticians were able to resist the _doxa_ of the white, male, middle- and upper-class monoculture. Far from seeing the Arnoldian ideas of education as liberating, some progressives no longer accepted that the knowledge of the dominant class was necessarily 'the best which has been thought or said'. Culture became the battleground, and why not? If science can feel that it is an outsider, how did other groups feel when their very identity was marginalized? High culture (in other words, traditional grammar in its widest sense) was under attack from a dialectical antithesis. This confrontation did not involve simply arguing with culture on its own terms, but questioning whether it was right to learn this 'great tradition' at all. The knowledge and values associated with dead white males was ripe for challenge.
In this divide there were more than just two cultures. Ideology began to be questioned on the grounds of gender, race, sexuality, and class; the best that has been thought or said itself was being questioned. _History_ became _herstory_. The dialecticians were on the rise, challenging the traditional grammarian views, their very ways of thinking. This was a time of upheaval and blessed were the change makers. There was a huge shift on the progressive side of politics. Instead of the WEA's stated desire of bathing in the running waters of purity and knowledge, their aim was the liberation of the individual through the celebration of their very experience – providing you were an outsider. Originally thought of as 'grammar schools for all', it soon became clear that for some teachers, parents, and pupils, comprehensive education had to resist traditional education values. The progressive movement began to gain ground. The question is: did this approach result in knowledge at the level of _logos_?
Perhaps the trivium was informing, however subconsciously, some of these thinkers and practitioners. The Arnoldian romantics were grammarians who had the goal of challenging the utilitarian status quo in order to improve society. Snow saw that this version of culture rejected science and technology and wanted to bring the two sides together to improve society. Freire rejected knowledge at this mundane 'bourgeois' level and wanted the ultimate knowledge, _logos_ , to be available to the oppressed. Some thinkers, however, looked directly to the trivium and used it to make their own observations about where education was going wrong.
## The Trivium Revisited: Mysteries, Messages, Pragmatism, and Prayers
Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914) came from a scientific and mathematical background, yet he came to think that science, on its own, was unhelpful as a way to reach understanding. Peirce was drawn to the trivium and made it a basis of his pragmatic philosophy which he called _semeiotics_. The core of this theory was his reworking of the trivium into speculative grammar, logical critic, and speculative rhetoric. A lover of triadic constructions, Peirce further divided logical critic into what he called scientific thinking: abduction, induction and deduction – an idea we will return to later. Peirce was enamoured by the creative forces unleashed by the relationship between tradition and modernity, which are exemplified by the core relationship of the trivium between grammar and critic. Peirce believed the master art was speculative rhetoric, and our understanding of the world, the real, to be a series of explanations rather than certainties. These explanations are undeniably human in origin and go beyond the purely scientific. For Peirce, mankind is not a detached spectator observing the facts of the world. Rather, we are an engaged participant creating the world around us and then understanding it. This community that creates the world is drawn from the idea of the trivium – as the place where the roads meet. This meeting occurs at a 'common' place, and therefore could be mistaken for being trivial. But for Peirce, this common place is far from marginal. It is a space of understanding; it is our collective knowledge, our community.
## Pert Poetic Parrots
In 1947, Dorothy L. Sayers made a speech at Oxford University entitled 'The Lost Tools of Learning'. Sayers lamented the current quality of education and harked back to the need for a revitalized classical trivium. She thought that the trivium constituted the 'tools of learning'. In other words, the trivium was primarily an approach in which pupils would learn how to learn. She interpreted the trivium as: grammar (any language, what it was, how it was put together, and how it worked), dialectic (logic and disputation), and rhetoric (expression). She described how some schools encouraged disputation and rhetoric through debating societies but, crucially, she bemoaned how they were detached from the main curriculum.
Sayers wanted the trivium to be included in all subjects, throughout the curriculum, as an approach to teaching and learning. She saw the three parts of the trivium as stages – which she referred to as Poll Parrot, Pert, and Poetic – through which a pupil must pass. These correspond approximately to the following ages and stages: grammar (Poll Parrot) is Key Stage 2; dialectic (Pert) is Key Stage 3; and rhetoric (Poetic) is Key Stage 4. She explained how each phase would work: grammar would involve learning Latin, English verse, and prose by heart, and the teaching of factual aspects of all subjects, particularly history, geography, science, mathematics, and theology. Dialectic would be the stage of debate: dramatic performance (especially pieces where argument is central), syllogisms, algebra, geometry, ethics, the use of imagination, and so on. Rhetoric would be realized throughout by attempting to show that all subjects and knowledge are 'as one' – interrelated.
Her speech was a passionate call for independent, lifelong learning, and echoes John of Salisbury's belief from 700 years earlier. It finishes with the following flourish:
[The decline in educational standards] is not the fault of the teachers – they work only too hard already. The combined folly of a civilization that has forgotten its own roots is forcing them to shore up the tottering weight of an educational structure that is built upon sand. They are doing for their pupils the work which the pupils themselves ought to do. For the sole true end of education is simply this: to teach men [sic] how to learn for themselves; and whatever instruction fails to do this is effort spent in vain. (Sayers, 1947)
## The Trivium is the Massage
Marshall McLuhan proposed that education was shaped like a 19th-century factory where 'information is scarce but ordered and structured by fragmented, classified patterns, subjects, and schedules' (McLuhan and Fiore, 1996 [1967]: 18). In _The Medium is the Massage_ , McLuhan suggests that all media are an extension of human faculties; for example, the wheel is the foot, the book is the eye, clothing is the skin, and electronic circuitry is an extension of our nervous system. He argues that when our media – our tools – change, we change. For example, he understood the spoken word as, 'The first technology by which man was able to let go of his environment in order to grasp it in a new way' (quoted in Gordon, 2010: 58), and that the alphabet was constructed of fragments that need to be connected. This connectivity was the work of grammar, which, due to the dominion of the written and printed word, made sense of our world in a linear way, and led to specialization, as extolled by Adam Smith. The rhetoric, logic, or rationality that followed on from our linear tools depended on the presentation of sequentially connected facts or concepts, which led to the architecture of Western civilization.
However, McLuhan saw that the electronic world was challenging this way of thinking and being by creating a multidimensional space – the 'global village' – in which our experience and environment constantly interplay. In order to understand and make sense of this 'mosaic' we need to create a 'teaching machine' to make 'everyday learning a process of discovery' (McLuhan and Fiore, 1996 [1968]: 68). He thought that our classrooms should move from mere instruction to discovery and the recognition of the language of forms. McLuhan took a neo-Platonist approach to communication and classification: 'the ideas', where facts, principles, nature, and conduct are investigated. This is the role of grammar.
McLuhan described grammar as the 'art of interpreting all phenomena'. The interpretations are then open to disputation and argument, to dialectic: 'Dialectics is, variously, a way of testing evidence or the study of kinds of proofs for an argument, a method of dialogue, or simply logic' (McLuhan, 2005 [1943]): xi). This then allows us to 'live mythically' by 'putting on an audience', a vesture, a whole time, a _Zeit_ , which he saw as the role of rhetoric. McLuhan understood that grammarians look for connections and distrust abstraction, whilst dialecticians look for divisions and distrust concrete modes of language. He interpreted the history of the trivium as a struggle for supremacy between grammarians, dialecticians, and rhetoricians. McLuhan, an avowed Catholic grammarian, argued that, on its own, grammar fails to provide a rounded education, unless it is supported by dialectic and rhetoric.
McLuhan perceived that, in our electronic age, young people were disembodied and 'looking for a formula' in order to relate to the universe. What was that formula? McLuhan wanted a radical restructuring of education based on the old idea of the trivium. The trivium was to be the 'new spectacles' that the young need to wear in order to interpret and understand their world. McLuhan saw that world as 'fragments of text', a mosaic through which we give meaning through 'pattern recognition' and through our active participation. We make sense of our experiences and communicate our sense-making through a rhetorical device, 'the probe', which, rather like an aphorism, is sent out into the world to connect with other texts and contexts in our global village.
## Voices from the States: Christian Fundamentalism and Classical Home Schooling
In her book _The Trivium_ , Sister Miriam Joseph writes that, 'the essential activity of the student is to relate the facts learned into a unified, organic whole, to assimilate them as the body assimilates food or as the rose assimilates nutrients from the soil and increases in size, vitality and beauty. A learner must use mental hooks and eyes to join the facts together to form a significant whole' (Joseph, 2002 [1937]: 7). She goes on to say that this approach (the trivium) would make learning easier, more interesting, and more valuable.
The trivium's links with medieval Christian education has brought it a new lease of life in the United States through Christian schools and the home schooling movement. Many people are now being drawn towards a 'classical' education movement, which extols the virtues of a liberal arts education rooted in Christianity. The educational history of the United States is very different from the English experience. In a nation that was formed through a break from tradition – having dissolved 'the political bands which have connected them with another', according to the Declaration of Independence – progressive ideas seem to have the upper hand. It might certainly help to explain why the concept of a grammarian 'common core' has gained ground.
E. D. Hirsch, Jr. has been a big influence on this movement. He talks of a 'knowledge deficit' in American schooling, and blames romanticism. He is distinctly anti-Rousseau and asserts that the romantic approach leads to complacency in an educator who waits for a child's development to unfold. Taking on the 'history is bunk' ethos, which he believes pervades American schooling, he claims that progressives link 'the acquisition of broad knowledge to "rote learning" of "mere facts"' (Hirsch, 2006: 10). Hirsch sees progressives arguing for the development of critical faculties, but derides their attempts to achieve it without a base in foundational knowledge. He sees shared knowledge and grammar as vital if individuals are to belong to the society in which they have been brought up – because in any society, whether you like it or not, taken-for-granted background knowledge is assumed, whether in vocabulary, history, mathematics, or the arts. Hirsch has created his own inventory of What Every American Child Should Know (although he also acknowledges that his list will change with time).
Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise take Dorothy L. Sayers at her word and build an entire home and self-schooling curriculum based on her approach to the trivium. They consider that the way to approach learning is to obtain facts, analyse and evaluate them, and then form your own opinions. They suggest that schools often jump to the third stage before the first two stages have been covered in enough depth or detail. As such, they believe that the pattern of the trivium 'trains the mind in the art of learning' (Bauer and Wise, 2004: 20).
In the next chapter I will explore how this training could work in our schools today.
Chapter 7
# A Crack in Everything: The Imperfect Arts
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in
Leonard Cohen, 'Anthem'
## Shakespeare's Trivium, 'The whining schoolboy... creeping like snail unwillingly to school'
If the trivium is 'training' for the mind, then it is worth looking at how someone who was taught through the trivium has used their training in their work. It is not too hard to see Shakespeare in the schoolboy creeping snail-like to school – but thank goodness he didn't play truant. The education he received at Stratford Grammar School is reflected in his plays. The aim of the school would have been to teach Latin and provide a solid grounding in classic Roman, Greek, and biblical texts, as well as teaching ethics and religion. Classes would begin at six o'clock in the morning, with breakfast at nine. This would be followed by more study from quarter past nine to eleven. There would then be school dinner and a break from study until one o'clock, after which there would be further study until five. Finally, this extended school would serve supper, and six or seven pupils would formally present what they had learnt that day – or, on Fridays and Saturdays, review the week's learning. One week every school year would be devoted to the pupils reciting their learning for the year.
The method of learning was through the trivium. Grammar would generally be studied first, in order to learn precepts. As Shakespeare got older, he would have moved on to logic as a tool of analysis and rhetoric as a method of composition. Texts would be studied to look for evidence of how they used the three arts of the trivium (grammar, argument, and style), and then little William would have practised using the arts through copying, writing, and speech making. It is likely that his schoolmasters also taught contemporary literature and debate rather than just logic.
Such exercises in exploring rather than solving arguments are just the sort of thing that might have inspired a young dramatist in his playwriting. Clearly, Shakespeare uses this exploratory art in his most famous speech, 'To be or not to be', in which Hamlet goes through self-reasoning, or _anthypophora_ , a rhetorical device he may well have learnt at school. In her superb book, _Shakespeare's Use of the Arts of Language_ (2005 [1947]), Sister Miriam Joseph explores how Shakespeare's education – and, in particular, the trivium – is reflected in his plays. This consideration raises the following questions: How much are we a result of our schooling? Would it be possible to educate children in the same way as Shakespeare today? Would my daughter flourish under this form of study? When people hark back to 'traditional methods', do they want to take on those methods lock, stock, and barrel, or do they want to retain the right to pick and choose? It is obvious that the methods used to teach Shakespeare would not work in schools today, but could the underlying method, the trivium, offer a blueprint or a mantra upon which to build?
In _The Well-Educated Mind: A Guide to the Classical Education You Never Had,_ Jessie Wise Bauer sums up the trivium as a process that passes through three stages: grammar, where children learn foundational knowledge; logic, where they analyse and criticize information and rhetoric, where they learn how, 'to express their own opinions about the facts they have accumulated and evaluated...'
Classically educated students know this pattern (learn facts; analyze them; express your opinions about them) applies to all later learning. (Bauer, 2003: 18–19)
_The Well-Educated Mind_ has a companion volume, written by Susan Wise Bauer with her mother, Jessie Wise, called _The Well-Trained Mind_ (Bauer and Wise, 2009), which is designed around this approach to the trivium. It has been written for those who are home schooling or supporting their children's education. 'Is this trivium the equivalent of McLuhan "spectacles for our age"?' I put Susan Wise Bauer's idea of the trivium to the philosopher Alain de Botton, who also helps run the School of Life, which is dedicated to 'a new vision of education'. He replied:
_[This idea of] the trivium presents a very appealing model of how learning should take place, but I wonder whether it is really suited to our times. A number of objections come to mind: there is a lot more to know nowadays. The idea that one might know everything in the first stage of education, then concentrate on analysing it, then speaking properly, seems unsuited to the demands of the modern world. Even if there wasn't so much to know, one wonders why the analysis of facts is given such prestige. Why not, for example, the pursuit of wisdom? Why couldn't that be the next stage, after the facts have been taken on board? There could be a time when the facts are interpreted in a search for a good life (Aristotle's idea). The emphasis on rhetoric is also bizarre: this was fine in ancient Rome, but do we need rhetoric nowadays? Hardly. PowerPoint use perhaps, which takes an afternoon to teach. Also, it is evident that modern society does not want everyone to be questioning everything. It is just too awkward. Therefore, a Marxist would quickly spot that any scheme to raise a self-conscious citizenry is going to run into trouble from the powers that be._
If de Botton is right, and Wise Bauer's take on the trivium is not right for our age, then what is? Perhaps it is a waste of time to pursue the trivium itself and my quest should end here, or maybe I need to think about how to refashion it for our age, as others have done for their ages, whether they are Boethius, Bacon, Sayers, McLuhan, or Peirce. Hmm, I'm clearly not in the same league as any on that esteemed list, but, anyway, I'll give it a go. I have nothing to lose but my... er... Well, clearly, I've _nothing_ to lose.
## God Help Me
In an extraordinary tour de force, the essay entitled, 'An Apology for Raymond Sebond', Montaigne derides the idea of reason existing on its own in the world and states that craftsmen and ploughmen can be wiser than professors. In the essay, Montaigne addresses how the trivium works, how the logician refers to the grammarian, and the rhetorician to the logician. Then he raises a crucial question: on what is all this philosophy based? To Montaigne, the answer is a Catholic God. But, as a non-believer, I take God out of the equation, so all I am left with is individuals referring to each other. Therefore, is my trivium just an abstraction or is it connected with life as experienced? That would simply be education to fill in time between the cradle and the grave.
So, should education be more than just abstract academic study? I want my daughter to enjoy, be curious, get excited by learning, and have experiences that stay with her for a lifetime. It must offer something authentic, which speaks of the depths and heights of human experience, which can fire enthusiasm or spark the anger of debate, but without the need of an authority figure, a God, giving credibility to the whole enterprise. In a nutshell, is a secular approach to the trivium possible?
## Trivializing Google
To be authentic, a contemporary trivium needs to reflect the complexity of our times as well as the complexity of the past. Eric Schmidt, the former executive chairman of Google, has observed, 'We create as much information in 48 hours, five billion gigabytes, as was created from the birth of the world till 2003.' There _is_ a lot more information to know about nowadays; the challenge comes from linking ideas and making sense of it. In practical terms, we need to be more selective, more demanding of supporting evidence, and more adept at picking, connecting, and understanding what knowledge is important and relevant to our lives. Just because there is more to know, that does not mean we can switch off because it is difficult to differentiate – and end up knowing nothing. It is extraordinarily difficult to find out useful information if you don't know anything in the first place. What we need is the ability to filter out what is trivial, in the modern sense, and concentrate on acquiring our own wisdom.
Starting with the trivium, is there a way to adapt it so that we can educate our children to be able to continue to educate themselves in successful ways once they leave formal education? Is it possible to find in the trivium an approach to schooling that would be relevant to our times, one that would leave an imprint on the lives of our children in much the same way as the trivium left its mark on Shakespeare? Can the trivium cross the two cultures of science and art? Do we need a new 'educational paradigm' to achieve this?
Any alteration to the landscape of education is extremely disruptive and can create all kinds of unforeseen problems for those involved. It is apt to employ the gardening analogy that Stephen Toulmin uses in his book _Return to Reason_ (2003). Up until the romantic period, garden design in Britain was about imposing formal designs onto the landscape. But then along came Lancelot 'Capability' Brown (1716–1783), who revolutionized British garden design, not by means of rational planning and imposition, but by looking at what was there and seeing what offered the 'capability' to be improved.
This is a philosophy that takes what is already there and makes changes that are organic and born of the landscape. This is also important in the field of education. A key part of the trivium is the passing on of the culture and traditions of the past; it would not be in the spirit of the trivium to argue for itself as a new paradigm. The trivium that I am arguing for is one that is drawn from the past but is adapted for the present. Therefore, I have given it the name Trivium 21c. We do not need a new model; our system already has the capability to improve our existing educational landscape. This is truly radical: it is from the root and also progressive.
## One Man's Paine Is Another Man's Burke
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) and Thomas Paine (1737–1809) were both fine rhetoricians and, at one time, great friends. Burke is reported as joking, 'we hunt in pairs'. The conservative Burke was more like a cultural ecologist; he believed that society should hand on tradition with its own inherent wisdom to the generations that follow. The radical Paine saw that just because something has tradition on its side, and that it appears to be common sense, does not mean it is right. In education, this relationship is the heart of what we do. We pass on our culture to our young people in a way that is respectful, but also so that it can be opened up for criticism. If we are receptive to others reinventing the world, we will welcome our young people criticizing and making new sense of what we bequeath to them – just as we did in our own youth.
Each generation has to adapt, reject, or re-model their view of the world in order to take full stewardship of it in the future. With a sense of duty, we transmit our culture to our progeny, warts and all. As they embrace this culture, we need to ensure that instead of closing down their stewardship (and repeating the same mistakes), they have a collective idea of what is important and valuable, what needs changing, what could be changed, and how they establish their ownership through change. This is not easy. It takes place on our common ground, where we all come together. Within this cultural landscape the young must develop the capability to improve and make an organic difference. We need to ensure as a community, and as educationalists within that community, we help them develop that capability.
Tzvetan Todorov writes, 'Living in a culture is the natural state for human beings and the fact is that culture and, to begin with, language are transmitted by those who came before us... Tradition is constitutive of human beings; it is simply that it does not suffice to make a principle legitimate or a proposition true' (Todorov, 2009: 42–3). Ensuring that the three ways – grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric – meet in such a manner as to open up education for us all, there is a need for a certain degree of scepticism. As Leonard Cohen sings in 'Anthem', 'There is a crack in everything/That's how the light gets in.' If we can shine a new light on each of the three arts of the trivium, then through their imperfections we should start to see a way of bringing them together.
With this in mind, let us explore the three arts of the trivium in terms of their relevance to the 21st-century classroom – its teachers and its students. And, as the educators of Shakespeare would have done, let's start with grammar.
Chapter 8
# Grammar: From Rules of Language to Cultural Capital
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
William Butler Yeats, 'The Second Coming'
The relationship between a parent and child, inevitably, has various tensions which are negotiated over time. The authority of the parent is gradually relinquished whilst the child finds ways to increase their power and to make their own life. In a similar way, a culture has a relationship with its youth; the older, traditional part reconciles itself with the younger, progressive part's desire for exploration and change.
In the process, some degree of anarchy is loosed upon the world. In this way, each of us collectively imprints our culture with a way of being, through which we hope to form the next generation. The new is in perpetual battle with the old, change versus the status quo. It is in realizing a synthesis that the next generation can rediscover the old, and find within it a relevance (or irrelevance) to their lives. Philip Larkin took the whole thing further by writing that:
Man hands on misery to man,
Philip Larkin, 'This Be the Verse'
The poem's famous first line makes the point far more starkly; a nihilistic viewpoint for those who don't see the point in giving anything beautiful or worthwhile to the next generation. The purpose of parenting, and teaching, is to negotiate the relationship between an age that is dying and one that is beginning to reinvent the world. You give of yourself, enthusiastically and wearily, hopefully and painfully, happily and warily, in order that a child might benefit, grow stronger, and be able to fulfil themselves and others by living a good life. This relationship is played out in millions of homes, schools, and institutions, continually renewing and refreshing, losing and forgetting – a movement in personal, regional, national, and global history. In Disney's _The Lion King_ , this is called 'the circle of life', and it is the stuff of many coming-of-age stories in the literary canon.
Grammar, _la grand-mère,_ is the parent passing on her not-always-explicit rules to a child, for good or ill. We hope that our current culture is somehow right; it seems reasonable to us. Yet, we know that there are cracks in it, because knowledge expands, perhaps methodology and technology improve, and values change. What was the best that has been thought or said justifies itself anew as fresh ideas come along to challenge the old.
The question we should ask is, 'What is worth knowing? Should we teach everything or, at least, the foundational knowledge of everything?' In _Why Don't Students Like School?,_ the cognitive scientist, Daniel T. Willingham, writes, 'Cognitive science leads to the rather obvious conclusion that students must learn the concepts that come up again and again – the unifying ideas of each discipline' (Willingham, 2009: 37). This leaves open the question of which disciplines to teach and which ones should make up our common fund of knowledge. Once we have decided what subjects to teach, then all we need to do is select the unifying ideas. But is it as simple as that?
Traditional grammar is associated with the structure of languages and, through this, the learning of languages. But that is not the whole story. Today, we think of this as only part of what is meant by the study of grammar. If we look for definitions of grammar, we find that no two authorities or reference books agree. McLuhan's definition was the 'art of interpreting... all phenomena' (2005[1943]: xi). Grammar can also be perceived as foundational knowledge, not only of language but also of culture.
This notion of foundational knowledge is key: schooling for most people comes near the beginning of their lives and, therefore, along with their parenting, it provides the basis for learning. Grammar, in every subject, discipline, and art, is the beginning of our understanding of all phenomena – it is a way of reading and making sense of culture. From the Middle Ages onwards, grammar came to mean reading the world, as well as reading the word. Children need to learn the basic units of meaning that will enable them to become part of their culture, share its values, and maybe work to transform it for the better.
## Achieving Balance
If the grammar of a subject (the foundational knowledge) is 'the unifying ideas of each discipline', what are these ideas? Are they a collection of facts? Are all facts the same? What our culture holds as true, establishes as a fact, or gives importance to, has a lot to do with our explicitly and implicitly agreed ideas as to what matters.
Some of the things I learnt as 'facts' at school have since changed. For example, the capital of China is no longer Peking but Beijing. Other facts had not yet come into existence, such as the internet or the Higgs boson particle. A difficulty arises if we start out with an idea and present it as a priori knowledge or an 'absolute' truth, when it is based on fallible human understanding. At some point this truth will be exposed as 'false', and that can lead to an entire belief system collapsing.
Grammar is not just about literacy, but also cultural literacy. The world of education is but a subset of the world as a whole; it has the same need to resolve the eternal conflict between stability and change, certainty and uncertainty. This affects everything we do and teach. In a practical sense, this means we need to make the contradictions explicit. We must answer questions like: what should a teacher teach and how should they teach it? This must include a sense of the incompleteness, the cracks in our knowledge. Teachers must move away from a position of omniscience.
Much of what passes for the jungle of English grammar is a list of heuristics or 'rules of thumb'. The English language is not sufficiently tightly rule-bound to be without exceptions. For example, when I and my classroom comrades were taught that, in spelling, 'i before e except after c', we were shocked to discover words such as 'ancient' or 'society'. How weird, we thought! And yet this was taught as if it were a priori knowledge. Then we were told that there were exceptions, and the more we looked the more exceptions there were. But because this had been presented as fact, and we had now found out that it wasn't, we became suspicious of _all_ the knowledge we were being taught. Hence, our inclination was to argue. The rhetorical question in our heads was, 'Why are you telling us these lies?' It is only now that I am able to codify that experience as belonging to the 'dialectic' stage rather than the 'grammar' stage. So, if we choose 'traditional English grammar' as a unifying principle we can begin to see how confusion might occur and how disputes can arise.
We need to understand that teachers should have the authority to teach, but also to recognize that what they teach is probable, uncertain, open to amendment, change, revision – that no knowledge is ultimate or perfect. Some might argue that, therefore, we should ditch the authority of the teacher (the sage on the stage) and let our children find their own way (with a guide on the side). This is all very well, until the entire class marches off a cliff, at which point the teacher ceases to guide and washes their hands of the entire venture pleading, 'Well, I told them not to, but would they listen?'
When I contemplate teaching my daughter about the world, I baulk at letting her choose to learn about anything she wants. She might just indulge in computer games when I want her to read Shelley's _The Mask of Anarchy_ ; she might prefer to play with a Barbie doll when I want her to rehearse _The Taming of the Shrew_ ; or she might stuff her face with chocolate when I want her to cram her mind with chaos theory. Clearly, I would like her to learn about some things more than others. This is why the authoritative figure of the teacher is important.
## Dr Johnson and the Dictionary
The invention of printing meant that there was a need for the printed word to become standardized. In writing his dictionary, Dr Johnson was clear in wanting to impose strict rules on the language. In English, inevitably, this would have class and regional connotations. Professor Colin MacCabe writes, 'Dr Johnson makes the point clearly enough in the preface to his dictionary when he ridicules the notion that the middle or working class actually speak English.' He continues, 'Nor are words which are not found in the vocabulary to be lamented as omissions. Of the laborious and mercantile part of the people, the diction is in a great measure casual and mutable; many of their terms are formed for some temporary and local convenience, and though current at certain times and places are in others utterly unknown' (MacCabe, 1982: 11). English grammars were written, 'to divide the nation into those who could speak their own language and those who could not' (ibid: 12).
However, after much work on his dictionary, Dr Johnson realized that his ambition to impose rules, facts, and stable definitions on what he termed 'fugitive cant' was going to be difficult. Instead of giving up, Johnson turned this problem into something positive. In the foreword to a later edition of his dictionary, he wrote, 'If an academy should be established for the cultivation of our style, which I, who can never wish to see dependence multiplied, hope the spirit of English liberty will hinder or destroy, let them, instead of compiling grammars and dictionaries, endeavour, with all their influence, to stop the licence of translators, whose idleness and ignorance, if it be suffered to proceed, will reduce us to babble a dialect of France' (Johnson, 1755: para. 90). For Dr Johnson, 'liberty' in the English language was a mirror of our national 'cultural' identity.
In _The Language Wars: A History of Proper English,_ Henry Hitchings links the British constitution to the English language, claiming that just as Britain has no formal constitution, it has no formal grammar. He asserts that the attempts to solidify British national identity through grammar, between 1586 and 1800, produced more than 270 grammatical books, covering 56 different systems, and even those systems that were closely linked to Latin managed to produce 20 different grammatical approaches. Our constitution (and language) has 'evolved for practical purposes. It is amorphous and in many places indistinct, and as a result it is much contested' (Hitchings, 2011: 80–81). It is this fluidity, of not only the language but also of the past, that might have prompted David Starkey to say, 'The history of England is the history of modernism' (Starkey, 2012).
Peter Ackroyd writes in _Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination_ , 'There are very few rules in English syntax and grammar which cannot be broken... It is an absorbent medium established upon the imperatives of usage and practice. It carries a pragmatic force, therefore, and may bear certain responsibility for English empiricism itself' (Ackroyd, 2002: 394). The conservative writer Simon Heffer acknowledges the fluidity of traditional grammar. He knows that English is not fixed but at the same time he celebrates the prescribed rules of usage. Despite ongoing change, he says, he knows that at any one time the English language is codified and, therefore, there is no ambiguity. This is neither true nor reasonable; it would be an impossible task to pinpoint the current 'rules' of grammar. As Heraclitus is reported as saying, 'No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.' And where would the double entendre be were it not for ambiguity? So, how do we address this conundrum?
If the teacher presents knowledge in a way that makes it seem like conjecture, then they provide the space for debate and the challenging of dialectic. This also encourages students to appreciate that they can challenge ideas, if they can muster a sufficient amount of evidence. Such an approach opens up a degree of uncertainty, but it also implants the idea that deeper thinking is needed. Teaching about unicorns is as real as teaching about lions to one who has seen neither. Therefore, the teacher should use language in such a way that ensures uncertainty has its place, explaining the kind of 'truth' under discussion, and casting doubt where scepticism is appropriate. This opens up a world that is no longer 'fixed', where it is possible to examine the framework of knowledge in which something is held as true – the evidence it is based on and the reasoning behind the proposition. But how much doubt and uncertainty should we embrace?
## Culture, Conservatism, Class, and Cricket
The common fund of knowledge, and the unifying ideas of each discipline, are at once our collective cultural history and our sense of who we are. Grammar provides the building blocks for a conversation between past, present, and future. As a parent, I am teaching my daughter both 'how to speak proper' and how to be culturally literate, so that we have a communality of culture. We want to be able to share our ideas and experiences, and we need to have a space where we come together to further the development of our relationship.
To what extent should grammar be prescriptive? In _The Selfish Gene_ (1989), Richard Dawkins coined the word 'meme'. A meme is an element of culture or way of living that is passed from individual to individual by non-genetic means. We pass on our memes in order to help us solidify a sense of our cultural and subject heritage, rules, traditions, and qualities. If we pass on our memes in an unthinking way – by just seeing all knowledge as reflecting our contemporary and current concerns – then we will never prescribe codes of behaviour or select knowledge that we think is important. Our memes are passed on, in the main, because we attach importance to particular knowledge and ways of living, either unconsciously or consciously.
In _England: An Elegy_ , the philosopher Roger Scruton writes about how his education helped form his view of Englishness and how it shaped his character. He portrays the teachers he encountered at grammar school and university, and describes the importance of culture and his 'ideal' England, which in his view is being discarded. He also discusses the importance of myths that tell us truths about ourselves, 'The global economy, the democratization of taste, the sexual revolution, pop culture and television have worked to erase the sense of spiritual identity in every place where piety shored up the old forms of knowledge and local custom fortified the moral sense' (Scruton, 2000: 246). To this conservative thinker, the 'grammar' of national character needs a reverential foundation on which to justify and build itself.
The memes that Scruton wishes to pass on are threatened by the memes of the market. If 'all history is bunk', then it is the progress offered by unfettered capitalism and a Benthamite utilitarianism that drives us into abolishing a shared past and sense of belonging. Grammar cannot exist in a never-ending present; it needs a relationship with the past to shape the present, and through this it helps prime our future. Grammar works by transmitting its memes. It cannot just be reflective; it has to prescribe its rules and commonality of practice, or else it is completely given over to the whims of fashion.
During the time of the British Empire, certain disciplines, codes of behaviour, unifying principles, and foundational knowledge were taught and imposed at home and throughout the colonies. It is a history of occupation, cultural imperialism, and other awkward truths. In Ireland, Éamon de Valera would, after independence, see to it that most of the trappings of Englishness, both in terms of governance and culture, would be rejected or downgraded and replaced with Irish cultural practices.
De Valera included sport in his pursuit of Irish identity, lauding Irish sports over British ones. In other countries that had been colonized, however, the 'civilizing' sports of the occupier became, literally, the fields of resistance. Take the quintessentially English game of cricket: in his book _Beyond a_ _Boundary_ , the Trinidadian C. L. R. James talks about cricket, aesthetics, class, race, politics, and colonialism. In a telling passage, he writes:
between the ideal and the real fascinated me and tore at my insides... thus the cricket field was a stage on which selected individuals played representative roles which were charged with social significance. (James, 2005: 87)
The unifying principles of cricket became the field of play for 'ownership' of knowledge, of the sport. Later on, the West Indies would teach England a thing or two about how to play the game the English had invented.
Sunder Katwala is the director of British Future, a think tank looking at issues around British identity, integration, migration, and opportunity. Prior to this, Sunder was general secretary of the Fabian Society and a writer at _The Observer_. In my interview with him for this book, he said that he would be 'quite attracted to the idea that there is a tradition, and that it is an evolving tradition, where the synthesis comes out of the traditional and the modern. If you are going to rip up the rules of literature, you need to know the rules of literature. Experimentation tends to be rooted in the traditions it is rebelling against.'
This is my point exactly. It shows the intrinsic nature of the relationship between the modern and the traditional, between the dialectic appetite for destruction and newness and grammar's insistence on what came before. Katwala continued, 'I think the tradition versus modernity argument in British society sometimes involves an assertion of tradition.' It is this assertion of tradition, and that it is good for you, which is problematic, especially if you are an 'outsider' to that tradition. Katwala added:
_The liberal instinct is that tradition looks like it is not including people; what about the people it doesn't include? The progressive project seemed to say 'for inclusion to work, tradition has to go'. So you end up with a grievance of the large constituency for the traditional, who see that the price of_ _inclusion is to not be 'you' anymore and instead you have to be part of this totally cosmopolitan thing. It was not a necessary move, yet Labour modernists seemed to feel it quite strongly and they went for a year-zero version where you end up saying, "Let's celebrate what's great about this country – come and look round the Millennium Dome," and some people said, "But you haven't put anything in it!"_
I put it to Katwala that, in education, we seem to be very much in that mode – the traditional versus the progressive. Some progressives are arguing for a new paradigm, and this worries me; movements that call for a year-zero option can end up tearing down some good things that are already there, like replacing old housing stock, some of which is now highly sought after, with tower blocks. Katwala replied: 'The tower blocks are a very good example of that "Fabian progressivism", a sort of done to, not done by. I'm basically sympathetic to the small "c" conservative idea that you need to know the traditions you are operating within if you want to make some radical move.'
It is possible to be radical, and still take people with you, through organic change. I asked Katwala how he saw the English curriculum, and especially the history syllabus, which tends to be one of the more sensitive areas in which this debate plays out:
_I think there was definitely a view in the kind of inner-city Birmingham classroom of the 1980s that it was a very good idea not to talk about the history of Empire and colonialism, because people thought it was going to be divisive for the children in that classroom. The counter-argument to that would be to say, "In which case, society is never going to know how the children in that classroom came to be in that classroom." I think there was a latching onto Nazi Germany and the American civil rights movement as a way of telling a human rights story. But there aren't many people on the 'Nazi' side of the question; it's a goodies and baddies view of history. It's taught as a morality tale where everyone is always on the same side. I think it's a fantastic mistake not to teach colonialism, because the reason you're_not _doing it is actually the reason you_ should _be doing it. I think it's brilliantly captured in literature like [Andrea Levy's]_ Small Island, _where you arrive at the mother country from the Caribbean and you're expecting that because you know all about it, you're expecting it to know all about you, which sets up a set of assumptions about the task that needs to be done. The encounter is incredibly 'othered' and we embark on this 'difference' anxiety._
I asked the Conservative Member of Parliament, Elizabeth Truss (who since this interview has become parliamentary under-secretary of state at the Department for Education), what she felt the balance between tradition and modernity should be:
_The process of education itself is the advancement of human knowledge. You should teach things based on their inherent merit. How good it is. Maybe how important it is to the fabric of society. Shakespeare is clearly integral to that, and I don't think that just because somebody comes from a different background that they may take something in a different way and that some 'particular' type of poetry may not be appropriate to them. You shouldn't make too many assumptions about what children are capable of taking on._
I then invited her to suggest what should be in our current curriculum:
_We can over-focus on literature and history at the expense of mathematics and science. I think education is a good thing in itself, but you do have to keep an eye on exactly what the application of it is and understand that, if the country is failing to produce people... and you are having to import a vast number of people with a particular type of skill, you have to ask yourself the question: Why are we not teaching that in our schools?_
So, if there is a balance to be achieved between what the state needs and wants, as well as what the individual wants, what happens when it comes to shaping culture and character? Truss said:
_Some things about culture and identity come from education but a lot of it comes from outside the education system. It is from our broader culture as a country. Education is about character, yes, but being a parent is also about character. Therefore, where there is poor parenting – or no parenting – education takes on an even more important role._
Here we can see the tensions between the traditional and the modern revealed. Sunder Katwala is conscious of how sensitivities towards Britain's past led to a year-zero approach in schools where anything could be studied, as long as it didn't cover 'British' culture in too much detail. Instead of examining our own history, some schools looked at themes and issues from other cultures to avoid the difficult questions that are at the heart of being British. Elizabeth Truss sees the importance of teaching subjects of individual merit for the advancement of knowledge, but she also sees a tension between the teaching of humanities and the arts and the utilitarian necessity of teaching mathematics and science. Hers is an interesting view on what the state wants from our kids. The state takes on an authority or parental role in deciding what is best for its own needs, and then tries to convince children that what is best for the state is also best for them. This is the relationship between the falconer and the falcon again. Grammar is not really _une grand-mère_ ; it is everyone's parent, full of the difficulties and tensions that the role entails. And love?
## Civilization: Are We in Chains or Can We Become Our Ideal Selves?
As parents, teachers, and citizens we face a fundamental question, 'What should my child (and every other child, for that matter) know? What manners, what words, what books, what formulae, what history, what behaviours, and what facts should we hold up as exemplary? What are the memes we wish to pass on?' Our answers are charged with social (and cultural) significance.
The Marxist thinker, and one-time leader of the Italian Communist Party, Antonio Gramsci (1891–1937) wrote a series of essays while imprisoned by Mussolini, which become known as _The Prison Notebooks_. In one of these essays, _On Education_ , he wrote, 'In the school, the nexus between instruction and education can only be realized by the living work of the teacher. For this he must be aware of the contrast between the type of culture and society which he represents and the type of culture and society represented by his pupils, and conscious of his obligation to accelerate and regulate the child's formation in conformity with the former and in conflict with the latter' (Gramsci, 1971: 35–36). This question needs to be addressed in every classroom: who and what does the teacher represent?
When we teach our children manners, and tell them off for bad behaviour, are we making cultural judgements? We value certain types of behaviour, knowledge, and ideals, which make us who we are and who we want our children to be. We do this to ensure that our children conform to moral codes and cultural practices that we assume will stand them in good stead for their future. We want to civilize our children to share in the culture and society of which we are a part. And we civilize them with our memes, which are, by definition, historical.
Yet, it is through understanding our civilization that we decide which disciplines we value and, therefore, teach. We select the relevant foundational knowledge and unifying ideas that we feel are important. Although I have sympathy with Rousseau's romanticism and his ideas on the importance of self-expression and freedom, I find it difficult to believe that civilization is always something through which man becomes chained. Gandhi's observation that Western civilization 'would be a good idea' strikes at the heart of the difficulty inherent in the idealized concept of tradition. It is fundamental in all cultures and civilizations to present an ideal through which we can aspire to be the best that we can be and learn the best that there is to learn. Education (and parenting) might be forms of cultural imperialism, but they are stronger and more important because this authority gives structure to the young, through which they can find themselves. Remember the idea of the liberal arts – how from these rules and precepts freedom can grow.
In his _In Search of Civilization: Remaking a Tarnished Ideal_ (2010), John Armstrong writes about the importance of the pursuit of higher things. There is a fundamental importance for humans in feeling uplifted by achievement, beauty, wisdom, love, and in the significance that these experiences have for us. I will address this in more detail when I look at _logos_ (see Chapter 9), but here let us get some idea of what schools should be teaching. Schools should be involved in the pragmatic nitty-gritty of the mundane, but they should also aspire to these higher ideals. One of the ways to do this is to ensure that the grammar taught in schools relates to the best that has been thought or said. As Armstrong puts it, 'We are taken up: subsumed into and absorbed by something that seems greater than ourselves, but in which we can participate – which is why we are enlarged... In thrilling to grandeur, we become grand' (Armstrong, 2010: 178).
To Niall Ferguson, who echoes Elizabeth Truss's concerns, civilization is, 'as much about scientists' laboratories as it is about artists' garrets... as much about sewage pipes as flying buttresses... [as much about] some understanding of the economic, social and political institutions which devised... paid for... executed... and preserved... the eye-catching achievements' (Ferguson, 2011: 2–3). All this, and more, will be relevant as we move into an uncertain future. The individuals with the most to offer will probably be those who have the ability to adapt themselves across disciplines, including those not yet thought of; those who can adapt the knowledge of the past to shape the knowledge of the future; and those who will aspire to be the best they can be. This is why the polymath who spans two (or more) cultures will be particularly advantaged.
## Cultural Capital
Young people can easily acquire knowledge from many sources. The de-schooling and un-schooling movements trumpet the idea that children should be left to learn at their own pace, asserting that their natural curiosity will enable them to grow up in the way they want to. By taking them out of factory schools, they believe, children will develop their own learning webs based on their own curricula (and nowadays they have many opportunities to do this). But, what if they were to respond to this freedom by spending all day playing computer games or calling up for pizzas? Should we allow them to carry on?
Pierre Bourdieu (1930–2002), a leading French sociologist, argued that neo-liberalism was killing culture in the name of making a fast buck. A man of the left, Bourdieu thought that the teacher's role was essentially traditionalist. He came up with the idea of 'cultural capital' – that the accumulation of cultural wealth is a major way in which the middle and upper classes (the bourgeoisie) maintain their position in society. For those who are denied cultural capital, in some or all areas, formal education should provide the key to unlocking the closed doors to the high culture that is so often unavailable to those who believe it isn't for them. As Roger Scruton puts it in _Modern Culture_ , 'A high culture is a tradition, in which objects made for aesthetic contemplation renew through their allusive power the experience of membership' (Scruton, 1998: 39). Bourdieu describes how the bourgeois home environment, which values books, reading, art, theatre, science, mathematics, and foreign travel, will ensure that the bourgeoisie continue to dominate.
Make no mistake about how this works. If a school or a child's parents were to ignore cultural capital, this would not free their child from the chains of civilization. By providing cultural capital for your children, you bequeath to them the ability to take part in experiencing, learning, and conversing about culture confidently. Possessing a wide vocabulary and knowing how to communicate about a variety of subjects, forms, ideas and artefacts from both 'high' and 'popular' culture helps enable a child to develop as a culturally literate person, and able to feel at home in a variety of different environments. Caliban learns many 'languages' and the children who inherit this wealth of knowledge and tradition will continue to pass on these cultural memes to their children. Therefore, if we live in a society where we want individuals to be able to traverse class distinctions, we need to ensure that the allusive power of membership is made available to all. Formal education can help to widen the constituency for cultural capital.
## Tradition
So, grammar is tradition; it is our cultural literacy and history in all fields, subjects, and domains. It crosses and links them as well as defining their differences. In a stable society, mastering that culture's knowledge and rules was all that was needed. Now, in a less stable world where – as Marx put it in _The Communist Manifesto_ , 'All that is solid melts into air' – young people can take part in a great conversation by developing knowledge and rules from a wide experience of culture, and with the idea of the possibility of change and likelihood of ambiguity. Although much of what they learn will be pragmatic and address their day-to-day existence, we should also aim to teach them a qualitative sense of the best they can be, whether that is based on higher truths or on the dominant, hegemonic values of our society.
On a visit to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, I was struck by the tendency of the Nazis to log everything. For some reason the bureaucracy shocked me. It was as though I needed evil to be disordered rather than be revealed through the mundanity of measurement and counting. This reinforced for me why I prefer the messy to the messianic, the difficult and contradictory over the easy and certain. Let it never be forgotten that the British devised the concentration camp and were deeply involved in colonialism and the slave trade. Reading Goethe or Shakespeare, or listening to Beethoven or Purcell, does not automatically mean you will be a good person. Civilization is a constant source of debate.
Tradition is also a dialogue. It was exemplified in the opening ceremony for the 2012 London Olympic Games: it was a discourse between past, present, and future, as well as our interpretation of all three. Watching that ceremony, I was moved but I was also aware that this was part of the job of education – to enable that dialogue to take place, to present that information, to share that collective knowledge and more, in a way that is just as awe inspiring, emotional, and enabling. British children should be able to engage with all the references that were made in the ceremony because it should be part of them. If it isn't, then it should be.
## Vertical Transmission
The 2004 tsunami delivered a 9-metre high wave to the Andaman Islands in the Indian Ocean. Indian Government officials feared that the isolated tribes on the islands would suffer heavy casualties, but this wasn't the case: the tribes' oral traditions told them to escape to the high ground if the sea retreated. While recent settlers suffered terribly, the tribespeople found safety in the hills.
Jonnie Hughes, _On the Origin of Teepees_ (2012: 269)
Can we detect in this passage a problem with our knowledge age? Yes, and it relates to how we make meaning of the vast amount of knowledge that is being shared in ever more ingenious ways. This sharing allows the memes to breed in ever-faster ways, connecting horizontally from person to person. We are all quickly communicating our opinions via Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, blogs, texts, email, and so on. We can self-publish books, record music, make videos and upload them for others to appreciate. For many people this is great. However, if we decide to abandon everything to horizontal transmission then our young people might easily lose sight of, and abandon, the wisdom of their elders. They will then be more vulnerable to the impulses of the market, or the memes that are based on rumour, innuendo, and prejudice. To stop them being swept away on a wave of indiscriminating knowledge without roots, we need to ensure that education – whether at home, school, or other institutions – understands the duty it has to the continuing vertical transmission of knowledge; to exist alongside, and negotiate with, the horizontal.
The job of grammar in the 21st century is to make certain that we have a core, a place where valued authority, culture, knowledge, and skills in our society can reside. Grammar is our collective memory. However, it needs to be mature enough to recognize the degree to which it deals in uncertainty and is liable to change. It should be a modest art, reasonable and open to negotiation like all true _liberal_ arts.
Chapter 9
# Dialectic: Logic, Dialectic, and _Logos_
'Logic!' said the Professor half to himself. 'Why don't they teach logic at these schools?'
C. S. Lewis, _The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe_
The relationship between dialectic and grammar is crucial: get it right and creativity flourishes; get it wrong and devastation follows. Like C. S. Peirce (see Chapter 6), I think it is useful to divide dialectic, or what he called 'critic', into a further triad. Peirce proposed _abductive, inductive_ , and _deductive_ logic; for me the three are _logic, dialectic,_ and _logos_. Logic includes mathematical and scientific thinking, these are not the same but they can be considered complementary. Dialectic is understood as argument, debate, and dialogue, and also of mashing, mixing, and joining up ideas. _Logos_ can be seen as a teleological pursuit of an end that might not be fully understood – the mystery of it all.
There is a lot to explore – what follows is just a beginning. In the trivium, dialectic has evolved over the years. Looking at the different facets of dialectic will help us understand how it has changed and why it is important for trivium 21c.
## Critical Thinking
In _Mastermind: How to Think Like Sherlock Holmes_ (2013), Maria Konnikova explains how we could all improve our strategizing, problem solving, and creativity if we thought more like Sherlock Holmes. She outlines his methods, ostensibly called 'deduction', but points out that Holmes's thinking is more akin to what logicians would call 'induction' and 'abduction'. Konnikova also shows how Holmes's indulgences in pipe-smoking, walking, and playing the violin, have a strong relationship with his ability to think clearly.
Holmes' use of _logical_ thinking, his _dialogues_ with Watson, and his _enthusiasm_ for playing the violin can, indeed, be a metaphor for the dialectical art: _logic, dialectic,_ and _logos (enthusiasms)._ Summed up by some educationalists as critical thinking and creativity, my understanding of dialectic will ensure our students are able to use _logic_ and develop an understanding of science, enter into a _dialectic_ by learning to question, debate, discuss and argue, and also need to be given the opportunity to develop their own _enthusiasms_ through authentic engagement with the creative arts, sport, vocational and other practical challenges.
In an open letter to his daughter, Juliet, the evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins wrote, 'Next time somebody tells you something that sounds important, think to yourself, "Is this the kind of thing that people only believe because of tradition, authority, or revelation?" And next time somebody tells you that something is true, why not say to them, "What kind of evidence is there for that?"' (Dawkins, 2003: 248). In explanation he said, 'I was trying to tell her how to think about certain things; not what to think, but how to think' (Dawkins, 2012). This is a lovely explanation of how scientific method can challenge tradition and grammar. That is the job of logic, and it should be embraced. It can help take us on a journey towards truth. It can aid us in finding sufficient certainty for living in an uncertain world. Logic is a vital part of what we should teach our children. They should be able to straddle the arts and the sciences, knowing when and how to use methods of analysis, statistics, criticism, or logic and whether to apply deductive, inductive, or abductive reasoning.
Although scientific method is part of our pursuit of truth, it is by no means the only way. The American philosopher Thomas Nagel puts it like this, 'In every area of thought we must rely ultimately on our judgements, tested by reflection, subject to correction by the counterarguments of others, modified by the imagination and by comparison with alternatives' (Nagel, 2012: 103). In schools, and to a very large extent in education policy, this relationship has been reduced to a very narrow understanding of logic; a view that the philosopher of science, Karl Popper, believed began with Francis Bacon.
Popper thought of Bacon as a prophet of the new world of science, and that Bacon's view that 'knowledge is power' would lead, gradually, to the dominion of science over other modes of thinking. In _The Myth of the Framework_ (1994), Popper likened these other modes to a 'rationalist church'. Bacon's modern, progressive thinking treated the world as a _tabula rasa._ Knowledge, tradition, and myth all bowed down before a harsh empiricism that observed nature as the start of the rationalist approach. To Popper, what to observe is not neutral; you approach the things you are interested in, and what you are interested in is not a process of the world opening itself to you – it is you making the world. According to Popper, if we dispense with doubt and imagination in our schools, we do so at our peril, because both are essential to scientific thinking, to the making and creating of art, and in the pursuit of knowledge itself. If, for Bacon, knowledge is power then, for us, knowledge should be the power to share, disagree, and grow strong bonds of community.
## Critical Thinking about Critical Thinking
The current education and assessment system does not like doubt; it has its targets and assessment objectives. Teachers teach children what to think, what to write, and how to write it down for endless tests, which are intended to prove that they know what to think. Doubt is treated as an imposter; despite the language of opening minds, many are in fact being closed down. In the run-up to the US presidential election in 2012, the Platform and Rules Committees of the Republican Party of Texas published the following two policy statements:
**Controversial Theories** – We support objective teaching and equal treatment of all sides of scientific theories. We believe theories such as life origins and environmental change should be taught as challengeable scientific theories subject to change as new data is produced. Teachers and students should be able to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of these theories openly and without fear of retribution or discrimination of any kind.
**Knowledge-Based Education** – We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs... which focus on behaviour modification and have the purpose of challenging the student's fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority. (Republican Party of Texas, 2012: 12)
A revealing dichotomy: critical thinking is OK when it challenges scientific assumptions that these Republicans question, but not when it challenges societal assumptions that Republicans hold dear. Clearly, critical thinking is an area of controversy; you could argue that that is part of its purpose.
## Logic
### There Is No Doubt That There Is Doubt
Everything is in flux.
Heraclitus
Logic is the art of reasoning. It is associated with a system of thinking that can lead to valid conclusions derived from a set of premises. This separates it from emotional responses and irrational feelings. The problem with logic is that, although it might seem to be a secure approach, it cannot cope logically with paradoxes such as, 'This statement is a lie'. Logic is an art used by philosophers, mathematicians, scientists, computer programmers, and lawyers, but we know for certain that it will never arrive at the whole truth.
If the main aim of education is to simply learn facts and then analyse them – as Susan Wise Bauer seems to suggest – then deductive logic takes centre stage. Deductive logic works but it is limited to certain types of argument; we can only arrive at sound conclusions if the premises the argument is based on are true. This means that when teaching deductive reasoning, we should be clear about how it works and where it works best.
In the real world, we tend to use inductive logic, which is less secure. A lot of the time, arguably, we use abductive logic, which is more akin to educated guesswork. When faced with arguments or evidence, children should be able to differentiate between what is being presented as 'fact' and what is more or less probable; between what has supporting evidence and what is just opinion. This is easier in simple cases, but far more difficult in complex examples.
To improve an individual's ability to make rational judgements, they will need all the tools of a logician's armoury. This will include more than just a technical knowledge of axioms and syllogisms, but also an understanding of the logical traps, fallacies, and paradoxes that beset our thinking. All this should be taught, preferably, in the context of various disciplines rather than as a separate subject. Some people think that deductive logic is the only 'real' logic, due to the doubt that surrounds abductive and inductive reasoning. Deductive logic is certainly far more secure, but it is only as safe as the original premise that it is set to analyse.
### Measuring Truth
Science seems to being going from strength to strength, yet can we truly perceive of a time when scientific method will be our only approach to understanding? I talked to the writer Bryan Appleyard about this very problem. Appleyard has written a number of books including _Understanding the Present: Science and the Soul of Modern Man_ (1992) and _The Brain is Wider than the Sky: Why Simple Solutions Don't Work in a Complex World_ (2011). In the latter, he argues for the importance of art and literature and the depth of human experience, as opposed to the way in which science and technology, for example, are trying to reduce us to simple 'readable' products of our genes. In the former he puts forward a critique of how, as a society, we have become in awe of science. On the subject of science he said:
_The idea that measurement and logic would eventually let us know everything, I think, is frankly, absurd. You need to teach scientists the history of philosophy, although they get very upset when you say this. Science was philosophy. It came out of philosophy and Renaissance magic, so I think the claim that the sciences and the humanities are somehow different is absurd. Whenever I see the scientific claim that everything is reducible to a single measurement, I know that it is wrong. Anything complex is not reducible to a single measurement. That's why it is a complex system. There is simplicity which is just stupid, and there is simplicity which is profound. I think part of the problem in education is that somehow we have arrived at the situation_ _where we say, 'This is softer – the arts,' and 'This is harder – the sciences.' It just isn't true; it's interesting how often the assumptions of 'hard science' are completely overthrown. They should learn that science is as questionable a discipline as any other. It's not just something where you have to learn all the equations and then everything is true._
If we are to entertain doubt and uncertainty, we need to teach not with an idea of the 'two cultures' – softy arts and macho sciences – but in a way that shows 'truths' as complex and difficult things to get to. This is not anti-science; far from it. In fact, this stance can be found in the history of logical thinking and the scientific method. I believe that science itself is far more aware of its flaws than, perhaps, the rest of society. Sometimes wider society seems too much in awe of science. It has been so successful, and brought so much to our world, that those of us who are outside scientific culture can easily succumb to the illusion that it offers all-embracing answers for our increasingly complex lives.
### The Whole Truth and Nothing but the Truth
The sense of reality is vital in logic.
Bertrand Russell
Rather than just accept my views about logic and scientific method, and its relationship to truth, it is useful to look into what logicians and scientists have said about their own methodology. Gottlob Frege (1848–1925) was responsible for taking logic away from empiricism and putting it firmly into the mathematical realm. Instead of logic being seen as a product of the human mind and the senses, and thereby derived from experience, he said that logic could be arrived at through mathematical principles and analytical truths. Influenced by Frege, Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) wanted logic to be used to understand the nature of external reality, and he brought to mathematics the idea of using objective, logical foundations. Russell discovered that Frege's logicism included inconsistencies, which caused Frege great distress. Russell had applied the techniques of logical analysis and found there were serious difficulties in arriving at truth and meaning. This led to the detailed analysis of language, concepts, and logic by groups of philosophers, mathematicians, and scientists. By the end of his life, Russell was troubled that logic had moved away from the pursuit of wisdom and had become over-concerned with analysis for its own sake.
The objectification of logic, and its link to mathematics, was criticized by Edmund Husserl (1859–1938). He thought that it was necessary to put logic and philosophy back in touch with the 'real' world of phenomena, empiricism, and pragmatism. In order to alleviate bias, his idea was to build knowledge by 'bracketing out' assumptions. By the end of his life Husserl, too, came to realize that his desire to put logic and science on a firmer footing had failed. Arguments persist to this day as to what logic is and whether it has any base in absolute certainty.
Russell's student, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951), was to downgrade all philosophical systems by following his own logic. He came to the conclusion that logic does not interpret our world. He was not against philosophy or logic, but he did say, 'Don't be afraid of talking nonsense... [but] you must keep an eye on your nonsense.' Wittgenstein wrote extensively about grammar and associated it with the styles and forms of life as lived – what I would call culture. His philosophy was playful, revealing the ridiculousness behind the games we all play. Whether one follows the idea of logic as expounded by Aristotle, Frege, or Husserl, it has proved to be a good method of thinking, but it is not infallible.
The philosopher Julian Baggini explained his thoughts on logic to me over a cup of coffee:
_Russell's was the glorious failed project and that is the glorious history of philosophy. Whenever people have tried to find an absolutely secure basis,_ _something on which the whole can sit entirely securely, it has always failed. Good that they've tried because we've learned stuff along the way. What we get by thinking about things rigorously, though, is generally greater clarity and greater coherence. On certain empirical matters we get, from a functional point of view, certainty, or as close to certainty as we need without anything being 100% certain. But on all the other important matters of living, it is just trying to understand things better._
_Nagel talks about objectivity being a matter of degree, and relativity is the same. There is a sense in which, obviously, whether your coffee is delicious is relative because it is to do with taste buds. They vary. But, at the same time, to say it is completely subjective is not true because there are objective facts about coffee – there are reasons for saying some things are better quality than another. These reasons are related to subjective experience. They wouldn't make any sense unless human beings had general patterns of perception. But it makes perfect sense to say that some coffees are of a superior quality, and part of the reason for saying that is to do with the facts of human physiology._
_Obviously it doesn't hold for Martians, but sometimes people try to make it too binary. If there isn't an objective fact about it, it's relative, it's subjective. What I think you rather need to ask is: what are the facts which inform these things, and how much room does that leave for relativism and a subjective judgement? And for every issue it will vary: with food, more so than with other things; with values, a certain amount but not completely; with how far Paris is from London, not at all._
### Elementary, My Dear Peirce
Of course, my dear Baggini, but it also depends where you measure London and Paris from, which part, how you measure it, and what with – which is not straightforward on a spherical planet! Your answer will be pragmatic and subject to human error and inaccurate measuring devices. The strength of the deductive method is that if the premise is true, you can be certain of the conclusions. The method fails should the premise be wrong, or vague, or unknowable. In other words, ask a silly question, get a silly answer. Is it possible to help my daughter to recognize a silly question when the answer might seem plausible? Induction, however, is looser and more likely to lead to probabilistic outcomes, but it can be more adaptable to circumstances. For example, you can ask questions in a looser way, 'If we are doing this, therefore, is it possible that...?'
Here is Julian Baggini again:
_You start from two facts which are observations about the world and then you reach a deduction on the basis of these facts. You can make a deduction based on purely a posteriori evidence ( for example, there are only two people in the room, one shot the other, the person who shot the other person is the person who wasn't shot). That's a deduction. There's nothing a priori about it. The only a priori thing is the fundamental principles of logic, the rule by which you work that out. You can even get too worried about that (that is, whether it's a priori)._
_In ways we can't yet imagine, it may well be that we discover some facts about the world which contradict the basic laws of logic. What would that show? Well, to be honest, it would still show that in virtually every other case in the world the laws of logic hold. So, in a sense, the reason (man shoots man in room) is a robust deduction. It need not rely on any a priori claim that the laws of logic dictate that x, y, and z. It can be based on the empirical claim that 'this is what we observe'._
_From a practical purpose, there are always reasons for pursuing these things philosophically, almost for their own sake, but if you are interested in good reasoning the ultimate basis of it doesn't matter as much. Virtually everything we do is inductive, but it is highly constrained by logic. Logic doesn't get you from the observations to the conclusion, but the constraints of logic stop you getting from the evidence to a conclusion that is completely stupid or false._
Our conclusions can be as near-right as they can be, based on the evidence we are aware of. But the strength of our enquiry about who shot whom, based on all the evidence we can gather, must always entertain the possibility that the man shot himself or someone else shot him through the keyhole. Ouch.
### Logic and the Fallible
The physicist David Deutsch writes, 'The real source of our knowledge is conjecture alternating with criticism. We create theories by rearranging, combining, altering and adding to existing ideas with the intention of improving upon them' (Deutsch, 2011: 32). He sees the importance of the 'tradition of criticism' and the search for 'good explanations' as a rationalization for progress since the Enlightenment. Deutsch, drawing on the work of Popper, believes in fallibilism: he sees the importance of doubt rather than certainty. This approach acknowledges that, in any field, the creative hunch or imaginative hypothesis will always leave the door open for disproof through experiment, dispute, dialectic, or discovery.
When knowledge is 'owned' by an authority or vested interest, it is even more important to open it up to scrutiny and questioning. Logical arguments can be shown to be true even if they are based on false premises. Conclusions reached are only as good as the information on which they are founded. If the data used is based on invalid assumptions, then it becomes difficult to ascribe genuine meaning to the answer. The particle physicist Lisa Randall puts it this way, 'Science generally settles issues with some degree of probability... only infrequently can anyone absolutely settle an issue – scientific or otherwise – on the basis of evidence' (Randall, 2011: 202).
### Scientific Progress as Paradigm Shifts
Popper's scientific narrative was a linear process by which changes happen in a smooth way while reaching towards greater truth. But, for some, this doesn't address why scientists can come up with completely novel hypotheses. The scientific philosopher Thomas Kuhn (1922–1996) saw that science, instead of being a linear narrative of progress moving ever closer to complete knowledge, moves instead in jumps that can contradict each other. He thought that science justified itself more than its method deserved, proving itself rather than subjecting itself to criticism (such as papering over any cracks that occur by overlooking contradictory results). However, when anomalies in proof accumulate to a critical point, a crisis follows, and this causes a paradigm shift: a new theoretical framework comes into play, with new hypotheses, and the process begins again.
### Good Science and No Science
'It is wrong from beginning to end,' said the Caterpillar decidedly, and there was silence for some minutes.
Lewis Carroll, _Alice's Adventures in Wonderland_
We seem to be losing our hold on 'truth' and also on the means – logic and scientific method – for finding it. Imre Lakatos (1922–1974), a mathematician and scientific philosopher, brought Kuhn's and Popper's ideas together and argued for a rationalist view of science in which a 'metamethod' would evaluate the history of science and find out what was good science and what was bad or 'pseudo-science'. This would be based on the idea of 'testability'. That is to say, good science can be tested and be seen to be true or false, whereas bad science cannot.
Lakatos's friend, Paul Feyerabend (1924–1994), thought that science and myth had an intrinsic relationship and he went against the meta-method thesis and described how there is no such thing as scientific method at all. Feyerabend claimed that if there had been strict rules, science would not have progressed. Whenever we explore anything, or when we are told something is evidence-based, then we need to consider the following questions: Why was the area investigated? How was it being measured? How secure was the method used? How much doubt is there? Is the method used one that actually addresses the problem it purports to?
Analysis, which, in itself, can be a worthwhile process, is thus seen to be only as good as the context in which it operates. Logic is but one tool by which we reach for understanding. The idea that some studies/researches/investigations are unsuitable for a scientific approach – in other words, they aren't falsifiable – opens up the possibility that the arts and humanities have the potential to reach truths that science cannot. I want my daughter to explore a wide range of truths, not just scientific or analytical ones. I want her to develop the ability to reason, to be reasonable, and to develop and trust her intuition. I want her to have a sense of wonder and not be hoodwinked by charlatans. There is also a place for responding to the beauty or ugliness of the world with a developed sense of outrage or love.
Susan Wise Bauer's assertion that the trivium 'trains the mind in the art of learning' (Bauer, 2003: 20) is central to my thesis, but her idea that 'the logic stage' is about children analysing grammar, and deciding whether what they are looking at is right or wrong, is too black and white. Grey areas also matter. Parsing, analysing, and investigating are essential tools, but they are only part of the story of dialectic. Therefore, I would like to argue that this 'logical' art needs to do more than just analyse or reason; it needs to move beyond the realms of logic into the worlds of dialectic and _logos_ , where it becomes more about the identity of the student and authentic engagement with their work.
Peirce's scientific method came from what he saw as the role of 'critic'. In his trivium it is abduction (creating hypotheses or conjectures) followed by deduction (clarifying the implications of the conjecture) and induction (testing). I discussed the importance of grammar in the previous chapter. It should be taught in a way that leaves it open to the critical art of dialectic. In Popper's version of the scientific method, it is almost as if the first two arts of the trivium are brought together: grammar as conjecture and dialectic as criticism. In trivium 21c, I propose simply that we educate in a way that treats grammar as conjecture and opens it up to the criticism of dialectic. This criticism involves analysis, logic and scientific method. A student well versed in those critical skills should also learn to argue, debate, and think and work creatively.
## Dialectic
In schools, dialectic is associated with debate, although it is more often called class discussion or dialogue. As Christopher Hitchens put it, 'When there is a basic grasp of narration and evolution and a corresponding grasp of the idea of differing views of the same story... [we have] the theory and practice of teaching by dialectics... [as practised by the Greeks]' (Hitchens, 2006: 277). This method of teaching requires students to have a knowledge of differing viewpoints; therefore, the learning of the 'grammar' of a subject needs to include alternative views to the 'traditional' in order to allow dialectic to work. Dialectic can include dialogic teaching, but it is not the same.
According to Peter Mack, in English schools in the 16th century, 'Rhetorical knowledge was reinforced by the comments pupils and students made on the texts they read. Dialectic was not taught at the grammar school but some of the grammar school textbooks drew on ideas from dialectic' (Mack, 2007: 99). This approach is not strictly dialectical; it is, however, an important part of the art. Mikhail Bakhtin (1895–1975) used the word 'dialogic' to describe a conversation that uses a process of exchange to listen and empathize with, but not necessarily agree. Dialectic, in the Hegelian sense, looks for synthesis and agreement, but Bakhtin did not believe this was necessary.
As Richard Sennett observes in _Together_ , 'Dialectic and dialogic procedures offer two ways of practising a conversation, the one by a play of contraries leading to agreement, the other by bouncing off views and experiences in an open-ended way. In listening well, we can feel either sympathy or empathy; both are cooperative impulses' (Sennett, 2012: 24). In a school situation, it is desirable that some form of agreement is arrived at. Given the likelihood of disparate points of view, it becomes necessary to find out whether resolution is possible or not because of different frameworks of understanding. The thinking on both sides of the argument should always come from an appropriate evidence base, but how should the classroom teacher handle disagreement? How can we agree to differ? How might assessment lend itself to operate in a mature way that recognizes the possibility of difference?
### Debate
Students need to engage in a critical process that engages the curious mind. A curriculum that drives the learner forward is absolutely essential. This is not about questioning simply in order to demolish an opponent without first considering their point of view. This is about questioning with an open mind, which allows for the possibility of changing one's own ideas. In this way lies wisdom. Here is Elizabeth Truss again:
_I think I learn best when I'm challenged, I learn best when I'm debating things. The trouble is there is a strong tendency in parts of the education system not to be prepared to learn from history. I think we should stop being defensive. I spend a lot of my time proposing ideas about what to change about things. Sometimes the ideas might not be right, but partly why I'm suggesting them is to say, 'Let's not be satisfied – just because we've always done it like this doesn't mean it's the right thing to do.' You have to be prepared to constantly question, which is critical thinking. Some of the primary advocates of the critical thinking approach to education don't seem to be prepared to think critically about their own ideas._
### Contrariwise
The importance to Holmes of his Moriarty is vital; without the evil genius where would he be? Perhaps we all need to develop an inner nemesis, or even a trusted friend, with whom to disagree – like Socrates searching for Glaucon, Holmes finding his Watson, or Kirk needing his Spock. The type of dialectic we have with another can be quite fruitful. The muscular version of dialectic that Abelard indulged in would, perhaps, most resemble the role a teacher assumes when they take on the role of devil's advocate.
During the Enlightenment, when the spirit of dialectic was lacking, there would have been little rebellion against the authority of knowledge embedded in the tradition of the Church. In _A compendium of the art of logick and rhetorick in the English tongue_ (1651), Petrus Ramus ( _c_.1515–1572) writes that, 'Dialectica is the art of disputing well.' The right to say 'no' is fundamental. Natalie Haynes observed, 'The Socratic urge is partly to destroy the things you are presented with as perceived wisdom and partly what it means to be young. There is a reason why one of the things Socrates was executed for is corrupting the young.'
Dialectic, in this sense, has the protean impulse – to be versatile, to be able to adapt, but also to be the maverick, the radical, the dissident, the sceptic, to be naive and naughty. In _Letters to a Young Contrarian_ , Christopher Hitchens writes, 'One should strive to combine the maximum of impatience with the maximum of scepticism, the maximum of hatred of injustice and irrationality with the maximum of ironic self-criticism. This would mean really deciding to learn from history rather than invoking or sloganising it' (Hitchens, 2001: 138). If we think of history as the tradition of a domain, indeed its grammar, then we can start to see how the opportunity to be contrarian to it is so vital.
This is the backbone of our constitution. Look at how the House of Commons is set up for confrontation: the government makes its thesis, the opposition presents its antithesis, and the process continues until an agreement (synthesis) is reached in which the majority view wins. How far a teacher would want to engage with this method is up to them, but the testing of the boundaries of knowledge is a very exciting way to engage students in the classroom. It makes young people see the possibilities of their responsibility: that they can take on the great traditions – and if that knowledge can be added to, then all the better. Can students be expected to enter into this form of dialectic if they are not 'experts' in the field? As teachers, we need to consider this carefully when it comes to implementing this method.
It might be rather rude to cast David Aaronovitch as our Moriarty, but, as the son of communists, the _Times_ opinion columnist, broadcaster, and journalist was brought up with dialectic in his blood. When he appeared on _University Challenge_ in 1975, he and his Manchester teammates challenged that bastion of the establishment with a protest, answering each question with the answers 'Che', 'Marx', 'Trotsky', or 'Lenin'. Later, he became president of the National Union of Students, wrote a number of books, including _Voodoo Histories_ (2009) about conspiracy theories, and, for a man of the left, finds himself vilified (in much the same way as Christopher Hitchens) as a neoconservative for some of his views on Iraq and Tony Blair, and for working for Rupert Murdoch. If anyone understands the notion of being a contrarian, he should, as he told me when I spoke to him, 'If that's all you are doing [being a contrarian], in the end people will not respond to it, and why should they? "What is everybody thinking? I'll think the opposite." If they know that is what you are thinking, it ceases to have a value after a while.'
The comment sections of newspapers can serve various purposes. Some people read them to find out what they should think, some go to their favorite columnist to have their views or prejudices confirmed, but other journalists confound you, challenge you, irritate you, or surprise you. This is exactly what a teacher should do in the dialectic 'contrarian' phase. They should genuinely challenge the pupil to think in a different way, even though it might really annoy them... But it could also open up a new way of thinking that might only make sense in five, ten or twenty years' time as the misty-eyed alumni look back and say to themselves, 'Yes, now I see what they meant!'
A potential problem with dialectic is that the students might begin to question not only the authority of the knowledge, but the authority of the gatekeeper, the teacher. Should you teach kids to argue back? David Aaronovitch thinks we should:
_My instinct is yes, but only in the context of what is valuable and what isn't. Just because it's an argument doesn't mean it's good, but it doesn't mean it's bad. I was taught in schools where having an argument with teachers was automatically bad. In the lower sixth we were discussing_ Henry IV, Part 1, _and we had this wonderful teacher – a gay guy, florid and big, bow-tied. I really liked him, but a bit on the melodramatic side. He was anxious to point out Shakespeare's disapproval of Falstaff but he overdid it, and I said, 'Actually, I think Shakespeare also liked Falstaff. He knows there are things about ourselves we are ashamed about but we enjoy picking at our scabs.' And he sent me out of the room. Now, what is the quality of the sending out at this moment? I can't speak for the manner in which I spoke, but did he send me out because he didn't like the idea? He could have quite easily said, 'That's interesting,' and if he'd said that he wouldn't have had to send me out. If he says, 'That's interesting,' what is the message everyone gets? It's not that his original statement is somehow negated. So yes, you want kids arguing._
I mention David Starkey – a controversialist, historian, and bastion of conservatism – in the context of using argument as an emotional technique. Aaronovitch adds:
_David Starkey is a perfect example of someone who actually loves arguing. If you don't argue with him he has nothing to argue about, but he can be quite offensive. Arguing is a risk but, by and large, if you put yourself in a position of constant dialogue you obviously like it. I obviously like it. I imagine most teachers like dialogue because one of the things that is happening when kids are arguing is kids are doing_ something _. The state I can't stand is indifference._
### Dissoi Logoi
It is possible to take dialectic one step further. Instead of looking for agreement and compromise, or disagreement and conflict, we can bring two things together that might, at first, seem to be complete opposites. This process uses the idea of dual thinking in a highly creative way.
Marshall McLuhan had this ability to think in a dual way; for example, he was both traditional and progressive at the same time and he used oxymoronic formulations, such as 'global village'. By putting the two words, global village, together, McLuhan presents us with a _dissoi logoi,_ an ancient Greek term for a two-sided argument. _Dissoi logoi_ is the art of seeing both sides in an argument as true, which calls for the ability to harmonize or understand opposing ideas. Instead of an argument being about one side being right and the other wrong, a _dissoi logoi_ explores the possibility that both sides are right within their own context. Although one side may have a weaker argument than the other that might not always be so.
Whether through confrontation or accommodation, dialectic – when used against or with the stabilizing nature of grammar and in the context of tradition – becomes a creative force. Arguably, when tied with _logos_ , it is the ultimate creative force. It is no accident that the trivium had a role to play in the education of some of the most creative names in history. Our mantra begins to come together...
## _Logos_
### Plato and Aristotle: Skills, Work, and Wisdom
In _Plato's Earlier Dialectic,_ Richard Robinson writes that Plato believes, 'Dialectic is a skill... [and] Plato [regards the dialectician's work] as the alteration of his own personality in a fundamental way, as character building... This character building is about altering oneself and "becoming wise"' (Robinson, 1953: 74). Aristotle altered the meaning of dialectic from Plato's 'highest intellectual activity' to one where, it could be argued, dialectic had a more utilitarian purpose with generic skills and was an end in itself. Plato intended these skills to serve a relationship with the highest form of knowledge – that of fundamental change in one's character.
At a time in our education system when factions on the left and the right are suggesting that we need to be educating young people to fill the gaps in labour-related skills, rather than encouraging education for and of itself, surely the idea of building character through learning and growth need to be in our minds more than ever.
### Good Character
The word _logos_ emphasizes a higher level of knowledge, skills, and experience. In other words, wisdom that has the capability to shape us, to make us who we are, or who we are capable of being. In essence, it is the essence of our character. In _Of Good Character_ (2010), James Arthur seeks to distinguish between good acts, which good or bad people can do, and goodness. He writes about the ways in which the curriculum can present a reductive idea of skills that are 'marketable' for employers or 'convenient' for schools, yet he also points out that character education has an emphasis on high academic standards and a positive ethos. This is useful in an era when the challenges of a secular or multi-faith age may have undermined the grammar of virtue and morality. This is not about behaviour, punishment, and reward, which many people may reduce this to; moral education is not about control.
For Richard Sennett, in _Respect: The Formation of Character in an Age of Inequality_ (2003), character is a process of curiosity, of 'turning outward'. For him, this involves character as well as an understanding through relationships with other people and 'shared symbols', practices, and artefacts, similar to the shared symbols of a religion. This dialogue with others creates a depth to communal experience: this might be attending a football match with your mates and wearing your team's colours, supping Chardonnay with your chums at Glyndebourne, or taking part in the London Marathon with 35,000 other runners. Sennett explains that, to turn outward, 'something has to happen deep within the individual. 'Turning outward' means the prisoner reforms rather than is reformed; he cannot simply be prescribed another, better set of social practices' (Sennett, 2003: 240).
Prisoner is an odd term for Sennett to use. If we see people who are classified as not having much 'character' (a dubious thought, but stay with it for the moment) as 'prisoners of the market' or 'uncritical consumers' – lacking the capacity and knowledge to make sense of the age in which they find themselves – then perhaps their imprisonment is more a matter of ignorance. This idea works in the light of Plato's Allegory of the Cave (which I explore later in this chapter). Character is not about the cult of personality; turning outward need not be the 'performing' act of the extrovert. It is the relationship between depth, discipline, and virtue, not between the shallow, ill-disciplined, and immoral. This character is about the journey rather than the destination, about doing things for their intrinsic value and not for some other reward. Of all the establishments in which young people may find themselves, schools can directly address the issue of 'good character'. They can do this, not through a few lessons reflecting on what a good character is, although that may help to contextualize the idea, but by opening up the possibility of experience. This means allowing the child to reform themselves by being challenged through authentic tasks and by rising to these tests.
### Character Building
Our character is, paradoxically, only accessible through a distinctive attitude to work, craft, and the desire to create something or do something of importance in the physical world, but with 'beauty' or 'truth' as a transcendental aim. This is a journey towards deep understanding, a depth that gets to the essence of whatever form or domain in which we work. But this craft is not just about involvement with doing or making; it is about the essence of being, of presence, of being with a purpose. This comes from being able to engage with knowledge, not as a passive listener but as a doer. Even at times when we have to listen, we should do it attentively as an active listener, engaging with the process. The essence is not necessarily intrinsic to the form or domain; it is what we bring to them; it is our experience, our work, and our desire to appreciate their fundamental nature. This was summed up by the footballer, Danny Blanchflower (1926–1993), when he said, 'The great fallacy is that the game is first and last about winning. It's nothing of the kind. The game is about glory, it is about doing things in style and with a flourish, about going out and beating the lot, not waiting for them to die of boredom.'
Even in the role of spectator we have a part to play. A book is only 'great' if we read it, if we make that effort to engage with it. Only through the effort, engagement, and desire to energize the form or domain in a way that makes a difference can we arrive at a sense of the metaphysical; a oneness with the work, and with others who appreciate our work. This oneness is 'character building'; it is a sense of striving towards something. For some people this something is 'divine'. For those of a more secular persuasion we sense, instead of divinity, real achievement and wisdom. As Elizabeth Truss observed, 'It is about character.'
### Striving
If God is dead, what are we left with? How do we cope with the idea of the metaphysical in a godless age? By rejecting Plato's idea of forms, the controversial philosopher, Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) moved from phenomenology (the study of consciousness) to existentialism (our individual existence in a meaningless universe) through the idea of nothing. Here, metaphysics is not 'something' but is arrived at by being 'present'. It is the search for authenticity in what we do, how we relate, and who we are. These essences are atop mountains and, like Sisyphus, we struggle to reach them – because every morning we find ourselves having to lug the rock and ourselves up the mountain again. Yet, by working hard we might, slowly, begin to understand, to feel, if not universal truths, then those truths to which our culture attaches importance.
In _The Case for Working With Your Hands_ , Matthew Crawford writes, 'For the early Heidegger, "handiness" is the mode in which things in the world show up for us most originally, the nearest kind of association is not mere perceptual cognition, but, rather, a handling, using, and taking care of things which has its own kind of knowledge' (Crawford, 2009: 68–9). We are striving, as G. E. Lessing (1729–1781) observed, 'If God held enclosed in his right hand all truth, and in his left hand the ever-living striving for truth, although with the qualification that I must forever err, and said to me "choose," I should humbly choose the left hand and say "Father, give! Pure truth is for thee alone"' (quoted in McGilchrist, 2010: 461). It is the ever-living, ever-striving that is our purpose, and we either do it willingly or we turn our back on it.
### Being Awake; Being Alive
The theatre practitioner Antonin Artaud (1896–1948) had the idea that an artist should be 'alive within the score'. For this, they had to 'submit to their necessity', 'be in harmony with their necessity', and be like someone 'burning at the stake, signaling through the flames'. By being aware of our mortality, doing what we do as though it could be our last breath, we achieve an intensity of purpose both in rehearsal and performance. It was this that Étienne Decroux (1898–1991), the teacher of Marcel Marceau, and a Marxist atheist, called the moment of having 'God within you'. The word 'enthusiasm' reflects this – it is drawn from the Greek _en theos_ , meaning 'with God'. Enthusiasm is a necessary pursuit and should not be denigrated into meaning something lesser. Enthusiasm is the search for essence, that moment of 'flow', but also of intensity and work that is essential for high achievement. This is the idea of mastery: discipline, focus, work, beauty even in ugliness, truth, and the pursuit of in-depth knowledge. This is, perhaps, what Plato thought of as 'being awake'.
### Mastery
For schools, mastery should imply that the journey is more important than the outcome. The quality of a life well lived, during schooling, is the richness that brings one far closer to truth than some grades written on a piece of paper. This is the search for wisdom and the good life, not utilitarian target setting and getting _x_ number of exam passes and a job. As George Leonard writes in _Mastery: The Keys to Success and Long-Term Fulfillment,_'How do you best move towards mastery? To put it simply, you practise diligently, but you practise for the sake of the practice itself. Rather than being frustrated while on the plateau, you learn to appreciate and enjoy it as much as you do the upward surges' (Leonard, 1991: 17). This equates to Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi's theory of 'flow'. Flow can occur during difficult, risky journeys that challenge and stretch our capacities. These creative challenges may be hard to enjoy because of the elusive goal, but Csikszentmihalyi believes we create an unconscious awareness that understands the process. This 'muse' communicates 'through a glass darkly, as it were. It is a splendid arrangement, for if the artist were not tricked by the mystery, he or she might never venture into the unexplored territory' (Csikszentmihalyi, 1996: 115). Part of this mysterious trick of the muse is the less mystifying influence of the teacher.
This process represents the opening up of 'true knowledge' at the level of _logos_ as expressed in Plato's Allegory of the Cave from _The Republic_. In this myth, Plato implies that the average person, without much education, would have very little relationship to truth; they would be staring at shadows cast onto the cave wall. Perhaps a modern-day equivalent would be staring at a flickering TV or computer screen. Yet, if they were led out of the cave, they would come into the sunlight of reason and dialectic – in other words, receive the education to qualify as a 'philosopher king'. This is exactly what schools should be doing: taking students on a journey towards the sunlight – with an emphasis on _towards_. In other words, schools help set a student up for the journey. Formal education can only be a staging post; there will always be more learning to do. Rather than philosopher kings, I like to think that when a child leaves school they are a like a _philosopher kid_ , not fully formed but with the wherewithal to flourish in whatever they choose to do.
I asked Julian Baggini whether he thought we were on a journey from the cave. He replied: 'Ha, I think we're trying to understand the cave better.' Clearly a long way to go then! _Logos_ is this journey; it represents the pursuit, the effort, and the striving. It is arrived at through the desire and pursuit of mastery.
### The Allegory of the Cave, Re-Imagined
In my modern-day version, the cave is the journey from prisoner kids to philosopher kids. Prisoner kids are huddled in their caves tethered to machines that flicker with pictures, words, and sounds. Before them are the products of the 'knowledge age'; from screens and earphones they witness the shadows and sounds but they lack the education to understand. When education in its broadest sense intervenes, and their appetites and desires are honed and trained to reject instant gratification, they are on the journey to become philosopher kids – those who have mastery in a desire for learning and the ability to achieve. Now they admire wisdom and love pursuing it. At this point the child is ready to assume the mantle of the philosopher kid, but not quite yet, for there is one further act they need to perform. In order to achieve mastery and access fully the essence behind forms, the philosopher kids need to return to the cave as parents, teachers, coaches, or friends in order to lead other kids out and set them on their own journeys towards mastery.
The most important message for a school to pursue is the idea behind _logos_ : students need _authentic_ experiences – doing, making, creating, and being. This should run alongside the more abstract academic curriculum and take place within the school day as well as beyond. In these genuine experiences and maybe in the rest of the curriculum too, the school will achieve something very special: the engagement of students' enthusiasms at a very profound level.
## The Art of Dialectic
The art of dialectic therefore covers a very wide range of important activities in teaching and learning. In the context of whatever they are studying, students are taught the specific grammar that gives them structure and knowledge. This is taught in a way that also opens up the possibility of criticism, which in turn opens up the possibility for dialectic. Therefore, students should become well versed in being able to analyse and challenge, whether it be through logic, scientific method, or debate and discussion. Controversies should be welcomed and addressed. In classrooms, we should see the skills of deduction, induction, abduction, analysis, criticism, debate, argument, challenge, and dialogue. Added to this is the opportunity offered through _logos_ : students should have quality time to develop their own enthusiasms and whether, like Sherlock Holmes, they like to play the violin, or whatever they decide to pursue, ways need to be found to ensure activities like these are recognized as being more than mere hobbies at the fringes of the curriculum.
Chapter 10
# Rhetoric: Communication, Citizenship, and Community
Let Rhetoric be the power to observe the persuasiveness of which any particular matter admits.
Aristotle, _Art of Rhetoric_
What of our contemporary rhetoricians, are they still to be found in our schools? Yes, can you see them hanging around the staffroom? I think they might be disguised as the proponents of modern communication technology, encouraging the idea that the 'flipped' classroom is best, that you can learn lots from a computer, and 'Hey, get the kids to write their own blogs and put some stuff up on YouTube!' Other rhetoricians might be found defending the subject of citizenship or running school debating societies, honing those opening words to perfection. Failing that they might be in rather dustier schools getting students to perform memorized tracts of epic poems...
The continuing struggle between the tradition of grammar and the modernist critique of dialectic needs to be resolved. Grammar (the transfer of knowledge and culture) submits itself to dialectic (the contemporary analysis, discussion, challenge, and debate), which can, in turn, bring about progress, creative tension, destruction, and change. But this is a cycle without end. In order to get out of the loop, something different has to happen. The way beyond this negative battle of wills can be found in the moment of pause and culmination provided by rhetoric. For example, by taking part in or reflecting on performance, by taking stock, or by testing things out, the debate can move to a bigger stage. It is these moments of performance that allow us to reflect. The performances can take place on a public stage or constitute a private entry in a personal diary. Rhetoric is a peroration, an art of summation, of evaluation. It has both an informal and formal role, embracing methods through which young people can become more confident citizens and communicate and celebrate what it is to feel, to think, to be eloquent – to grow into philosopher kids and maybe even philosopher kings and queens.
Alain de Botton believes that an emphasis on rhetoric in contemporary times is 'bizarre' and makes the point that '[it may have been] fine in ancient Rome, but do we need rhetoric nowadays? Hardly.' Is this true? Paradoxically, it takes an articulate man to draw our attention to it. Those of us who struggle with communication are less flippant about rhetoric. Perhaps it is only when you have been deprived of a voice that you realize its potential. In the stratified societies of Cicero, Quintilian, or Aristotle, rhetoric had a fixed role; it was reserved for speaking to a relatively small group from a limited _demos_. Demos referred to 'the people', but in practice it meant only those citizens who were able to take part in the assembly. This did not include women or slaves. Now, in our more inclusive age, we assume the idea of citizenship for all; but having a voice means knowing how to use that voice and how to use it effectively. Philosopher kings might need to know the art of rhetoric, but philosopher kids in philosopher crowds need to know more than just how to put together a PowerPoint presentation.
Nowadays, we are expected to be able to communicate in many ways, not just face to face but also using social media. In cyberspace, citizens of the world can meet together in a kind of virtual _agora_. In ancient Greek city-states, the agora was a kind of meeting place, which also served as a sporting arena, art gallery, market, place of worship, and even a venue for political meetings – a true civic square. The Oracle at Delphi, an agora par excellence, served as the centre, or 'belly button' as it was known, for the ancient world. I think of Twitter as a modern world equivalent of Delphi where the Oracle was inscribed with the aphorisms: 'Know Thyself' and 'Nothing in Excess' – both handily communicating to the world in 140 characters or fewer.
People would come to Delphi from all around the ancient world to find answers, but also to perform, be seen and heard, show off, discuss, debate, think, feel, and reflect about themselves and their world – much the same as we do with Twitter, except we no longer have to travel physically. The town of Delphi grew up around the oracle and became a thriving community: the local people staged athletic games rivalling the Olympics, along with musical competitions and theatre. The growth of the institution of Delphi made the town more important and open – a place of cultural cohesion, a hub of the social network for classical times.
The social networks and gathering places of the 21st century are far more fluid. Although we can carry the rhetorical world around with us on a smartphone, the role of rhetoric is more difficult to define. There might still be a role for persuasive speech making that makes use of a repertoire of classical oratorical techniques, but in our more informal and instant messaging age, we also need to be able to move from the high style of grand oratory into what some would argue is a world of 'rhetoricality'. In the knowledge age, citizenship is about having the wherewithal to join in with the great conversations of our time as members of our neighbourhoods, networks, nations, and world.
The English comedian and writer, Natalie Haynes sees rhetoric as 'one of those things that some think is stupid and old fashioned':
_So the only people who ever learn it are in schools that are fancy enough to have a debating society and then, oddly enough, those are the people who end up in government. The ability to clearly articulate your case is crucial in speech or in print. Whether you are at the very bottom of the work ladder trying to argue yourself a raise or whether you are at the very top of the pile trying to persuade people to vote for you to be President of the World, you need to be able to articulate your case. By keeping some children in a state where the very idea that they would need to be able to express themselves confidently and formally in public – that that's somehow 'for other people',_ _that 'it's for toffs' – is just another way of keeping things the way they are now, where the powerful remain powerful and the powerless, quite literally, don't have a voice. The most depressing version is on a [TV] programme like_ The Apprentice, _where day-to-day you get candidates speaking almost literally gibberish and you realize it's because all they have to refer to is the modern vocabulary of business and there is absolutely nothing behind it._
It is useful to look at the major ideas behind the formal art of rhetoric because, even in a tweet, we can improve not only how we communicate but also how our children might do so too.
## Aristotelian Rhetoric and the Art of Communication: From the Grand Style to the Sound Bite
The basic ideas of rhetoric still resonate even in a world in which most of us have abandoned the grand style. Yet, through the knowledge of this ancient art young people can begin to create an articulate future. For Aristotle, rhetoric had three branches and five parts. The three branches were: deliberative, judicial, and epideictic (or panegyric). The five parts were: invention, arrangement, style, memory, and delivery. Each of these is relevant for the crafts of the classroom, whether you are working on your delivery technique or teaching children to communicate well.
Let's begin with the three branches of rhetoric:
**1 Deliberative** : _Associated with the future_. Getting people to do something either because it is the virtuous course or because it is in their best interests. If both, then all the better. This is best described as the political branch because the future is the stuff of all change makers, such as politicians, advertisers, teachers, and three-year-old children wanting a chocolate.
**2 Judicial** : _Associated with the past_. This is the forensic branch: trying to find out what happened and piecing together evidence from the material available. This is important for detectives, researchers, football managers, after-match commentators, and three-year-old children with faces covered in chocolate trying to deny they have eaten any chocolate.
**3 Epideictic** : _Associated with the present_. The display of 'now', the connective between past and future. This is important for news commentators, journalists, and three-year-olds who are caught in the act of taking a chocolate from the sweetie jar.
I interviewed Michael Lea, a speechwriter who has written material delivered by the British Prime Ministers David Cameron and Gordon Brown, President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and ex-French President Nicolas Sarkozy, amongst many others, about his use of rhetoric in a modern context. I suggested that we are so inundated with the constant chatter from the world of modern communication that it is difficult to draw out elements of classical rhetoric from contemporary speeches and writing.
Lea first latched on to the notion of being genuine and having credibility, 'Although it's a cocktail, things don't work on their own. Let's use the "I have a dream" speech: the audience, the stage, context, all coming together to form "the moment".' This connects to the idea of presence, of being 'alive within the score', of 'signalling through the flames', which I explored in the previous chapter. The present tense is transitory, but in this fleeting moment we must learn to communicate in a way that is alive with possibility. We must _be_ present. Being in the moment is about feeling and communicating in a way that energizes your audience. Because it is so immediate, it can be the most genuine. But as every con artist knows, it can also be the most manipulative. Advertising or stories that work really well can tap into our subconscious or emotional selves, exploiting our intuitive, immediate responses – 'you want this and you want it now' – and it soon goes viral.
So, if you are someone who is purposeful about what you want to go viral, how will the five parts of rhetoric be of use to you?
**1 Invention** (Proof): This is about constructing your argument and looking for what structure would be best for it, as well as what the counter-arguments might be. Again, your judgement of the audience is key. Invention, according to Aristotle, has two kinds of proof, inartificial proof or 'evidence' and artificial proof which is itself divided into three parts: _ethos, pathos,_ and _logos_. Ethos means credibility: how you present yourself, your character, your disposition, and their appeal to others. Are you an honest kinda guy? Aristotle uses the word pathos to indicate a shared emotion: your own emotions and those you wish to evoke. Nowadays, seeing people cry in public is one of the most outward expressions of pathos. When a politician weeps we might warm to them, at first, but the moment needs to be right. At its best, pathos allows your audience to see you as credible. _Logos_ (or logic) is the third element, which, in this context, is what Aristotle refers to as reason. Are you making a reasonable argument, one that seems based in a version of truth the audience can buy into?
**2 Arrangement or Shape** : Once you have your arguments and counter-arguments you need to consider the best way to present your claim. For this you also need to think about the third element...
**3 Style** : The three main types of style are low, medium, and grand. In our sound bite age, it has been argued that the grand style is on the wane, but I'm not so sure.
**4 Memory** : This was the part that most exercised the ancients, particularly with the arrival of the written word: would memory go into decline? By this they meant both the ability of the actor to memorize their part, but also the idea that memory is simply knowing your stuff and being able to recall it when you need to (perhaps for a tweet).
**5 Delivery** : Our performance, which includes voice, gesture, and pose. Perhaps teacher training courses wouldn't go far wrong if they concentrated on the workings of classical rhetoric and taught teachers how to communicate and persuade their charges based on the above.
Aristotle's principles are not the only 'rules' of rhetoric that have been posited. For example, Cicero thought there were three parts to oratory: _docere_ (to teach), _delectare_ (to delight), and _movere_ (to move). Any outstanding teacher should perhaps take this to heart, as long as docere is their main concern!
I asked Michael Lea if he had been trained in classical rhetoric. 'I learnt the art through the craft, by listening and reading other speeches,' he said. 'Most speeches are quite formulaic – there are two or three different formulas that great speeches seem to follow. Bear in mind that few people know the whole content of great speeches. Politicians work to a formula, and speechwriters need to be aware of the lines that will make the headline or be picked out for broadcast.' When working at Number 10, Michael particularly remembers the amount of time and care spent on identifying what sound bites would be singled out by the media, and making sure that they carried the intended message. These bite-sized chunks often work through repetition, such as in Martin Luther King's 'I have a dream' speech. This is what makes headlines. Lea often spent longer on crafting the sound bites than he did on the rest of the speech. Does anyone remember anything else about Tony Blair's speech in which he mentioned 'Education, education, education'? Unlikely. Instead, people remembered the sound bite and they got the message the government wanted to prioritize.
If we analyse newspapers it is clear how headlines and articles work. There is an art to telling the story in such a way that the reader gets the gist without having to read all of it. When Lea worked for the _Daily Mail_ he recalls, 'We used "boxes" – fact files, mini-biographies, did you knows, and numbers of the day – to break up the text, so that the readers could have an understanding of the story by looking at the headlines and sub-headlines.'
The skill of journalists and speech makers becomes apparent to us when we go through a selective history of the sound bite and headline. There is a power in an aphorism which is able to conjure up so much more than just the bare words, 'We shall fight them on the beaches', 'They think it's all over', 'The lady's not for turning', 'Don't mention the war', 'Gotcha', 'Will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights', 'Annus horribilis', 'I may have the body of a weak and feeble woman', and the ultimate preamble of liberal values, 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness'. In this electronic age, we take the everyday rhetoricalities of our relationships into the wider space of the global village. Most of us enjoy at least the possibility, if not the practice, of instant communication with large numbers of people. You are only ever one tweet away from the rest of the world. We are all rhetoricians now, and all the world is our stage, whether we are aware of it or not. We must give our children practice and experience of performance and rhetoric to prepare them for the rhetoricality of cyberspace.
## Rhetoric, Eloquence, Authority, and Science
When you are asked, 'How do you feel?' what sort of answer do you give? How can you best transfer what is in your mind to someone else? How can we communicate, for example, the metaphysical qualities of love? 'Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?' We need to converse in a way that reflects the beauty of our thoughts. It is difficult, if not impossible, and yet we must do the best we can to transfer knowledge, ideas, feelings, and thoughts (including half-thought-through impulses) to others, so that they can understand us. Given the imprecision of communication in all its forms, we must use every tool available to get across our message and our ideas as well as we can. In order for our audience to feel that they understand, we need to convey the things beyond words – the ideas that tap into our shared wisdom. A virtuous life doesn't just mean to be wise and live like a hermit with a vow of silence. Our community needs wisdom and it needs eloquence. Even when messages are starker or darker, we need a language for sharing and inspiring.
We also have to choose how we take part. Do we want to challenge or defend the cultural traditions in which we are embedded? Do we want to communicate with those who are the gatekeepers for those traditions, or those who want to smash down the barricades? In the recent past, trust and respect were automatically invested in those with authority. Superiority was associated with 'breeding' or, to a lesser extent, expertise. This distanced those in power from those without, and the gap was maintained because they could hide behind a rhetoric of patriarchal superiority, as if they were a race apart, passing on their edicts from on high. It seems that this is no longer possible. Authority figures can no longer automatically expect to be listened to or have their opinions taken on trust.
The same is true of science. There are many examples of fakery and self-aggrandizement: phrenology, recovered memory syndrome, Cyril Burt's falsified (or careless) research on the heritability of IQ, the exaggerated claims of various pedagogical fads such as Brain Gym and learning styles. In _The Rhetoric of Science,_ Alan Gross writes, 'The sciences create bodies of knowledge so persuasive as to seem unrhetorical – to seem, simply, the way the world is. But however much scientists require the justification of realism, rhetoricians are realists only at their peril: for them, realism must remain an analytical target, a rhetorical construct like any other' (Gross, 1996: 206–207). In other words, beware any claim that insists that the world really is like this. The way in which we succumb to 'bad science' suggests that many of us are still in thrall to the white coat, even in an age when other authority figures struggle to be heard. Conversely, much 'good science' can be just as easily dismissed through the cynicism that accompanies the realization that it is rhetoric too. Look at how rumour and suspicion trumped science in the row about the MMR vaccine; at the root of the controversy was a scientist who was wrong, but people preferred his theory to the many other scientists who disagreed with him.
For some, the collapse of authority has its dangers as well as its benefits. Scientists and others need to be more open about the claims they make. However, there is danger that this has happened at the same time as the democratization of communication. As a result, there is no longer any degree of hierarchy of validity; every view is seen as carrying equal weight. We are encouraged to say what we think and that whatever we think is OK. It is our opinion, so it necessarily demands respect, regardless of how superficial or ill-informed it is. In a democratic electronic age the whistleblower is equal to the emperor. The philosopher king can rightly be challenged, but this may simply leave a void that we will try to fill as quickly as possible. The question is: how do we decide what to believe? How do we know whether what is being said is true if we are subjected to the wisdom of crowds rather than the wisdom of the wise? In times of cynicism, we can all point out naked emperors, even if they are fully clothed. This may end up with us regarding everyone in authority with suspicion. Their word is no longer to be trusted, their rhetoric a sham, and thus we are fools to believe them.
The art we need to inculcate in our young people is the discrimination of knowing who to listen to and recognizing when they are being conned. We need to understand the art of rhetoric if we are to realize the importance, or otherwise, of what we are being told. Then we will have the power to laugh at or expose falsehood, but not to abuse that power through inarticulate trolling, abuse, or lies. This learning begins at home and in the classroom: in how we use, listen, and develop our personal rhetoric, as well as in the ability to examine a debate objectively. In this way, children develop their own authority. This confidence should be based not just in the _what_ but also in the _how_.
## The Rhetorical Age
For Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679), rhetoric was the 'art of speaking finely'. In that word, 'finely', there is a core value for education. In other words, this is not just about communication, or effective communication, though that helps. Rather, it is about fine communication, which has elegance, excellence, wisdom, and virtue running through it. This qualitative argument is a palliative to relativism. It is not OK to communicate just as you see fit; we must remember that communication is a two-way process. We communicate with an audience in mind. We don't just speak, we don't want just to be heard; we want to make a difference to those we are communicating with. This is persuasion, not as a low form of skulduggery, but a higher form of art. This involves the desire and ability to do and say the right thing in the right way.
In _You Talkin' to Me? Rhetoric from Aristotle to Obama_ , Sam Leith says that we have reached the most 'argumentative age of any in history... We may no longer study or teach rhetoric in anything like the way our ancestors did, but many of us rely much more heavily on it than ever before... Our commerce, our politics, our cultural and social lives are all rhetorical to an extraordinary extent' (Leith, 2011: 17).
Our lives are shaped by the memes that are passed on to us – culturally, institutionally, and technologically. Rather than through the high rhetoric of a great orator, we are surrounded by 'rhetoricality'. The marketization of society creates consumers of us all and we need to be aware of how easily we buy into something because of its surface appeal, which is made apparent to us through rhetoric.
In _Rhetoric_ (2008), Jennifer Richards describes the move from rhetoric to rhetoricality. She argues that the schism caused by modernity ended rhetoric as it was then understood. She makes a case for a modern view of rhetoric that recognizes the importance of contrariness, of opening questions up rather than closing them down. It could be argued that much of what she says seems to belong more to the trivial art of dialectic, because she seems to place rhetoric in an interrogative place – a place that belongs to conversation rather than performance, and that makes use of philosopher crowds rather than the oratory of philosopher kings. Yes, there is crossover here, but rhetoricality should be more deliberate. Even in social media, where rhetoric is a two-way process, it is still public; silent followers will be aware of every tweet and even the smallest status update. This is where education comes in. We must teach young people how to take part as both audience and orators/performers. In this electronic age, we need to recognize our place in the philosopher crowd and in the agora, where we are playful but thoughtful too. We must also accept that, sometimes, we have to use the grand style.
The responsibility each of us has when we communicate using social media needs to be evaluated, and urgently. During the riots in England in August 2011, a young man, Jordan Blackshaw, used Facebook to incite an 'event' called 'Smash Down in Northwich Town'. The irony was that no rioters turned up, but the police did and they arrested him. Subsequently, Blackshaw was sentenced to four years in a young offender institution.
Each 'probe' we send out into the great conversation in the global village carries responsibility. On Twitter, it doesn't take long to find racist or homophobic abuse, grotesque sexism, and death threats. Attempts at humour can often go awry; 140 characters is a very small space in which to experiment with nuance and subtlety. Paul Chambers was charged under section 127 of the Communications Act 2003, even though the police thought his tweet about blowing up an airport in England was probably a joke. Chambers had to pay a £1,000 fine and legal costs and he lost his job. (His conviction was later quashed on appeal.) Joshua Cryer was given a two-year community sentence for the racial abuse of footballer Stan Collymore, and John Kerlan was convicted for inviting people to post excrement through a Bexley councillor's letterbox. The exposing of the name of a rape victim on Twitter, and on a variety of blogs, immediately led to three people being arrested. Hiding behind an apparent cloak of secrecy enables some people to think they are above the law, but if the crime is serious enough, that cloak won't save you. This is especially true when we consider the amount of personal information kept about us by internet providers. Social media takes us from the conversation in a pub onto a global stage, with the possibility that an unintended or badly worded utterance goes viral. In an age of rhetoric, schools would do well to help future citizens to be aware of how to use the art for their own ends, as well as understanding how the art uses us.
## Effective Communication as Performance
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts.
Shakespeare, _As You Like It_
The need to perform does not alienate us from ourselves; rather it is an expression of ourselves. I regard each school and classroom as a kind of Delphi – as a coming together of people who create a community, tell their own stories, ask questions, and thus achieve a sense of group belonging. Over time, the group members are shaped by a tradition and, in turn, shape it. In the process, they transform themselves – from Year 1 to Year 6 and from Year 7 to Year 13, my goodness, how they are changed! Knowing thyself seems as good a reason as any for education; a school or college becomes an institution that provides a communal space which enables its members to construct an identity collectively and individually. We should remember the Oracle at Delphi's advice to Chaerephon about his friend Socrates: he was the wisest because he understood how little he knew. Well, the greatest classrooms are paradoxical places that teach knowledge with the aim of wisdom but thrive with the hunger born of ignorance.
Schools should ensure that opportunities to perform and communicate are at the heart of what they do. Performance means making theatre, speech making, poetry readings, dance, sports events, community spectacles, art, and so on. Some schools run their own theatres, concerts, radio and TV stations, film companies, multimedia platforms, publishing houses, school newspapers, web pages, Twitter communities, blogs, computer programmers, art galleries, and workshops, with the philosopher kids developing their communicative skills through performance. This should be about creating content not capital. In order to do this, schools should use their partnerships with local communities, businesses, and individuals, as well as their heritage, history, and cultural institutions. Schools should encourage their alumni back into the cave and value the vertical transfer of knowledge through building their own history. One of the first impressions a new student should get when they enter a school should be the rhetoric of the tradition of that school – the institutional equivalent of 'know thyself'. In the classroom, teachers should also find ways of celebrating work through performances of all kinds, including writing, dance, speeches, and other kinds of performing that show off their students' learning to the critical community of their class and beyond.
In _How Language Works_ , the linguist David Crystal writes:
The modern academic view of rhetoric... deals with the whole study of creative discourse,... modern rhetoric studies the basis of all forms of effective communication. (Crystal, 2006: 321)
This is the basis of citizenship. In order to take part in the big conversation, we need to take in as well as give out: to be an audience, to interpret, and to add to the debate, the argument, and the tradition. As Marshall McLuhan might have put it, we send out our probes (or our snippets, tweets, and fragments) in order to add to the mosaic of our world.
In a true democracy all citizens share responsibility for their community. We need to educate all young people to be philosopher kids, to be part of the philosopher crowds, finding their way through the global village. I want my daughter to be out in the global agora exchanging ideas, dialogue, argument, products, noises, and silences, in public and individual spaces, through dynamic, inter-personal and extra-personal communication, made possible by the technology of the electronic age, the architecture of our cities, and the maturity of our institutions and traditions. This is a bit more demanding than spending an afternoon learning how to use PowerPoint.
## The Imperfect Trivium
If grammar is seen as authority, rules, and hierarchy of knowledge, dialectic as the challenge, analysis, and pursuit, and rhetoric as the expression and community of our disordered selves we can see that no art can have dominion over the other. In the past, the only way people have seen to accommodate this is either by imposing a truth on others or by being completely culturally relative. Neither is satisfactory. It is Hume (2007 [1748]) and others who point us towards a mitigated scepticism by which we can examine the cracks in our ideas, in our arts; for it is through their imperfections that the way can be found to bring them together:
The crack in grammar is that despite its seeming solid and true, like a mighty oak, it is arbitrary and it changes, so no matter how hard it tries to be stable the wind keeps blowing it, time and the seasons keep changing it, and it is susceptible to other elements including the odd lightning strike. In a storm, it is not a good idea to shelter beneath it. Grammar offers stability that is not stable.
The crack in dialectic is three-fold, in science and logic it has tried and failed to come up with a theory of everything, in dialectic it can argue to the point of destruction and in _logos_ it cannot reach the point of truth. Dialectic is the criticism that is not fully realised.
The crack in rhetoric is that in a rhetorical age, we are in a world where truths are contradicted as soon as they are uttered; where we belong by being adaptable and communicative in shifting conversations rather than in the senate with a more limited and enclosed audience. Rhetoric is communication and citizenry in a world of more than one language and more than one way of being.
Separately, the arts are unable to deal with the complexity of our world; together they can begin to educate our children properly through their contradictions. Just as a democratic Parliament governs through its disagreements we need to put our disagreements into the centre of the curriculum. We need to take the politics out of school policy and put it right bang in the centre of how we teach and learn most subjects. Instead of trying to bring up little grammarians, dialecticians, or rhetoricians we should be trying to raise children who have some understanding of all their fellow men and women, and have a polymathic hold on the world across the two or three cultures of the trivium.
When brought together, the three arts of the trivium are more than a sum of their parts. By teaching and learning through the trivium it is, perhaps, possible to see the development of a further art – whether this is called wisdom, virtue, or a good life. In the next chapter I will explore what this approach to education is for, and why it is needed, by looking at the Renaissance scholar and polymath Michel de Montaigne.
Chapter 11
# We Have a Montaigne to Climb
This above all: to thine ownself be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Shakespeare, _Hamlet_
## To Thine Own Self Be True: Authenticity and Virtue
A child is likely to spend around 14 years of their life in education, not because they want to but because the state demands it. If parents don't want their child to go to school then they will have to provide an education for them instead. The success of a child's schooling, whatever form it has taken, will be summed up at the age of 16 with a bunch of qualifications and again at 18 (for some) with another bunch.
In order to become a more scholarly member of society, students are required to amass a certain number of academic qualifications, which are deemed the best sort to have. If any child fails in this task, then the horny-handed labours of vocational qualifications are laid before them. They are classified as 'non-academic'; although they are also the sort of people you could do with when you actually need something done! The remaining option is to find your own path, learning from the School of Hard Knocks or the University of Life, for which there are no exams or assessments.
## Counting Counts
Schools today are awash with data. Teachers and schools are judged to be good or failing on the basis of how they perform on various measurements. Countries compare their education systems through data collected through organizations with acronyms... that's education in the 21st century: data and acronyms. But are we measuring the right things? Is being data-rich a good thing? Can we target and measure too much or too often? With more data might we make more dubious correlations? What would David Hume make of our obsessing over targets and test scores?
Somewhere along the line we seem to have forgotten something vital. By concentrating on counting and measuring we have neglected education. Consequently, the easily measurable and relatively late phenomenon, the exam, has taken the place of education. The lofty but fuzzy aims of 'a life well lived', 'wisdom', or 'a virtuous life' have been replaced by hard data. Meanwhile, the joy of learning has been displaced by a distorted, evidence-based view of education, which is not based on what works educationally, but on what it takes to get your pupils an ever higher number of ever higher exam passes and your school an 'outstanding' inspection outcome.
However, if the classroom teacher is more worried about whether a child gets a C or a D, or whether an inspector approves of their lesson plan, than whether they are educating children, then something, somewhere has gone very wrong. Hit me with your measuring stick! Where is the evidence-based education or inspection framework that proves our schools are producing wiser and more virtuous citizens who are living well-lived lives?
The challenge for the future of education is to develop a holistic approach based on the quality of education; the existing target-chasing quantitative approach does not serve today's students. This means that we need to take into account not just the exam results of the young people who leave our institutions, although that can be included, but we must also look at their character, their ability to take a full part in society, to live a rich and fulfilling 'good life', and influence those around them in positive ways. We all have a part to play in developing the richness of our society, but we need the maturity to realize it is not just the responsibility of our schools.
Creating this change will mean that we must re-realize that just because something is either difficult or impossible to measure, doesn't mean that it isn't important. This radical adjustment will involve challenges to society, to policy, to institutions, to schools, and also to what goes on in individual classrooms. We need to get away from the attitude that the primary role of schools is to deliver exam results, because if that is what we measure then you can bet your bottom dollar that is what they will try to do. If exams are mainly for the convenience of the school or the state, and cannot be shown to be of any practical use later in life, then a change in practice is necessary. But this implies we know what we are aiming for instead.
## Philosopher Kid
So, let me try to articulate some kind of vision beyond that of accumulating exam passes, as currently envisaged. Let's start with a more detailed vision of the philosopher kid whom we met in the last chapter.
The idea of a philosopher kid is intended to help articulate the idea that both within and beyond our working lives, we have a responsibility to ourselves, our families, our friends, our neighbourhoods, our nations, and our planet. This is citizenship based on more than just a few lessons about the workings of parliament and how to vote. We have a duty to enter into dialogue in the present, with the past, in order to build a future. This discourse should be with those individuals we come into contact with through study, who we meet, and also, importantly, with ourselves. The philosopher kid understands the importance of becoming a rounded human being and is interested in seeking continual improvement in whatever they do. At a time when we need lofty ambitions for all our young people, the trivium offers a supporting structure for this kind of attitude. It won't work for everyone, but at least it has a pedigree and the possibility of making a real difference to children's lives. Now we need to explore how we can, with its help, realize these ambitions in a practical way.
For a start, we could revisit the idea of the Renaissance man and woman. The Renaissance person specializes but they also have an interest in a wide range of other pursuits. They are citizens who can comfortably range across C. P. Snow's two cultures of science and art (and more); they are truly multi-cultural polymaths. No one is an island any longer; we all are immersed in political and financial affairs; we are all exposed to influence from the media and advertising; we are all subject to taxes and financial planning. We learn, to a greater or lesser extent, how to keep fit, stand up for ourselves, protect our property, understand the law, look after our health, and so on. Over and above all of these mundane needs, we also wish to find our place in the world and meaning in our lives. We want to discover respect, love, and friendship, to share our happiness and pass on what we know. We want to challenge the traditions that no longer serve us and create a world that rejoices in its being.
We can learn some lessons for the future by looking at a genuine Renaissance man from the past. We can examine how his formative youthful years are reflected in his adult life by looking at what he passed on. This is the French writer and philosopher, Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592), whose upbringing was a mix of a traditional well-to-do 16th-century French education and some quite outlandish and progressive ideas. Montaigne's parents saw education as essential for young Michel's future success. As an adult, he enjoyed travelling and collecting ideas. He was curious, existing in a perpetual state of enquiry and with a good degree of scepticism central to his rational approach. In order to ascertain the influence of Montaigne's upbringing, it will be useful to look at both his own schooling and the education he wished for others. For Montaigne, education was a lifelong process.
Montaigne had a touch of the Socrates about him. His famous phrase, 'What do I know?' echoes Socrates and emphasizes how doubt and uncertainty are part of thinking and learning. To the American literary critic, Harold Bloom, Montaigne represents everyone 'who has the desire, ability, and opportunity to think and to read' (Bloom, 1995: 151). Here we have the epitome of the lifelong learner. It is clear from what Montaigne says about his education, and what can be gleaned from reading his works, that he did not seek out one guru, one method, or one teacher. He thought that universal theories were of no use in modern life. Consequently he was able to be both a man with strong opinions and open minded. A _dissoi logoi_?
Montaigne wrote two seminal essays on education, which will prove useful in our current discourse. Indeed, the very notion of the essay, so beloved of educators, was invented by Montaigne. The word _essai_ means 'attempt', revealing that, for Montaigne, instead of achieving closure, there always remains the potential of finding another way of putting it, of beginning a new journey. There is always room for improvement. To emphasize that all is not black and white, Montaigne was to embrace the contradictory to the extent that he even argued with himself, often adding to his own essays and never seeing them as finished.
Montaigne believed that the task of the thinking person was to find ways to balance opinion, test it for truth or meaning through practice, and build up powers of judgement. This was a scientific approach; or rather, it was the way one lived one's life. His education, he thought, had helped him become a learner, someone who could learn independently, an autodidact or self-educator. His self-authorship comes out of the remarkable concatenation of tradition and progressivism, as becomes clear when his ideas on education are examined.
Michel came from a large family. His father, Pierre Montaigne, ran a successful wine business; he married Michel's mother when he was 33 and she was 'of age'. She was regarded as a very smart and able woman, but she had a difficult relationship with her son. Soon after he was born, Michel was sent to live with a peasant family in order to absorb their culture, quite literally, through the breast milk of a wet nurse. When he returned to his family, he was forced to speak Latin. A Dr Horst was taken on as his Latin tutor and neither would communicate except through Latin. Everyone else in the family, including the servants, had to learn some Latin in order to talk to them. Therefore, through the process of absorption, Montaigne had learned something of peasant life, and knew Latin grammar. Not for him the learning by rote beloved of 16th-century schoolmasters. Later, he learned Greek, but through games (his father was clearly on the progressive side) rather than textbooks. His father ensured that his son would have the key to the wisdom of the ancients and also a working knowledge of the language of the civil and legal services, which at that time was Latin. It was this early grounding, this wide-ranging cultural capital, that at once deprived him of what many would see as 'normal' or even important. However, Montaigne later reflected upon his upbringing as a quite pleasurable experience.
Every morning, Montaigne was woken by the playing of a lute or other musical instrument, and this gentleness suffused his upbringing. His early years were a strange mix of constraint and freedom. All this was to change at the age of six when Montaigne was sent to school. This twin approach of unusual upbringing and formal schooling was to foster an adult who would be independent and yet able to live within society. The school taught Latin by rote, but here Montaigne was at an advantage – he already knew his Latin. School would start early with the study of Cicero, Horace, and the like. The afternoons would be spent with abstract grammar, which almost destroyed any interest he had in reading, but his teachers kept his enthusiasm going by allowing him to read his own choice of books, and also by giving him some other well-chosen tomes on the quiet. These 'unsuitable' texts – which included Ovid's _Metamorphoses_ , Virgil's _Aeneid_ , and the works of Plautus, Tacitus, and Plutarch – would inspire him. Through these texts he learned that reading was exciting and, significantly, in the case of _Metamorphoses_ , that things change. Later, his reading material would include more histories and biographies from which he learnt about man's diversity and complexity.
The evenings were about reading out loud, memorizing, chanting, and analysis. Montaigne 'conversed' with the ancients, joking with them in a friendly manner, reading and collecting: he would write fragments of texts and ideas he had collected in notebooks. In his teens he began studying philosophy, logic, and metaphysics. As he grew older, he and his fellow students took part in debates and rhetoric, all in Latin. In her book on Montaigne, _How to Live, or a Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer,_ Sarah Bakewell writes, 'From these, Montaigne picked up rhetorical skills and critical habits of thought which he would use all his life' (Bakewell, 2010: 61).
Many of his contemporaries learned classical rhetorical techniques, which consisted of memorizing hours of speeches, something that did not appeal greatly to Montaigne, although he did enjoy appearing in school plays – another outlet for rhetoric. Paradoxically, Montaigne wrote that he felt he must be slow witted. Maybe this was false modesty. He also thought, quite helpfully, that the slow way was the wise way. Montaigne argues that we are born to go on a quest for the truth and that the 'world is but a school of enquiry' (Montaigne, 2003 [1580]: 1051). When he left school Montaigne was well equipped to deal with the world of enquiry because, for him, his schooling continued.
Practising rhetoric is one thing, but arguments can also get out of control. Montaigne discovered this at close quarters through a shocking incident that would leave an indelible impression on him. In 1548 there were tax riots in Bordeaux. The school closed, and a 15-year-old Montaigne witnessed the murder of the local lieutenant general, Tristan de Moneins. Through these events, Montaigne began to appreciate the complexity and difficulties inherent in conflict.
Learning new things fascinated him; he would never stay still intellectually. Not satisfied with simply knowing, Montaigne was happier when learning, wondering, and musing, both outwardly and inwardly. He might come across as an anti-intellectual, yet he was highly educated, and even though he could be sceptical, education was his foundation.
Montaigne's influential _Essays_ , first published in 1580, are like conversations with himself. They are open and playful, and are, arguably, about the process of thinking and learning itself. In 'On the Art of Conversation', he writes that the best way to improve the mind is through conversation, and that the more exposure we have to vigorous thinking, the more we will benefit. He is aware that, in debates, although we can learn to refute arguments, there is also a danger that we can end up refuting truth. He encourages a style of conversation that listens, learns, and questions – rather than disputes through which we simply try to get our point across. Montaigne didn't want to be _taught_ by great minds; he wanted to _get to know_ _them_. This gives a very different complexion to the idea of learning 'the best which has been thought or said'. He also takes logic to task, wondering whether it has ever enabled anyone to become 'intelligent'.
Two more of his essays concern us directly: in 'On Schoolmasters' Learning,' Montaigne complains about those who think they know it all, having learnt by rote, but are not wise in the way of a real philosopher, who, echoing Socrates, knows the limits of their knowledge; and in 'On Educating Children', he looks at the importance of enthusiasm in educational journeys towards learning and virtue. These essays reflect his thoughts on his own education and also give insights into how he felt children should be educated.
Montaigne writes about the contempt in which he thought teachers were held, quoting as an example how Plutarch uses the word 'scholar' as an insult. But why is it, he asks, that the most learned of people aren't the most 'alive'? He thought that just as a plant can suffer from too much water, our minds can atrophy from too much study: we 'aim only at furnishing our heads with knowledge: nobody talks about judgement or virtue. When someone passes by, try exclaiming, "Oh what a learned man!" Then, when another does, "Oh what a good man!" Our people will not fail to turn their gaze respectfully towards the first. There ought to be a third man crying, "Oh, what blockheads!"' (ibid: 153). This refers to Seneca taking on the liberal arts of his time and prioritizing virtue.
Montaigne continues that schooling should not be about whether someone has learned a great deal but who has 'understood best' (ibid: 154). Teachers should not just 'spew' out their learning; they should pursue understanding. Here, he argues, we should not just take on the ideas of others; we need to make them our own, obtain wisdom, and, importantly, enjoy it.
Montaigne, having a daughter rather than a son, dedicated 'On Educating Children' to his friend Diane de Foix, who was hoping for a son – a son who would expect to be educated rather better than a daughter. Ignoring the implied sexism of the age, I can easily think of it as an essay for my own daughter. Montaigne writes: 'We should always guide them towards the best and most rewarding goals' (ibid: 168). These goals are not the pursuit of money or advantage but should be inward enrichment, character, and intelligence, which are more desirable than just knowledge. A child should be judged on what they have understood and made a part of them, not by just repeating material they have memorized. A child should have a range of ideas from which they can choose, or they can choose to remain in doubt. It is through their own reasoning that they should learn. The end product of a child's learning should be this: transforming 'borrowings' and coming up with their own judgement and end product. A child should be sparing about their personal accomplishments and not quick to criticize everything, even if it is not to their liking, although they don't have to agree with all they learn. Sometimes the lessons will be reading, sometimes discussions which are to be had with a happy face, sometimes work will be given to them, and sometimes the work will be a shared pursuit with the teacher. This transforming of borrowings is the essence of the trivium. You borrow the knowledge and wisdom of the past, transform it slightly or radically (with respect), add to it, even create it anew, and then lend it to your children.
Montaigne had it in for grammarians, such as Demetrius, observing that 'furrowed brows' are for them. He believed that virtue is found through control rather than through effort; through loving life, beauty, health and moderation – not in a life that is over-devoted to study; nor should virtue be ruined by the 'uncouthness and barbarity' of others. Montaigne said that our chief study should be philosophy, so as to form good judgement and character. We should be creating gentlemen, he asserted, rather than grammarians or logicians, who should not be overly concerned with the minutiae of rules of grammar and rhetoric, but should learn 'suppleness of voice and gesture' through performing. A good education should bring people together for games, sport, worship, and for community goodwill, 'There is nothing like tempting the boy to want to study and to love it: otherwise you simply produce donkeys laden with books. They are flogged into retaining a pannier of learning; but if it is to do any good, learning must not only lodge with us: we must marry her' (ibid: 160).
For Montaigne, most of all, education should require us all to display virtue and pursue understanding, to obtain wisdom and enjoy it. Without this we remain no better than blockheads. Our current danger lies in moving even further away from Montaigne's ideal, failing even to value the knowledgeable person. Instead, we pursue the type of glory achieved by obtaining the greatest number of certificates; there has to be, indeed there is, more.
Chapter 12
# The Professors
Although the theory of a dogmatic phase followed by a critical phase is too simple, it is true that _there can be no critical phase without a preceding dogmatic phase_... All learning is a modification (it may be a refutation) of some prior knowledge.
Karl Popper, _Unended Quest_
I have my mantra – grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric – which gives rise to the idea of the philosopher kid, a free-thinking Renaissance citizen, with the ability to adapt, strive, and value both tradition and modernity, yet treat both with a certain degree of scepticism, because in each there is the possibility that 'there be dragons'. By valuing the pursuit of truth more than its ownership, a philosopher kid can take part in our common life, where the three arts meet. The philosopher kid will pursue wisdom through the arts and through their everyday life. Formal education should be seen not as an end in itself, but as a preliminary stage in life's journey. This is the education I want for my daughter. As a parent, I will help to provide it.
My daughter is currently obsessed with the idea of 'falling into a book'. I want her to put herself in our 'shared book', to build up an idea of who she is. She will also access knowledge through the school system, engage with it, make sense of it, argue with it, play with it, make connections, see contradictions, understand its fluidity, its importance, and its function. I want her to be given opportunities to express her growing relationship with knowledge by developing a sense of belonging. I want her to be able to criticize our common culture(s) in that shared place where we clash along with each other. I want her to trip across cultures, high, low, artistic, physical, philosophical, and scientific, and to be able to collaborate in order to restore, conserve, and remake the world as she sees fit. In this way, my hope is that she will become fully human, awake, and alive.
I want her to go to a school that will encourage all this. Am I dreaming? Is what I want so far from what there is that it will never happen? Am I being too radical?
The word 'radical' carries two traditions within it. It comes from the Latin _radicalis_ meaning 'having roots' (from _radix_ or 'root') and has come to mean anything that is fundamental to life. This meaning is retained in the worlds of mathematics, music, and botany and relates to the root of a number, chord, or plant. It is first recorded in English in 1562 as meaning 'inherent' or 'fundamental'; it wasn't until 1800 that it began to denote 'fundamental reform'. In the mid-19th century it came to mean extreme reform, and later in the 20th century it also meant unconventional. On the one hand, radical means a departure from a tradition, and on the other it means roots. In my argument for change, I am proposing change that is radical, in that it reflects progress and tradition, reform, and roots.
## The Three-Legged Stool
Progress does not necessarily mean progress to a greater end; tradition does not necessarily mean that which came before endures because it is intrinsically better than that which came later. None of the arts of the trivium on its own holds the key to 'truth', knowledge, or wisdom. Each art – grammar, dialectic, rhetoric – is but part of the answer. We sit on a three-legged stool; take away a leg and we fall.
The most destructive conflict today is still between the grammarians and the dialecticians or, in current parlance, the traditionalists and the progressives. It is to both these groups that we need to reach out. The radical move of Trivium 21c is to get these two sides to accommodate each other and come together through the third art of rhetoric. I want to explore this possibility by looking at the arguments and ideas of three interested parties: academics, political thinkers, and teachers.
Firstly, I will appraise the thinking of two professors who seem to sum up this dichotomy. The first is Ken Robinson, who is often lauded by the progressives; the second is Daniel T. Willingham, who is acclaimed by the traditionalists.
## Ken Robinson and the Creative Trivium
As one of the major proponents of creativity in education, Ken Robinson extols the virtues of the creative curriculum. Yet, when he does, he does so in a very traditional lecture format, which makes me wonder why that is.
Robinson argues that we need a new paradigm. In his TED talk from 2006, he talks about how schools kill creativity. Crucially, Robinson says that creativity usually emerges from an interaction of disciplines which encourage a different way of seeing. He draws from this that education needs to change, and to do so he wants us to mine our creative capacities. Robinson has said that he sees developing the creative mindset in children through schools to be as important as teaching literacy and numeracy.
In his later TED talk, 'Bring on the Learning Revolution' (2010), Robinson says many of us are wasting our talents, and that in numerous cases, education takes people away from their 'natural talents'. He argues against a 'tyranny of common sense' and to illustrate this thought he quotes Abraham Lincoln, 'The dogmas of the quiet past, are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise – with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.' Robinson takes from this that we need to 'disenthrall' ourselves from some of the old ways of thinking and doing things. He wants education to 'feed our spirit', which means to move away from the industrial model of education to an organic, agricultural archetype. He says this involves personalization; that is, making schools fit the children they teach. The technology that now surrounds us gives us the capability to do this. It is almost akin to Marshall McLuhan's view of how our electronic age can serve our 'pre-linear, pre-industrial' selves.
In his 2010 talk, 'Changing Paradigms', at the Royal Society of Arts, Robinson extols Benjamin Franklin as a polymath and a Renaissance figure, who wants the arts to be central to education. He believes that imagination is a unique capacity, which is systematically destroyed in children, although not deliberately. Robinson argues that the legacy of the Enlightenment is a breakdown in effective education because of a perceived need for economic utility, which has resulted in 'useful' and 'useless' subjects being studied. Public education, as developed during the Enlightenment, aimed to produce a broad base of manual workers, some administrative workers, a few professionals, and even fewer leaders. Deductive reasoning and knowledge of the classics were at the centre of this idea of intelligence, which benefited some people but not most. He sees the huge changes that are taking place in technology, population, globalization, and urbanization and fears that we are trying to do for the future what we did in the past: we are educating children for their economic capability and not their cultural identity.
The arts are a victim of this process. Robinson sees art as an aesthetic experience through which one becomes fully alive and in the moment, as opposed to an anaesthetic experience where one is deadened to being alive. He says we should be waking our children up: schools should not be places of 'utility, linearity, conformity, and standardization', but should be places of 'vitality, creativity, diversity, and customization'. He talks of the ascent of human nature being destroyed by education. Divergent thinking is an essential capacity for creativity; in order to foster this, we need to invest in human capacity, group learning, and collaboration.
Robinson says much with which I can agree. I recognize his neo-Platonist argument and I am completely at one with him in his opposition to the utilitarian, factory model of learning and his championing of the idea of the polymath. Where I fundamentally disagree, however, is with his prioritizing of creative thinking: in so doing, he is kicking away one of the legs of our three-legged stool. Robinson argues for creative, 'divergent' thinking, seemingly at the expense of the teaching of the knowledge and traditions that he wishes the creative mind could diverge from. But it can't diverge if it doesn't know!
Cultural identity is not something to be sniffed at. The classics, the great works, our tradition are all part of creativity. There might be a 'creative pre-born' desire within us (and there might not), but if we are always to pursue a new paradigm, or start a new tradition, then we are dislocated from our past and the conversation with it. The arts, in all their forms, are taught through the constraints of the rules and precepts laid down in the past and, in the main, this is the role of grammar; it is our collective wisdom, our common sense, our way of doing and seeing. By all means treat it with scepticism, but let's not dismiss it – because if it is abandoned, then creativity itself suffers. In the 1953 film, _The Wild One_ , Marlon Brando's character Johnny is asked, 'What are you rebelling against?' to which he replies, 'What have you got?' This is not fruitful ground for the creative act; this is where the destructive act is sown. To rebel you need something to rebel against; you need a tradition.
Peter Murphy (2010), quoting research done by Charles Murray about fundamental creative discoveries in a range of disciplines in Europe and North America measured by per capita of population, comes up with the following 'most creative times in history'. In the visual arts this was the mid-1400s to mid-1500s, with a second peak in the mid-1600s. Music peaks in the early 1700s and continues to the mid-1800s. Literature peaks in the early 1600s and again in the mid-1800s. Science peaks in the late 1600s and then from the mid-1700s to late 1800s. High-level technology peaked in the early 1870s. Murphy argues that from the 1870s there has been a decline in the rate of creative achievement in the West, in mathematics, the visual arts, and literature, as well as in the number of outstanding creative individuals. There are some exceptions. There was a growth in the number of exceptional figures in literature, science, and the visual arts from 1900–1920 and some technologies advanced from 1920–1950. The film arts flourished during the 1940s and 1950s and recorded music from the mid-1960s to mid-1970s.
Murphy believes that, 'a society that can cope with opposition at the same time as it can function in an integrated manner is a society that is able to meld incongruous values into a rich and uncanny culture' (ibid: 347). He cites the ancient and Renaissance city-states as examples. Murphy continues that in the act of creativity we need to be able to switch sides in our imaginations, 'This ability is indispensable to the scientist who is able thereby to imagine light as a wave and a particle simultaneously' (ibid: 349). The ability to see things differently, and simultaneously pulling together seemingly incongruous ideas, is central to creativity. A sense of the past, of being different, and of communicating this to others is what drives many creative ventures.
## Evidence: A Cognitive Psychologist Speaks
Daniel T. Willingham is professor of psychology at the University of Virginia and is the author of _Why Don't Students Like School_? (2009) and _When Can You Trust the Experts? How to Tell Good Science from Bad in Education_ (2012). In a contact made possible by the technology of our rhetorical age (I contacted him via Twitter and he agreed to be interviewed over Skype), we had a very positive interview, during which I asked him about cognitive psychology:
_I think of cognitive psychology as the latest set of assumptions and body of theory directed towards a scientific approach to understanding thought. There are people who have been trying to understand thought for quite a long time – the oldest recorded musings on how thought works are probably 2,500 years old. Scientific study of thought is, of course, much younger than that, probably 200 to 300 years old, and a really organized study, with all the trappings of academic departments and so forth, about a century. The cognitive approach is more like 50 years old, but there were other epistemologies in place prior to that_.
_Learning as a subset of cognitive psychology is one of the cognitive processes that we care about. We are at a very early stage in using this science, and we_ _have to be careful about its use, especially bearing in mind how important a certain degree of scepticism is in our approach to 'truth'_.
How true can scientific truth be?
_I think my answer to the question is very much the same as most working scientists would give, which is: anything we know can't be regarded as absolute truth and has to be regarded as truth as we know it today – it's provisional. And there are different findings from the world of science and models of those phenomena in which we profess greater or lesser confidence, and always with the understanding of what that confidence means. I think of it in terms of time: I think this will last ten years before it gets knocked over. It's going to get knocked over at some point, right? So I think there is certainly a lot of phenomena from the world of cognitive psychology about learning that probably falls into that camp. The way we're thinking about them is probably not right, in terms of explanation, but in the practical terms of usefulness it will probably endure longer_.
How about other ways to truth, say the arts and the humanities?
_Arts and the humanities are able to tell us truths and, again, I consider myself a duffer on these matters. These are very deep questions – I haven't made a career out of thinking about them and reading about them – but I'll answer the question nevertheless. I'll never let a lack of expertise slow me down! Actually, I talk about this quite a bit in my new book_ When Can You Trust the Experts?, _about the limits of science and how scientists think about questions they can answer and questions they can't_.
_In general, the prerequisites for application of the scientific method are that it needs to be something from the natural world; scientists seek to describe the natural world. And it needs to be something that you can measure in some way. You can't just execute scientific method in the absence of measurement_ , _as that's not going to tell you whether your model is correctly predicting the world. So, in terms of education, lots of things fall outside the view of science._
_For a start, education is not suitable subject matter for science. Education is an application. I think of scientific fields, like cognitive psychology, as being fields that theories of education can draw on. One way in which it is clear that education is different is that education is goal driven. In science you seek to describe the world as it is; in education and other applied fields you want to change the world. You are trying to make the world more like you think it ought to be, so it's similar in that sense to engineering, for example, or architecture, where you're trying to create something. You're trying to build a bridge or a skyscraper or, in the case of education, the thing that you're trying to change is not the landscape, you're trying to change children, and you've got a goal of what you want them to be like._
_The definition of that, the specification of that goal, is completely outside the purview of science. It's a matter of one's values: what you think children should learn at school, what you think they should end up like when they're done with school. Once you've defined the goals, science might be able to help you achieve the goals_.
I then gave Willingham a flavour of the thinking behind the Trivium 21c idea. He asked me: 'There is a little bit of a flavour of this which is like Bloom's taxonomy, right? Is it meant to be sequential? You initially have to gain the knowledge, before you begin to think critically, or is it the idea that these can run in parallel?' This is a crucial point. I explain that in the classic 'first instance' it is, indeed, that knowledge must come first before you can argue with it. However, I add the proviso that this becomes more flexible, and that my view is against the Dorothy L. Sayers' approach in which there is a stage in learning when all you do is soak up knowledge before you can argue with it. Willingham responded:
_I'm pretty sympathetic to that. I've written to that effect. I've softened a little bit in that I've found that the position is easy to caricature, and people do, with the idea that you're seeking to just fill their heads with knowledge and_ _you're discouraging them from grappling with it in any way – asking questions and so forth. Of course, that's not what I really want at all._
_A cognitive psychologist would tell you that if your goal is for kids to know things, a terrible thing to do is to give them a disjointed list of things to know and ask them to try to memorize it. You're always expecting and hoping they're going to be thinking about it. I guess what I'm fighting against is the idea that the main way to acquire knowledge is through posing questions for kids and expecting that they will come to discover this knowledge on their own. I think that it can happen, but it's incredibly difficult to pull off. I believe it can be done, but it puts an enormous burden on the teacher's skill._
_First, you need to know the knowledge very deeply, so that if the child goes off in a direction you don't expect them to go off in, you need to know how to guide them back towards the goal, but to do it in a skilful manner so that you're not, essentially, bullying the child. The whole point is you're trying to let the child take the lead a little bit, or more than a little bit, so handling the interpersonal dynamics is very demanding. It's demanding doing it with one child, but doing it with a classroom full of children – I don't know how you manage it._
_So, coming back to the question you initially posed, I think there is some sense in which you expect that you've got to have some foundational knowledge before you can engage with the dialectic processes. At the same time, and this is very speculative, one thing that we've really noticed in higher education in the United States is a huge influx of educators from China and India coming to the US trying to figure out what we're doing to make our kids creative. I've no idea the extent to which this is true, but what these educators are telling us is, 'All of our kids in China and India are full of knowledge but they're terrible at dialectic.' They don't put it that way, but using the terms we're using, that's what's going on._
_So, you could imagine that these kids are the product of a system where dialectic is left until very late in the educational process and that, if you're not used to doing this over long periods of time, two things happen. One, you're obviously not very practised in it, but second, it may not really be a 'habit of mind'. American kids are certainly encouraged to question, and I think British kids are as well – it's viewed as a good thing if a kid asks a teacher a_ _question, for example. Challenging a teacher in the United States about content, respectfully, is viewed as a good thing. It's not clear that is always true in China, for example._
_I had a student from Korea who said that if you ask a question of the teacher then that implies that the presentation was incomplete, that there was something he didn't really tell you. I've heard from other students in China who say, 'No, no, it was fine to ask questions.' You know, obviously it's a huge, diverse country. I'm just using these as illustrations. Thinking about this question of grammar versus dialectic, we're in green fields here because I don't think there is enough known to do more than speculate. But doing something as you describe, as you have already disagreed with, of two years of knowledge and then you do dialectic – that would make me nervous_.
I then suggested that some progressives believe that you can have critical thinking or creativity without needing much knowledge – the pursuit of dialectic at the expense of knowledge.
_In my experience, when kids have a lot of dialectic, but not much knowledge, the dialectic is not very effectively deployed. They have great fun talking with one another, but they're really recreating the thinking of other people (their peers). It's useful in its way, but it might be more useful if they just read up a little bit and then they would have a more advanced starting point_.
I moved onto rhetoric. Does writing an essay, or presenting your learning in some other format, focus and improve your thinking?
_That's an interesting question. There is some data on this – there is not an enormous literature – but there is certainly some support for the idea. Loads of us have had this experience: when you're forced to write something it forces you to be more explicit about your own thinking. If you write a well-organized essay, it helps you to spot gaps in your own thinking because, as_ _you're writing, you're thinking, 'Hmm, my argument is missing something here.' It's a bit like computer programming._
_This is a very big advantage within cognitive psychology. Psychologists recognize that you may think you understand cognitive processes quite deeply, you think your theory is quite complete, but the ultimate test is actually writing a program. I can easily skip over a gap in my own knowledge and never notice it, but the computer is going to notice it, it's going to crash. So I think that is not a bad analogy for the value of communication._
_If you're a good writer, and you are consistently able to produce well-ordered essays, then that is quite a test of your understanding of a subject: to write something about it. So, as I said, there is some data, and what there is, I think, supports this idea_.
Finally, I wanted to explore my use of the word _logos_ – whether the pursuit of something is important. Willingham asked: 'Do you mean how important it is in terms of motivation?' I agreed, but there is something more. I am trying to think about what it does to us, whether the opportunity to explore deliberate practice – the doing of something in an authentic way – can have a profound effect on who we are or how we experience who we are.
_That's a great question, and honestly I hadn't thought of it from that angle. When I think about deliberate practice, I always consider what it means for the skill. There were a couple of decades of wonderful work by K. Anders Ericsson, which has been discovered by a lot of mainstream writers like Malcolm Gladwell and Dan Pink: the 10,000 hour rule – which actually Ericsson didn't coin, Herb Simon did. The idea of disciplined practice as being important to motivation, I'm sure there's something there. Just on the basis of my own experience, I think that most of us have the sense that that's tremendously important, that there's something about one's self-image that hard work and deliberate practice contribute to. You come to see yourself working hard, you become the kind of kid who works hard; it becomes part of your self-identity. And as you get older, of course, the image changes from_ _student to whatever your profession is; it again becomes part of who you are. I think this is a great idea, I think you're on to something_.
This interview with Willingham was extremely helpful. Later, on Twitter, he pointed me towards a piece of research in the _Journal of Research in Science Teaching_ (Venville and Dawson, 2010) showing that if students are taught how to construct and use argumentation in their lessons, it improved both their ability to argue and their understanding of what they were studying.
Willingham demonstrates the importance of knowledge, and that it can work in the way that E. D. Hirsch describes as 'mental Velcro': once you have some, you can stick more to it. I would go along with this, but the things I want to attach to the Velcro are dialectical and they can connect through juxtaposition, criticism, or contrary viewpoints. It doesn't have to be a clean attachment of what is already known or approved. The importance of dialectic, as Willingham points out, is that it can improve understanding and, to my mind, it create new understandings as well. This is the essence of creativity.
Ken Robinson's neo-Platonist idea – that we are born creative and have it driven out by our schooling, and that we need schools to help us 'find' our métier – needs further exploration. Whether someone is born a dancer or a musician, like the vegetation in Death Valley, as Robinson argues, they await the nourishing rain to enable them to reach their potential. If instead they are more of a _tabula rasa_ and, through nurture, find themselves becoming a great dancer or a musician, in the great scheme of things, this doesn't matter. Schools should enable us to work towards something, over time, in an authentic way. This should be part of a broad curriculum that enables children to explore possibilities and this is where _logos_ is understood. I disagree with Robinson that in order to do this we must 'disenthrall' ourselves from tradition. In my view, we engage with common sense. We don't treat it as the enemy of progress, but as part of the highly creative meeting place of the three arts of the trivium.
Chapter 13
# The Grammarians vs the Dialecticians
All political arguments need to begin with an appreciation of our relationship not only to dreams of future betterment, but also to past achievements: our own and those of our predecessors.
Tony Judt, _Ill Fares the Land_
Think tanks and parliaments echo to the sound of the great education debate, which also reflects the schism between traditionalists and progressives. The education we want for our children in the 21st century is highly political. As parents we are faced with choices that question our principles. We negotiate with our own thoughts and those of our partners, our children, and other parents who congregate outside the school gates waiting to pick up their offspring.
The education that my wife and I want for our daughter is also an emotional decision based on how we feel about what is available. The schools on offer are either progressive or traditional – the state ones veering towards the former, the independent ones towards the latter. To select a school for our child we are faced with the great class divide. England has one of the most socially divisive education systems in the world. This division is not just about how schools are funded or organized, but extends to what and how children are taught and assessed.
In _The Righteous Mind_ (2012), the moral psychologist Jonathan Haidt writes about how our intrinsic morality divides 'liberals' and 'conservatives'. If a progressive teacher sees a classroom of rows of children passively absorbing knowledge from teacher talk, they react as emotionally as a traditionalist teacher might if faced with the advice that they might be a better educator if they tried more group-work. Haidt's work echoes the ideas of the philosopher David Hume. Where Hume saw reason as the slave to emotion, Haidt sees the relationship as an elephant and its rider. The elephant of our emotion reacts to a situation, to an argument, by moving one way or another; this lurch affects our conscious self, the rider. Haidt believes our intrinsic moral 'taste' receptors drive our elephant in a conservative, liberal, or libertarian direction; then we use our capacity to reason to justify the way we have turned.
If our moral taste receptors incline us towards one of the three arts of the trivium, then the case that I make in this book – that conservative thinking tends towards traditional grammarian ideas, and liberal thinking towards the progressive dialectical – suggests that what we do is based on an emotional reaction rather than on reason. This means that accommodating both traditions, rather than defeating one side or the other, cannot be achieved through reason alone.
For this book, I wanted to talk to individuals who considered themselves to be either progressive or conservative to see if it was possible to ascertain how they feel, as well as reason, about how to achieve a conscious coming together of the three arts. For this to happen, conservatives or traditionalists will need to be persuaded to accept the merits of dialectic; liberals or progressives will need to see the necessity of the tradition of grammar. If I can do this, I will have succeeded.
In Chapter 2, I discussed Ferdinand Mount and his notion that the progressive versus traditionalist argument in education was exemplified in the proffering of the hemlock cup to Socrates. Mount is known as a one-nation Conservative. He is a baronet, although he does not use his title, and is related to Prime Minister David Cameron. He wrote the 1983 Conservative manifesto for Margaret Thatcher, for whom he was head of the Number 10 policy unit from 1982–1984. He has more recently written a couple of highly eloquent books, _Mind the Gap_ (2010) and _The New Few_ (2012), which look at rising inequality and the increasing gap between 'them' and 'us'. Some people assert that this trend began during the very government for which he worked, but I am more interested in the fact that this conservative thinker is sensitive to issues that might be construed as being the concerns of progressives. Mount was also one of the few people who had heard of the trivium. He had this to say:
' _Bring back the Trivium' is a slogan that warms my heart. There is indeed a false opposition between the critical and the absorptive school of education. One cannot function without the other. It is impossible to make proper critical judgements without a secure base of knowledge. But it is also impossible for that base to be secure if we have not brought a critical intelligence to bear on the information being thrown at us. We have to assess its reliability, its relative importance, and its relation to other facts. It is when you are listening and learning that you should be thinking hardest_.
This is a thoughtful description of what the trivium does, and his comment about the order in which grammar and dialectic are introduced is important. Can our critical faculties be developed in such a way that we can dispense with the need to know first, and can just retrieve it whenever or wherever through our 24/7 access to technology, as some have argued? Mount was emphatic:
_First, what I think very strongly is that knowledge must precede criticism, scepticism, contemplation, and all the other desirable stances. Without information, such stances are merely shallow posing. The [global] warmists point to melting glaciers and icebergs in the Arctic; the sceptics point out the relatively modest changes in global temperatures and thickening ice in much of the Antarctic. The enriching of knowledge is an essential preliminary to questioning received wisdoms. Thus comparative religion is not intrinsically_ _a diversion from, or a challenge to, faith. Many great theologians have found it inspirational. Ditto multiculturalism_.
So, when should the process of questioning perceived wisdom begin?
_As for how we improve theories and paradigms by refining, testing, and arguing, all this seems to me not irrelevant to teaching children how to think. But to pretend that such epistemological questions can constitute the central activity of the Lower Fifth [i.e. pre-16] is, I think, premature. The golden years of maximum brain activity should be spent principally in absorbing, in reading and listening to every conceivable source of knowledge. And rote learning, in all its forms, is an essential discipline in acquiring intellectual muscle_.
Mount's argument here is, essentially, a strong grammarian one; although he sees the absolute need for critical thought, he says that it should arrive later than most schooling, in sixth form and university. This is not my view, but I do take his point that knowledge needs to be the absolute beginning of argument. I am disappointed that he does not see that dialectic has a role far earlier in education. It seems that the traditionalist elephant might be very difficult to steer. My quest might be more difficult than I hoped. How about the progressive elephants – how easy are they to steer?
I thought I would ask Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the Royal Society of Arts (RSA) and previously chief advisor to former Prime Minister Tony Blair. The RSA has a long history of involvement in education in Britain – it runs a chain of academy schools and promotes the RSA Opening Minds competency-based curriculum. Taylor sent his children to state comprehensive schools. As such, he is well placed to have a view on the progressive agenda in education. I asked him if he thought the debate between the progressives and the traditionalists had been damaging to education. His reply was heartening:
_I think there has been an unhelpful, lazy dichotomy which puts facts and traditional didactic teaching on the one hand, and then puts concepts, skills, competencies, and engaging, project-based teaching on the other. So, what one understands a lot of the time is that you should teach facts and grammar, and it should be taught in a fairly traditional way, versus a caricature of competencies, in which children work on projects where there is a much greater emphasis on engagement and the development of skills, competencies, and insights, rather than an emphasis on subject and fact._
_Now, of course, neither side would accept that account. I do think facts are important and it is essential to learning that you learn some of the facts, because facts are the basis for building up conceptual knowledge. I'd like to get out of that dichotomy though; because I think what's interesting is the possibility of teaching facts in engaging ways. So, I'm drawn to video games and video technology and reward systems as ways of getting kids to learn facts._
This sounds as though there is the possibility that, on the progressive side at least, there is a way to accommodate the traditionalist's view of the importance of knowledge. The rub might come when I question the validity of a history curriculum, for instance, that is heavily based on our island story, kings and queens, and heroes and heroines of our past:
_It seems to me there are real problems about that because it requires us to give a highly partial account, and I wonder who has the right to say that children should learn a particular history of our 'great island nation'. I'm not suggesting for a moment that one needs to feel shame about Britain's past. But the suggestion that Britain's past is great, in the face of national_ _decline? Some of the effects of the Empire which continue right up to this day... You're basically saying you should learn history as ideology_.
If content is a problem, what about the reason for that content? Can it act as a kind of cultural glue for our country?
_I support the idea that it is good for young people to learn similar things, so there are things they have in common that they can talk about, but that's where I get confused. Why are people saying all we are learning about is the Tudors and the Nazis? Because, if we are all learning about Nazis, at least children can talk to each other about the Nazis. I don't quite get what this argument is._
_If it is that people should learn the chronology of kings and queens, I'm not actually opposed to that, because it's like the times tables. It's saying that the foundation for history is the understanding of chronology. Fine. But I would be guided by historians about whether or not that is the factual base necessary for deeper conceptual understanding. It seems to me ludicrous not to be guided by the subject experts._
_It's exactly the same with the sciences. I have a predisposition about science as somebody who didn't like science at school, and regrets it deeply, because I think science should start with the big, exciting, amazing, Brysonesque 'Isn't science crazy?' stuff and then work back. Primary schoolchildren should be told things like, 'Do you know that atoms are so small that if an apple had been created on the day that the universe was created, and we took one atom from that apple for every second since the Big Bang, we'd still have half the apple left!' We should start with wonder and when kids start to say, 'That's amazing,' you say, 'Well, OK, but do you want to understand why and how?'_
Taylor sees knowledge as vital and he recognizes the importance of fundamental subject knowledge and skills. There might be a way for him to accommodate much of the traditionalist agenda, if it were to come from 'experts'. He does have an issue, though, with how topics are taught. As he suggests, it's the old 'grammar is boring' conundrum: 'Could progressives recognize the importance of facts, but then could the traditionalists recognize the importance of getting children to learn facts in really innovative, engaging, funny, and fun ways?'
I explored this further with Phillip Blond, the director of the centre-right think tank ResPublica. He is a conservative political thinker with a background in philosophy and theology. I wondered what he thought the correct balance should be between grammar and dialectic, between being told what to learn and having a degree of autonomy to criticize or become an independent learner:
_For myself, I was only able to learn in my mid-20s – there is a point in the education cycle where you do start reading for yourself. But I think the reason that the goal of the self-authoring self or of educational autonomy is rubbish is because, to paraphrase Newton, we all stand on the shoulders of giants. We only make progress because others have made progress before us, and really the key is to learn the tradition before you can innovate or before you can build on it. It's this idea of perpetual autonomy that has produced such poor educational results. There's nothing progressive about this so-called progressive method because, I think, it might apply to talented people earlier in life, their early teens, and less talented people later in life, but even the most talented people learn from others_.
I'm going to find this more difficult than perhaps I thought. Do you draw out the ability from the child or put it in?
_There is something to be brought out of children and that is particular inclinations or talents. They are somewhat innate, but they are also switched on by the environment. But, by the same token, part of education is_ _increasing your peripheral awareness, deepening and broadening yourself. You are able to drill deeper if you have a wider base to support you_.
I ask Blond to reflect on whether this base should just be traditional 'knowledge' or include the idea, beloved of progressives, of competencies and skills:
_The point is we need a new level of intellectual, cultural capital. We need a new hardware – people who can do maths, computing, design – and we also need a new software – interpersonal skills, the ability to learn, human kindness, trust, responsibility. All of these soft skills are absolutely a prerequisite for utilizing the hard skills, and, of course, vice versa_.
So, I ask him, by way of summing up, whether education policy is just a battle between the old and the new:
_I tend to think this is all about being a human being. It's very simple. Human beings are progressive creatures, in the sense that they proceed on the achievements of others. Otherwise, we would be static beings still living in caves. Therefore, we have to learn what others have given us; we then create a legacy for our future_.
Nick Pearce is the director of the left-leaning think tank, the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR). Before that he ran the Downing Street Policy Unit and was also a special advisor to David Blunkett when he was the education secretary. He co-wrote _Wasted Youth_ (Pearce and Hillman, 1998) and has co-edited several books, including _Politics for a New Generation_ (Pearce and Margo, 2007) and _Tomorrow's Citizens_ (Pearce and Hallgarten, 2000). I asked Pearce how the progressive left would deal with, for example, selecting knowledge or facts based on the canon:
_Things are much more fluid, open, and contested than they used to be. I think that critical reflection does require you to have been inside 'something' and does require that constant process of engagement. It isn't something that you can either arrive at, never having been taught it in the first place, or be taught a 'shriveled' version of, or taught skills that don't enable you to reflect on it because they are specious, thin, or vacuous_.
This means that you need to be taught the 'great tradition' in order to criticize it, and you need critical faculties that are sufficiently developed in order to make any criticism, whether to attack or to defend:
_Some Conservatives would say we've been forcibly cut off from our history by the left and, I suppose, in response to that you'd say to them that history has always been much more contested than you ever give it credit for. There are plenty of other voices in that history and if it weren't for, for example, feminists and others, it would never be brought to light_.
This is exactly my point: for progressives it should be a debate, it should be contested. What does modernity lose from tradition if the progressives have a year-zero approach? Can the left embrace ideas about the ground they have abandoned (such as ideas around civilization)? Has this ground been completely abandoned to people like Roger Scruton?
_Scruton is interesting because I think his book_ , England: An Elegy, _is beautifully written, and you learn some very deep things from it. The ability of Conservatives like Scruton to connect you to an account of the historical past that is rich and real, when trying to think about your national identity, contrasts very sharply with people on the left who try to connect with national identity and end up saying, 'Let's have a St George's Day Bank Holiday and wave the flag a bit more.' It ends up being very thin because_ _they can't connect. They don't have, as Scruton's book has, 'the Law, the Church, and the land'._
_Now what would be your left equivalent? You end up with a Tony Benn, 'Yes, I know about English history and I'll bring you the Diggers, Winstanley, and things like that.'They're meaningless to lots of people today. Billy Bragg has a much more modern sensibility, but he tries to turn it into a set of dispositions and values. It tends to be a love of England because it's a bit spiky, and you get lists of people's favourite composers or authors. Conservatives, though, are able to rest on these big building blocks of tradition_.
Can these big building blocks of tradition be thought of as high culture or are they simply a bourgeois construct?
_I've always resisted the post-modern claim that 'high' and 'low' is an artificial construct, that popular culture is every bit as valuable as anything that the bourgeoisie have philosophically called 'high culture'. After all, there must be some inherent properties of art or beauty that are not simply a function of how they are received by human beings in any particular social configuration. If you deny people their own cultural expression and the validity of anything they experience in their own cultural lives, then you're in the business of exclusion and oppression. But if you simply validate everything people do in their own daily lives, if you say 'culture' is simply anything that you consume and produce, anything that people in advertising and marketing departments are able to put down your throat, then you're into the endorsement of things that have less value than they should in our civilization_.
This is a real breakthrough. It seems that there is the possibility that some progressives can see and, importantly, feel the importance of cultural tradition. Similarly, that there is substance in a tradition that can act, in its own way, as a critique on the modernity driven by the market.
Sam Freedman was one of the senior policy advisors in the Department for Education from 2010–2013. Formerly of the highly influential think tank Policy Exchange, Freedman helped devise the Conservative Party's free school policy. I asked Freedman whether there was a need to teach the canon (i.e. grammar) at an early age, especially now that he has young children himself. Is teaching it somehow lacking in variety or being uncreative?
_I think you can have the same canon of material given to kids and they'll treat it in very different ways with their teachers. They'll bounce off it in different ways. If you look at the creative industries in this country, they are dominated by people who went to very traditional public schools, partly because their parents could afford to indulge their interest, but also because being able to bounce off the canon is a very good starting point for moving into a creative industry_.
Is the canon a product of our class system? The values of the bourgeois persist. So is a certain type of cultural capital always going to be out of the hands of those who can't afford to indulge their children?
_A fairly obvious point about cultural capital is that people, like me, make sure that their children have lots of books, which is why you have the gap starting very, very early. This is why we're throwing so much money at sending two-year-olds to nurseries_.
To take them away from their parents?
_There are two models of schools that are really good at closing the gap between rich and poor kids. There is one with massive parental engagement: spending a huge amount of time with the parents, helping them to read as well as their kids. And then there's the other one which says, 'Sorry, parents_ _out! We'll lock the door and you can come and get them at 6 o'clock. We've been with them all day, we've 'cultured' them, given them social norms and culture. In fact, we'll send them to a boarding school in another county to get them away from this environment.' And actually they both work_.
And is there a moral equivalence?
_I think so, as long as there's consent, definitely. Probably the first is more sustainable because it's cheaper and easier than just creating fortresses all over the place. But I think they both work, which is quite interesting. Whether the second model works when the kid leaves the school is a very interesting question. They can get the social norms, they can get the culture, but when they're sent back out into the community, can they cope_?
So, is cultural capital more important than poverty in determining a child's future?
_What would I cite? Chinese families: although the Chinese sample in this country is fairly small, it is very stark. The same is true of lots of smaller ethnic groups: Indian families, Ghanaian and West African families, Jewish families, even very poor Jewish families. The only groups where there is a big gap are white – both boys and girls, but especially boys – as well as Afro-Caribbean boys and the Pakistani community. What are the similarities between those three groups? They don't have 'cultural capital' in their societies, whereas your middle-class Ghanaian, Indian, and Chinese, even if they're poor here, do have that cultural capital_.
I ask Freedman about his experience of schools, such as KIPP and charter schools, in the United States, and whether he can explain to me the job title, Director of Culture:
_What I discovered when I was in New Orleans is that a lot of schools had someone whose job it was to make sure that the school's particular set of values are in every part of the curriculum and in every lesson – completely consistent throughout the school. Every teacher is reinforcing them. A lot of it is to do with behaviour_.
So, is there any space for eccentricity and difference if the system is overly rigidified?
_A good system will say, 'Here are the values and norms we are promoting as a school, here is the literacy model we are using', etc., but will still give plenty of scope. One of the most interesting lessons I went into when I was in New Orleans was in one of the KIPP schools. It was a brilliant history lesson about war. The teacher was comparing the American Civil War with the Iraq War and how war had changed over time, and whether it was morally different if you had fewer people dying. The pupils must have been about 11. At the same time he was also reinforcing the school's set of values, he was focusing on literacy, etc. It doesn't mean you can't do a really interesting lesson, if it's done right. But it's a difficult thing to do, obviously, or education would be easy_.
Here is another breakthrough: a lesson that goes beyond teaching just the chronological facts but also one that highlights dialectic and difficulty. I continue my questions: does Freedman have any thoughts about the movement to include behaviours and competencies in the curriculum – creativity, global awareness, teamwork, and so on?
_Those sorts of things are not something that a curriculum can do. It's the wrong place to try and get that stuff to happen. The curriculum is the place where you say, 'We think you should know this stuff and be able to do these things.' On top of that, the school then has to work out the values – they have to come from the school. We are saying that a curriculum that says that kids should be creative is of no use to anybody. That has to come from the school. A curriculum is a document, it's simply a guide to where kids should be at each age in terms of what they should know and be able to do and as a basis for assessment. If you are going to have national assessment you need a basis for national assessment_.
This issue about the distinction between knowledge and skills also came up when I asked Nick Pearce what he thought about the skills-based curriculum and why it was part of the 'progressive' agenda in education. Pearce said:
_In the 1980s you had the introduction of competence-based qualifications: NVQs. This came from the right, not the left. It was explicitly based on behaviourism, which said, 'You don't need to understand what goes on in their head. You don't need to look for depth, knowledge, and understanding. You just need to know whether someone is competent at doing a task.' This concept of skills came to be associated with a very narrow and thin understanding of critical faculties. Essentially, skills came to be associated with a quite 'bureaucratized' and limited understanding of competence and performance and that had, I think, deleterious consequences for vocational education. It also had deleterious consequences for liberal thinking about education too, because people took the view that subject knowledge didn't matter; that what mattered was the ability to reflect on yourself, learn about yourself, etc. I find that a very thin, unsatisfactory, and ultimately wrong_ _approach and I also think it does a huge disservice to the liberal education tradition_.
Melissa Benn is a passionate advocate for state comprehensive education. She is co-founder of the Local Schools Network and is author of _School Wars_ (2012), in which she argues for a fair, non-selective education based on the idea of 'universal excellence'. I asked her about the familiar battle between high and low culture and what should be taught in our schools. She responded with a simple distinction: 'One of the things that I think is very important is difficulty. Learning, to me, is about how much you engage with difficulty. Bob Dylan is difficult, it's popular culture, but it's difficult.' I ask her about the teaching of knowledge and cultural capital and she was very clear:
_When I hear people in debates say that there is no need to teach knowledge because you can just look it up on Google, I think that is profoundly wrong. Knowledge has to have roots. You have to feel it matters and to know why it matters, to know why knowledge is important. I don't think the Google paradigm does that at all. It's not about simply accessing something. It's about it being part of the beginning of your understanding of the world. You inhabit it. You interrogate it. You reject bits of it and then create your own traditions. When you grow up in a tradition, you tend to take it for granted, you don't see it; but that's cultural capital, isn't it? The more you know the more you want to know, and the more you know the more you can argue about what you know, and it all becomes very interesting. Whereas if you don't have any basic knowledge, you're into a very different kind of thing, living in a moment that has no meaning, has no passion, and goes nowhere_.
Benn goes on to talk about her own experience at one of Britain's first state comprehensive schools, of which she has fond memories. It was, in the main, a positive experience. However:
_I loved my schooling – but I have gaps in my education, particularly in science. Partly adolescent inattention, partly down to the more laid-back approach of the seventies where teaching was more dependent on the individual quality of the teacher. My elder daughter has 11 GCSEs at A and A* but at times I would have wished for more engagement with learning. I think there is a generation that has been totally switched off literature and criticism, because mostly it's just box ticking_.
This word 'efficient' set me thinking: Should education be efficient?
_Progressivism, for me, is about quality in education and freedom of exploration. I believe in school autonomy – we do need a national curriculum with a broad and balanced entitlement but with autonomy of delivery. I think with that, along with high teacher quality and certain other changes like smaller classes, you could begin to bring in a richer, less efficient, and more progressive model in schools._
_The trouble with the [traditional] private schools and the grammar schools is that they create the philosopher kings – literally, socially, and intellectually. By definition they make everyone else supermarket oiks_.
This is very tricky. If we aim high will we always be disappointed?
_In my own experience, school set me up to know and to like to learn, to have an appetite for learning. I can remember coming out of the London School of Economics and all I came out with is a list of what I didn't know, which was positive. Interaction is a hugely important part of education, as Stefan Collini said, 'To be stimulated by someone, to be amused by someone, even_ _to be frightened by someone you're learning from, is a very important part of the education experience.' And that was so true. When I was at school there were inspiring teachers – and I see that with my girls. If they are interested in someone it will inspire them in terms of the subject._
_That happened to me at university. My personal tutor was David Starkey, the historian. No point of interest or common ground, but the fact that he was such a brilliant lecturer, the fact that if I wanted to argue with him I'd better know my stuff, all of that was an important, small part of my education. It was more important than meeting a boring left-wing person I might agree with_.
This brings me to dialectic. It seems that progressives can accept the value of teaching tradition as part of a rounded education. Where there is more of a problem, perhaps, is whether traditionalists can see the point of teaching tradition in a way that opens it up to criticism, and whether it can be added to or changed as history moves.
## Dialectic
I put Alain de Botton's point that modern society does not want a questioning population to Phillip Blond. Do the powers that be really want a self-conscious citizenry?
_I disagree with the great man, because modern capitalist society does want everyone to question everything; therefore they believe in nothing, therefore you can do whatever you want with them. The opposite is true. The nihilist questions everything and then they die. Only people who believe in things can create, construct, work with others, and build from there._
If creating and constructing things is only possible without criticism, we should not teach children to criticize then?
_I always used to forbid my students from disagreeing with me, because they didn't have minds which they could make up yet because they weren't tutored. You need to know first before you can disagree with what you know. Whereas, at the moment, we disagree that we know, even though we claim we are knowing something, precisely because we are disagreeing that we don't know it! It's a mutually contradictory position. A lot of debate is interminable relativist nonsense; until we have teleological education we can't get proper disagreement. What I mean by teleological is education towards an end – that could be an educated man or woman, and an account of what that might be. The point is, at the moment, what passes for disagreement is laughable, 'It's OK to eat people; it's not OK to eat people_.'
So, disagreement has its place: criticism can be part of education if we can forge some sort of agreement about what the ultimate aim for education should be. If that aim is positive and constructive then the act of criticism is contextualized; it is not just an aim in itself. Perhaps it is about enriching the process of learning?
Max Wind-Cowie works under the auspices of the centre-left think tank Demos and heads their Progressive Conservatism Project. If anyone can pull traditionalism and progressivism together it should be him! In his pamphlet, _A Place for Pride_ (2011), Max and his co-author, Thomas Gregory, come to the conclusion that education is central to the task of community cohesion, generating pride in one's country, and promoting social networks and social engagement – the proper foundation of a real Big Society.
So, does he agree with Alain de Botton's point that for the 'powers that be' questioning citizens are not wanted?
_Well, I don't agree, but I don't want to raise generations of people who respond to everything and everyone with cynicism – I think that is the danger. The problem with critical thinking is that it doesn't encourage children to distinguish between areas where scepticism and cynicism are warranted and areas where they are not. As a Conservative, I would say that the areas where scepticism and cynicism are less warranted – the institutions that are established as part of civic life, that have a history and a tradition behind them, and have a role in our civic life – are not things that you should be spending as much time questioning as, for example, websites you find on the internet. I believe that there are institutions that we should be raising children to a large degree to accept as benign. Then there is a plethora of other sources of information, guidance, and convictions that we should be teaching children to be deeply sceptical about_.
Does the British tradition not include dissent?
_It is the 'dough' effect: the way you make the British loaf is that you keep kneading it, rolling it, and incorporating, but it doesn't crush dissent, crush questioning, or crush reform. It incorporates just enough of it; that is the strength of all British institutions. It's why they have been strong. But your dissent from an institution is only justified if you have participated in it. Those institutions can only incorporate your dissent, your reform, your call to action, if you're part of them. Otherwise, what you are doing – it's the difference between questioning and being cynical – is standing outside of those institutions and criticizing, which makes you (I can't think of a nice way to say this) no better than a foreigner in the purest sense of that word. What I mean is that, rather than participating as a virtuous citizen, you are non-participating_.
But in most case the outsider is kept outside, they are not invited in. They are excluded by the prejudices that have accrued over time, not being born in the right family or in the right place. Is it any wonder that some people stand outside and hurl rocks, it's not through choice is it?
_I do think that is right, but I would also make a plea for the paradox of British institutions. We have cultivated a set of institutions which sit outside the state, which enable you to participate in civic institutions while opposing them, which I think is an almost unique part of British civic life. The throwing rocks thing is an interesting one; for instance, when we look at the way in which the London riots took off. These are, presumably, exactly the sort of people who feel like they are not part of any institution, and we have failed to incorporate them, like air, into the dough_.
_One of the reasons we have failed is that we have not, in education, made an effort to explain to young people that there is a difference between 'being an individual' and individualization. There is a difference between saying, 'I have a set of opinions and I want to bring those opinions to the public square and I want to win an argument about this,' and saying, 'I have a set of opinions – you can't tell me I'm wrong because they're my opinion, and therefore there is nothing for us to discuss_.'
_Education has adopted the latter model to far too great a degree. It respects the individual's right to an opinion, respects the individual's right to question, all of which is good. But it then says that there's no need for deliberation to reach agreement or compromise, because I've respected your right to an opinion, you've respected my right to mine, and we'll leave it at that. The phrase 'We'll agree to disagree' is the most hateful phrase in the English Language. You can't just agree to disagree if you are going to be part of a social group_.
Is this the difference between dialogue and dialectic?
_I would say that dialogue that doesn't go anywhere, that doesn't aim at a conclusion, leads to people throwing rocks. Encouraging young people to participate in debate is a really good thing, but debate for debate's sake_ – _that all you need to do is have an opinion and that your opinion is somehow sacred and that is what defines you – this is encouraging a profound alienation_.
This is a crucial difference coming through from the right. Self-directed learning is not, of itself, a good thing because it can be so destructive to society. There is a difference between the self-authored self and the need to develop agency and independence whilst existing within society. This is the difference that is expressed in cultural theory as the distinction between the horizontal and vertical transfer of knowledge. There is a danger in a skills-oriented curriculum, or when teaching critical thinking, that the vertical transfer of values and knowledge is destroyed or dismissed in a way that causes the destruction of society itself. The traditionalists can accept the importance of criticism if the overall aim of schooling is clear – that this is criticism with a purpose. The purpose is framed by the aims but also through the focus provided by the third art of the trivium, rhetoric.
I ask Wind-Cowie about the aims of education:
_Fundamentally it's about character. I think it's important to move away from purely individual-based assessment, not because it's somehow appalling how some people do better than others, but because we shouldn't believe that what we achieve is purely down to us in every sphere of our lives. Rather, it's about the interplay of you and the other people around you. The important thing about being in a class is that you are part of a social institution. You are, in your own little way, a town square, and that is important_.
Can there be a really diverse social make-up to that square?
_I obviously do believe that schools are there to socially engineer and I think that schools that have a mixture of backgrounds are better than schools that_ _have an incredibly homogenous intake. Schools are important to this, but we can't just rely on schools_.
Many schools run breakfast clubs and after-school clubs, and they are heavily involved in childcare. Some would argue that is their most important role: keeping kids off the streets. Does Wind-Cowie approve of this of wrap-around care?
_This is quite wrong. The school shouldn't be the whole of your identity. It is paradoxical that you want schools to be forging identities and to be strong institutions that help protect children from ever-increasing circles of ignorance. But what you don't want is schools to be the only institution in children's lives, which is one of the dangers of the obsession for turning schools into parenting institutions_.
I then move on to the idea of rhetoric, and the opportunities that students have to show their learning. Nowadays, for most students, this is the exam, but aren't there other ways we should be encouraging students to show their learning and different ways of assessing it? I ask Wind-Cowie whether participation should be a formal part of what is taught and, ultimately, assessed:
_It's appropriate that we test children because we need some way of ordering children on their way out. I would like to see assessment take account of both knowledge and skills, in a way that it does in some areas of the curriculum incredibly well. But I would also like assessment to take account of the degree to which young people have exposed themselves to participation, have involved themselves in strengthening and facilitating the institution they've been part of_.
How to approach assessment and what it is for is another area of contention. Matthew Taylor of the RSA pointed out:
_Policy makers have been trying for 25 years to say that all children should reach a certain academic threshold. That was never the case before. This is a new mission. It was the case, until 30 years ago, that we accepted that quite a lot of young people would reach a very low level academic threshold. We weren't that worried that they couldn't read or add up very much because they would go and work in factories. These jobs don't exist anymore. Even low-paid jobs now require you to be able to communicate and have different kinds of skills. So let's compare like with like._
_I've heard people deride higher education and say it's been devalued by people doing degrees in golf management, but there's no evidence at all that that's impacted on the elite. It's like arguing that the more children there are playing football on a Sunday, the more that damages Wayne Rooney's performance. We have systematically expanded higher education and, yes, there are people who are less academically adept who are going into higher education, but we are trying to get more pupils to achieve an academic threshold than we did in the past_.
Making it easier for children to pass exams by bringing in modular learning and some 'easier' vocational qualifications has become a battleground. Taylor responded to the accusations from some Conservatives that education has been dumbed down:
_Because we have set it as a social goal that we want all children to attain a certain level, and to stay on now until 18, we're having to resort to a different set of methods and techniques, such as modular learning, BTECs, and all these types of things. But what's the point in having a system of learning and accreditation where 60% of the kids are going to fail? The evidence is that attainment has risen, but it hasn't risen as fast as accreditation, so we have deliberately made it easier for more children to reach the standards that we set at 16 and also to go to university_.
_That hasn't lowered standards. It's just that we have the deliberate policy of social engineering. The number of children staying on throughout education has risen far faster than the underlying increase in IQs and attainment. I don't see what's wrong with that. Meanwhile, the evidence suggests that, in relation to the worst secondary schools, there has been a major step forward in the last 10 or 15 years. There are very few disastrously failing schools now_.
Taylor admits that standards have been made easier in order to socially engineer an increase in the number of students attending university. But what effect has this undoubted improvement in numbers passing exams had on the quality of education? Here is Phillip Blond again:
_Modern schools are often utilitarian factories that fail to produce either individual happiness or general happiness. They teach to an end that isn't actually an end, because most students don't even come out with excellent exam results, but then follow a course in life that is predicated on the exams that they do. I think that schools have to be more than that, and that means a broader and more – I hesitate to use the word – 'liberal' curriculum, with a less formal account of what success is. Exams and academic excellence have to be a part of it – success in exams shows_ something _– but our exam system is manipulation. It is rote learning. It has no critical elements in it. It doesn't give you any indication of critical or intellectual imagination or capacity. I don't really have any faith in exams. An 'A' at A level – who knows what that means_?
Now we seem to be getting somewhere: a call for a broader curriculum, exams with more critical and imaginative elements, and an appeal for the importance of less formal experiences to be given a higher importance – what I refer to as 'the authentic curriculum'. I asked Blond whether, if exams are manipulative, the idea of targets exacerbate this problem:
_It's the general perversion of targets. The more you use a proxy to stand in for the real thing, then the more you measure things by a proxy and the more you tend to realize the proxy over the real thing. I think you should set objective standards that are richer (beyond just the exam results), but you also become entirely indifferent to how those standards are realized. You are entirely free and happy to pursue excellence, a broad account of excellence, but you don't centralize, you don't standardize, and you don't determine. You're free with regard to how you fulfil, as long as you fulfil. But the matrix that you fulfil has to be a richer one than the current paradigms._
_I believe in principles and outcomes. I believe in teleological education and I think that, almost from the beginning, as a child, what you really need is a vision as to what you should become. You copy an ideal you want to fulfil and direct your life that way – and that's what's lacking from education at the moment._
Part of learning to disagree properly is to practise it; it is part of the journey towards wisdom. So, what would be a worthwhile goal for education – the pursuit of wisdom or a good life?
_They are both teleological. I prefer the good life. I believe in virtue ethics and [Alasdair] MacIntyre and colleagues. I believe in flourishing as a model, and I think there are objective needs for human flourishing_.
Criteria-led marking has become part of our exam system. Students are told what they need to write in order to get a grade. This is not something that lets them develop their critical faculties and nor does it encourage unique viewpoints or arguments. It transpires that Nick Pearce had something to do with this while in government. He said:
_It's very hard for people in power to spend their time going through qualifications. When I was an advisor to David Blunkett, I worked quite closely with Tessa Blackstone on 14–18 qualifications. The centralization of the English state has meant that we literally sat in meetings deciding whether there should be a Critical Thinking AS/A level. Now, that is ridiculous! This should not be the responsibility of ministers. Power should be configured in our society so that the people who are responsible for those things are professionally equipped. You now have children told, 'In this paragraph you've got to make two points; in that paragraph you've got to make two points; your essay on Shakespeare is not complete unless it has this structure and says these things at each stage.' That is an absurdity_.
This is important stuff. The exam system is part of the problem, and part of that problem lies in the accountability of the exam system. If we are teaching kids how to answer questions 'properly', when they haven't got the slightest idea what they are talking about, then there is a real crisis. Exams should recognize the role of a well-structured and thought through argument, a dialectic that can sit outside the expected criteria. This is different from teaching children that there is a predetermined way to answer a question, and if you don't conform, you fail. The unexpected should be valued, not destroyed by assessment objectives which tell you what you should think. The art of dialectic is not served well in much of the current exam system; we should assess quality of argument as well as content.
How can we cultivate an education system that develops the whole person? Matthew Taylor again:
_Schools are complex institutions that not only have to address the needs of society, but also the desires of children and their parents. They are trying to do three things: they are trying to give children the knowledge they need; they are trying to give children the broader set of competencies and life skills and_ _predispositions which are important to their success; and they're trying to find children's enthusiasms and grow those enthusiasms, because if children feel enthusiastic about a subject or an activity, then that is the foundation from which much can grow. I think that schools should understand themselves to be places that are always wrestling with these three competing priorities – knowledge, competence, and enthusiasm. But it will never be resolved because these three things are complex. If I were critical of schools, primarily it would be their inability to integrate these things and create a more holistic development_.
I argued earlier that the relationship of knowledge to character is essential for a 21st-century trivium, so I am interested in what Taylor means by 'holistic development':
_Schools, as a whole, aren't nearly systematic enough at discovering children's enthusiasms. I think that is where the science has slightly changed things. Now, we know the 10,000 hour stuff, that if children spend enough time at something they will become very good at something. There is also Carol Dweck's work on the importance of effort and young people understanding that effort pays off – that success is not about innate ability, it's about effort. I think this reinforces the point about enthusiasms, because if you can find things that young people want to do, want to be good at, want to be adept at – whether it's football, painting, language, or whatever it might be – you can harness that enthusiasm and get them into the habit of recognizing that if you work hard at something, become good at it, then that is a bedrock for an attitude of mind and a theory of learning which is really empowering to young people_.
Bearing in mind that enthusiasm comes from the Greek word 'with God', as well as my ideas based on _logos_ (when someone pursuing a discipline through authentic experience and engagement has a profound learning experience), I asked Taylor whether _any_ enthusiasm is reasonable to pursue, even an interest in appearing on _The X Factor_ , for example:
_I don't think the problem is low aspirations. I think it is narrow aspirations. To get young people to think much more openly, and in a much more informed way, about the range of things they could choose as enthusiasms, and then support them in that, is a really big new task for schools. It's not about careers advice. Getting young people to reflect on what they want in life is an important role now for schools. I think Eton would lay open a lot of possibilities for things that you could do if you decided to make an effort, whether it was sport, medicine, or law. There would be lots of careers where children would know from their parents and their contacts that, if I work away at that, if I'm enthusiastic about that, I can reach this level. I think in working-class communities there are far fewer routes. It looks as though the only things you can get good at by working hard in them are_ The X Factor _and football_.
This, to me, seems to be about developing the capacities for a 'life well lived' or 'the good life'. It is certainly a far wider aspiration than just utilitarian skills for a working life. An important part of Trivium 21c is the idea of citizenship, but an authentic citizenship – one built from the study of authentic thoughts, ideas, and practices, experiencing and engaging with those ideas and practices, making them your own, and communicating or performing them. This, I suggest, is something far more useful for helping young people become engaged in our society than discrete lessons in citizenship. Taylor responds:
_I think we have to re-socialize public services. We need to blur the boundary between the public sector and civil society. We need to re-conceptualize many public services as being co-productions in which public servants work with service users and citizens to generate the shared social outcome. In the case of schools, I believe very strongly that schools need, for want of a better phrase, 'a new deal'. That deal is this: schools recognize that their role is not simply_ _to educate children between 8.45 a.m. and 3.15 p.m.; their role is to be beacons for a culture of learning in the wider community. The wider community, by the same token, needs to recognize its responsibility to be participants in the broad task of the socialization of young people_.
_So, we need to see that the job of the socialization of young people is a job that belongs to all of us. We are all involved. And that ripples down in all sorts of ways – mentoring, the way we interact with young people on the street, the role employers play with young people, the expectation that many more of us will support the work of schools in one way or another, and a much richer engagement of parents. Educating young people is the responsibility of the whole village, as it were. Schools that lead on that are going to have to throw themselves open. The RSA has been doing a project called the Area Based Curriculum Initiative in Peterborough, getting institutions – heritage and third-sector institutions – to genuinely work with schools on the co-creation of a local curriculum, one embedded in local institutions and local knowledge_.
This engagement between young people and the cultural heritage and traditions of local and national institutions and global concerns is essentially the work of citizenship. Citizenship is about authentic dialogue and rhetorical interactions based on a respect for tradition, as well as engaging with people who are radical, entrepreneurial, or challenge the status quo in some way. I asked Max Wind-Cowie whether marketization is working against compromise and just forming individuals who want to get what they can get:
_If we have an education system that is constructed on individual attainment and individual opinion then we're never going to be pushing children to form the kind of institutions that we want them to form, or to join the kinds of institutions that we want them to join. We have to start by recognizing that the individual within education is not the most important thing. It might be that the strengthening of the individual is the thing we're aiming for – after all, a virtuous citizen is a strong citizen – but the individual is not the_ _most important thing in the practice of education. The practice of education should be about groups and should be about encouraging people to do things together that makes things, solves things, or answers things in a way that encourages people to participate with one another. And that's not what we do_.
This is a surprise. I wasn't expecting to hear a defence of group work in schools from a traditionalist!
_Groups offer routes to socialization, to – let's be properly Marxist about this – collectivization, within schools, within education. The reason I think it's important to identify the group as being more important than the individual within the classroom and within the curriculum is not necessarily because I want that group to form its own institution, but because I want the individuals within that group to learn how to be in institutions, to learn how to adapt and bend that aspect of their will to institutions_.
Does this include the groups that come together through technology, social media, Twitter, and so on? Are these institutions suitably hierarchical or are they more anarchic?
_The internet can encourage the participant not to participate, it can encourage you to self-select, it can encourage you to bring groups together over which you have instant and ongoing consent, but you've got no particular obligation to it. The ease of the opt-out, the ease of self-selection are problematic things. But, having said that, there are, of course, opportunities for pre-existing institutions to use the internet in order to ensure that the role they have in people's lives is extended into this important sphere that is increasingly central to people's existence._
_There is also a crucial thing here –the internet allows you to persist in ever more eloquent ignorance. You can use the internet to exclude debate from your inner intellectual core, and that kind of fragmentation of learning_ _(which is the aim of self-directed learning – learning that it is fragmented and autonomous) is profoundly dangerous_.
Is this where we might find more agreement between progressives and traditionalists? The notion of the common life seems to echo what Matthew Taylor described in relation to the RSA's idea of the Area Based Curriculum. It is a theme that seems to be important to the left. Nick Pearce again:
_Democratic, mass, high-standard education is what we are aspiring to. Are you educating children together? Do your schools embody some notion of common life? How do you break down segregation into its different dimensions? You want your schools to be integral to the wider community, so that the sense of where the culture resides in the community and the responsibilities we have to our schools as adults – as well as parents and as members of the community – remains incredibly important. The function of schools of being integrated in the community and serving the community is not just about their intake and what they do, but also about their interconnections within that community. We have to re-establish some notion that education is a common enterprise. What is really important is equipping our children not just for their own success but for a common endeavour_.
Pearce praises the work of the Scandinavian children's centres, staffed by trained professionals, which serve to offset the disadvantages of the home environment:
_These centres build common life between us. They are not just a place where you can dump the kid; it's much more powerful than that. They are also building the social capital that comes with common life. For example, friendships are made across social classes and by parents as well as children_.
It is in this spirit that we can see education as a space that builds a common life, the common trivial place where the three roads meet. This is where grammar – the impulse to conserve the authority of tradition, our place of rules, precepts, and control – meets the critical, radical questioning of dialectic. It is also where we need the authenticity of _logos_ and the analysis of logic. It is where modernity meets tradition. It is here that we have the community, the conversation, the performance of our interactive lives, as well as the more formal aspects of performance that help build our character as individuals and as communities. To take a full part we are but philosopher kids in the pursuit of the good life.
The way to do this, to make the kind of school I would like to send my daughter to, is to listen to both the conservative and liberal impulses. So, here is my list of criteria for teaching in our schools:
Cultural capital should come from the teaching of knowledge and reflect the best that has been thought or said. This should involve complexity and difficulty, so there should be space for students to criticize, to think, and to develop their own character, as well as develop their own enthusiasms.
Schools should develop a curriculum that responds to change, as well as being rooted in a sensitive awareness of our traditions and how they are evolving. It should seek out academic, cultural, social, artistic, and physical challenges that are authentic, that stretch each child, and give them experiences they would not otherwise get.
Schools should teach the importance of a sceptical approach to both tradition and modernity. Children should be encouraged to be curious, to question and debate, but alongside the idea that the institution in which the debate takes place deserves its place in our civic society because it provides the space for that debate.
Schools should not serve the grammarian over the dialectician or the progressive over the traditionalist. Like parliament, the school is a fundamental institution in which debate takes place. The school I want for my daughter will enable her to leave with a wide range of interests and excitement about the continuing pursuit of wisdom.
We started this chapter with a one-nation Conservative, Ferdinand Mount. Let's end it with what the British Labour Party are attempting to do with the notion of one-nation politics. In his introduction to the pamphlet _One Nation Labour: Debating the Future_ (2013), Jon Cruddas MP writes about his vision for progressive politics, which is 'a politics that is both radical and conservative'. He believes that where there is 'a sense of belonging' and where there is 'the agreement of a common ground reached between different groups and interests' that this is 'the outcome of deliberation'. That is, crucially, 'a democratic process that is never completed and always contingent'. He sees the potential for 'a politics of togetherness' and 'a way of talking about the "we" while holding to the uniqueness of each individual'. Cruddas writes, 'The Conservative tradition has been a powerful national force... it gave many people meaning, value and a sense of belonging... But for all its good... [it] relied on deference to secure its power.' It is therefore a democratic aspiration rather than an authoritative one to join tradition and how to marry it to the 'best in modernity' through the rights to sit at the 'common table' and the obligations inherent in that role.
Education has a role to play, and the metaphor of sitting at the common table is akin to the common meeting place where the three roads meet. Cruddas is ascribing to One Nation Labour the same arguments that I have adduced for the trivium: the three roads – tradition, modernity, and the obligations to our shared community – meet and make common cause in a process that is always contingent and never complete.
Chapter 14
# The Contemporary Trivium
What did you learn in the morning?
How much did you know in the afternoon?
Were you content in the evening?
Did they teach you how to question when you were at the school?
Did the factory help you grow; were you the maker or the tool?
Did the place where you were living
Enrich your life and then
Did you reach some understanding of all your fellow men?
Ewan MacColl, 'Ballad of Accounting'
## The Magic Formula
In August 2012, the think tank IPPR published an essay by Michael Barber, Katelyn Donnelly, and Saad Rizvi called _Oceans of Innovation: The Atlantic, the Pacific, Global Leadership and the Future of Education_. Michael Barber is the chief education advisor to Pearson, the largest education company in the world. Previously he was head of Tony Blair's Delivery Unit (2001–2005). In the essay, they call for a radical 'whole system revolution' to meet the needs of the 21st century. The work is based on research about current international needs, especially economic ones, and how education needs to drive innovation, economic power, and leadership. They argue that the most successful education systems in the world need to rethink what they teach and how they teach it. The authors believe that innovation and entrepreneurship should be central to the education offer. They sum up their argument as to what that offer should be in an equation:
**Well-educated = E(K+T+L)**
where E = Ethics, K = Knowledge, T = Thought, and L = Leadership. Ethics is the way of being and doing exemplified by the institution and its relationships. By Knowledge they mean the type of knowledge to be taught in schools which is 'significant'. Thought is the type of (critical) thinking that goes back to Plato – it should be part of lessons rather than a separate subject. Leadership means communication, collaboration, and community.
This, then, is E(K+T+L). The contention here is not just that a curriculum of this kind would better prepare students for the 21st-century lives they will lead; it is also that the explicit combination of knowledge plus thinking plus leadership underpinned by ethics is the combination most likely to unleash in young people the qualities which will enable them to be innovative in their work and life and constructive in their engagement with communities at every level from the local to the global...
[C]ollectively we don't know yet how to achieve E(K+T+L) for every student. (Barber et al, 2012: 57, 60–61)
With this formula, it would appear that the wheel is being reinvented: at first sight it seems to be nothing more or less than the trivium as argued for in this book; clearly, it is a remarkably similar mantra. Not yet knowing how to achieve E(K+T+L) is perhaps due to the fact that the authors are looking only to the future and not to the past. How to achieve what Barber and his colleagues are calling for involves radical change – change that is rooted in the history of the trivium. It is to this that they should attend.
## The Spine
I am, therefore, agreeing with Michael Barber when I state that a great education is one that balances the three roads of the trivium and gives education a spine on which to build. There might be a chasm between progressive and traditionalist thinkers, but in many classrooms I have a suspicion that a more pragmatic approach occurs already. Teachers are probably adept at pulling together both traditions in practical ways. It is teachers, in the main, to whom I address this chapter.
In my drama teaching, I found a key for unlocking the students' creative abilities: the mantra. Once they had the mantra in place, they became independent learners. It was by using this mantra that students made art happen, independent of their teacher. In the process, understanding was delayed. We lived with uncertainty for as long as possible, in an unresolved fluid reality that allowed us to explore a variety of emotional and intellectual responses, individually and in groups. We cogitated, played, analysed and experimented. With discipline and focus we explored the rules and the precepts. Finally, we began practising the art. The imposed limitations had led to a creative freedom. This was revealed in a wide variety of ways of seeing, reconstructing, and representing and communicating experience. This was learning as an art form. The process had begun with constraints, rules and precepts; the end was independent children capable of open and free expression.
This is how art works. At its heart, the trivium is a creative process. And it has led me to propose that the trivium is a mantra which can have wider application in all branches of education. It suggests how education could work in the 21st century. But it needs firm foundations. In order to be critical and creative, kids need to know stuff, to have a good grasp of the basics, the grammar of a topic. Only then can they become creative, critical citizens fully engaged in the complexities of our communication age, yet also responsive to and knowledgeable of our rich and varied history and culture.
What follows are some ideas about what Trivium 21c, as a spine for schooling, might look like. This is not 'the method': it is intended as a starting point. The suggestions are drawn from across the great education divide and the wide spectrum of theories and practices. It is not exhaustive and you might have better ideas. These are but fragments of the whole, drawing together ideas in a way that works more formally than a pick-and-mix pedagogy. Although there is a good degree of crossover between the three arts of the trivium, there may well be disagreement about where to place some of the components.
If I were to give the movement a title it would have to be a _dissoi logoi_ : Progressive Traditionalism. Trivium 21c encompasses the following aspects:
**Outcome:** The philosopher kid. Wisdom and the ability to live a good life. A respect for the best that has been thought or said, yet with the confidence to test it out, with the good grace to bow to acceptance, or cultivate doubt – sometimes anger – and a desire to add to or change, honouring progress as an equal to tradition yet able to question both. Importantly, an ability to take part in the great conversation and make a contribution towards our common life.
**Ethics:** With its roots in _logos_ and rhetoric, an ethical education points towards human flourishing: developing agency, enthusiasm, independence, leadership, and mastery; guided by principle, character, virtue, and ethical awareness; underpinned by questions about moral purpose. This gives rise to the philosopher kid, the Renaissance man or woman, the polymath.
**Trivium:** Taking on both the traditional and the progressive and valuing them both as important in education. Focusing on the need to communicate well in a variety of forms, such as speech, writing, arts, and crafts; enhanced through scepticism, engagement, and realization of the creative tension; cultivating dialogue and curiosity, mastery of learning.
**Grammar:** Knowledge, skills, tradition, authority, discipline, hierarchy, and cohesive cultural identity (including vertical transmission of knowledge), cultural and social capital, conjecture, 'finding out', connecting, treated with a degree of scepticism.
**Dialectic, logic, and _logos_ :** Analysis, critical thinking, philosophical enquiry, thought, discipline, deductive, inductive, and abductive reasoning, creative, scientific, and mathematical thinking, sorting out, criticism, dialogue, argument, questioning, individual identity, wit, humour, play, progress, modernity (including horizontal transmission of knowledge), debate, _dissoi logoi_ , wondering, argument, effort and challenge, pursuit of truth, beauty, essence, character, emotional engagement, journey, self-discipline, resilience, reflection, virtue, authentic experience, wonder, enthusiasms and their pursuit, being alive.
**Rhetoric:** Turning outwards, persuasion, communication, conversation, ethics, performance, community, relationships, citizenship, social capital, leadership, telling and showing about..., responsibility.
## The Goals of Schooling
A great education is defined by its goals. If we are to make changes to the schooling, we must first ask, 'What are our goals?' In order to ensure they are clearly defined, we need to make certain we understand what we mean by goals. Are our goals _teleological, deontological_ , or _eudemonic_?
Teleological means the process of being directed towards an end or goal, and can lead to the idea that 'the ends justify the means'. It comes from _telos_ which means 'final purpose'. It looks for an end result. Deontological is more about denying, sacrificing, or changing what we want to do in order to do the 'right thing'. It is about sticking to rules and codes. Eudemonia is a lifelong pursuit founded on wisdom, practice, and excellence. It is about human happiness or the rather more useful term, human flourishing. All three can be brought together: we have aims, we have responsibilities, and we have a need to flourish in the every day. Sometimes the right thing to do is to sacrifice our immediate happiness and learn the importance of delayed gratification for future fulfilment.
Do we want goals that are about ends, or about the journey? Should the journey be one where children, instead of following their own dreams and desires, deny or sacrifice their lives in order to serve the greater good, perhaps the nation state? If we need more engineers, for example, then despite what the individual wants, we might ensure young people become engineers for the greater good of our country. Or perhaps we want individuals to be happy and follow their dreams, even if that doesn't seem to serve the greater good? These choices will make a lot of difference to the types of goals we set in our schools.
### Trivium 21c: Define your Goals
In schools, the journey should be towards wisdom and the need for knowledge via wonder and curiosity. This should be a journey that builds enthusiasm and a hunger to know more, and which develops the habits of mind, adaptability, and creativity that have enabled educated people to make real contributions to the great conversations of their time, by making, engaging, and sharing in their communities and the wider world. It is a journey that will enable the philosopher kid to learn the best that has been thought or said, to engage with it, adapt, change and add to it, and learn a way to approach established knowledge and create new knowledge in a world that offers many chances and challenges. The goal of education should not be about work, but about life. Life includes work, but it is clearly so much more: education for its own sake includes life, the universe, and everything!
At the heart of this idea is that in your school, your class, or your domain, you help to nurture citizens with a curiosity in, and an ability to use, knowledge and foster an expertise in communicating and learning. Learning is a lifelong pursuit; when students cease to study with you, they should be further along the journey but still exploring towards these ends. While in your classroom, students should be imbued with knowledge, enthused by the subject, contributing to the school and wider community, and engaging deeply with it all. Above all, the students should be able to perform to a level that transcends their own expectations. We should all have dreams; schools should go further in making them happen. This can be expressed through the school motto and its aims.
### Trivium 21c: The School Motto
I approached the leaders of three very different types of school to see if there were any similarities in approach, across the sectors, that are drawn from ideas from the trivium. Until she finally retired in 2013, Dr Irene Bishop CBE was the head teacher of St Saviour's and St Olave's School in the London Borough of Southwark, an 'outstanding' inner-city girls' comprehensive school, near the Elephant and Castle. As an institution, the school goes back a long way. Dr Bishop said, 'Tradition is very important to us; our school motto, which is also our mission statement, is "Heirs of the Past, Children of the Present, Makers of the Future".' It evokes the trivium, the tradition of grammar, the dialectic of the now, and the rhetoricality of making the future.
Jonathan Simons is the chair of governors from the Greenwich Free School, again in inner London. He said, 'We have a very clear set of values that run through the school, which we call "Growth, Fellowship, Scholarship" – which comes from our acronym. We are unapologetic about saying these are the values that we want to instil in our pupils, and not just through the curriculum but through everything they do.' This is essential; there is no point in having values unless they are seen to be central to the school's ethos. A new school can't fall back on its past, but it can lay the foundation stones for a good future.
Dr Anthony Seldon is the master of Wellington College, a public school in Berkshire, which also sponsors a state academy school. He said:
_I think there is a common ethos that is important to have in all institutions, which are time honoured, and which were defined in ancient Greek philosophy, around virtues. It's clear that young people pick up values not from learning the names and being taught what they are, but from seeing them being modelled by adults and out in the community. There's no point in telling them that integrity is a core value if they don't see the school acting with integrity. As for our academy, I don't think you can bludgeon a core set of values into each institution – it is too much of an imposition. Values should be partly organic, partly generic; the prioritization will substantially_ _come from each academy. So, the values we have at Wellington are worked out by the whole community, by the kids and by the adults_.
### Trivium 21c: Ensuring Your Goals are Articulated in Your School Motto
The school motto should offer an eloquent expression of the three roads of the trivium. Schools should make certain that the motto gives an idea of what the school ethos is, as well as what they wish their students to aspire to. The three areas of focus as defined by the trivium – grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric – could also be stated as means to achieve the aim of turning out well-educated philosopher kids. Clearly, the ethos is something that should unite everyone in common aims and be discussed accordingly. These 'time-honoured values' also need to be open to review. The motto and the aims are an expression of the spine for a school, and should be active in your community of learning.
### Trivium 21c: The Only Way Is Ethics
Ethics might be open to challenge at any time, so a school should be sufficiently sure of itself to understand how virtue and morality can be contested. Also, the institution should be mature enough to debate openly and balance the competing impulses of tradition and modernity. Ethics includes the moral principles, knowledge, behaviours, and customs that hold a society, culture, or subculture together. In this context, ethical codes and conventions include an idea of right and wrong, and can also define moral character, even if that behaviour is formed through the ethical codes of gangs or even terrorist groups. Usually, though, ethical behaviour would be perceived as moral behaviour. The ethical code of an institution should therefore bring about the expectations and cultural and social capital that enable individuals, through their own agency, to behave in a virtuous way, either by reflecting or rejecting the ethical codes that are expected of them.
Dr Irene Bishop reflects on the pressures that surround her school, 'I do think there are some things wrong in society where people feel that there is no point in being part of society, because they've got their own society which gives them what they need, through gangs or whatever. They've got their own code of ethics, they've got their own rules, their own uniforms, and also they've got their own hierarchy, an unpleasant hierarchy.' At Greenwich Free School, deputy head teacher Sarah Jones believes that 'active citizenship' should be encouraged to counteract other pressures:
_In active citizenship, they bring any issue – from the news, from school, from their local communities – and they can consider how they can campaign on that issue. This enables kids to be empowered to make a difference; it gives them the tools to make a difference. That's the kind of thing that your middle-class kid gets modelled at home all the time. We want kids to understand that they can get involved, that they can physically change their local environment for the better_.
Citizenship is an active process. It should be authentic rather than abstract. It should be imbued with a sense of social and cultural capital; a human becoming is a human belonging.
### Trivium 21c: Virtue and Virtuosity
Virtue is a standard of excellence or morality; a means to an end or the end in itself. It will guide us but at times we will fail to achieve it. Virtue includes moral strength, good qualities, and righteousness. Sharing the same root as virtue, we also have 'virtuoso', meaning someone who is skilled, learned, or even an expert. Training in being a virtuoso opens up the world of excellence; excellence, in turn, is virtuous. Virtue could be seen an active idea, rather than an abstract otherworldly one. It is a tendency, a disposition, or habit. This habit could be result of our own agency, and/or the habits of mind that are formed and internalized through our relationships with each other and our institutions.
An important job of the school is to promote an ethical framework that enables us to choose, if we wish, to develop a virtuous character. Such a framework should guide and develop character, virtue, and virtuosity through active authentic engagements and relationships. Schools should exploit their local communities to engage fully in this process. This also means that the activities that are in danger of falling away, not only into extra-curricular provision but disappearing from there too, should be brought back as a central concern of the curriculum itself. This could be called an 'authentic curriculum'.
### Trivium 21c: The Relationship between the Three Arts
In _Teach Like a Champion_ (2010), Doug Lemov, amongst other things, recommends that a teacher:
Stops day-to-day lesson planning.
Plans with the idea that you are leading to mastery.
Begins with the end in mind.
Starts 'unit' planning.
I would concur with this. The whole process of teaching through Trivium 21c demands that you develop learning along with knowledge, and change the process of teaching and learning as you go; therefore, it is essential that the whole picture is acknowledged rather than just the day-to-day. You will teach differently as the course proceeds, whether it is by day, week, month, year, or course. Naturally, adjustments will need to be made, but if you are absolutely focused on the knowledge and skills you are imparting, and on them being digested and not regurgitated, then you will aid the process of digestion subtly, yet remorselessly.
In _Visible Learning_ , John Hattie cites a report that states, 'Effective teachers have high expectations and increase the academic demands on their students... Effective teachers communicate high expectations for students to self-regulate and take charge of their behaviour and academic engagement' (Hattie, 2008: 259). This is mastery in academic engagement and in learning.
Trivium 21c is a journey towards mastery and wisdom. It asks for:
Progression in quality and quantity of knowledge.
Increasing challenge.
Developing enthusiasm and complexity.
Increasing skills.
Building resilience.
Looking for beauty and/or truth, profundity, and doubt.
Celebrating performance.
Taking part in the great conversation.
And it is possibly:
Transferable and self-reflective through the idea of the mantra being part of a whole-school approach.
It has been argued many times over the centuries that the trivium:
Enables learning to learn.
Develops positive habits of mind.
And it asks the questions:
How should we ensure students progress?
How should we adjust our teaching?
Do students learn differently as they progress?
The answer lies in the idea that we teach in order to let go. Alongside the acquisition of knowledge and skills is the idea of learning, playing with, and honing knowledge for our own ends. This improvement might be about becoming more knowledgeable, more skilled, or both. Whether this journey is about a whole discipline or focuses on each moment along the way, or both (it is for the teacher to decide), it should be based, loosely, on the precepts of independence, grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric.
### Trivium 21c: Teaching from Dependence to Independence
The classroom journey has been described in a variety of ways in pedagogical books on teaching, such as:
**Directive (directed practice):** This is the domain of the teacher – 'I'. The teacher has authority as does the subject or discipline.
**Guided discovery (guided practice):** Shared between the teacher and the student – 'we'. The teacher guides the student in the acquisition of the subject or discipline, encourages engagement, critical awareness, and enthusiasms.
**Receptive – exploratory (independent practice):** The domain has moved to that of the student – 'you'. The teacher ensures that ownership moves from the authority of the teacher to the authority of the student within the discipline or even against the discipline.
Or as Doug Lemov puts it: I – We – You:
You could almost think of this as going from the traditional to the progressive:
### Grammar
Schools should ensure that the curriculum they provide reflects the greatest that culture has to offer. Grammar is the key to unlocking doors, the key to understanding the human condition, the examined life. When teachers have the choice, they must not choose knowledge by how accessible it is, but by how important it is; they should then use their professionalism to make it accessible. Anthony Seldon advises, 'One should look at those aspects that are proven by time to be enduring rather than the ephemeral. Given that time is limited in the curriculum, it's better to study those things that are major rather than those things that are minor.' Jonathan Simons agrees, 'If you don't have a basic corpus of knowledge, and the critical skills about how to progress your own knowledge, you can't do anything.' Each subject has its grammar, the history of how it became itself, the wisdom (and the mistakes) of the past, which make it ready to be altered in the present.
In _Mastery_ (1991), George Leonard describes how we start the journey of teaching and learning with small incremental steps and that we should clearly reveal the process. Doug Lemov (2010) explains how to break down complexity into simple pieces and build knowledge systematically. The skill of a great teacher is to make the start of the journey, the grammar, fun, engaging, or necessary; sometimes all three.
### Trivium 21c: Grammar
Grammar represents the building blocks, the foundational knowledge, the facts, opinions, works, ideas, and thoughts of real value; which are all, probably, contestable. In order to access knowledge the teacher can help by:
Building from bite-size pieces of knowledge.
Teaching about and modelling research skills.
Talking about the process of getting ideas and mastering the fundamentals of the discipline or subject.
This process can be made more motivating and palatable if, at the start, teachers ensure that they:
Introduce relevant concepts, rules, facts, and fundamentals of the subject.
Only set short homework tasks, if any, at the beginning.
Provide resources that can be accessed by students at their own speed and are open ended.
Provide notes, or minimize note taking, then teach memorization or other ways of absorbing knowledge and skills.
Start simply.
Introduce deliberate practice – even repetition, rote, and ritual.
Plan and teach through the trivium (make it explicit).
Increase capacity by building on previous knowledge – make larger pieces connect through 'mental Velcro'.
Gradually increase knowledge load and complexity.
Teach research skills and take delight in connecting ideas.
Use analogy.
Tell stories about the knowledge you are teaching and emphasize narrative(s).
Talk about the people behind the knowledge – whose shoulders?
Begin to introduce arguments against the knowledge, where relevant. Show how it is contested and open up this space ready for the next stage. Encourage a degree of scepticism.
### Trivium 21c: Dialectic/Logic/ _Logos_
Try teaching logic in the context of your subject. Show how to approach subject-specific thought and reasoning and how it links to other subjects and their approaches. Greenwich Free School's Sarah Jones considers this process to be essential in education, 'If you are equipped with thinking and reasoning, you can make choices for yourself. The thing about a great education is we teach kids it's OK to challenge, it's great to think about things, and to ask difficult questions.' It is also central to the ethos at St Olave's. Dr Irene Bishop observes, 'I think it is our job as educationists to give children the tools to be able to find their own way in the world. That means giving them the opportunity to develop their own ideas. I don't think it's to inculcate them with something that they never question, because as soon as that child gets to the point when they realize that there are questions, how do they cope?'
This means that questioning, thinking, and debating should be a substantial part of teaching and learning. Anthony Seldon agrees, 'All young people should learn how to debate, construct an argument, know what a good argument is, and how to avoid personal comments that can destroy reason.' In schools there are various ways of doing this. A debating society is clearly a good idea, as are classes in the theory and history of thought and knowledge. At Wellington College they have a Philosopher in Residence – something that might be worth pursuing in other schools, whether through the idea of a philosophy cafe or team teaching lessons where underlying philosophical enquiry can be brought in, as a way of linking learning with wider issues from the history of thought. At Greenwich Free School, they now use philosophical enquiry both in tutorials and also in the body of lessons. The school sets aside time for debating as a pure skill, arguing for the other side, thinking about logic and argument creation. Here is Sarah Jones again, 'We get all our teachers to build on these skills in lessons, so when they're teaching English, they are thinking whether a debate or more creative, imaginary stuff like P4C [Philosophy for Children] is suitable. And in maths, teachers are asking, is it a logical sequence?'
The teacher needs to bring in enquiry so that it becomes a part of the school ethos rather than just an add-on. The children need to grapple with knowledge that is rich, so that an atmosphere of curiosity and criticism is created. The theory of knowledge component in the International Baccalaureate (IB) might serve as inspiration. Perhaps this component could be extended into a course on the theory and history of thought, which could take the place of religious education in all secular schools (although religious thought would still play a major role). In faith schools, however, this could be taught in the first instance from within their religious tradition.
More muscular argument is also necessary and passionate disagreement should be part of the classroom experience. Anthony Seldon says:
_Argument is fundamental. We are too often frightened of disagreement, so we suppress disagreement and we get a kind of unsatisfactory soup. The best and the most creative ideas have come out of quite strong and tough argument. If you have strong disagreement based on grounded arguments, that can make for great learning, great spectacle, and great opportunities in education. I'm not certain that when I was 11 I really did know what I felt about literature. At my age today, I still don't really know what I think about most things. But, of course, it's important and valuable to argue and debate_.
Children do not always 'know' what they are saying, they are not always right; but they need the opportunity to express themselves, whether they are right or wrong, in a framework that allows them to engage. It is essential that this is tied together with knowledge; they should develop an awareness of how 'sure' they are and why.
Lessons are generally enlivened by dialectic: it can inform the story, it can be a narrative force by introducing the 'baddy', it can enlist the passions through argument and conflict, and it can drive the learning forward as students engage more fully with the learning. This stage is highly active and engaging as it uses practical experiment, exploration, dialogue, debate, and/or argument. Our schools must resound to the sound of debate.
For Carol Dweck (2006), the 'growth mindset' sees students engage in the process of difficulty and working at things; this mindset is encouraged by understanding that performance is enhanced by practice rather than innate ability. The classroom needs to be a place of progress, not just arrival. Performances along the way can celebrate progress, by sharing work and ideas that are half-formed rather than complete. An expectation of self and peer criticism, as well as from the teacher, should be encouraged, especially if children pursue perfection in the knowledge that they will rarely arrive at it.
The idea of elite performance – and the belief that we mainly err – is completely different from the continual award of merits and gold stars for good work. This path to wisdom involves developing self-discipline, practising deliberately, and gradually increasing complexity. This can create the 'flow factor' that relies not on instant gratification but on increasingly complex tasks.
According to Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, 'Complexity is the result of the fruitful interaction between... two opposing tendencies...' (Csikszentmihalyi, 1996: 363) the two tendencies are the cultural traditions of a domain and the individual's ability to respect, respond and to be in conflict with it if necessary. In the classroom, the teacher in the dialectic phase will ensure children:
Analyse and explore.
Try out deductive, inductive, and abductive thinking.
Make connections and justify thoughts.
Ask and answer questions by finding out answers, possible answers, ideas, and opinions.
Test out and argue.
Use logical thinking, syllogisms, fallacies, and other ways of arguing.
Experiment and play.
Make sense of ideas.
Are creative, critical, resilient, and enthused.
To bring this about, the teacher should use, among many others, the following methods:
Introduce alternative views on topics and teach about enquiry and judgement.
Model connecting and making sense within the subject and beyond, encouraging thinking and drawing it out.
Introduce and increase complexity – provide scaffolds where needed.
Explore thought and how thinking has changed in the subject.
Gradually increase homework load, note taking, and evaluative work.
Open up dialogue through questioning.
Introduce debate and the habits of discussion.
Argument – be provocative, play the devil's advocate.
Point out ethical issues which allow for wider engagement than just with the topic under discussion.
Do less _for_ the student and do more _with_ the student; be a critical friend whilst retaining the authority of expertise.
Encourage a culture of criticism.
### Rhetoric
Rhetoric is the expression of our learning, enabling us to take part in, and be a part of, the great conversation. Here, identity is forged as we remake ourselves, in the society and communities into which we are born, how we affect them and why, and the traditions that we pass on. This can constitute performance in an exam or in other walks of life, taking part in the great conversation, producing something. Whether it is a piece of art, an essay, a craft, a sport, a science, a blog, or climbing a mountain, rhetoric is a form of communication, the culmination of a period of preparation. Rhetoric is where we strive to take part in the best that has been thought, said, and done.
### Trivium 21c: Rhetoric – The Expression of Your Learning
We begin with the idea of persuasion. Can the student persuade people that they know what they are talking about? This can be done through the written word or through speech. It can also be expressed in a wide range of skills, performances, and materials. This art can include, amongst others, artistic and sporting performance. As a teacher, how do you judge, in the widest terms, the performative aspects of your subject? However you do this, in the context of rhetoric, these are the skills your students should become familiar with:
Expressing and listening to opinions.
Arguing and articulating ideas elegantly.
Teaching, lecturing, communicating, and leading.
Appreciating beauty and aesthetics.
Understanding complexity whilst attempting to communicate simply.
Expressing evidence-based ideas and opinions.
Performing and understanding performativity.
Generating rather than just resolving questions.
Acknowledging the importance of audience, communication, and citizenship.
Appreciating ethical concerns.
Being aware of the community in which they are a part.
Being able to perform confidently in different situations.
Helping establish and strengthen communities.
Knowing how to express dissent effectively.
Knowing how to make changes.
Being responsible for their own work.
In order to strengthen the rhetoric phase the teacher should also:
Ask the students to present the 'big picture' in a variety of media, checking the students' understanding and what they have brought to it.
Encourage opportunities for performance.
Realize that additional support for expert learners does more harm than good; by not 'letting go' you produce students who are ever reliant on the teacher.
Produce open-ended homework tasks and allow the students to set their own homework tasks.
Let the students follow their own enthusiasms in the framework of the discipline (as it allows).
Let go.
Challenge and be a critical friend, with authority but also with grace, allowing space for failure and the possibility for great success.
### Assessment
Along with the journey of education, assessment also has to change. Just as demanding a dissertation at the grammar phase is probably unfair, learning a poem and reciting it is not. It would be bizarre to end a PhD course with a fifteen-minute multiple-choice test, just as it would be odd to expect a course with debate at its core not to involve some sort of discussion in its assessment.
The same is true for day-to-day classroom assessment. There are many ways of assessing – for example, no hands up (where students are encouraged to answer questions or share their ideas at the behest of their teacher rather than putting their hands up) – but no technique should be used exclusively. Teachers should have flexibility in what they do, and in so doing, provide an example for the children.
### Trivium 21c: Assessment
In this table is a suggested assessment journey that supports the idea of progression as previously outlined. In it I am using assessment ideas that have been shown to be effective, and I am matching them to the trivium, using assessment in a particular rather than in a blanket way. How we assess should be sensitive to the journey the student is engaged with.
Not all of these ideas will be suitable for every subject, but in them there is the concept of progression that I would highly recommend. In other words, effective assessment will vary for different parts of the journey. Note that peer assessment is relevant, but only when a certain amount of expertise has been gained.
The central message is that teachers should not teach and assess every lesson in the same way.
### Trivium21c: Examinations
Instead of being purely the tail that wags the dog, exams should assess the curriculum as experienced. Formal assessment at a national level should include recognition of the three roads: grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric. A series of school-level qualifications and experiences should include the following:
**Multiple choice and short answer tests.** These have a part to play in showing basic knowledge, but other types of knowledge would need to be explored in more detail in order to reveal depth of understanding within and across subjects.
**Essays showing how ideas have been drawn from research and made into thoughtful argument.** These essays should be of a standard such that instead of students just showing they know the tradition, they should also be able to demonstrate how and why they challenge or accept the tradition.
**Exams in the form of viva voces, debates, speeches, blogs, longer pieces of work, artefacts, and performance**. Whatever works best for the particular academic domain should be included, but should be carefully overseen to make sure that there is a level of parity between disciplines.
By drawing distinctive types of exam from the arts of the trivium, as relevant to different subjects, breadth and depth of assessment would be assured.
The examination and curriculum system that most closely assesses the values as expressed in the trivium is the International Baccalaureate and the Middle Years Programme, so here would be a good place for schools to start when adapting current practice. The international element of the IB is about ethos, not availability. In order to safeguard the idea of cultural capital, perhaps we could envisage a British (Isles) Baccalaureate, where our shared traditions could be enriched, as well as our relationships with Europe, the Commonwealth, the English-speaking nations, and the rest of the world.
### Trivium 21c: Authentic Curriculum
All students should experience a balance between academic and authentic learning. The authentic curriculum should take up around 40% of formal curriculum time, as well as a large chunk of the extended school provision. The authentic curriculum should be varied and adaptable to the individual child. Although breadth of experience is more important early on, depth is also essential – the opportunity to specialize should be open to all. There should be an opportunity for group activities, such as music, art, sport, dance, drama, debating, crafts, apprenticeships, career opportunities and work experience, singing in a choir, performing in a school play, going on theatre trips, foreign travel, researching local history, producing a school magazine/newspaper/website, making films and TV programmes, writing and reciting poetry, circus skills, accountancy, writing a novel, composing a symphony, inventing a product, discovering a new planet, making a breakthrough in science, climbing a mountain, unearthing a Viking tomb, translating something from the original Anglo-Saxon... You name it, the authenticity is in the pursuit and the engagement, and for its own sake.
The authentic curriculum should be monitored and any notable successes – which might be in the form of the experience itself or suitable exams that the domain already operates, such as music exams or apprenticeships – should be tracked, but not thought of as exam equivalents. Instead, they should be valued in their own right. A Gold Duke of Edinburgh's Award should be just that; it shouldn't need academic, gold-standard equivalence to be thought of as a good thing.
Community forming is an essential part of much of the authentic curriculum. It is through the active pursuit, perhaps in a group climbing a mountain, where the flourishing of students and their peers relies on the virtue of each other working through an agreed ethical framework. This experience should not be cheapened by making it the equivalent of half a GCSE. Elizabeth Truss observes:
_I think there's nothing worse than fake authenticity, which is where it's claimed 'this is what's going on', but really it's just a paying lip service type of exercise, an ersatz experience, the sort of thing you do on a corporate away day. If it's genuine, it's useful. Joining the Scouts is authentic. The core purpose of a school is that the student leaves having learnt something and knowing how to learn, and also wanting to achieve things, to aspire. I think that our whole philosophy of education has to be about ensuring our children fulfil their potential_.
Part of the authentic curriculum is the idea that children should engage with the local community, its history and heritage. Local and national companies and cultural organizations should offer inreach and outreach, which would enable their employees and volunteers to come into schools and for schoolchildren to work off-site with them. These organizations could include artists, banks, service industries, retail, and industry as well as institutions like the Scouts, Girl Guides, the military, churches, the National Trust, zoos, hospitals, care homes, theatres, orchestras, recording studios, or computer and electronics companies. They could offer 'real' experiential learning during the school day and at after-school opportunities, residential weekends, holiday learning experiences, and even gap years.
Why does Dr Irene Bishop ensure her girls have so many authentic experiences?
_Because we're an inner-city school, where lots of children come from deprived backgrounds, and we feel we should make a difference. One of the ways of making a difference is to give them all the things that I would give my own children. So we take them to the ballet, we take them to the theatre, we teach them to play a musical instrument, we allow them to go to concerts, we take them abroad, we have school journeys where they have challenges like Outward Bound_.
_Any middle-class parent would do that for their child, so why should our kids not have exactly the same opportunities? It actually makes them more rounded, and it helps them learn more. Without all this 'stuff' they don't become truly human. They are all building blocks that make that person able to go out into the world and be a maker of the future. You could come into school and just do work to pass exams and so on. In this school, one of the reasons we are 'outstanding' is because we do this_.
To enrich, stretch, and challenge students, it is a great idea to invite in-residence artists, writers, philosophers, and scientists to the school. You can then offer non-timetabled opportunities for small group sessions or as 'events'. There is a huge amount of untapped potential out there, so rather than seeing education 'done over there in that imposing building', these activities bring our learning communities back together. The Extended Project Qualification (EPQ) is an excellent qualification that more schools could introduce. It enables students to study independently or interdependently. They can explore a topic of interest to them, in performance, writing, research, design, and so on. The Creativity, Action, Service (CAS) program from the IB also offers a model of how this idea could work. Students are encouraged to take part in, amongst others, arts activities, expeditions, sports, projects, and community service, and are asked to reflect on how their participation affected them and the people with whom they worked.
### Does the School Educate Well?
Let us educate first and then measure what occurs. Students can take exams, contribute to school life, engage with other institutions, take part in the arts, in physical activity, voluntary work, or community action, have an authentic experience of work, or do a thousand other things – and all this could be included in what we value. The problem with assessment, according to Anthony Seldon, is that:
_With any assessment you look for the quantitative, and in schools these are exam results, they are turnover, they are numbers. None of those are particularly good ways of assessing schools. How do you know if you are running a good family? You know it when you see it. You know what bad families look like; it's very hard to just write it down._
_An inspection is a pretty limited and limiting process. There's something better and greater. How do you know what a great human being is? You know when you're in the company of greatness, just like you know when you're in the company of someone who is a negative force, but it's very hard to have a checklist with a clipboard and go down it. It's actually rather demeaning to human beings to do that_.
Schools should judge themselves by how they fulfil their aims in the day-to-day and in their long-term outcomes. In the case of state schools, the government should share in helping to formulate some of those goals in partnership. When inspecting the school, they should then assess them on those terms, not on a strictly centralized idea of what the criteria should be. It is the ethos of the school as part of a community that should be rich and varied, and this should be judged on its own terms. Does the day-to-day curriculum and teaching reflect that ethos? What are the real outcomes? Elizabeth Truss says: 'I think schools should be judged on how well pupils achieve, the destinations of those students, as well as the more intangible things like the ethos the school creates.'
### Alumni programme
Schools should operate an alumni programme, which would collate information about immediate and longer-term destinations for ex-students. It could also act as a catalyst for bringing the philosopher kids back to the cave, to help them lead and inspire other students. Information about longer-term destinations would also be of interest to prospective pupils and parents; and this data should include more than just what jobs people have and where they studied. This information would be about more than just the school. Alumni programmes also provide an example of the positive ethos of the school as part of a journey – the philosopher kids becoming philosopher adults.
Sarah Jones from the Greenwich Free School describes how this is partly achieved in KIPP schools in the United States:
_They track their kids through college, and their kids know that they can ring their school and they'll talk to them still, care about them still. It's not just about gathering data about who leaves and where they go; it's about maintaining that relationship because they love them. They're still_ their _kids and they still want to support them. Lots of benefits come from that: knowing what they're doing, being able to bring them back to inspire younger kids. If kids just think all I'm telling them is how to pass an exam, they lose their desire to learn_.
Any school that chose not to have an alumni programme would, in itself, be making quite a negative statement about its ambition.
#### Be In Charge of the Development and Assessment of Teaching
Elizabeth Truss observes, 'At the moment exams have two purposes: one is assessing the students and one is assessing the school. I think those two purposes need to be separated.' In order to assess teachers each institution should define, again through negotiation, what sort of teachers it wants. These expectations should be expressed simply, perhaps as Ten Commandments (as below), and should focus on the quality of teaching the school wants its students to experience.
In an issue of the _New York Times Magazine_ , from December 1951, as part of an article entitled 'The Best Answer to Fanaticism: Liberalism', Bertrand Russell wrote what he called the Liberal Decalogue which consisted of ten commandments for a teacher to 'promulgate'. At number one was:
1 Do not feel absolutely certain of anything.
And at number eight:
8 Find more pleasure in intelligent dissent than in passive agreement, for, if you value intelligence, as you should, the former implies a deeper agreement than the latter.
These two suggestions seem highly pertinent to the trivium and I think it would be useful for schools to write a short mission statement about teachers and their relationship to knowledge via the trivium: how do we want our teachers to 'be' in the classroom? We want teachers to allow sufficient space for individuality, both for the discipline they teach and also for their own style, which would give a distinctive flavour to the education offer in a school. Rather than a centralized attempt to dictate this by government bureaucracy, we need a more localized feel which is representative of the surrounding community.
If only my daughter could be formally educated through a contemporary interpretation of the trivium, she would be able to access the ancient rhythms of learning by knowing a simple mantra – grammar, dialectic, rhetoric – and using it as the key to access any subject matter. Should any topic become difficult, she could take a step back and ask herself: What is missing here? Have I explored the grammar fully? Have I analysed or looked at the arguments in enough detail? Have I practised enough? Have I tried to communicate my thinking about this topic to someone? This, in a nutshell, is how the trivium can become a tool for the autodidact. Simple.
### Trivium for the 21st Century: Encore
A century is an arbitrary concept. As we moved from 1999 to the year 2000 a sudden change did not occur, education did not suddenly come face to face with the need for a new paradigm. Time moves on, and things do change but instead of revolution imposed by politicians, a highly stressed workforce in schools should re-realize their historic inheritance and absorb the political into their everyday practice not by pursuing one or other agenda but by bringing different ways of seeing the world into their schools and classrooms.
The tension between traditional and progressive educationalists can be resolved. The future of education can be a reinvigorated trivium; it is, as we have seen, infinitely adaptable, for the 21st century, indeed for any century. The trivium can satisfy the cries from across the political divide: traditionalists profess the need for high standards and the importance of knowledge as vital components of a good education with the teacher as 'sage on the stage'. Progressives have a desire to foster critical thinking skills, soft skills like creativity, empathy, and teamwork, vocational skills and with the teacher as 'guide on the side'. Both these approaches are made possible if schools adopt a trivium for the 21st century and encompass both the traditional and the progressive in their ethos and pedagogy.
This idea is drawn from the arts, and from the practise of all arts. Art education begins with rules and precepts, teaching the art form, and develops new ways of seeing, new art forms, new relationships and new ways of communicating. This is also true of the three arts of the trivium where the three arts meet. The art of grammar highlights the importance of skills, rules, and knowledge drawn from an, albeit contested, tradition. The art of dialectic covers critical thinking, analysis, questioning, arguing, discussing, developing enthusiasms, and the need for grit. The art of rhetoric encourages free expression, citizenship, community, and communication. More than the sum of its parts the trivium develops the transferable skills that enable individuals and groups to begin to realize their potential: the ideal of the 'philosopher kid'. The teacher learns to, gradually, 'let go', and the trivium helps develop free-thinking, independent learners with a sense of responsibility to others. Yet this is nothing new, we get there through ancient traditions to build the knowledge and skills necessary for the future.
Where the three arts 'clash along' creativity flourishes. That should be of no surprise. The trivium is, if you like, the art of arts. Why am I, a teacher of drama, drawn towards it? Perhaps it could be because at the heart of theatre is a process very much like the trivium. We have our grammar, the script. We use critical skills to examine, analyse, and develop our thinking, we play, argue, question, workshop, and rehearse with the desire to uncover great truths and beauty; in other words we use logic, dialectic, and the never-ending pursuit inherent in _logos_. Finally, the art rhetoric: we perform, together, to an audience where we commune and share, listening to the response. We adapt, we change, and we remain open and are ready to begin the whole process again.
PostScript:
# A Bit of Trivia
When browsing on the internet I came across the following quote by the poet William Cory:
At school you are engaged not so much in acquiring knowledge as in making mental efforts under criticism... you go to a great school not so much for knowledge as for arts and habits; for the habit of attention, for the art of expression, for the art of assuming at a moment's notice a new intellectual position, for the art of entering quickly into another person's thoughts, for the habit of submitting to censure and refutation, for the art of indicating assent or dissent in graduated terms, for the habit of regarding minute points of accuracy, for the art of working out what is possible in a given time, for taste, for discrimination, for mental courage, and for mental soberness.
That's it! That's the school I want my daughter to go to, I thought. Then I looked more closely. Oh dear, this is from the website of a very expensive boys' public school: Eton. Not a place for my daughter, clearly; gender and class stand in her way.
She is awake _now_ , so awake, inquisitive, thoughtful, and fun loving. Why is there no school for her?
# Acknowledgements
This has been an extraordinary experience for me and it has only been possible through the kindness, help, and support of many. Firstly, Ian Gilbert, for taking the initial risk and for his belief and encouragement, Caroline Lenton for backing up Ian's initial punt with the resources of Crown House, and Peter Young, for his support when I needed it most. Peter's reading and rereading of my draft manuscripts, his criticisms, and his ability to guide me through the fog have helped me realise the final shape of this book. My personal and deepest thanks go to Kerry, my wife, and Lotte, my daughter, for living with me and supporting me through this experience; both of you will never know how important a contribution that was. I am also indebted to my mother for her belief and the encouragement of other members of my family and my friends. I would also like to pay special thanks to those who have given of their time by being interviewed for this book especially as I was unknown to them, their generosity of spirit has been truly heartwarming: I have been inordinately lucky that so many busy and influential people took an interest in this project and made contributions that were at once thoughtful, challenging, and enlightening. Thanks especially to David Aaronovitch for taking me to White Hart Lane to see the mighty Spurs, an act of kindness I will not forget.
I would also like to thank all those I have worked with over the years, both staff and students, and also those who engage with me on Twitter; you have all helped me think this book through.
Last, and least, thank you to my schooling, without which this book would not have been possible.
Shall we forever make new books, as apothecaries make new mixtures, by pouring only out of one vessel into another?
Laurence Sterne,
_The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman_
# Bibliography and Reading List
**Aaronovitch, David** (2009) _Voodoo Histories: How Conspiracy Theory Has Shaped Modern History_. London: Vintage.
**Ackroyd, Peter** (2002) _Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination_. London: Chatto and Windus.
**Adams, Douglas** (1979) _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_. London: Pan Books.
**Adler, Mortimer J.** (1952) _The Great Ideas: A Lexicon of Western Thought_. New York: Macmillan.
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#### Interviews
**Aaronovitch, David** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Appleyard, Bryan** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Baggini, Julian** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Benn, Melissa** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Bishop, Irene** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Blond, Phillip** (2011) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Botton, Alain de** (2011) Interviewed by the author [via email]. London.
**Freedman, Sam** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Haynes, Natalie** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording via skype]. London.
**Jones, Sarah** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Katwala, Sunder** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Lea, Michael** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Mount, Ferdinand** (2012) Interviewed by the author [via email]. London.
**Pearce, Nick** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Seldon, Anthony** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording via telephone]. London.
**Simons, Jonathan** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Taylor, Matthew** (2011) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Truss, Elizabeth** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
**Willingham, Daniel T.** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording via skype]. London/USA.
**Wind Cowie, Max** (2012) Interviewed by the author [audio recording]. London.
# Index
#### A
1. Aaronovitch, David, , , ,
2. Abelard, ,
3. Ackroyd, Peter, ,
4. Agricola,
5. Appleyard, Bryan, , ,
6. Aquinas, Thomas, , ,
7. Argent, James,
8. Aristophanes,
9. Aristotle, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
10. Armstrong, John, ,
11. Arnold, Matthew, , , , ,
12. Artaud, , , ,
13. Arthur, James, ,
14. Augustine of Hippo, , , ,
#### B
1. Bacon, Francis, , , , , , , , ,
2. Baggini, Julian, , , , , ,
3. Bakewell, Sarah, , ,
4. Bakhtin, Mikhail,
5. Barber, Michael, , , ,
6. Bauer, Susan Wise, , , , , ,
7. Bausch, Pina,
8. Beard, Mary,
9. Benn, Melissa, , , ,
10. Bentham, Jeremy, , , ,
11. Bishop Berkeley,
12. Bishop, Irene, , , , ,
13. Blackshaw, Jordan, ,
14. Blanchflower, Danny, ,
15. Blond, Phillip, , , , , ,
16. Bloom, Harold, , , ,
17. Boethius, , , , ,
18. Bourdieu, Pierre, ,
19. Brando, Marlon,
20. Brecht, Bertolt, , ,
21. Bryson, Bill,
22. Büchner, Georg, , , ,
23. Burke, Edmund,
#### C
1. _Caliban_ , , ,
2. Campbell, Ken,
3. Capella, Martianus, , ,
4. Chambers, Paul,
5. Cicero, , , , , , , , , , , ,
6. Collymore, Stan,
7. Copernicus, , ,
8. Crawford, Matthew, , ,
9. Cruddas, John, ,
10. Crystal, David, ,
11. Csikszentmihalyi, Mihalyi, , ,
#### D
1. Darwin, Charles, , , ,
2. Dawkins, Richard, , , , ,
3. de Bono, Edward,
4. de Botton, Alain, , , , ,
5. de Valera, Eamon,
6. Descartes, , , ,
7. Deutsch, David, ,
8. Dweck, Carol, , ,
9. Dylan, Bob, ,
#### E
1. Erasmus,
2. Ericsson, Anders,
3. Ferguson, Niall, ,
4. Feyerabend, Paul,
5. Freedman, Sam, , ,
6. Freire, Paolo, , ,
#### G
1. Galileo,
2. Gandhi,
3. Gladwell, Malcolm,
4. Google, , ,
5. Gordon, W. Terrence, ,
6. Gramsci, Antonio, , ,
7. Gross, Alan, ,
#### H
1. Haidt, Jonathan, ,
2. _Hamlet_ , ,
3. Hattie, John, , ,
4. Haynes, Natalie, , , , , ,
5. Heffer, Simon,
6. Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, , , , ,
7. Heidegger, Martin,
8. Heloise,
9. Heraclitus, , ,
10. Hirsch, E. D., , ,
11. Hitchens, Christopher, , , , ,
12. Hitchings, Henry, ,
13. Hobbes, Thomas, , ,
14. _Holmes, Sherlock_ , , , , ,
15. Hugo of St Victor, ,
16. Hume, David, , , , , , , ,
17. Husserl, Edmund,
#### I
1. Isidore of Seville,
#### J
1. James C. L. R., ,
2. John of Salisbury, , ,
3. Johnson, Dr, , , ,
4. Jones, Sarah, , , ,
5. Joseph, Sister Miriam, , ,
6. Judt, Tony, ,
#### K
1. Kant, Immanuel, , ,
2. Katwala, Sunder, , , ,
3. Konnikova, Maria, ,
4. Kuhn, Thomas,
#### L
1. Lakatos, Imre,
2. Larkin, Philip,
3. Lea, Michael, , ,
4. Leavis, F. R.,
5. Leith, Sam, ,
6. Lemov, Doug, , , ,
7. Leonard, George, , , ,
8. Lessing, G. E.,
9. Lewis. C. S.,
10. Locke, John, , ,
11. Lucian,
#### M
1. MacCabe, Colin, ,
2. MacColl, Ewan,
3. Mansbridge, Albert,
4. Marlowe, Christopher, , ,
5. Marx, Karl, , , , , 1337
6. McLuhan, Marshall, , , , , , , , ,
7. Meno,
8. Mill, John Stuart, ,
9. Milton, John, ,
10. Montaigne, , , , , ,
11. More, Thomas,
12. Mount, Ferdinand, , , , , ,
13. Murphy, Peter, , ,
#### N
1. Nagel, Thomas, , ,
2. Newman, Cardinal,
3. Newton, , ,
#### P
1. Paine, Thomas,
2. Pearce, Nick, , , , , ,
3. Peirce, Charles Sanders, , , , , ,
4. Petrarch, ,
5. Philo of Alexandria,
6. Pink, Dan,
7. Plato, , , , , , , , , , ,
8. Popper, Karl, , , , ,
9. Protagoras,
10. Pythagoras, , ,
#### Q
1. Quintilian,
#### R
1. Rabelais,
2. Ramus, Peter, ,
3. Randall, Lisa, ,
4. Richards, Jennifer, ,
5. Robinson, Ken, , , , , ,
6. Robinson, Richard ,
7. Rousseau, , ,
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# Copyright
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© Martin Robinson 2013
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First published 2013.
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1,004,370 | Feminism and Joss Whedon: Death and Character Abuse
Posted on 12 September, 2009 6 September, 2009 by s.e. smith
Welcome to the next post in the Feminism and Joss Whedon series! Since there have been some problems with this before: this is a series about viewing Joss Whedon through a feminist lens. You do not need to be a feminist to comment on posts in this series, but you do need to have a basic grasp of feminist theory. Comments indicating a lack of said grasp will not be published, because this series is not about feminist education. Finally, a Feminism 101 Blog, is a great resource to use if you aren't very familiar with feminism. Don't let this scare you from commenting; if you don't know much about feminism, you may not be aware that you are making a 101 mistake, and I'm not going to be mean about it. Unless you keep doing it. I also want to note that these posts are part of a series, in which posts are building on each other. This means that they reference ideas/concepts which have been discussed before, so if you come to this series via a link to a single post and you think it's superficial or is drawing false assumptions, that might have more to do with the fact that you haven't read prior posts in the series than my abilities as an essayist.
Cordelia. Penny. Fred. Tara. To a lesser extent, Anya. What do all of these people have in common? They're all female. They're all characters in the Whedonverse. And they're all dead. But they're not just dead. They're dead because their characters were abused for the sake of plot, and, in some cases, the writers clearly radically misread the way in which viewers were responding to these characters. For some, they are the Achilles heel of the Whedonverse. And their deaths generated a lot of outrage among Whedon fans.
Death plays an important role in drama, and Whedon definitely doesn't shy away from death in any of his series. Some of those deaths might not be wholly justified in terms of the story, but many are: the death of Joyce, for example, is an important step on Buffy's hero's journey. The final death of Darla is a form of redemption (although critics have pointed out that "redemption through childbirth" and sacrificing yourself to save a child is pretty problematic; maybe I should add "pregnancy and babies in the Whedonverse" to the long list of topics I plan to include in this series). Warren and Caleb must die because they are misogynistic villains. Etc. For the most part, Joss knows when it's time for a character to die, and how to stage the death so that it does justice to the story and the character.
But sometimes, he really trips up. And it's notable that the major trip-ups have all involved female characters. And that these deaths are usually accompanied by a deeper emotional connection on the part of viewers: we are first distanced from these women, and then the story turns, so that we really start to resonate with them, and then they die. These deaths are also often accompanied by reconciliation and revelations on screen. There's a pattern, in other words: emotional fulfillment for female characters means that it's time to die.
As a commenter said in an email exchange, "Whenever Joss heightens emotions, death follows and this is as predictable as the sun rising (quoted by permission)." This trap is common in television: the creator deepens the emotions, makes them more complex, and then is backed into a corner. Something explosive needs to happen to move the story along, because emotions are peaking, and they have nowhere to go. Death is often the way out, but it's sometimes the wrong way out.
When death does a grave disservice to a character, it's wrong. It yanks readers outside of the story, reminding them that this is not a world they are experiencing vicariously, it's a world created by other people. Disserving a character also cheapens the experience for viewers; people have actually felt violated by character abuse, have felt betrayed by the creators, have lost faith. If you betray your viewers enough, and it's systematic enough, they will start to lose faith in you.
Cordelia is one of the most complex and nuanced characters in the Buffyverse. We are introduced to her as a total airhead, a writeoff character, but we learn that she's much more than that, and we watch her evolve and grow over the course of Buffy and later Angel. Cordelia Chase, for many, represented an incredible example of character development, and she showcased an ability on the part of the writers to really deepen and enhance characters viewers have been watching for years. Cordelia's rapture and return felt like a bit of cheap trick, especially when Cordelia started behaving oddly, and viewers felt increasingly betrayed and upset until they learned that she'd been possessed.
Perhaps out of a desire to distance themselves from a mistake, the writers stuck Cordelia off screen in a coma as soon as it was convenient, which was infuriating to many viewers. They were left with a sour taste in their mouths which was not alleviated by the clumsy attempt to kiss and make up in "You're Welcome" (Angel, Season Five, Episode 12). All the more infuriating? That as a point of reconciliation and revelation was reached, Cordelia died. And viewers knew that she was going to die, because this is what Joss does.
Penny's death in Dr. Horrible also aroused a lot of ire. She's a female lead we don't really get to know, because of the short length of Dr. Horrible, but it doesn't make her death any less infuriating. Neatly dispatched at the end to tie up loose ends? And, in the process, backing the story into a corner which it will have a hard time getting out of, should the creators wish to continue it? Perhaps her death was supposed to underscore, for viewers, the idea that it was a hollow victory. But we already got that. We don't actually need to have the subtle nuances of the story hammered into our heads.
Fred's death is another example of infuriating character abuse. As a viewer, I got the sense that the writers were getting tired of Fred, so first they created emotions, and then they killed her. I mean, great for Amy Acker that she got to stay on the show as Illyria, a character I actually really enjoyed, but it really cheesed me off, as a viewer, that they felt the need to kill Fred. In part, because it felt like the predictable Whedon's Last Resort: ok, we kind of resolved a story, Now What? I know, let's kill her! There are ways to create drama and conflict which don't involve death, people.
Tara is another character with a highly controversial death, and a lot of Whedonverse viewers felt extremely betrayed by what happened to Tara, and how it happened. In a pretty shocking display of ignorance in terms of understanding how viewers were relating to Tara's character and her death, the writers even thought it would be a good idea to bring her back as The First, something Amber Benson thankfully nixed, knowing that it would upset viewers.
Tara's already a problematic character because some people felt uncomfortable with Willow suddenly "turning gay," despite manifesting interest in the gentlemen in earlier seasons. My initial reading of Willow's character was that she was bi, but a commenter pointed out to me that, in fact, the situation may be more nuanced. Willow herself identifies as gay (which may be ignorance on the part of the writers), but it does bear consideration that many gay and lesbian youth attempt to forge relationships with the opposite sex in high school. As camouflage, as an attempt to try to fix something which feels "wrong" to them, out of fear. I can definitely see how people could read Willow's presentation as supporting evidence for the idea that being gay is a lifestyle choice, but I give the writers more credit for that. Or, I did, until I heard that they debated whether or not to keep her gay after Tara died.
Within the context of the story, Tara's death was a sobering lesson. It was a reminder that supernatural evil isn't the only kind of evil, and that people can die from something beyond the supernatural. Joyce died the season before of natural causes: Tara died because she was an innocent bystander and a misogynist's bullet managed to hit her. But, the thing is, we already got the idea that guns can be just as deadly as supernatural things, because we saw Buffy lying in the yard as though she was dead. We didn't need to have the lesson repeated with a freak bullet through Tara's heart. (Which, I mean, sex/love and punishment, anyone?)
Especially since we had just seen Willow and Tara reconciling. That was kind of a key sign that Tara was about to die, because, really, where are you supposed to go from reconciliation? We couldn't have explored her character any more, right? She was tapped out. Finished. Done. So, let's just kill her to advance the plot, in act of callous and casual cruelty which will undoubtedly get us ratings.
And, of course, let's ignore the fact that the classic thing to do with lesbians on television is to kill them or make them evil. (Hey, Whedon got a bingo there, he killed one and made the other one evil!) The justification for Tara's death is that it made it possible for Willow's magic to get totally out of control. Except that Willow also cares deeply about Buffy, and her magic could have just as easily gotten out of control as she attempted to deal with Buffy's very serious injury, and with the realization that Warren was truly an evil, sick, twisted, sadistic fuck.
Whedon very cleverly deflected criticism about Tara's death by arguing that, of course, she wasn't killed because she was gay, it just had to happen, with the plot, and that he would have killed Oz off just as easily: it's about being Willow's lover, not about sexual orientation. And I think that appeased some critics, but not most, because most thought that the treatment of her character was highly problematic, because it played into Whedon's general habit of destroying relationships as a form of dramatic tension. For me, Tara's death falls right into the sex and punishment theme, which is such an old trope: why do people think that punishment is the only way to move a plot forward after characters reconcile/have sex/build a strong relationship with each other? Surely, there must be other sources of drama.
I also find Anya's death problematic. I think it was meant to underscore the savagery and brutality of the final battle, but it felt more like tying up ends to me. Xander and Anya were repairing their relationship, so Anya had to die. This, of course, frees up Xander for romantic entanglements when the story continues in comic book form. We already got, as viewers, the sense that the battle was brutal and hard, and the amount of sacrifice involved. We didn't need to see Anya die to understand that.
So, what is it with Joss and pointlessly killing off female characters? In all justice, I can think of a few male deaths which have been read as pointless (Shepherd Book, arguably necessary as part of Mal's hero's journey, and Wash both come to mind). But it is troubling that female characters in the Whedonverse pretty much get a death sentence as soon as viewers forge emotional connections with them and as soon as they start to resolve their relationships. A happy relationship is said to make a boring storyline, but exploring the nuances of a relationship doesn't have to be dull, and there was a lot more to mine with all of these characters. Their stories were brutally cut short by deaths which felt jarring and upsetting.
The tendency to kill women off to create drama is hardly limited to the Whedonverse, of course. It's pretty much the oldest trick in the book when it comes to generating drama for the television. But I would expect an auteur who labels himself as a feminist and prides himself on pushing the boundaries and exploring new storytelling techniques to avoid such hackneyed tropes.
Posted in Everything, Joss Whedon, social justice, Social Justice and Joss Whedon, televisionTagged Angel, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
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One Reply to "Feminism and Joss Whedon: Death and Character Abuse"
Bruce from Missouri says:
16 October, 2009 at 10:58 am
I agree with most of what you said(or at least see your side), So I will address the two that I don't necessarily agree with.
The first one is what happened to Fred. I think that the structure of Season 5(taking over Wolfram & Hart) wrote her character into a corner, that of the labcoat tech mainly there to deliver a couple of lines of exposition and disappear for the rest of the show. Whedon LOVES Amy Acker(He raves about her in commentary tracks), and wanted to put her back in the field with the rest of the core gang and more front and center in the story. I actually thought it was a brilliant way to get rid of a character that wasn't working in the current format of the show, but keep the actress.
As far as Anya goes, she fell victim to a Whedon dramatic philosophy: You have to earn the payoff.
If Buffy is brought back from the dead, it can't be all puppies and roses… she is going to spend some time traumatized.
When Angel comes back from 100 years in hell, he's going to be insane.
Whedon hits this point again and again in his commentaries. Anyone, of course, is free to disagree with his philosophy.
Whedon felt that to pay for that final battle, he had to kill off more than just a few secondary and tertiary characters. He didn't want to kill any of the core Scoobies (Buffy, Xander, Willow, Giles), they were still kicking around doing a series about Faith, So he killed the next two highest ranking characters, Spike(temporarily), and Anya. Anya died the way she did to show that not everyone dies heroically in battle, some people just get hacked down. Anya, like Wesley and Gunn in the final episode of Angel, also had no supernatural powers to protect her, so it made a certain amount of sense for that reason that she died how she did. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,371 | His Majesty: On Vladimir Sorokin's "Day of the Oprichnik"
February 16, 2019 • By Victoria Nelson
Day of the Oprichnik
Vladimir Sorokin
AT THE HEIGHT of the fall 2018 pre-election flurry, The New York Times published a detailed investigative report on Putin's influence in the US election illustrated by a striking photoshopped image of the Russian president. That mordant, single-eyed head floating in a well of darkness immediately put me in mind of Vladimir Sorokin's novel Day of the Oprichnik, a biting satirical riff in which the imperial tsar governing the new Russia of 2028 appears as a head suspended in a shining hologram dispensing wisdom to the oprichniki, his faithful cadre of secret police. "His Majesty sees everything, hears everything," the story's hero tells us fervently. "He knows who needs what."
Sorokin, one of his country's most gifted and controversial writers, has butted heads with Russian officialdom since his writings first appeared in the 1980s under the old Soviet regime. His novels seesaw between speculative/metaphysical (the Ice trilogy, The Blizzard) and outright satire, but political commentary (if sometimes only implicit) is never absent. Blue Lard (1999) famously depicted sex between holograms of Khrushchev and Stalin. The bravura epic Ice trilogy chronicled the steady corruption of a group of "pure" Gnostic souls from outer space reborn in human bodies who ally themselves with successive autocratic Russian regimes to fulfill their single-minded goal of escaping this vile planet.
Since Vladimir Putin's climb to power, Sorokin has been charged with writing pornography, had his works cast into an enormous fake toilet in a central Moscow square, and even endured a possible attempt on his life. Sorokin told an interviewer he composed Day of the Oprichnik in a single month "like an uninterrupted stream of bile," as part of a conscious decision to become more politicized in his writing. Now 63, he currently spends half the year in Berlin.
Clearly, I thought, the Times's Cyclopean Big Brother with its baleful eye radiating sinister spirals of influence would make a wonderful cover for a work that, if anything, is even more relevant now than it was when it was published in the author's homeland in 2006. Penguin Classics UK spotted that relevance sooner than I did: their reissue of the 2011 English translation in November 2018 coincided neatly with the latest hijinks from Putin's oprichniki as well as the US election and the vagaries of our country's own president.
In another of the author's many prescient touches, besides engaging in the ruthless elimination of his adversaries, Sorokin's new Ivan the Terrible has also built giant border walls to protect the motherland. These walls, especially the western one, are meant, in the words of the autocrat's devoted enforcer who narrates the story, to "cut us off from stench and unbelievers, from the damned, cyberpunks, from sodomites, Catholics, melancholiacs, from Buddhists, sadists, Satanists, and Marxists; from megamasturbators, fascists, pluralists, and atheists!"
Day of the Oprichnik, translated into English by Jamey Gambrell, is no earnest retread of Solzhenitsyn's One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, even though Sorokin, a talented mimic of his fellow Russian authors, clearly intends the ironic echo. On the contrary, this short and savage offering puts the "dys" in dystopian in a way few novels bearing that label can claim. It's an outrageous, salacious, over-the-top tragicomic depiction of an utterly depraved social order whose absolute monarch (referred to only as "His Majesty") is a blatant conflation of the country's current president with its ferocious 16th-century absolute monarch known as Ivan Grozny.
In Sorokin's Russia of the near future, the tsar's elite cadre of thugs bear the name and accoutrements of Ivan's dreaded secret police force, to whom he gave sweeping powers that included carte blanche to kill anyone they wished. The narrator, the fourth most powerful oprichnik in His Majesty's elite cadre, recounts the luxurious morning he spends attended by an army of servants in his grand house confiscated from a murdered merchant. Donning his black caftan, the uniform of Ivan's thugs, he jumps in his "Mercedov" (all foreign brands must be Russianized), an official vehicle decorated daily, after the custom of some of Ivan's oprichniki, with the hood ornament of a freshly severed dog's head. His Majesty's valiant servant is off to perform the noble duties of his "passionate, heroic government life": namely, murder, rape, incineration, and other atrocities that Sorokin recounts in excruciatingly precise detail.
In a pitch-perfect channeling of the fascist temperament, the voice proudly sharing these brutal exploits radiates a naïve and sentimental piety ruthlessly undercut by vicious sadism and self-regarding cunning. Bursting with near-hysterical enthusiasm, the latter-day oprichnik crosses himself and invokes the Holy Church as he righteously inflicts sickening violence on His Majesty's identified enemies. After murdering a boyar, gang-raping his wife, and setting fire to his mansion, he lectures a colleague that smoking is an impure act. So is swearing — unless, of course, one is a senior army officer or an executioner. His Majesty, he tells us, insists on "chastity and cleanliness." On the heels of more prayers and invocations, he winds up his eventful day engaging in a drug-fueled group copulation with his fellow oprichniki that gloriously cements their brotherhood.
There are signs the fictional new Russia that Sorokin anticipated more than a decade ago mirrors the present day in increasingly disturbing ways. Just as the Holy Church in Sorokin's brave new world is deeply complicit in upholding the new tsar's authority, Putin has made the real-life Russian Orthodox Church central to validating his regime. His own oprichniki, the FSB, has heavily identified itself with the Russian Orthodox Church (as a further touch, they switched to black uniforms the year the novel came out). In 2016, a heroic bronze statue of Ivan the Terrible on horseback brandishing a cross was unveiled in the city of Oryol south of Moscow. Far-right nationalists celebrated the occasion by unfurling medieval banners and the flag of Imperial Russia.
Responding to protests that Ivan was one of the most bloodthirsty and autocratic rulers in recorded history, the regional governor is quoted in a Guardian report saying the fearsome tsar was a great monarch and preserver of the Orthodox faith, "a defender of our land, a tsar who expanded its frontiers" and who did not let other nations encroach on them. Plenty of European monarchs, Russia's culture minister argued further, matched Ivan in ruthlessness. Such convictions are central to the Holy Russian Motherland and the "Eurasianism"-versus-the-West brand of ethnic nationalism that has become a cornerstone of Vladimir Putin's governing philosophy since he came to power.
In one of many surreal instances of fiction overtaking reality in Russian politics (not to mention in another major power), an interviewer asked Putin in all seriousness if he felt the fictional monster Cthulhu, a creation of the American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft, posed a threat to Russians should it choose to rise from its lair deep beneath the Pacific Ocean. Putin replied, with no irony, that the best course was to exercise caution and read the Bible for guidance.
Thus spake Putin. But whether the tsar's loyal minions impale prisoners in the presence of a delighted Ivan IV, torch children in front of their mother as in Day of the Oprichnik, or journey to Salisbury in the United Kingdom with a knock-off perfume bottle carelessly leaking lethal poison, in this strange palimpsest of past, present, and imagined future one thing is certain.
A thug is still a thug.
For further reading, see Charles Clover's excellent in-depth analysis of Eurasianism in Black Wind, White Snow: The Rise of Russia's New Nationalism; Ian Kershaw's comments on Putin's "modern-day version of medieval feudalism" in Roller-Coaster: Europe, 1950-2017; and especially Gary Lachman's Dark Star Rising: Magick and Power in the Age of Trump, a provocative study of the shared postmodern esoteric roots of alt-right US and Russian politics today.
Victoria Nelson is a writer of fiction, criticism, and memoir. Her books include Gothicka and The Secret Life of Puppets, studies of the supernatural grotesque in Western culture, On Writer's Block, and Wild California, a collection of stories.
Victoria Nelson
Victoria Nelson is a writer of fiction, criticism, and memoir. Her most recent books are The Secret Life of Puppets and Gothicka: Vampire Heroes, Human Gods, and the New Supernatural. She teaches in Goddard College's MFA Program in Creative Writing.
Posthumanism for Regular Humans Trapped in an Inhuman World: On "The Human Reimagined"
Aaron Winslow is stimulated by "The Human Reimagined: Posthumanism in Russia," an "essential volume" edited by Colleen McQuillen and Julia Vaingurt....
Out of the Picture: On Tony Wood's "Russia Without Putin: Money, Power and the Myths of the New Cold War"
Richard Lourie appreciates "Russia Without Putin," an "indispensable book about post-Soviet Russia" by Tony Wood....
Conspiratorial Realism: On Vladimir Sorokin, Victor Pelevin, and Russia's Post-Postmodern Turn
Maya Vinokour unravels the conspiracies at the centers of the latest novels by Vladimir Sorokin and Victor Pelevin, Russia's leading postmodernists....
Multilingual Wordsmiths, Part 5: Jamey Gambrell, In and Out of Russia
"By reading literature in translation, we become citizens of the world."...
A Strange and Endless Journey: A Conversation with Jamey Gambrell, translator of Vladimir Sorokin's "The Blizzard"
Alina Cohen interviews translator Jamey Gambrell about Vladimir Sorokin's new novel, "The Blizzard."... | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,373 | Jose Manuel, one of the great legends of the club, said that Sporting is a "state of mind". It was San Lorenzo beach which hosted the first steps of Sporting Gijon back in 1905. According to the scriptures of the century, it started with a combination of local players and sailors who came from abroad to collect coal. Since then, and under the command of a young Anselmo Lopez, the club began to forge a legend, one of the most important in Spanish football. Quini, Ferrero, Joaquin, Tati Valdes, Luis Enrique, Abelardo, David Villa, Ablanedo or the new generation of "Guajes", among others, have been the responsible actors to make city and club one thing. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
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1,004,375 | NIFT Hyderabad Reinstates 56 Workers Who Complained OF Sex Harassment
The National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) centre in Hyderabad on Wednesday reinstated 56 female housekeeping workers, allegedly after drawing flak for firing them over their sexual harassment allegations against a regular employee of the institute.
The NIFT withdrew its earlier decision to terminate the services of the housekeeping workers.
Following criticism from different quarters for sacking the workers for protesting over the alleged sexual harassment, NIFT Hyderabad restored the contract with a manpower agency employing them. All the housekeeping workers were asked to resume work from Thursday.
However, as the contract is ending by June end, the management has reportedly asked the manpower agency to recruit new employees in place of the existing ones.
One of the women leading the protest against sexual harassment alleged that the management was trying to silence them by driving them out. She said they would continue the protest till stenographer D Srinivas Reddy was punished.
Srinivas Reddy allegedly subjected four female workers to sexual harassment. One of the victims had lodged a complaint with the committee that deals with sexual harassment complaints in July last year.
The victim had also lodged a complaint with the police in October. The police registered a case but took no action as it suspected that some women made false allegations after they were pulled up for their poor performance.
With the internal committee's report not being made public and police also not taking action, a section of housekeeping workers on Monday staged a protest at Madhapur police station.
The same day, NIFT terminated the services of all outsourced workers by ending the contract with the manpower agency.
Article source: https://www.ndtv.com/hyderabad-news/nift-hyderabad-reinstates-housekeeping-staff-amid-sexual-harassment-row-2056181
New Delhi: The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) has started trial runs
Mumbai: The collapse of a decades-old multistorey building in Mumbai on T
Thane: A self-styled godman and another person were arrested in Maharasht
Dehradun: A man was killed by a tiger in Kalagarh area of the Corbett Tig
Chennai News Delhi top stories Tennis Mumbai top stories Cricket jaipur Health Care political sports ipl 2018 Breaking News Tech News Indian Politics WorldCricket Elections | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,376 | United States: 10 Reasons To Intervene In Bid Protests
by Aron C. Beezley
As we noted recently, the number of bid protest filings peaks in October as a result of increased government spending at the end of the government's fiscal year, which ends September 30. Thus, our previous article provided a fiscal year-end refresher for government contractors on the process for intervening in bid protests at both the Government Accountability Office and the U.S. Court of Federal Claims. This follow-up article provides 10 reasons why government contractors should consider intervening in bid protests.
The contracting agency's interests may not be the same as your company's interests, and your company is in the best position to protect and advocate for its own interests. In fact, contracting agencies owe an equal duty to all offerors, and thus their interests are broader than, and potentially distinct from, your company's interests.
Some government attorneys have limited resources or are overworked. Other government attorneys are "green" when it comes to bid protests because their offices simply do not see very many of them.
Intervening will help your company better protect its confidential and/or proprietary information if it becomes part of the record during the bid protest.
Similarly, by intervening, your company will be in a better position to protect its business reputation.
Your company knows its proposal better than anyone. As such, your company is best equipped to rebut challenges to your technical proposal, cost/price proposal and past performance. Likewise, intervenors often are in the best position to respond to allegations regarding key personnel and organizational conflict of interest (OCI) matters.
An intervenor can make arguments that, for whatever reason, the government fails to address.
If your company is the incumbent-contractor, then you may be more knowledgeable than the protester (and possibly the government) about the actual work under protest. As such, incumbent contractors may be uniquely able to rebut the protester's assertions about the scope and nature of the work at issue.
In a U.S. Court of Federal Claims bid protest, your company, as an intervenor, will be able to more persuasively and specifically articulate the harms that it will suffer if a temporary restraining order or an injunction is issued in connection with the protested contract.
Most bid protests are covered by a protective order that prohibits the attorneys from disclosing protected information (i.e., confidential, proprietary and source selection sensitive information). By intervening, however, your company will have the ability to be better informed about the course of the protest and the status of the procurement (subject, of course, to the terms of any protective order that is issued in the protest).
If the contracting agency decides to take corrective action in response to the protest, an intervenor will be in a much better position than a non-intervenor in terms of being able to influence the scope and nature of the corrective action.
Aron C. Beezley
United States Corporate/Commercial Law Corporate and Company Law Government, Public Sector Government Contracts, Procurement & PPP
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1,004,377 | Pseudupeneus maculatus , noto commercialmente come triglia atlantica è un pesce appartenente alla famiglia Mullidae, proveniente dall'Oceano Atlantico.
Distribuzione e habitat
Proviene dalle barriere coralline di Mar dei Caraibi, Brasile, parte degli Stati Uniti, Bermuda e Messico. Nuota fino a 90 m di profondità; gli esemplari giovani vivono prevalentemente nelle zone ricche di vegetazione acquatica, soprattutto tra le piante del genere Thalassia, piuttosto che nelle barriere.
Descrizione
Il suo corpo è compresso sull'addome, e ha una colorazione estremamente variabile: alcuni esemplari sono grigi chiari, altri rosa pallidi, ma possono cambiare colore e diventare bianchi a macchie rosse. Sono sempre presenti tre macchie scure lungo il corpo. La pinna caudale è biforcuta, mentre attorno alla bocca sono presenti dei barbigli giallastri. La lunghezza massima registrata è di 30 cm anche se di solito non supera i 22.
Biologia
Alimentazione
Si nutre di invertebrati acquatici come vermi policheti, crostacei isopodi, stomatopodi, anfipodi, granchi (Calappidae), ostracodi e gamberi (Caridea, Penaeidae, Alpheidae, Palaemonidae), molluschi bivalvi e infine echinodermi, in particolare stelle di mare.
Riproduzione
È oviparo e la fecondazione è esterna, non ci sono cure nei confronti delle uova.
Pesca
È un pesce abbastanza ricercato, quindi viene spesso pescato e si trova facilmente in vendita, nonostante la sua carne possa portare intossicazioni da ciguatera.
Note
Altri progetti
Collegamenti esterni
Mullidae
Taxa classificati da Marcus Elieser Bloch | RedPajamaWikipedia | test |
1,004,379 | Stanford professor Carol Dweck's work is being used all over the world. When we look at what school should epitomize...the growth mindset should be at the center. Many adults who work in schools say we need to get away from a fixed mindset, because a student's intelligence and future are not set. There is always room for growth.
But what if our actions in school contribute to the reason why a growth mindset has a low effect size?
Recently, John Hattie gave a keynote at the Annual Visible Learning Conference in San Antonio, Texas. Over 1,000 attendees from all over the world sat in the audience when Hattie gave a keynote focusing on The Science of How We Learn, which is the title of his book that was published 2 years ago.
As Hattie was going through the Skill, the Will and the Thrill of learning, he put up a slide that said, "Growth vs. Fixed mindset - .19." For those of you who don't know, and for full disclosure, I work with John as a Visible Learning Trainer. I gave up being a school principal in a community I loved to work with him. I write about his work from time to time because it provokes some of my best thinking. And because I'm such a huge fan of the growth mindset (I barely graduated from high school and was retained in elementary school), this slide poked my own hornet's nest.
We usually look for effect sizes that are .40 or above, which is what Hattie refers to as the Hinge Point. The Hinge Point provides a year's worth of growth for a year's input. A .19 is concerning because it is so much lower than the Hinge Point. The beauty of Hattie's work is that an influence with a low effect size (ex. Growth vs. Fixed Mindset) doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. The low effect size may be due to how the adults in the classroom or school building approach the influence, and we may have to change how we approach it.
As Hattie continued to speak, he said the reason why growth vs. fixed mindset has a low effect size is due to the fact that adults have a fixed mindset and keep treating students accordingly, so right now the effect size is low, and will continue to stay low unless we change our practices in the classroom. We put students in ability groups, they get scores on high stakes tests that help label them, and then we place them in Academic Intervention Services (AIS) which adds to their fixed mindset. Once students enter into AIS or Special Education, very few leave.
Students are conditioned to have a fixed mindset, and it's due to us.
First and foremost, we have to get away from having a fixed mindset because it has terrible implications for how we treat students. We do not have a crystal ball, and we shouldn't treat students who struggle like they will struggle for the rest of their lives. It's like a self-fulfilling prophecy. If we treat students like they will always struggle...they may always struggle.
Less Testing - Yes, I know. We don't feel like we have control over this but we do have control over parts of it. We can continue to speak up about the harmful way that high stakes testing is being used, but we can also change the way we use the tests we create and use in our classrooms. First of all, use less summative testing. Formative assessment is the sweet spot. Be less concerned about grades and more concerned about formative assessment. Join Teachers Throwing Out Grades and read this blog by Shirley Clarke.
More feedback - If we want things like class size to matter more, than we need to change the way we provide feedback. Reflect on the feedback you provide to students. Does the feedback go deeper as the students gain more expertise in the topic? Or do we just slap a grade or a sticker on a paper and say "Great job!" Praise, although great to hear, does not move learning forward.
Flexible Grouping - When we put students in ability groups like Lions, Tigers and Bears, something I was guilty of, they know which group has the high achieving students and others who are not as gifted in the curricular area. Students, no matter their academic level, can provide effective feedback to each other if it has been modeled correctly.
Different Questioning - 95% of questions stay in the surface level. According to Hattie's research, Experienced teachers ask 75% surface and 25% deep. Expert teachers as 75% that are deep and 25% that are surface. Check out SOLO Taxonomy for alternatives.
Stop talking so much - "Teachers ask more than 200 questions per hour," which means wait time is low and students are not getting the opportunity to talk with one another. Try to do a Think, Pair, Share or cooperative conversations.
We talk a lot about the growth mindset but our actions may be counterproductive to putting it into action. A growth mindset is so vitally important for adults and students. Adults need to have that mindset for their own growth but more importantly for the growth of their students.
Talking about the growth mindset is not good enough. Our actions are where the rubber hits the road. If we believe the growth mindset is important, and believe that it should have a higher effect size, then we need to follow up with the actions to make it happen. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,380 | This is a story about a time when we used vegetable cards in the kids class.
The kids shouted "Oh,no! This carrot is moldy!" as soon as they saw the carrot card in the photo above.
These black patterns seemed to look like mold from the kids eyes.
In this lesson, the kids chose vegetable cards they wanted so as to make a vegetable salad, but no one wanted the carrot card.
Thanks to the carrot card, they learned how to say "I don't want (something)" perfectly.
We teach to the test with past test.
Here is the newest lesson time schedule.
You can download it below.
© 豊橋市の英語・語学学校ワイズアクト英会話 All rights reserved. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,381 | MotorSportNotes
IndyCar, F1 & motorsport news & comment
Category: Indianapolis 500
Indy 500 2019: the year of the fairytale result?
While Fernando Alonso's quest for a fairytale finish at the 2019 Indy 500 failed before it started – thanks to a catalogue of blunders by his McLaren team – plenty of drivers are still on track for the win of their life. Ahead of the 103rd Indianapolis 500, Andy Webb runs the rule over the…
Rahal still sore over Long Beach, expects tight INDYCAR Grand Prix
Nearly 4 weeks may have passed since the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach but Graham Rahal remains convinced he lost a genuine podium finish on the California streets. Penalized by stewards for blocking eventual podium finisher Scott Dixon, Rahal took the checkered an unhappy 4th. "Am I disappointed with the ruling? Absolutely, I don't…
IndyCar Grand Prix: tire management the key for Rosenqvist
Rookie Felix Rosenqvist believes improved tire management is the key to unlocking a strong finish at the IndyCar Grand Prix. The Swede has struggled for consistency since a stellar opening race of the season in St. Petersburg but heads into this weekend's now traditional month of May curtain-raiser with renewed focus. "I view that as our…
Scott Dixon: An open wheel racing icon
In a championship as competitive as the NTT IndyCar Series, becoming a 5-time champion is the mark of a true racing icon. By doing so Scott Dixon – the New Zealander who moved halfway around the world to pursue his racing dream – has secured a place amongst the greats of American open-wheel racing. Now…
Guaranteed Indy 500 entries: get mad or get involved
Guaranteed Indy 500 entries was the hand-grenade Roger Penske, Chip Ganassi and Michael Andretti collectively lobbed into IndyCar last week. Fans – indignant at yet another assault on one of the few remaining month of May traditions – have been unequivocal in their response. But as Andy Webb writes, instead of digging in for a…
The Wave-Makers – Herta, Rosenqvist & Ericsson lead IndyCar's rookie class of 2019
The rookie line-up for the 2019 NTT IndyCar Series is one of the strongest and most exciting in decades. Just two races into the new season and stand-out performances have already come from Felix Rosenqvist and Pato O'Ward, capped off by Colton Herta's record-breaking win at the inaugural IndyCar Classic at COTA. After Robert Wickens'…
2019 NTT IndyCar season preview
The long offseason wait for IndyCar fans is almost over as the NTT IndyCar Series returns for 2019. A nail-biting 2018 season saw the championship battle go down to the wire and all the signs point to another thriller this year. Metronomic consistency proved to be the deciding factor as Scott Dixon became a 5-time…
Rahal confident engineering changes will pay dividends in 2019
Graham Rahal is optimistic about his prospects for the new season ahead of this weekend's Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg. The 30-year-old is confident that engineering changes during the offseason will pay dividends in 2019. "I feel like there are a lot of areas we have improved over the offseason", said Rahal on the…
IndyCar: the 3 most intriguing teammate battles of 2019
Though the NTT IndyCar Series paddock is a friendly and welcoming place, it is populated by people who love to win and hate to lose. For the drivers and crews, beating the guys on the other side of the garage is the first objective. On the eve of the new season, we have picked out…
Predicting the big IndyCar storylines of 2019
On the eve of the first pre-season test, we decided to get our magic eight ball out of storage and see which storylines will dominate the 2019 season in this two-part feature. Dixie goes for 6 Scott Dixon enters the 2019 NTT IndyCar season at the peak of his powers. Closing in on AJ Foyt's…
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1,004,382 | Hans Kulhanek (* 12. Februar 1906 in Wien; † 16. April 1996 in Kreuttal, Niederösterreich) war ein österreichischer Politiker (ÖVP) sowie Lebzelter und Zuckerbäcker. Er war von 1958 bis 1970 Abgeordneter zum Österreichischen Nationalrat.
Kulhanek besuchte nach der Volksschule ein Realgymnasium und absolvierte danach einen Abiturientenkurs an einer Handelsakademie. Danach studierte Kulhanek zwei Semester Staatswissenschaften. Beruflich war Kulhanek als Lebzelter und Zuckerbäcker tätig, wobei er 1954 zum Kommerzialrat ernannt wurde und noch im selben Jahr Bundesinnungsmeister der Zuckerbäcker wurde. Er war zudem Vorsitzender des Kontrollausschusses des Österreichischen Genossenschaftsverbandes und vertrat die ÖVP zwischen dem 24. Oktober 1958 und dem 31. März 1970 im Nationalrat.
Weblinks
Abgeordneter zum Nationalrat (Österreich)
ÖVP-Mitglied
Österreicher
Geboren 1906
Gestorben 1996
Mann | RedPajamaWikipedia | test |
1,004,383 | Sumac, a Monograph
Rhus glabra L. is one of the most common sumacs. It is an attractive ornamental plant and is cultivated by many for its beauty. The scientific name Rhus glabra comes from Greek and rhus is derived from "rhous" which means bushy sumac, glabra means smooth and refers to the stem and leaves of the plant (Kindscher, 1987).
Botany and Ecology
Division: Angiospermophyta
Order: Sapindales
Family: Anacardiaceae / Cashew or Sumac
Genus: Rhus
Species: glabra L.
Smooth Sumac, smooth upland sumac, sumach, sumac, dwarf sumac, scarlet sumac, red sumac, lemonade berry, vinegar-bush, vinegar-tree.
For information on Native American names of Rhus glabra L. refer to Kindscher (1987, 1992).
Rhus glabra L. is a large shrub or sometimes a small tree with open, flattened crown of a few stout, spreading branches and with whitish sap. The height can vary from 2-20 ft.
The leaves are alternate, stalked, odd-pinnately compoundwith slender axis, 12 - 20 inches long (30 - 50 cm), with 11-31 lance-shaped to elliptic leaflets, which are 2 - 4 inches (5-10 cm) long and ¾ to 1¼ inches wide. The upper surfaces of the leaflets are dark green and shiny/glossy, the lower surfaces dull and whitish; they are hairless, almost stalkless, and have toothed serrated marginsand pointed tips.
The leaves turn bright red in the autumn.
The bark is light brown and smooth on young plants, on older wood it is smooth or becoming scaly and grey to brown.
The stem is erect, rigid, very stout, hairless, angular, smooth, has raised air pores, and covered with a whitish coat that can be wiped off. It is reddish purple when young, grayish when mature.
Staminate, pistillate, and bisexual. The small, numerous flowers occur in large branched clusters at the ends of the branches; they are less than 1/8 inches (3 mm) wide, crowded in large upright clusters to 8 inches (20 cm) long. The staminate flowers are small and yellowish green; they have 5-parted calyces, 5 whitish petals, distinct, and ovate with 5 stamens, which have yellow anthers. The pistillate flowers are similar, in smaller clusters, more densely flowered; and have yellowish stigmas. The buds are small, covered with brown hair.
The inflorescences are panicles, dense, pyramid-shaped, 4 to 10 inches long, and terminal.
The fruits of Rhus glabra L. are crowded in upright clusters of red drupes4 to 6 inches tall. Each drupe (a fleshy fruit with a hard or stony center) is about 1/8 inches (3 mm) in diameter, round, contains a single smooth seed, numerous, dark red, and covered with short sticky red hairs.
Habitat(s), ecosystem(s) and geographic range where found
Rhus glabra L.is found in open uplands including edges of forests, grasslands, clearings, roadsides, and waste places, especially in sandy soils (eNature.com). It also grows at pastures, along railroads, and is cultivated in private settings (Kindscher, 1992).
It grows in colonies that result from stems sprouting from roots (Missouri Department of Conservation).
Rhus glabra L. is native to North America; it is the only shrub or tree species native to all 48 contiguous states (eNature.com). In addition, it stretches from southern Quebec west to southern British Columbia in Canada, and to Tamaulipas in northeasternMexico.
Phenology (time of growth, flowering and fruiting)
The flowering period is in the spring (from May to June). The male and female are usually on separate plants.
Fruits mature in late summer (from August through September) and remain attached in winter.
Ecologic Status (widespread, uncommon, weed)
According to Elpel (2008) there are 60 different species of the Rhus genus in the world out of which there are two species in Colorado.
Poison Oak, poison Ivy and poison Sumac used to be included in the Rhus genus, however, nowadays they are separated into their own Toxicodendron genus (Elpel, 2008).
Poison ivy flowers are small and scentless. Poison ivy fruits are yellowish white and clustered.
Medicinal Information
Flowers in spring from May to June. Leaves when turning red in the autumn. Berries when ripe in autumn. Bark and roots may also be gathered.
Tea from berries, leaves and roots.
Bark syrup
Root bark poultice
Leaves dried and smoked
(Source: Foster & Hobbs).
Medicinal Use
According to Foster & Hobbs (2002),
I. The berries are used as tea in traditional European folk medicine to treat:
Bloody discharge
Urinary tract problems
Gargled for ulcerations of mouth and throat
Externally to wash ringworm lesions and slow healing ulcers
II. Leaf tea used for:
Urinary tract disorders
III. Root tea used:
Externally as a postpartum wash for bleeding
Internally to relieve painful urination, urinary retention, colds, dysentery, suppressed appetite, and as an emetic.
IV. Bark syrup used to:
Stimulate lactation
Stop bleeding
Vaginal yeast infections
V. Root bark poultice used externally on old ulcers.
VI. Leaves smoked with tobacco for head and lung problems.
According to Hartley, Rhus glabra is also used in gargles as an antiseptic, refrigerant and diuretic. A strong decoction or diluted fluid extract, affords an agreeable gargle for angina.
In the homeopathic system of medicine Rhus glabra is used in occipital headache, ulceration of mouth, stomatitis, epistaxic and profuse perspiration (Boericke, 1984).
Additional information: Kindscher, 1987, 1992.
Primary Constituents
Leaves and bark contain gallic and tannic acid (Elpel, 2008).
In an antibiotic screening of British Colombian medicinal plants, it was found that Rhus glabra was more effective in its crude methanolic extracts than the other 100 plants screened. The extract showed both the widest zones of inhibition in a disc assay, and the broadest spectrum of activity (McCutcheon et al. 1992). The chloroform/methanol extract was fractionated and revealed three antimicrobial compounds; gallic acid and two of its methylated derivatives, 3,4,5-trihydroxybenzoic acid and 4-methoxy-3,5-dihydroxybenzoic acid (Saxena et al., 1994). Only gallic acid has been isolated from Rhus glabra in the past (Doorenbos, 1976). These compounds showed better activity against the gram-negative bacteria than the gram-positive bacterium Staphylococcus aureus. While this study explains the traditional uses of Rhus glabra by native peoples, it is unlikely to lead to new antibacterial drugs (Hartley).
Other Use
Raw young sprouts were eaten by the Indians as salad. The sour fruit, mostly seed, can be chewed to quench thirst or prepared as a drink similar to lemonade. It is also consumed by birds of many kinds and small mammals, mainly in winter. Deer browse the twigs and fruit throughout the year (eNature.com).
The berries can be infused into cold water to make a good lemonade-type drink (Elpel, 2008)
Sumac thickets provide shelter for wildlife. Native Americans used the drupes medicinally to treat sunburn and sores and to make red and black dyes; the roots to make a yellow dye; and sometimes smoked the dried red leaves. Deer and sheep sometimes consume the leaves (Kansas Wildflower & Grasses).
Potentially toxic in large or concentrated doses (Foster & Hobbs).
Ayurvedic Information
Rasa: Kasaya (astringent), Amla (sour)
Virya: Shita (cooling)
Vipaka: Amla (sour), Katu (pungent)
Prabhava: Madhura (sweet)
Guna: Ruksha (dry), Shita (cold), Laghu (light), Guru (heavy) (Lad, 1997, p. 248)
Mahabhuta: Vayu (air), Prthvi (earth) (Lad, 1997, p. 248), and Tejo (fire) (Lad, 1997, 244)
Anti-diarrhea (stops diarrhea) Brmhaniya
Anti-diuretic (increases absorption of fluids) Mutrasangrahania
Anti-phlogistic (anti-inflammatory) Shotahara
Anti-pyretic (stops sweating) Jwarahara
Vulnerary (closes wounds and promotes healing) Sandhaniya
~ Sources: (Lad & Frawley, 1986), (Sharma, 1995), (Lad, 1997), (Tirtha, 1998)
Kidney, bladder, and liver (Tierra & Frawley). Colon and lungs (Lad, 1997, p. 242)
Dhatus
Rasa, Rakta, Artava
Srotansi
Prana vaha srotas, Anna vaha srotas, Ambu vaha srotas, Rasa vaha srotas, Rakta vaha srotas, Purisha vaha srotas, Mutra vaha srotas, Sveda vaha srotas, Artava vaha srotas, and Stanya vaha srotas
Estimation of Ayurvedic use
Cooling herbs create a sense of refreshment, a lifting of feelings of oppression. They promote detoxification and clarity. They tend to clear Pitta and the blood but can also increase vata and kapha. When taken in excess, cooling substances produce an undesirable coldness, hypoenervation, frailty, sadness, nervousness, poor memory and gradual degeneration (Tierra & Frawley).
According to Sharma (1995), the general systemic action of kashaya (astringent taste) is healing, absorbing, anti-diuretic, and normalizing skin pigmentation. Furthermore, it acts on diarrhea, hemorrhage, wounds, polyuria, and respiratory disorders.
Astringent taste is sedative, stops diarrhea, aids in healing of joints, and promotes absorption of bodily fluids, and the closing and healing of sores and wounds (Lad & Frawley, 1986).
Astringent causes shrinkage of mucous membranes or exposed tissues. It may be applied internally to check discharge of blood serum or mucous secretions caused by sore throat or diarrhea, or applied externally on cuts, allergies, fungal infection, scars or insect bites. Astringent also helps to heal stretch marks and other scars (Mother Herbs & Agro Products).
Psychologically, astringent taste is supportive and grounding, it brings things together and makes the mind collected and organized, putting everything in its right place (Lad, 1997, p. 249).
Sour taste improves the taste of food, enkindles the digestive fire, add bulk to the body, invigorates, awakens the mind, gives firmness to the senses, increases strength, dispels intestinal gas and flatus, gives contentment to the heart, promotes salivation, aids swallowing, moistening and digestion of food, gives nourishment (Lad & Frawley, 1986).
Sour taste brings comprehension, appreciation, recognition and discrimination. It makes the mind alert, sharp and enhances the span of attention (Lad, 1997, p. 245).
The taste of kashaya (astringent) is contraindicated in disorders such as vata provocation, general debility, and loss of appetite (Sharma).
Constipation, vata provocation, blood clots (Lad, 1997).
Heidi Nordlund
Bioimages Home. Rhus Glabra. (pictures). Retrieved on December 14, 2008, fromhttp://www.cas.vanderbilt.edu/bioimages/species/frame/rhgl.htm
Bioimages Home. Identifying Invasive Plants. (Detailed photos to distinguish Smooth Sumac from similar plants). Retrieved on December 14, 2008, from http://www.cas.vanderbilt.edu/bioimages/pages/invasive-plants.htm
Boericke, W. 1984. Pocket manual of Homeopathic materia medica. Pratap Medical Publishers, New Delhi, India. 9th ed.
CAT.INIST. Antimicrobial constituents of Rhus glabra. 1994, vol. 42, no2, pp. 95-99 (13 ref.).Retrieved on December 10, 2008, from http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=4108174
Central Council for research in Ayurveda and Siddha (CCRAS). The Ayurvedic Pharmacopoeia of
India. Tintidikida, Vol. V (p. 205). Retrieved on November 9, 2008, fromhttp://www.ccras.nic.in/PharmacopoeialWork/Links/API/API-Vol-5.pdf
Doorenbos, N. J. 1976. Journal of the Mississippi Academy of Sciences 21:53
Elpel, T.J. 2008. Botany in a Day: The Patterns Method of Plant Identification. Hops Press, MT. (p. 124)
eNature.com. 2007. Smooth Sumac Rhus glabra. Retrieved on December 10, 2008, from http://enature.com/fieldguides/detail.asp?allSpecies=y&searchText=sumac&curGroupID=10&lgfromWhere=&curPageNum=4
Foster S. & Hobbs C. 2002. Western Medicinal Plants and Herbs. Houghton Mifflin Company, NY (p. 309).
Germplasm Resources Information Network (GRIN). Taxonomy for Plants. Rhus glabra L. Retrieved on December 10, 2008, fromhttp://www.ars-grin.gov/cgi-bin/npgs/html/taxon.pl?31689
Hartley, L. Secondary Compounds Within the Anacardiaceae. Colorado State University. Retrieved on December 13, 2008, fromhttp://www.colostate.edu/Depts/Entomology/courses/en570/papers_1998/hartley.htm
Kansas Wildflower & Grasses. 2007. Smooth Sumac. Retrieved on December 14, 2008, from http://kswildflower.org/details.php?flowerID=109
Kindscher, K. 1987. Edible Wild Plants of the Prairie. University Press of Kansas (pp. 190-194).
Kindscher, K. 1992. Medicinal Wild Plants of the Prairie. University Press of Kansas (pp. 182-188).
Lad, V. Dr. 2007. Textbook of Ayurveda: Fundamental Principles. The Ayurvedic Press, NM.
Lad, V. Dr. & Frawley, D. 1986. Yoga of Herbs. Lotus Press (pp. 34, 53, 216).
McCutcheon, A. R., Ellis, S. M., Hancock, R. E. W., Towers, G. H. N. 1992. Journal of Ethnopharmacology 37:213
Missouri Department of Conservation (MDC.online). Smooth Sumac (Rhus glabra L.). Retrieved on December 14, 2008, fromhttp://mdc.mo.gov/nathis/exotic/vegman/twentyfo.htm
Mother Herbs & Agro Products. Astringent. Retrieved on December 14, 2008, from http://www.motherherbs.com/astringent.html
Saxena, G., McCutcheon, A. R., Farmer, S., Towers, G. H. N., Hancock, R. E. W. 1994. Journal of Ethnopharmacology. 42:95
Sharma, P.V. 1995. Introduction to Dravyaguna. Chakhambha Orientalia. 3rd edition (pp. 34-35).
Tierra, M. & Frawley, D. 1988. Planetary Herbology: An Integration of Western Herbs Into the Traditional Chinese and Ayurvedic Systems. Lotus Press (p. 340).
Tirtha, S.1998. The Ayurvedic Encyclopedia. Ayurvedic Holistic Center Press.
Wikipedia. Rhus Glabra. Retrieved on November 1, 2008, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhus_glabra
Ashoka Tree, a Poem
ASHOKA TREE
At the time of dawn you opened to the drops of rain
Born as an Evergreen in the rain forest
Living throughout India and Sri Lanka
Rising straight in to the sky
Like a seeker raising the awareness into the abode of God
Dressed in long leaves and dark brownish black bark
Blooming in the spring
Pink and yellow-orange flowers
Offering delightful fragrance to all
Turning red like the color of blood
As a uterine tonic you heal the feminine
Bringing hope and joy to all women
Taking away grief and sorrow
You are Sacred
Dedicated to the God of Love
Filled with Shakti power
Named like the female deities of the Jainas
Blessed for witnessing the birth of the Buddha
Blessed for witnessing the first meeting of Sita and Hanuman
By Heidi Nordlund
Advanced Ayurvedic Practitioner
www.NamaskarHealing.com | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,385 | Home > Blog > Web Team > Pick Up the July/August Issue of Diabetes Self-Management!
Pick Up the July/August Issue of Diabetes Self-Management!
Want to learn about how to be medically prepared for an emergency, writing a Section 504 Plan for your child, diabetes-friendly meal delivery services, and more? Then pick up the newest issue of Diabetes Self-Management at Barnes & Noble or your local grocery retailer, or download it on your favorite device. And be sure to subscribe for up to 50% off the newsstand price and receive our award-winning, expert information all year long! | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,386 | Paharia language may refer to:
the Malto language of east-central India;
the Mal Paharia language of east-central India;
Nepali, the official language of Nepal;
a dialect of Santali.
See also
Pahari language (disambiguation) | RedPajamaWikipedia | test |
1,004,387 | Nearly new PMI Crawler knee pads for sale, $30 plus shipping cost. I used these maybe one or two times, and they just weren't quite to my liking. Maybe they would work great for you; you can try these for just over half the price of new ones. Shipping should be about $8 or $10. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,388 | Reddit Banned Nazi Forums In Its Crackdown On Violent Rhetoric
Recently banned subreddits include /r/Nazi, /r/EuropeanNationalism and /r/NationalSocialism.
Reddit has begun a new wave of community bans, and it's homed in on violent subreddits. This notably encompasses groups that include Nazis and Nazi sympathizers.
As of Wednesday afternoon, Reddit's banned communities included /r/NationalSocialism, /r/EuropeanNationalism, /r/far_right, /r/DylannRoofInnocent and, of course, /r/Nazi.
The bans follow updates to rules regarding violent content. Reddit administrator landoflobsters wrote Wednesday: "Going forward, we will take action against any content that encourages, glorifies, incites, or calls for violence or physical harm against an individual or a group of people."
Related Story 'Hatreon' Is The New Crowdfunding Platform For The 'Alt-Right'
That administrator said the previous policy was "too vague," allowing violent groups and content to permeate the site.
Back in February, Reddit banned two prominent alt-right subreddits for posting personal information. But other reported neo-Nazi groups, like the recently banned /r/EuropeanNationalism, were still allowed on the site.
This latest decision to ban violent far-right groups comes months after other websites and tech companies did the same. Surrounding the violent Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, white supremacist groups and so-called "alt-right" figures were booted from GoDaddy, Airbnb, Patreon and GoFundMe. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,389 | Entrepreneur, Thabo Molefe aka Tbo Touch is under fire over his racial insensitive tweet.
The distasteful tweet has caught the attention of former Minister Of Sports Fikile Mbalula, DJ Fresh and many more who took it upon themselves to question Tbo Touch who is always advocating for Black Excellence.
In his defence, he wrote "I'm using myself as an example, not that it's my reality. Im advocating for Black Excellence in all shape and form. We need more @MkhariGiven @djsbu @KhanyiDhlomo maybe you should open your TV network showcase black success! We need more"
In a series of tweets, Touch says he was calling for black people to support one another however followers did not receive it like that.
When I board a flight and hear a voice of a Black Pilot, tjerrrr ??. I want to know where he graduated, how many years he has flown, is he sober or not going through a divorce. Does he owe anyone money or has ever been to rehab. These are all the fruits of colonization.
Oreng Chief? tacking a sensitive subject with such ambiguity. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,390 | Category: DNA, RNA and Protein Synthesis
Quantitative and qualitative changes in important genes trigger a cascade of changes that lead to disorders in several signaling pathways (such as signal transduction, and expression levels that affect signal transduction through the pathway [52]
Quantitative and qualitative changes in important genes trigger a cascade of changes that lead to disorders in several signaling pathways (such as signal transduction, and expression levels that affect signal transduction through the pathway [52]. this therapeutic concept needs to be supported by the growing body of clinical trials. inhibit this process [4,5]. Human articular chondrocytes express a constitutive complex of major histocompatibility system (MHC) class I, which are molecules that regulate match activation. After their activation, such as under the influence of FX-11 or as a result of inflammatory joint diseases, chondrocytes also express MHC class II and and -blockage, and MMPs inhibition[21,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35]transcription FX-11 factorsand action, and terminal differentiation[41,42,43,44,45,46]apoptosis FX-11 regulators and trail inhibition[47,48,49,50] Open in a separate window The genetic changes in cartilage are regulated directly and indirectly via genes associated with tissue metabolism. Quantitative and qualitative changes in important genes trigger a cascade of changes that lead to disorders in several signaling pathways (such as transmission transduction, and expression levels that impact transmission transduction through the pathway [52]. Cartilage degradation by the proteasomeCubiquitin system and intra-cartilage ossification have been correlated with abnormalities in the Wnt pathway mediated by and [53,54]. In turn, genetic changes in and affect, via the and pathways, the induction of rheumatoid arthritis [55,56]. Therefore, the introduction of inhibitors of overexpressed transcription factors and proinflammatory cytokines may have clinical benefits in the regulation of chondrocyte proliferation and differentiation [36]. The activity, concentration, or expression of the above-mentioned molecules is relatively easy to determine (at the gene or protein level) in biological fluids such as blood, urine, and joint fluid. Markers of cartilage degeneration have a moderate or good correlation with clinical and radiological changes in the course of degenerative diseases, especially OA and RA [25]. Cartilage diseases are often accompanied by synovitis [57] (Physique 1). Symptoms of the inflammatory state are the proliferation of synoviocytes and tissue hypertrophy. Synoviocytes release inflammatory mediators and matrix-degenerating enzymes into the joint. Their activation occurs due to the action of inflammatory mediators and cartilage matrix molecules, initiating a opinions cycle within the synovium, which results in progressive degeneration of the joint. Open in a separate window Physique 1 Arthroscopic appearance of the patient with synovitis and initial pathologic changes in the cartilage of the medial femoral condyle (MFC). Arrowheads: hypertrophic synovium. MFC: cartilage of the medial femoral condyle. P: patella. Arrows: blood vessels. The picture comes from our own material. 3. Diagnostic and Therapeutic Biomarkers Metalloproteinases, inflammatory factors, signaling molecules, and transcription factors belong to the best-described groups of enzymes and their genes involved in the pathogenesis of cartilage tissue disease [36,58]. Genetic changes within these gene superfamilies are useful diagnostically and also have therapeutic potential. 3.1. Metalloproteinases Metalloproteinases (MMPs) are responsible for the irreversible proteolytic destruction of cartilage, especially via the breakdown of type II collagen. Seven matrix metalloproteinases are expressed under FX-11 varying circumstances in articular cartilage [59,60,61]. Among them, only are constitutively expressed in adult cartilage. Their physiological function is usually tissue turnover and the level of their expression increases significantly in pathologic says. The presence of in cartilage appears to be characteristic of pathological circumstances only [59]. Additionally, the soluble collagenases play a key role in cartilage destruction. The collagenolytic activity of other MMPs (such as and degrade other ECM components, but in vivo, they are unable to cleave native type II collagen [59,62,63]. The proper regulation Rabbit polyclonal to ABCB5 of expression of the metalloproteinase family depends on many factors and triggers several intracellular signaling pathways. The expression patterns of MMPs in cartilage depend on proinflammatory and pleiotropic cytokines and growth factors [64,65]. The overexpression of MMPs is an important marker of the progression of osteochondral diseases, regardless of etiology [59]. There is a relationship between the increase in MMP expression and the quick rate of joint destruction.
Posted in DNA, RNA and Protein Synthesis
Cogn
Posted on November 18, 2021 by ipa2014
Cogn., Roxb. with aqueous remove of fruits showed significant ( 0.05) decrease in the total acidity and ulcer index. Improvements in all histopathological parameters were noticed in Rabbit Polyclonal to POLR2A (phospho-Ser1619) the fruits was shown to possess significant ( 0.05) antiulcer property in rats. The polyphenols XAV 939 like quercetin reported from the plant may attribute to the antiulcer property of the extract. Hook f. is a wild crop, well known as in Tamil. The synonyms of are Roxb. Cogn., Roxb. It is available in various parts of India, and it is XAV 939 a highly acceptable wild vegetable across south India. The nutritional study of the fruits of have reported that they possess a high level of calcium, potassium and vitamin C, in addition to its high crude fiber content.[1] The fruits of have been reported to possess hypoglycemic activity in rats.[2,3] The fruit extracts of were shown to have antidiabetic and hypolipidemic properties.[4,5] The roots of this plant have been used by the natives of north Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh to treat some gynecological ailments and also to induce abortions.[6] The decoctions of fruits have been used in traditional medicine as a treatment for gastric ulcer. Although traditionally it is used for gastric ulcer, the plant has not been shown to possess antiulcer activity on the basis of scientific data. Ulcer is an open sore that develops on the inside lining of the stomach (a gastric ulcer) or the small intestine (a duodenal ulcer). Both types of ulcers are also referred to as peptic ulcers. The most common symptom of a peptic ulcer is a burning or gnawing pain XAV 939 in the center of the abdomen (stomach). In the past, it was mistakenly thought that the main causes of peptic ulcers were lifestyle factors, such as diet, smoking, alcohol and stress. While these factors may play a limited role, it is now known that the leading cause of peptic ulcers is a type of bacteria called can infect the stomach and small intestine; and in some people, the bacteria can irritate the inner layer of the stomach and small intestine, leading to the formation of an ulcer.[7] Peptic ulcer occurs due to an imbalance between the aggressive (acid, pepsin and fruits in rats. MATERIALS AND METHODS Plant material Plant material and chemicals: was collected from Aruppukottai, near Madurai, Virudhunagar district of Tamil Nadu, India. The fruits of the plant were botanically identified and authenticated by botanist Dr. R. Kannan. A voucher specimen of the herb (TUH No. 266) was deposited in the Department of Environmental and Herbal Sciences, Tamil University, Thanjavur. All the other chemicals and solvents used were of laboratory grade unless otherwise mentioned and purchased from S. D. Fine-chem Ltd., Mumbai, India. Preparation of plant extract Five kilograms of the fruit powder was extracted through successive solvent extraction in Soxhlet apparatus using the solvents Pet-ether (60-80), chloroform, ethyl acetate, methanol; and finally the marc was subjected to aqueous extraction by maceration in 15 volumes of purified water. The solvent extracts were used for phytochemical investigation. The aqueous extract (yield, 9.5%) was concentrated and dried at a temperature not exceeding 60C in high vacuum (0.1 mmHg). The dried powder of the aqueous extract was suspended in distilled water and used for the following study. Experimental animals Male rats weighing 200 to 220 g were procured from Glenmark Pharmaceuticals, Navi Mumbai. All the animals were placed in polypropylene cages at controlled room temperature 24C 1C and relative humidity of 60% to 70% in animal house and maintained on standard pellet diet and water was carried out as per standard.
RNA samples were subjected to direct gene expression analysis by measure counts of mRNA/per sample using murine nCounter? PanCancer Immune Profiling Panel
Posted on September 25, 2021 by ipa2014
RNA samples were subjected to direct gene expression analysis by measure counts of mRNA/per sample using murine nCounter? PanCancer Immune Profiling Panel. in regulating the tumor immune microenvironment. Using a murine 4T1 breast adenocarcinoma model of spontaneous metastasis in immune-competent BALB/C mice, we show that genetic ablation of Crk by CRISPR-Cas9 leads to enhanced anti-tumor immune cell populations, cytotoxic LEPR effector and immune surveillance cytokines in primary tumor. Pathologically, this leads to a significant reduction in tumor growth and lung metastasis. Mechanistically, Crk KO suppresses EMT and PD-L1 expression on tumor cells and acts additively with Trans-Tranilast anti-PD1 therapy to suppress tumor growth and metastasis outcomes. Taken together, these data reveal a previously un-described function of Crk adaptor protein expression in tumor cells for cell autonomous regulation of tumor immune microenvironment. results indicate that Crk KO acts additively with anti-PD1 in suppressing tumorigenesis and lung metastasis. In effect, the reprogramming of immune microenvironment by Crk KO results in reduction of both tumor growth and lung metastasis. These results establish a previously undescribed role of Crk in tumor immunology and immune evasion in an immune-competent mouse model. Materials and methods Generation of Crk knockout 4T1 murine breast cancer cells 4T1 murine adenocarcinoma cell lines were grown in RPMI supplemented with 10% FBS. Two individual guide RNAs targeting exon 1 and exon 2 of cellular murine Crk were synthesized and cloned into All-in-one plasmid vector (U6-gRNA/CMV-Cas9-RFP) (Sigma). Both vectors containing the guide RNAs were individually transfected into 4T1 cells and sorted for RFP expression after 48 hrs. Cas9-2A peptide-RFP fusion protein expression enabled monitoring of transfection efficiency and FACS based single cell sorting. Single cell clones were grown and screened by western blotting for Crk expression. A total of four individual clones were tested in experiments and representative data were shown. In vivo experiments For the studies, 6-week-old, female BALB/c from Jackson laboratory were used. All the procedures involving animal care and use were approved by IACUC of Rutgers University. 100,000 Wild-type or Crk KO cells were injected in the mammary fat pad of each mice. The tumors were palpated every 3?days, and body weight and tumor volumes were measured. At the end of the 6 weeks, the mice were sacrificed and tumors and lungs were harvested for immune phenotyping, IHC, western blotting or RNA extraction. Anti-PD1 or isotype antibodies were administered (i.p.) every 3?days at 200 mg/kg/day dosage in the combination experiments with total 4 administrations per group/study. NanoString immunoprofiling analysis Total RNA was isolated from four primary tumors for each group (WT and Crk KO) using RNeasy Plus? total RNA Isolation kit (QIAGEN). RNA samples were subjected to direct gene expression analysis by measure counts of mRNA/per sample using murine nCounter? PanCancer Immune Profiling Panel. Multiplex assay consisting of 770 murine inflammatory response genes were analyzed using nSOLVER? Analysis software 3.0 by the strategies previously described.16 Immunohistochemistry Immunohistochemistry was performed on the Connection Rx autostainer (Leica Biosystems). Principal tumor areas had been stained for anti-CD3 (Abcam16669, 1:100), FoxP3 (Novus NB100-39002, 1:1000), PD-L1 (Proteintech 17952-1-AP, 1:200), F4/80 (eBioscience 14C4801, 1:200), PD-1 (Abcam stomach52587, 1:100), Compact disc31 (Abcam stomach28364, 1:100), Ly-6G (Abcam Trans-Tranilast stomach2557, 1:300), Granzyme B (Connection TM Ready-To-Use, Leica Biosystems PA 029), Ki67 (Abcam stomach15580, 2 g/ml). All rabbit primaries had been Trans-Tranilast discovered using anti Rabbit-Polymer- HRP accompanied by DAB. Biotinylated anti-CD8 (Ebio 130808, 1:200) was discovered by Streptavidin-HRP (Leica Biosystems) and accompanied by DAB. All of the areas had been counterstained with hematoxylin after that, dehydrated and film coverslipped utilizing a TissueTek-Prisma and Coverslipper (Sakura). Entire slide checking (40x) was performed with an Aperio AT2 (Leica Biosystems). At least 3 mice/group/antibody had been employed for the analyses and the very least 5 105 cells had been examined per specimen. Outcomes were represented seeing that percentage staining and strongly positively staining live cells positively. Error bars signify +/-SD. P < 0.001. Cancers Irritation & Immunity Crosstalk RT2 Profiler PCR Array Total. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,391 | Information by country and territory
Canada and the United States
Consulate General of Canada in Dallas, United States
Susan Harper, Consul General of Canada in Dallas, United States
In November 2022, Susan became Consul General in Dallas, the senior representative of the Government in Canada, responsible for Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas. Her office, the Consulate General, covers economic, political, and public affairs, and provides consular and commercial services. The Consulate of Canada in Houston, which focuses on commercial issues, also reports to her office. In addition, these offices coordinate with several other key federal government departments, which focus on a range of issues including energy, environment, security and defence, as well as with Canadian provinces who are active in the territory.
Previously, Susan was Consul General in Miami (2016 to 2022), Canada's Senior Arctic Official (2013 to 2016), and Director General in the trade policy area, covering policy, negotiations and regulatory issues (2009 to 2013). She was at the Embassy of Canada in Washington DC (2004 to 2009), where she became the Minister (Economic Affairs). In 2001 to 2004, she was Canada's Ambassador in Montevideo, Uruguay. She previously held trade positions in Yaoundé, Paris and Buenos Aires.
Prior to joining the Government of Canada, Susan taught at both Cambrian College in Sudbury, and George Brown College in Toronto. She holds an MBA from the Ivey School of Business, at Western University, and an Honours BA in Math and English, from Queen's University.
Ms. Harper has 2 children, who keep her diplomatic, financial and cross-border travel skills honed. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,392 | Air-Line Restrictors, for 1/16 inch Airlines, 4 pack, from Robart, rob-189 - Chief Aircraft Inc.
These solid-brass air restrictors reduce the cycle speed of pneumatic retracts and are designed for use with 1/16-inch id air lines. Barbed ends for secure connections. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,393 | designs for living rooms with fireplaces gorgeous decorating ideas for living room with fireplace best fireplace living rooms ideas on.
office reception ceiling design ideas pop false ceiling designs office interior designing.
ground bed frames low to ground bed frame low to the ground bed beds low to the ground low low to ground bed frame.
beautiful living rooms with white sofas black white and gray living room with throw pillows and gallery wall of art.
modern working desk modern working desk modern work desk modern working desk modern work desk home design as well modern working desk.
modern house designs blueprints free house floor plans first home builders of floor plans simple house plans free 3 bedroom free house floor plans.
grey and white patterned floor tiles incredible farmhouse floor tiles for the bathroom oh my if i could have.
modern bedside pendant lights bed lighting ideas unique hidden bedroom ceiling lights ideas bedside table lighting ideas.
grey kitchen design ideas grey kitchen designs ideas cabinets photos. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,394 | SMC Financial Services is a new forward-thinking financial company, based in Crosby, delivering smart and efficient financial advice.
The Brief was to Create a logo, branding, corporate identity, business stationery and website for a financial advisor in Liverpool.
The logo was developed from the shape of the S in the name and has three elements to it to represent the three letters from the name. Once we have the basic shape of the logo and the colours chosen the rest of the corporate identity was developed during the website flat artwork stage. From this, we designed and printed all their business stationery including business cards, letterheads, pull-up banners and signage. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,395 | Late last month, I wrote about LeRoy Carhart, a Maryland abortionist, and one of the few in the country who practices late-term abortion. Recently, in part four of its "Inhuman" undercover investigative video campaign, LiveAction.org got Carhart on video admitting to the most disturbing things. (For more information about the Carhart and "Inhuman" series, including a fact sheet, news releases, press notes, letters to officials and more, click here.) He explains the abortion process to the undercover "patient," explaining the injection he gives to her to kill the baby and the 2-3 day waiting period before the "meat in the crock pot" is ready to come out, just as if she was "giving birth." If it fails? He's got all sort of neat gizmos to cut it up, though he can't completely guarantee a part of two might not get left behind in the womb. He's pretty proud of his actions, too, and has the nerve to tell the woman how uncomplicated the entire procedure is while at the same time telling her about the pack he'll give her in case the dead baby comes out while she bides her time between appointments at the nearby hotel. He even tells her that if she needs help, to call him — not 911. In fact, that's exactly why he's being investigated right now — a real patient died and he was nowhere to be found.
But his nonchalant destruction of human life isn't enough. He doubles the horror by wreaking havoc on his "patient's" mind, telling her, among many things, that abortion is no big deal; that while having a baby provides mental disturbances, aborting one will make her stronger. The only woman to have had an abortion who developed any subsequent depression, he incredibly claims, is a woman who, after her abortion, went home, saw her one-year-old, and became sad because she didn't abort her, too.
This should not only disturb any woman considering abortion, but anyone who thinks having one is no big deal. It should wake up those who are lukewarm to the issue. Carhart, and there are several more across the country, is every bit as heinous as Kermit Gosnell, the late-term abortionist on trial now in Philadelphia.
Leroy Carhart: Every bit as dangerous as Kermit Gosnell. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,396 | Chauncey Olcott
Born: 21 July 1858
Died: 18 March 1932
Chancellor "Chauncey" Olcott (July 21, 1858 – March 18, 1932) was an American stage actor, songwriter and singer.[1]
Born in Buffalo, New York, in the early years of his career Olcott sang in minstrel shows and Lillian Russell played a major role in helping make him a Broadway star. Amongst his songwriting accomplishments, Olcott wrote and composed the song "My Wild Irish Rose" for his production of A Romance of Athlone in 1899. Olcott also wrote the lyrics to "When Irish Eyes Are Smiling" for his production of The Isle O' Dreams in 1912.
He retired to Monte Carlo and died there in 1932. His body was brought home and interred in the Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx.
His life story was told in the 1947 Warner Bros. motion picture My Wild Irish Rose starring Dennis Morgan as Olcott.
In 1970, Olcott was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.
View the Wikipedia article on Chauncey Olcott.
Retrieved from "https://www.cpdl.org/wiki/index.php?title=Chauncey_Olcott&oldid=1036846"
U.S. American composers
English Wikipedia links | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,397 | US20110197246A1 - Broadcast Media Management Router Video Server - Google Patents
Broadcast Media Management Router Video Server Download PDF
Enzo Stancato
Anthony Godfrey Nedd
CYBER INTERNATIONAL Tech CORP
2008-06-25 Priority to ITCS2008A000016 priority Critical
2008-06-25 Priority to ITCS20080016 priority patent/ITCS20080016A1/en
2009-02-21 Priority to ITCS2009A000005 priority
2009-02-24 Priority to PCT/IT2009/000063 priority patent/WO2009157029A1/en
2011-02-14 Application filed by CYBER INTERNATIONAL Tech CORP filed Critical CYBER INTERNATIONAL Tech CORP
2011-02-14 Priority to US201113001132A priority
239000002609 media Substances 0 abstract claims description title 27
238000007906 compression Methods 0 abstract claims description 6
230000000977 initiatory Effects 0 claims description 8
238000005225 electronics Methods 0 claims description 2
206010051856 Primary transmission Diseases 0 description 4
206010051854 Secondary transmission Diseases 0 description 4
230000001702 transmitter Effects 0 description 3
102100015879 ADSL Human genes 0 description 1
206010024855 Loss of consciousness Diseases 0 description 1
101700073394 PUR8 family Proteins 0 description 1
230000003139 buffering Effects 0 description 1
239000003054 catalyst Substances 0 description 1
230000036629 mind Effects 0 description 1
238000004321 preservation Methods 0 description 1
H04L65/00—Network arrangements or protocols for real-time communications
H04L65/40—Services or applications
H04L65/4069—Services related to one way streaming
H04L65/4076—Multicast or broadcast
H04L65/60—Media handling, encoding, streaming or conversion
H04L65/601—Media manipulation, adaptation or conversion
H04L65/605—Media manipulation, adaptation or conversion intermediate
A multi wide area network (WAN) media content router, remotely controlled, and located from client reception stations, that enables video stream and multimedia content reception from terrestrial, satellite, internet protocol (IP) sources, 3G, and 4G. The router receives a plurality of direct transport streams from these different transmission media types without compression and routes these signals based upon predetermined protocol. The router receives multiple signals, discerns among the signals of different transmission media types, assesses the quality of the signals received, and delivers the highest quality signal to several multiplexed channels as an output in the form of a transport stream or packet data to a plurality of clients.
This application is a Continuation-In-Part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/001,132 filed on Dec. 23, 2010, which claims priority to PCT/IT2009/000063 filed on Feb. 24, 2009, claiming priority from Italian Application Nos.: CS2008A000016, filed Jun. 25, 2008 and CS2009A000005, filed Feb. 21, 2009.
The invention relates to a media content device, which manages IP streams primarily with content serviced from major internet media-centers and broadcast streams from television service providers for consumption via local clients. The device also supports a secured remote content portal. Specifically, the media content device enables transport/program streams and multimedia content reception from terrestrial, satellite, and internet protocol (IP) sources. More specifically, the media content device receives a plurality of direct transport streams from these different transmission media and routes these signals based upon predetermined protocol. The media content device of the present invention may generally be referred to as a router, and shall henceforth be termed as such.
The router may be managed and controlled remotely, and is software configurable. It is capable of receiving multiple signals, discerning among the signals of different transmission media, assessing the quality of the signals received, and delivering several demultiplexed channels as an output in the form of a transport stream or packet data to a plurality of clients. The router is capable of selecting, controlling, recording, and delivering media content to multiple users over secure networking protocols.
2. Description of Related Art
Communication technologies for routing signals are well known. In many instances, a signal transmission is received and then routed through a local network with any number of "clients" or receivers connected. Communication networks enable client devices to communicate with one another on a global basis. Wired Local Area Networks (wired LANs), Wide Area Networks, and the Internet, all play a role in this communication scheme. Each of these networks is generally considered a "wired" network, even though some of these networks may include transmission paths that are serviced by wireless links. A number of signal sources are now available and widely used by the public, for example, WiMax, 3G, 4G, Digital Subscriber Line, cable, optic fiber, digital satellite TV, digital terrestrial TV, and digital/analog cable TV, to name a few. Wireless networks have been in existence for a relatively shorter period of time. Cellular telephone networks, wireless LANs (WLANs), among others, are examples of wireless networks.
There are many issues that derive from trying simultaneously to engage, transmit, and/or receive, multiple signal and network types currently available in the marketplace. The quality of the video or data signal, the type of signal, and the selection of the different signal types makes any implementation of a multiple signal platform technologically difficult. Users are generally not in a position to determine which of various networks are actually available, will yield the best signal quality, and/or be most cost-effective at a particular time. Users may not have access to, or be aware that they may have access to, a plurality of transmission media. In this regard, it is desirable to have a device for the acquisition and distribution of various types of digital content, media, and/or entertainment, simultaneously. One such device capable of receiving signal content and directing the signal content to specific clients is a router.
Generally, a router distributes digital computer information contained within a data packet. Each data packet contains address information that a router can use to determine if the source and destination are on the same network, or if the data packet must be transferred from one network type to another. This transfer to another type of network is achieved by encapsulating the data with network specific protocol header information. Additionally, when a given packet is transferred to a network port, the router alters information in the packet header. This altered packet header information is then used by downstream network devices, including other routers to determine if a transfer is required. When multiple routers are used in a large collection of interconnected networks, the routers exchange information about target system addresses, so that each router can build up a table showing the preferred paths between any two systems on the interconnected networks.
A router generally has an interface connection for a single, given network transmission (such as copper cables, fiber optic, or wireless transmission). It will generally contain firmware for receiving and handling different network protocol standards. Each router is specialized to convert signals from one protocol standard to another. Thus, for example, a router capable of receiving wireless communication may transmit this information via cable to a receiving device.
In the US, multiple digital signals are combined and then transmitted from one antenna source to create over-the-air (OTA) broadcasts. By the reverse process, a receiver may first receive the combined transport stream and then decode it to display one of its component signals on a remote device, such as a computer or TV set. In principle, more than one signal within the same transport stream could be decoded by one receiver and displayed on multiple TV sets or as picture-in-picture on a single set, with only one selective tuning and demodulation block.
Since digital signals that are broadcast over-the-air are compressed (packed smaller) once they are received by a tuner, these compressed packets of digital data must then be reassembled and then decompressed (unpacked to their original size or converted into the required size for further use). In general, systems employ lossy compression, so while the decompressed data size is the same as the original uncompressed data size, the data produced is not exactly the same as the original data fed into the system at the transmitting site, but it is close enough that most people do not notice much degradation in the picture and sound. It would be beneficial, however, to be able to transport a stream of data without compression, and eliminate the loss in signal quality.
A transport stream is a standard format for transmission and storage of audio, video, and data, and is used in broadcast systems such as DVB and ATSC. A transport stream specifies a container format encapsulating packetized elementary streams with error correction and stream synchronization features for maintaining transmission integrity when the signal is degraded. Depending upon the transmission method, one or more program streams are carried within a transport stream.
The Transport Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) has been widely used in today's Internet technology. A TCP/IP-based Internet provides a datagram transmitting system between network devices such as hosts and servers connected to an Internet.
Digital signal compression involves a process for encoding digitized audio and/or video signals so that the amount of information transmitted can be increased and carried on a lower-capacity communications system, taking up less storage and requiring less bandwidth for efficient transmission. In this manner, digital signal compression increases a system's channel capacity.
Home wireless routers typically couple to the Internet via a cable modem or other broadband connection. The cable modem network capacity, however, is shared by a relatively large number of users and the availability of capacity to service communications between the home wireless router and the Internet varies over time. Moreover, the wireless routers available in the marketplace do not have the versatility or capability of receiving multiple transmissions from distinctly different sources (WiMax, 3G, 4G, Broadband Internet (DSL, cable, optic fiber), satellite TV, digital and analog TV, and cable TV) simultaneously, while being capable of making predetermined transmission decisions based on the different signal qualities received, including but not limited to: from a broadcast station with a smart server and software selecting the best transmission signal for the best bandwidth needed for high quality media content delivery.
Bearing in mind the problems and deficiencies of the prior art, it is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a router that represents a complete internet distribution center, and is capable of supporting a plurality of connection formats, such as WiMax, DSL, 3G/4G, and the like.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a router that utilizes digital terrestrial, satellite, and digital/analog cable signal decoders, allowing clients to receive any one of these signals without possessing its own client decoding hardware.
A further object of the invention is to provide a router capable of differentiating and qualitatively measuring various types of signal inputs, discerning among these signal inputs for the best transmission signal or combining multiple signal paths and load balancing, and delivering the best transmission signal to a client user.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a versatile router capable of a plurality of transmission and reception technologies to ensure global reach for clients where signal quality is poor due to limited service and/or limited providers.
The above and other objects, which will be apparent to those skilled in the art, are achieved in the present invention which is directed to a router for simultaneously receiving and routing digital terrestrial, internet, satellite, and cable signal transmissions, comprising: a first antenna embedded within the router, designed to receive and be in communication with digital terrestrial signal transmissions, and capable of receiving power from an internal power supply via a signal path; at least one second antenna embedded within the router, designed to receive and be in communication with wireless internet source transmissions; an electrical or optical cable interface designed to receive and be in communication with cable TV signal transmissions; a wireless or electrical cable interface designed to receive and be in communication with satellite signal transmissions; a broadband modem, which may be embedded, for receiving and being in communication with DSL and cable transmission signals; a processor for determining the quality of each signal received by the router, selecting a highest quality signal, and allowing for the transmission of the highest quality signal to a client requesting the signal; a plurality of embedded Local Area Network communication devices for transmitting routed signals to end users; and an embedded wireless transmission device for transmitting routed signals to end users.
The router may further include: a first signal multiplier for receiving and multiplying the cable TV transmission signal into N1 cable TV transmission signals; a first set of decoders corresponding to and in electrical communication with the N1 cable TV transmission signals; a second signal multiplier for receiving and multiplying the satellite transmission signal into N2 satellite transmission signals; a second set of decoders corresponding to and in electrical communication with the N2 satellite transmission signals; a third signal multiplier for receiving and multiplying the digital terrestrial signal transmissions into N3 digital terrestrial signals; a third set of decoders corresponding to and in electrical communication with the N3 digital terrestrial signals; and an IP Decoder Interface Manager in electrical communication with an output of each decoder in the first, second, and third sets of decoders.
The wireless internet source transmissions may include WiMax, Wifi, 3G, and 4G, or any combination thereof. The at least one second antenna preferably includes embedded antennas for receiving signal transmissions in WiMax, Wifi, 3G, and 4G, or any combination thereof.
In a second aspect, the present invention is directed to a transmission signal routing system for a client/server configuration comprising: a router for simultaneously receiving and routing internet, satellite, and cable signal transmissions, the router in direct communication with at least one server device; the at least one server device configured to manage transactions and communications with a plurality of client devices; the router comprising: a first antenna embedded within the router, designed to receive and be in communication with digital terrestrial signal transmissions; at least one second antenna embedded within the router, designed to receive and be in communication with wireless internet source transmissions; an electrical or optical cable interface designed to receive and be in communication with cable TV signal transmissions; a wireless or electrical cable interface designed to receive and be in communication with satellite signal transmissions; a broadband modem for receiving and being in communication with DSL and cable transmission signals; a processor for determining the quality of each signal received by the router, selecting a highest quality signal, and allowing for the transmission of the highest quality signal to a client requesting the signal; a plurality of embedded Local Area Network communication devices for transmitting routed signals to the at least one server device and some or all of the plurality of client devices, or any combination thereof; and an embedded wireless transmission device for transmitting routed signals to the at least one server device and some or all of the plurality of client devices, or any combination thereof. The router may direct media transport streams directly to the at least one server device.
In a third aspect, the present invention is directed to a method of receiving and routing broadcast transmission signals comprising: simultaneously receiving digital terrestrial signal transmissions, wireless internet source transmissions, digital terrestrial source transmissions, cable TV signal transmissions, and satellite signal transmissions in a single router device: determining the quality of each signal received; selecting a highest quality signal for each TV channel, or any other functions, such as video conferencing, video surveillance, VOD, and the like, selected by an end user; and transmitting the highest quality signal, from the simultaneous reception of multiple transmission sources, to the end user requesting the channel, the transmitting performed by sending the end user the highest quality signal via embedded Local Area Network communication devices or via embedded wireless transmission devices. This method may include: multiplying the digital terrestrial signal transmissions, wireless interne source transmissions, cable TV signal transmissions, and satellite signal transmissions, or any combination thereof, each into a plurality of signal sets; sending the plurality of signal sets to individual decoders corresponding to individual signals of the plurality of signal sets; managing outputs of each of the individual decoders using an IP Decoder Interface Manager, the IP Decoder Interface Manager responsive to the selection of the highest quality signal for each channel selected by an end user; and transmitting the highest quality signal for each channel selected by an end user via the embedded Local Area Network communication devices or via the embedded wireless transmission devices.
The method may further include continuously determining the quality of each of the signals received while the highest quality signal for each channel selected by an end user is being transmitted, and seamlessly substituting a new highest quality signal for a previous highest quality signal to the end user without interruption of the signal.
In a fourth aspect, the present invention is directed to a method for addressing signal integrity of a router connected to a network, the method comprising: initiating an area network status test by sending a ping-type data packet to at least one receiving device; checking for acknowledgement of the ping-type data packet from the at least one receiving device; reporting if the acknowledgement is not received; setting at least one counter of no acknowledgement; re-initiating the status test by resending the ping-type data packet to the at least one receiving device; and if the at least one counter exceeds a predetermined limit of receiving no acknowledgement, initiating a communications protocol restart of the router and resetting the at least one counter to zero.
The features of the invention believed to be novel and the elements characteristic of the invention are set forth with particularity in the appended claims. The figures are for illustration purposes only and are not drawn to scale. The invention itself, however, both as to organization and method of operation, may best be understood by reference to the detailed description which follows taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings in which:
FIG. 1 depicts an operational schematic of the remote controlled video and internet router of the present invention.
FIG. 1A depicts the intelligent selection path performed by the router of the present invention.
FIG. 2 depicts a detailed internal structure of the router of the present invention.
FIG. 3 depicts a client/server (master/slave) configuration utilizing a router of the present invention.
FIG. 4 depicts a connectivity and logic decision schematic of the router of the present invention within a WAN/LAN configuration.
FIG. 5 depicts the router of the present invention with wireless and digital terrestrial antennas mounted therein.
FIG. 6 depicts a perspective exploded view of the backside of the router of FIG. 5.
FIG. 7 depicts an optional embodiment of the present invention that incorporates board integrated amplified digital terrestrial antennas for UHF and VHF.
FIG. 8 is a perspective exploded view of the backside of the router of FIG. 7.
In describing the preferred embodiment of the present invention, reference will be made herein to FIGS. 1-8 of the drawings in which like numerals refer to like features of the invention.
The remotely controlled internet and satellite signal router of the present invention is designed to be a central device for media distribution, where clients may access broadband internet services or access one of many multiplexed channels, by commanding internal decoders within the router. The router may be designed to accommodate a plurality of channels (decoders) as desired without altering its basic operational principle, which involves the inclusion of remotely commanded demultiplexers for as many channels as predetermined. It allows for a plurality of clients without having to install expensive decoders and associated hardware.
The router of the present invention is designed to accommodate and acquire video and multimedia transmission streams from a plurality of independent sources simultaneously, including terrestrial, satellite, cable, and IP TV streams, such as WiMax, 3G, 4G, satellite, DSL, digital satellite TV, digital terrestrial TV, and digital/analog cable TV, to name a few, and is capable of transporting this information as selected to local environment clients. The router can also simultaneously accommodate individual independent sources of media content delivery. Electronic storage may also be provided for later retrieval and subsequent transmission to both local and remote sites.
The router of the present invention is preferably configured to receive video content (satellite, cable, and digital TV) simultaneously for distribution on the local intranet to clients. The video content is preferably available from multiple sources. The router multiples the signals it receives and sends the multiplied signals to individual decoders within the router. The decoders then transcode the video content in a compatible digital format for transmission via an intranet network.
Importantly, the router receives and transmits stream and packet data of video and audio signals, and is able to transmit the packet data and/or the entire stream to any computer or receiving device (e.g., electronic or mobile receiver) on the operating system. For transport streams, the router is tuned to a particular transponder via an antenna link, or Wifi/WiMax, or other air-to-air transmissions, and acquires the transport stream from the antenna. In this manner, all necessary signal information is acquired at the router. Each channel is delivered to each client at a time through the multiplexed scheme.
FIG. 1 depicts an operational schematic of the remote controlled video and internet router 10 of the present invention. Router 10 is configured to receive transmission signals from a plurality of sources including digital/analog cable TV 12, digital satellite video 14, digital terrestrial TV 16, Internet sources 18 such as Wifi 20, WiMax 22, 3G/4G 24, and broad band internet 26 including DSL, cable, and optical fiber. One portion 30 of router 10 includes electronic and software for multiplying, decoding, and transcoding the input source signals to the intranet. A second portion 32 of router 10 serves to route the internet sources. Router 10 is designed to transmit and receive information from wireless networks 34 and local area networks 36, which in turn, communicate with the end users 38. This allows end users 38 to communicate with router 10 and select channels for viewing, while allowing router 10 to transmit the selected channel to the client.
The remotely controlled video and Internet router is software configurable to receive input from internet connection, digital satellite TV, Digital Terrestrial TV, and digital/analog cable TV, and distribute these signals to multiple clients. Router 10 is configured via hardware and software to receive the multiple signals, measure the quality of each signal (compare and contrast), and upon client request for a specific channel, select the best signal of that channel to transmit to the client while periodically testing signal quality to maintain optimum signal performance to the client based upon internal empirical measures. A logical flow chart of this methodology is presented in FIG. 1A as a selection path.
FIG. 1A depicts the intelligent selection path performed by the router of the present invention. In this selection path, the user initiates the process by selecting, for example, a video (e.g., TV) program 1000. The main electronic program guide data base is then checked 1010 for the various locations of the video program. This check is preferably performed via the internet 1015. The router then selects the primary transmission source (deliverer) for the video acquisition 1020 based on a quantitative measure of the ability to deliver a quality signal. This selection is made from available sources capable of transmitting the selected video. Such sources include 3G/4G/WiMax IP Video Connections 1025, Digital Terrestrial transmissions 1030, digital/QAM/Analog Cable 1035, digital satellite 1040, and a plurality of wide area networks 1045 a-b, or any combination thereof A secondary transmission source is then determined 1020, if one exists, or if an IPTV 1050 a-b selects an additional transmission. The primary selected transmission source signal is then fed to the IPTV 1050 a-b and/or standard broadcast TV 1055 devices for ultimate display at the user end 1060 a-c. Upon a determination that the quality of the primary transmission source signal has degraded below the quality of a secondary transmission source signal, the secondary transmission source signal is then substituted for the primary transmission source signal in a preferably seamless manner such that the client/end user viewing is uninterrupted, and the client/end user is unaware that any signal substitution was actually made. The signal quality may be measured in numerous quantitative determinations, including, but not limited to, an investigation of signal amplitude, frequency, bandwidth, propagation velocity, distortion, rise/fall times, to name a few, and any combination thereof. In a preferred embodiment, the router of the present invention makes this signal quality determination periodically throughout the time the transmission source signal is being delivered. A new secondary transmission source signal may be substituted anytime the most recent allocated primary transmission source signal has been deemed deficient based on the signal quality metrics. In this manner, the user selected video program is delivered by the most reliable, and in some instances multiple, paths.
The satellite signal is multiplied many times and sent to a number of internal decoders. In this manner, the router receives a satellite signal and may output several demultiplexed satellite channels or a complete transport stream. The router is remotely controlled by the clients, who ultimately decide which channels shall be demultiplexed either locally or within the client.
Clients interfacing with the router of the present invention are able to query the router and control video streams via a set of IP commands.
Router 10 also includes a system that protects it from external agents. An external agent resistant enclosure and back ports protects the router from environmental elements and other infiltrations by extending the enclosure around the ports with an environmental safety cover. Thus, router 10 is versatile enough to be stationed and operable in an area exposed to outside environmental conditions.
Allowing router 10 the capability of being stationed outside enables the router to obtain solar power for its operation. In one embodiment, sides of router 10 may be covered with solar panels. With power storage, the solar panels can guarantee continuous function even in the event of an electrical outage. The power storage system (UPS) is preferably configured with a battery that can be recharged by both the main power (when available) and the solar panels.
In order to communicate with different signals, router 10 is configured with multiple antennas, such as satellite and digital terrestrial. Terrestrial TV, which is associated with and/or known as, Free-to-air-TV, Free-to-air Digital Television, Digital Terrestrial Television (DTTV), to name a few, is generally television transmission using one or more transmitters that are located on the ground. Analog television was initially transmitted via terrestrial transmission. Digital terrestrial TV (DTTV) is transmitted on radio frequencies through terrestrial space in the same way as standard analog television, with the primary difference being the use of multiplex transmitters to allow reception of multiple channels on a single frequency range (such as a UHF or VHF channel). Similarly, Digital Terrestrial Broadcasting (DTB) can be received anywhere and at anytime with a small reception antenna. The router of the present invention is designed to be expandable to accommodate Digital Terrestrial Bandwidth, when and where this technology is available.
Via DTB, end-users (customers) can watch programming and receive other data that has been transmitted to compatible wireless devices. These signals may be received via a digital set-top box, or preferably via an integrated receiving device that decodes the signal received via a standard aerial antenna. However, due to frequency planning issues, an aerial capable of receiving a different channel group (usually a wideband) may be required if the DTTV multiplexes lie outside the reception capabilities of the originally installed aerial.
FIG. 2 depicts a detailed internal structure of router 200 of the present invention. A video cable signal 201 is received by a cable signal multiplier 301, which is preferably configured as an n-times multiplier. Each multiplied signal is transmitted to an individual decoder. Similarly, a signal transmitted via satellite to digital satellite receiver 202 is received by a satellite signal multiplier 302, which also preferably configured as an n-times multiplier, sending each multiplied signal to its own decoder. The multiplexed video cable signals are transmitted internally to individual cable signal decoders 304, while the multiplexed satellite signals are transmitted internally to individual satellite signal decoders 305. The number of decoders is not limited, and may be extended based on predetermined system configuration requirements. The received signals are decoded, demultiplexed, and individually sent to an IP decoder interface manager 307, which controls the decoder outputs via internet protocol.
Router 200 is designed to distribute internet and a plurality of satellite channels to a plurality of clients. Each client may receive many different digital satellite streams.
The communication between clients and router 200 may be via internal LAN 313 and may not necessarily require an internet connection. Router 200 is preferably configured with multiple available internal decoders, each one of which may be remotely programmed by the clients with the commands available and defined by the internal protocol of router 200.
Essentially, router 200 receives multiplexed signals from TV, Internet, and media servers, and multiplies these signals n times, transmitting each of the n signals to corresponding internal decoders. Preferably, these decoders are commanded via IP by client devices, so that they are capable of selecting, receiving, and transmitting any given channel that the client device requests.
The decoders are piloted via an external interface, preferably via IP commands. The client boxes access one of the decoders (a non-utilized one) and transmit information regarding which channel is to be decoded by that particular decoder. The IP interface is programmable and has a predetermined user interface. Router 200 is programmable, transmitting and receiving information from externally connected devices, and designed to provide software verifiable commands such as: a) decoder busy (true/false); b) decoder/channel ID (number, channel selected); c) change channel (decoder, channel); d) free decoder (decoder number); and e) reset (decoder number), to name a few.
Other possible decoder functions are preferably implemented via software interface. The integrated software that provides the interface for router 200 is preferably served by the same gateway address.
DTTV (digital terrestrial) signals 203 are received internally by a Digital TV signal multiplier 303, which is preferably configured as an n-times multiplier. The multiplexed signals are transmitted internally to individual Digital TV signal decoders 306 that are then decoded and individually sent to IP decoder interface manager 307. In the present invention, the digital terrestrial antenna is preferably embedded within the router as part of the internal router hardware with electric power to the antenna supplied by the RF antenna signal path. This configuration eliminates a separate power cord to the digital terrestrial antenna. In at least one preferred embodiment, other antennas in addition to the digital terrestrial antenna, such as WiMax, Wifi, and 3G antennas, as well as wireless broadband antennas, are embedded within router 200, with the goal an embodiment to incorporate as many antennas internally to the router as current technology will allow. In another preferred embodiment, a signal tuner is embedded within the main board of router 200.
Furthermore, in order to integrate a TV antenna within the router enclosure, a reduction in antenna circuitry topology was necessitated that ultimately included an electronically controllable variable gain amplified antenna.
IP decoder interface manager 307 comprises an integrated circuit set of devices for controlling via IP, digital/analog cable signals 201, digital satellite signals 202, and digital terrestrial TV signals 203. IP decoder interface manager 307 allows the device to be controlled via Internet protocol by the clients it is serving. Consequently, router 200 is configured to receive via IP, commands from the clients, and to take instructions from these commands for routing the associated, selected signals.
Wireless input, such as Wifi, WiMax, 3G, 4G, and any future wireless protocol, are received by antenna 216 and routed via traditional routing functional hardware 308, 310, 311 to multiple Local Area Network (LAN) intranet connectors 313, and wireless intranet communication 312 for intranet communication 214. Connectivity selector 310 selects the signal to be routed. This selection may be made manually or automatically. In at least one preferred embodiment, a plurality, if not all Wifi, WiMax, 3G, and 4G antennas are embedded in router 200.
Broadband modem interface hardware (cable, ADSL or any future non-wireless technology) may also be accommodated with signals received via the Internet. A broadband modem 309 is preferably integrated within router 200, and routed through traditional routing functional hardware 310, 311.
Three sides 215 of router 200 are preferably solar panels for economical preservation of power. Power supply 314, UPS 317, and battery 318 form the power supply network for router 200, and work in concert with solar panels 215. The UPS circuit 317 and battery 318 maintain functionality during electrical outage conditions. This configuration accommodates exposing router 200 to environmental conditions.
Router 200 performs the traditional functions of a router in addition to the tasks delineated above. One primary function is to distribute harmoniously all channels and bandwidth. As depicted in FIG. 2, router 200 consists of a traditional WiMax or broadband input and an internal router with outputs, to provide connections to all the client boxes on the network. Router 200 also possesses unique satellite decoding capabilities as well.
Under the router configuration of the present invention, it is possible for clients to change the channel of a decoder, to have absolute privileges on a decoder, to free decoders, or any combination thereof. These client commands facilitate the external management of router 200.
Typical external commands that router 200 is designed to accommodate include the following:
a) change channel (demultiplex) the decoder number X to channel Y;
b) get absolute privileges on the first free decoder, and return the allocated channel;
c) request an occupied decoder, that is, if all the internal decoders are occupied, a request may be made for an occupied decoder to another router box, which may then decide if it will allocate a decoder;
d) free a decoder currently occupied by the client;
e) sends a message to the client when a decoder is free;
f) status the decoders and let users know if the decoder number N is free; and
g) provide a new address for the client (reset function).
Router 200 may be placed in the vicinity where clients are located. One advantage is that it functions for each client as a complete internet distribution center and is capable of supporting various types of connection inputs and outputs (WiMax, 3G, 4G, LAN, DSL, and the like). It allows for the efficient use of satellite decoders, allowing clients to have an internet input, without the need of possessing their own decoding hardware. Thus, router 200 helps reduce the cost of multimedia content for each client that seeks to receive internet transmissions. One ideal location for the router of the present invention to be utilized is in a gated community that is in need of, in some way, a cost-effective, versatile media distribution system.
The core processing of router 200 preferably utilizes a single or several high performance ARM processor(s) or the like to control high performance IP routing and transport stream acquisition hardware. An ARM processor is any of several 32-bit RISC (reduced instruction set computer) microprocessors. The ARM architecture has evolved into a family of microprocessors extensively used in consumer electronic devices such as mobile phones, multimedia players, pocket calculators, and personal digital assistants (PDAs).
ARM processor features include: Load/store architecture; an orthogonal instruction set; mostly single-cycle execution; a 16×32-bit register; and enhanced power-saving design. Currently, the ARM architecture is the most widely used 32-bit ISA in terms of numbers produced The core ARM code will facilitate the following functions:
a) the control and operation of individual transport stream access devices;
b) the management of all channel access and routing control;
c) seamless selection and control of media onward delivery transport channels;
d) arbitrating and maximizing channel efficiency and throughput capacity;
e) selection of IP program content or multiple broadcast stream sources at the command of remote clients, and onward routing to the requesting user;
f) management of channel load sharing and redundancy fall back;
g) aggregation of channels to facilitate higher throughput channels where required;
h) provisions for security for both client and system access, as well as stream data security, such as DRM management; and
i) provisions for a commercial portal to facilitate secure purchase and commercial promotion.
The router of the present invention is designed to accommodate multiple media transport stream access for all multimedia broadcast systems, including ATSC, Clear QAM, DVB-T, DVB-T2, DVB-S, DVB-S2, DVB-C, DVB-C2, ISDB, analog cable, worldwide analog TV, and IPTV, and the like. It is capable of accommodating future multimedia technology as well.
Furthermore, router 200 is designed to accommodate Local Area Network interfacing for current and future IP connectivity media including Wireless LAN 802.11a/b/g/n, and all Wired LAN 802.3x implementations. WLAN throughput is preferably optimized using Multiple In-Multiple Out antenna and transmission technology.
Wide Area Network interfacing is designed within router 200 for all current WAN connectivity methodology, including Cable modem, DSL modem, WiMax modem, Satellite modem, and high speed mobile 3G/4G modem, and the like.
In one preferred embodiment, router 200 includes a SATA interface for hard disc drive usage or for other storage media, which enables storage and recording of transport/program streams for future recovery. This also facilitates automatic stream buffering for rewind or stream recovery in the event of user satellite station downtime.
Debug, diagnostic, programming and field maintenance facilities are implemented in router 200 using USB, JTAG, and secure access IP routes. A dedicated master Real Time Clock facility is provided to ensure system security and time management at all times and in the event of power failure. UPS and Battery back-up is provided for maintenance of service during power blackouts. The Real Time Clock also facilitates signal synchronization.
The preferred embodiment of the router of the present invention is currently capable of supporting as many as twelve (12) independent broadcast channels, with hardware and software capability for further expansion.
Router 200 is a multifunctional telecommunication apparatus, implemented in a single box, having the ability to connect to any type of display, including CRT, LCD, or plasma.
The router is, above all, an advanced, specialized computer for routing and video serving that contains within it a variety of functions with consequent energy savings. Unlike existing television technology systems that exhibit a high consumption of energy because they are inclusive of a television and various other power consuming technological devices, for example, a DVD player connected to a TV, plus a PC connected to the Internet. In the present invention, router 200 allows for all such options and extra multimedia functions to be available through a single device that is capable of functioning as a transmitter/receiver signal catalyst.
As noted above, router 200 may also be utilized in a client/server or master/slave configuration, which is, for example, suitable for hotels and similar multi-use operations. Hotels, having a substantial number of rooms, can use a client device or box for each room which has lower performance to the master or server device, but sufficiently satisfactory performance for the use of the customer or client. The server device manages transactions and communications of the client device. The server device is the server for administration of its associated client boxes. In such configurations, it uses an ad hoc system that allows communication and controls the operations of the client boxes, using databases constantly updated according to type of contract selected by the client.
FIG. 3 depicts a client/server (master/slave) configuration utilizing a router of the present invention. Routers 400, 410, and 420 are connected to a satellite dish 430 and via the Internet 440. Each router is in direct communication with either a client/server configuration or a configuration where it is in direct communication with client devices. Router 400 communicates directly with client devices 405 a-c. Router 410 communicates with server or master device 411 and client devices 415 a-c. Router 420 is depicted communicating with master device 421 and client devices 425 a-c. Each server or master 411, 421 controls all the external traffic between any corresponding clients. Only the video streams in large data packets go directly to the client (after requesting and receiving permission from the server). This function is performed as a way not to overload the server, considering that the quantity of client boxes could be significant. The average client box allows a partial, but effective use of the service available through the router. For example, in the event that all users are viewing a single video stream at a time (a popular video or event), the client box is precluded from handling multi-video or full multi-processing, in contrast to a non-client configured device. This limited operation is still amply sufficient for a client desiring to view, for example, a TV program, or go on the interne or buy on demand.
The client device is less complex than the server or master device, and therefore a more cost effective device to be employed in large quantities. Essentially, it does not have as extensive complex hardware/software, and performs fewer functions. It has a processor, motherboard, and video card with considerably lower performances than the master device. In this manner, it is considerably smaller in size, and made to be available at a considerably lower cost than the master client. Importantly, the client device maintains technology to ensure excellent communication and interaction with a specialized system, such as the hotel client/server (master/slave) configuration identified above. In this configuration, the master device is the true server. It has a far more complex structure than that of the client device, but still lowers the cost of implementing a router in each hotel room insomuch as the master device only has to manage data, and in some instances, report purchases made by the client box. It is not required to perform the entire workload of the client devices, working only as a control system and database, authorizing the client device to perform a requested operation. The structure of the master is very similar to the router structure, without the higher performance hardware, associated embedded antennas, multiplexing and demultiplexing, and associated supporting software for these functions.
The router of the present invention includes correcting, or self-healing firmware to accommodate and adjust for signal disruption. FIG. 4 depicts a connectivity and logic decision schematic of the router of the present invention within a WAN/LAN configuration. Router 400 sends a test signal 405 to status the Wide Area Network. This initiates a ping-type packet 410 to be sent to the system server 415. Receipt or acknowledgement 420 of the ping-type pack is returned by server 415. As noted in Decision Box A, if the ping-type packet is properly received 425, and acknowledgement verified, then nothing further need be done, insomuch as this portion of the communication is properly functioning. If, however, the ping-type packet is not properly received, and acknowledgement from server 415 is not available, a report 430 is issued. The test ping-pack is then resent 435 to server 415, and an acknowledgement is again solicited. The logic flow for this sequence is illustrated within Decision Box B. This procedure is performed a limited number of times by a WAN set counter 440, preferably M=2 times, although the exact number of test initiations is arbitrary but generally quite few. If router 400 fails to receive a proper acknowledgement within the predetermined number of test initiations, a reset signal 445 is initiated for router 400. Upon a reset command 450, as indicated within Decision Box C, WAN set counter 440 is reset to zero (M=0), a message is sent to the network that router 400 is rebooting, and a router reboot 455 is initiated.
In a similar fashion, router 400 also tests the Local Area Network communications. Router 400 sends a test signal 505 to status the Local Area Network. This initiates a ping-type packet 510 to be sent to devices 515 on the local area network. Receipt or acknowledgement 520 of the ping-type pack is returned by LAN devices 515. As noted in Decision Box D, if the ping-type packet is properly received 525, and acknowledgement verified, then nothing further need be done, insomuch as this portion of the communication is properly functioning. If, however, the ping-type packet is not properly received, and acknowledgement from LAN devices 515 is not available, a report 530 is issued. The test ping-pack is then resent 535 to LAN devices 515, and an acknowledgement is again solicited. The logic flow for this sequence is illustrated within Decision Box E. This procedure is performed a limited number of times by a LAN set counter 540, preferably N=2 times, although the exact number of test initiations is arbitrary but generally quite few. If router 400 fails to receive a proper acknowledgement within the predetermined number of test initiations, a reset signal 545 is initiated for router 400. Upon a reset command 450, as indicated within Decision Box C, LAN set counter 540 is reset to zero (N=0), a message is sent to the network that router 400 is rebooting, and a router reboot 455 is initiated.
FIG. 5 depicts the router of the present invention with wireless and digital terrestrial antennas mounted therein. An integrated amplified digital terrestrial antenna 600 in its casing is shown attached to the router enclosure upper casing 602, flanked on either side, or both sides, by wireless antennas 601. Depicted on router enclosure upper casing 602 is an integrated heat sink 605 utilized for thermal management of the internal electronics. Preferably, on at least one side of router enclosure upper casing 602 is a removable panel 604 (protective covering) for accessing a port or multiple ports for USB, 3G, 4G, WiMax modem, and the like.
FIG. 6 depicts a perspective exploded view of the backside of the router of FIG. 5. Digital terrestrial antenna 600 is electrically connected to at least one amplifier power output 617. Antenna 600 is secured to router enclosure upper casing 602 via mounting configuration 620. Attached to the enclosure rear panel/base plate 610 are ports for signal transmission. Port 613 is an electrical connector for receiving signals from an external digital terrestrial antenna. Ports 614, 615 are electrical connectors for receiving external DVB-S2 satellite antenna. Two WAN inputs 608 are shown attached to enclosure rear panel/base plate 610, although any number of inputs may be implemented and accommodated by the router design. Multiple LAN outputs 609 are presented on the enclosure rear panel/base plate 610. The router is preferably configured with a 110/220 V internal power supply 616. An AC mains power port 607 connects external power to internal power supply 616 and is responsive to a user operated power switch 606. A removable battery cover 611 allows a user to access and interchange the battery.
FIG. 7 depicts an optional embodiment of the present invention that incorporates board integrated amplified digital terrestrial antennas for UHF 621 and VHF 622. FIG. 8 is a perspective exploded view of the backside of the router of FIG. 7.
While the present invention has been particularly described, in conjunction with a specific preferred embodiment, it is evident that many alternatives, modifications and variations will be apparent to those skilled in the art in light of the foregoing description. It is therefore contemplated that the appended claims will embrace any such alternatives, modifications and variations as falling within the true scope and spirit of the present invention.
1. A router for simultaneously receiving and routing internet, satellite, 3G, 4G, and cable signal transmissions, comprising:
a first antenna embedded within said router, designed to receive and be in communication with digital terrestrial TV signal transmissions;
at least one second antenna embedded within said router, designed to receive and be in communication with wireless internet source transmissions;
an electrical or optical cable interface designed to receive and be in communication with cable TV signal transmissions;
a wireless or electrical cable interface designed to receive and be in communication with satellite signal transmissions;
a broadband modem for receiving and being in communication with DSL and cable transmission signals;
an electrical interface for receiving and being in communication with satellite internet signal transmissions;
a processor for determining the quality of each signal received by said router, selecting a highest quality signal, and allowing for the transmission of said highest quality signal to a client requesting said signal;
a plurality of embedded Local Area Network communication devices for transmitting routed signals to end users; and
an embedded wireless transmission device for transmitting routed signals to end users.
2. The router of claim 1 including:
a first signal multiplier for receiving and multiplying said cable TV transmission signal into N1 cable TV transmission signals;
a first set of decoders corresponding to and in electrical communication with said N1 cable TV transmission signals;
a second signal multiplier for receiving and multiplying said satellite transmission signal into N2 digital satellite TV transmission signals;
a second set of decoders corresponding to and in electrical communication with said N2 digital satellite TV transmission signals;
a third signal multiplier for receiving and multiplying said digital terrestrial TV signal transmissions into N3 digital TV terrestrial signals;
a third set of decoders corresponding to and in electrical communication with said N3 digital terrestrial signals; and
an IP Decoder Interface Manager in electrical communication with an output of each decoder in said first, second, and third sets of decoders.
3. The router of claim 1 wherein said wireless internet source transmissions include WiMax, 3G, and 4G, or any combination thereof.
4. The router of claim 3 wherein said at least one second antenna includes embedded antennas for receiving signal transmissions in WiMax, 3G, and 4G, or any combination thereof.
5. The router of claim 1 including an internal power supply designed and adapted to receive power via a signal transmission path, said internal power transmitted to an embedded antenna.
6. The router of claim 1 including solar panels attached to at least one side of an enclosure of said router, said solar panels in electrical communication with a battery and UPS circuit within said router enclosure, to charge said battery and ensure power to said router during electrical outage conditions.
7. The router of claim 2 wherein said multiplexors and decoders are designed to multiply and decode, respectively, multiple media transport streams, including ATSC, Clear QAM, DVB-T, DVB-T2, DVB-S, DVB-S2, DVB-C, DVB-C2, ISDB, analog cable, worldwide analog TV, and IPTV, or any combination thereof.
8. The router of claim 2 including embedded electronics for wide area network interfacing comprising a cable modem, DSL modem, WiMax modem, satellite modem, and high speed mobile 3G/4G modem, or any combination thereof.
9. A transmission signal routing system for a client/server configuration comprising:
a router;
at least one server device in communication with said router;
a plurality of client devices in communication with said at least one server device or said router;
wherein said router simultaneously receives and routes internet, satellite, and cable signal transmissions, said router in direct communication with at least one server device;
said at least one server device configured to manage transactions and communications with a plurality of client devices;
said router comprising:
a first antenna embedded within said router, designed to receive and be in communication with digital terrestrial signal transmissions;
a broadband modem for receiving and being in communication with ADSL and cable transmission signals;
a plurality of embedded Local Area Network communication devices for transmitting routed signals to said at least one server device and some or all of said plurality of client devices, or any combination thereof; and
an embedded wireless transmission device for transmitting routed signals to said at least one server device and some or all of said plurality of client devices, or any combination thereof.
10. The transmission signal routing system of claim 9 wherein said router directs media transport streams directly to said at least one server device or multi-server device.
11. The transmission signal routing system of claim 9 wherein said router and said at least one server device include:
a second signal multiplier for receiving and multiplying said satellite transmission signal into N2 satellite transmission signals;
a second set of decoders corresponding to and in electrical communication with said N2 satellite transmission signals;
a third signal multiplier for receiving and multiplying said digital terrestrial signal transmissions into N3 digital terrestrial signals;
a third set of decoders corresponding to and in electrical communication with said N3 digital terrestrial signals;
an IP Decoder Interface Manager in electrical communication with an output of each decoder in said first, second, and third sets of decoders;
12. A method of receiving and routing transmission signals comprising:
simultaneously receiving digital terrestrial signal transmissions, wireless interne source transmissions, cable TV signal transmissions, satellite signal transmissions, and 3G/4G, or any combination thereof, in a single router device:
determining the quality of each signal received;
selecting a highest quality signal for each channel, function, or media, or any combination thereof, selected by an end user; and
transmitting said highest quality signal, from said simultaneous reception of multiple transmission sources, to said end user requesting said channel, said transmitting performed by sending said end user said highest quality signal via embedded Local Area Network communication devices or via embedded wireless transmission devices.
13. The method of claim 12 including:
multiplying said digital terrestrial signal transmissions, wireless internet source transmissions, cable TV signal transmissions, and satellite signal transmissions, or any combination thereof, each into a plurality of signal sets;
sending said plurality of signal sets to individual decoders corresponding to individual signals of said plurality of signal sets;
managing outputs of each of said individual decoders using an IP Decoder Interface Manager, said IP Decoder Interface Manager responsive to the selection of said highest quality signal for each channel selected by an end user; and
transmitting said highest quality signal for each channel selected by an end user via said embedded Local Area Network communication devices or via said embedded wireless transmission devices.
14. The method of claim 13 including continuously determining said quality of each of said signals received while said highest quality signal for each channel selected by an end user is being transmitted, and seamlessly substituting a new highest quality signal for a previous highest quality signal to said end user without interruption of said signal.
15. The method of claim 14 including synchronizing said signals received using a real time master clock in said router such that said new highest quality signal to be sent to said end user is seamlessly substituted for said previous highest quality signal sent to said end user.
16. The method of claim 13 including transmitting a stream of data from said digital terrestrial signal transmissions, wireless internet source transmissions, cable TV signal transmissions, and satellite signal transmissions, or any combination thereof, through multipliers and decoders, to an end user without compression of said signals.
17. The method of claim 16 including transmitting multiple media transport streams, including ATSC, Clear QAM, DVB-T, DVB-T2, DVB-S, DVB-S2, DVB-C, DVB-C2, ISDB, analog cable, worldwide analog TV, and IPTV, or any combination thereof.
18. The method of claim 16 including tuning said router to a transponder via an antenna link and acquiring a transport stream from said antenna link.
19. The method of claim 16 including transmitting packet data of video. audio, and data signals to end users.
20. The method of claim 12 wherein said wireless internet source transmissions include: WiMax, 3G, and 4G, or any combination thereof.
21. The method of claim 14 including operating in a client/server configuration, where transmission of said signals includes transmitting to a server device and a plurality of client/server devices in electrical or wireless communication with said server device.
22. A method for addressing signal integrity of a router connected to a network, said method comprising:
initiating an area network status test by sending a ping-type data packet to at least one receiving device;
checking for acknowledgement of said ping-type data packet from said at least one receiving device;
reporting if said acknowledgement is not received;
setting at least one counter of no acknowledgement;
re-initiating said status test by resending said ping-type data packet to said at least one receiving device; and
if said at least one counter exceeds a predetermined limit of receiving no acknowledgement, initiating a self-reboot of said router and resetting said at least one counter to zero.
23. The method of claim 22 wherein said network comprises a wide area network, a local area network, or both.
24. The method of claim 23 wherein said at least one counter includes a first counter for counting reports of no acknowledgement from a wide area network test status signal, and a second counter for counting reports of no acknowledgement from a local area network test status signal.
25. The method of claim 22 wherein said at least one receiving device includes a server for wide area network communications, local area network end user devices for local area network communications, or both.
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JP2010537313A (en) 2010-12-02 Mobile media router and method of using the same | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,398 | The ASUS TUF line is always one of the more exciting product ranges to come out of the ASUS consumer motherboard platform, albeit a very niche form of excitement (well I find it exciting anyway…). I took a look at my first ASUS TUF series motherboard last year when ASUS kindly sent over their Z87 Sabertooth board. My general thoughts were that the board was a very good piece of kit although the monitoring, reliability and stability aspects of it seemed to be quite niche, aimed at a specific form of power user. I don't really expect that to change given that the TUF series is still about giving you military grade reliability and stability but I am hoping there will be lots of new features on offer with the new Z97 TUF series. Today we are looking at the ASUS Z97 Gryphon motherboard which is the micro-ATX version of the TUF line. More specifically we have the ARMOR EDITION equipped with the ASUS thermal armor but ASUS do offer a version without for users who find it garish or unnecessary. The full specifications of the motherboard are fairly basic given that there's no M.2, no SATA express, no WiFi and so on. However, for a micro-ATX motherboard it still has all the key features a desktop user would expect such as Gigabit LAN, dual PCIe 16X lanes, SATA III ports and decent spec audio.
The flagship feature of the ASUS TUF series is that 5 year warranty, that really is the selling point for all the reliability and stability features.
The back breaks down the key features of the motherboard, most are related to reliability and stability aspects such as reducing dust and heat.
Included is an extensive bunch of documentation including details on how to install all the extra accessories.
The "standard" accessories include a rear I/O shield, four SATA cables, SLI bridge and some Q connectors for the front panel I/O.
The "TUF" accessories include a small fan for the rear I/O (part of the Dust De-Fan feature), thermal sensor probes and a variety of slot covers for things like the unused rear I/O ports and so on. These are to prevent dust build up.
You also get dust covers for the PCIe lanes, the RAM slots and some miscellaenous screws and fittings for attaching things. The included guide explains all if you get overwhelmed by the mass of accessories. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,399 | Home Betting
Online site for playing the betting games
There are numerous choices of playing games on the web and thinking about every one of those choices and completing those things there is some site wherein we can play the games in on the web so considering each one of those potential choices and playing the betting games there is numerous site where we can play the games we need to play. Infact all these are the things that should be considered so knowing every one of the potential alternatives for playing the games in online like infact there are numerous games that should be thought about so there are a few nations which doesn't permit the betting games to be played on the grounds that playing these games may get dependent and individuals won't show Interested in there day by day exercises so knowing every one of the upsides and downsides and going with the specific site is better on the grounds that there are a great deal of choices accessible which should be known so making every one of these things done infact there are numerous choices that ought to be known prior to playing the games in online one ought to be instructed of the betting games like there are a ton of choices accessible for playing these games and realizing each one of those choices is better infact there are some site wherein one ought to become acquainted with the surveys blog where there will be a many individuals composing the audits of the particular site and furthermore about the particular games knowing every one of those surveys and playing in the specific reliable site is better where there will be no deficiency of cash so considering each one of those choices infact there are numerous potential things that ought to be known.
The site offers numerous advantages like in the wake of getting enrolled into the particular site there will be a lot of rewards and prize point that will be given by the site realizing each one of those awards focuses and playing the games is better where there will be numerous issues so considering every one of those and making the things done in fact there is numerous choices of playing the internet games.
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Knowing every one of these things and playing the games is better where we can play the games that we need to play however for no reason in particular and the rush is preferred rather than enslavement.
betting games
Online Horse Race Betting Games For All Those That Love Steeds
Betting Ariella - September 15, 2022 0
Steed racing is just one of one of the most prominent equestrian video games that has actually constantly been connected with betting. However wagering on races and also making real money is not everyone's...
5 Tips To Pick On-Line Gambling Sites
There are a number of items that gives some Online Gambling In Singapore sites a benefit over the various other sites; as well as there are hundreds of sites available online. Due to the fact...
If you are from as well as are searching for a location to wager online, you have actually involved the right area. There are lots of various websites available that provide an on the... | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,400 | We provide excellent hair styles and hair care services in a professional, customer friendly enviroment. We take time to educate you about hair, ensuring healthy and beautiful hair everytime you leave our salon. We are highly skilled and work hard to stay current on proceesses and techniques. Call now and book and appointment. We also welcome walk-ins. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,401 | This third edition of Pediatric Urogenital Radiology has been thoroughly updated to take account of the recent advances in the imaging and treatment of pediatric nephro-urologic disorders that have been achieved over the past years. A number of new chapters have been included on topics such as the role of ultrasound and MRI for urogenital imaging in the fetus and the use of contrast media in childhood. Other chapters have been extensively revised or rewritten, while information that continues to be pertinent has been retained.
The book describes in detail all aspects of pediatric urogenital radiology. It is written primarily from the point of view of the radiologist, but also includes essential clinical information from and for the pediatrician, pediatric surgeon, and urologist. It is specifically designed to aid the clinician in making decisions on imaging management, and to help the radiologist to understand the clinical background and needs. The newest techniques and the changing relevance of imaging and interventional procedures are described, and the diverse problems associated with the changing anatomy, physiology, and pathophysiology from the newborn period to adulthood are explained. The whole spectrum of imaging features of agenesis, anomalies and malformations, dysplasia, parenchymal and cystic diseases, urolithiasis, neoplastic diseases, renal vascular hypertension, renal failure, renal transplantation, pre-and postoperative imaging, and genitourinary trauma is covered. Individual chapters are devoted to vesicoureteric reflux, urinary tract infection, congenital urinary tract dilatation, upper urinary tract dilatation, voiding dysfunction, and neurogenic bladder. A chapter on the clinical management of common nephrourologic disorders explains how imaging is embedded in the whole process of clinical management. Short conclusions are included at the end of chapters and sections to highlight the key information.
Michael Riccabona, MD, University Hospital Graz, Department of Radiology, Division of Pediatric Radiology, Graz, Austria. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,402 | Azure Striker Gunvolt, Mighty Gunvolt, News
Mighty Gunvolt Goes On Sale November 28th, Update and DLC to Follow
11/18/2014 Inti Creates Matt 20 Comments
<CORRECTION: We previously reported that the version update will coincide with the release of Mighty Gunvolt as a standalone game on November 28th. This was an error. Rather, the update will coincide with the release of the DLC instead, at a date to be announced soon. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience.>
We here at Inti Creates are very happy to announce that Mighty Gunvolt will be receiving a version update and DLC package! Mighty Gunvolt will go on sale as a standalone game on November 28th for $3.99 (USD). The early adoption campaign for Azure Striker Gunvolt which allows you to download Mighty Gunvolt for free will be ending at this time as well, so make sure you pick up Azure Striker Gunvolt by 8:59AM PT on the 28th if you want to receive Mighty Gunvolt for free! A release date for the version update and DLC package is coming very soon, so stay tuned for an update in regards to that. The update can be downloaded from the eShop free of charge when it is available. Now, let's have a look at what is coming with the update and DLC!
Azure Striker GunvoltDLCMighty GunvoltMighty No. 9Update
Azure Striker Gunvolt, Fleeting Memories, News
Azure Striker Gunvolt – Fleeting Memories: Part 1
11/14/2014 Inti Creates Matt 8 Comments
[For those of you who have been watching our Interactive Wave Youtube program, you probably know about the side story to Azure Striker Gunvolt called 'Kagerou no Memoria', or in English, Fleeting Memories. This was written by Toshiaki Tai, the scenario writer for Gunvolt, and translated by yours truly. We have received a lot of fan feedback about having this story translated into English, and at long last, we are more than happy to announce that the story will be translated into English! We will be releasing the English translation of the story once a week here on the website, in the same manner in which they are released on our Interactive Wave program. Enjoy!]
Azure Striker GunvoltFleeting MemoriesInti CreatesMatt PapaToshiaki Tai
Welcome to the Inti Creates English Website
On behalf of the entire Inti Creates team, I would like to welcome you all to the new official Inti Creates English website! As a company, we have never been more accessible to our fans outside of Japan, and being such, we thought it was only natural to have an English medium where our fans from around the world can connect with Inti Creates like never before. In addition to our social media profiles, from this point forward we will be maintaining a constant open line of communication with our English speaking fans through this website. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,403 | Attachment-based Therapists in North Billerica, MA
Area auto-widened to MA - no Attachment-based Therapists were found in North Billerica, MA
No matches for Attachment-based Therapists in Massachusetts - try other Therapists below
Alden Cox
Counselor, MEd, LMHC, SEP
"I believe each human being has direct access, all the time, to the intelligent creative vitality that is our own life force. When we are overwhelmed, traumatized, depressed, or anxious, those resources might seem scarce. Living confidently from our deepest nature and purpose requires that we have access to the internal guidance rooted in this vitality. Contacting this energy directly with awareness, tracking emotional and physiological processes, and working with present moment awareness, belief systems, and biological self-protective capacities supports the nervous system to reorganize and reorient the whole self back towards authentic, spontaneous ease and wellbeing."
Attachment-based therapy in North Billerica is form of therapy that applies to interventions or approaches based on attachment theory, which explains how the relationship a parent has with its child influences development. These Therapists in North Billerica can help with North Billerica Attachment based therapy.
Therapists in North Billerica are able to work with a wide range of issues.
For example, if you're seeking a marriage counselor in North Billerica you'll find that most therapists are trained in marriage counseling or couples counseling in North Billerica and couples therapy. And they welcome families for family counseling in North Billerica or family therapy in North Billerica. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,404 | Kappeler, T; Kuksin, S; Schroeder, Viktor (2003). Perturbations of the harmonic map equation. Communications in Contemporary Mathematics, 5(4):629-669.
We consider perturbations of the harmonic map equation in the case where the target manifold is a closed Riemannian manifold of nonpositive sectional curvature. For any semilinear and, under some extra conditions, quasilinear perturbation, the space of classical solutions within a homotopy class is proved to be compact. An important ingredient for our analysis is a new inequality for maps in a given homotopy class which can be viewed as a version of the Poincaré inequality for such maps. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,405 | I posted a picture of this yummy dinner the other day on Instagram and got quite a few requests to share the recipe – so here it is! This meal is delicious you guys.
I have been eating healthy lately and not to toot my own horn, but I've been killing it. I may even be having fun with it right now. But don't even think that I don't still constantly crave chocolate and give in to that temptation every now and again.
My sweet tooth is especially ravenous before I go to bed so I have been searching for something that was somehow sweet, delicious and healthy all at the same time — and I finally found it. It was on the SnapChat of lifestyle blogger, KatieDidWhat. I have this quick and easy treat many nights before bed and though its not chocolate, it really holds my sweet tooth over.
It is seriously so easy. There are four ingredients and takes just a couple minutes to prepare.
You just cut slices of cucumber, drop a little scoop of greek yogurt on top, stick a couple strawberry slices on and top with a little honey. It is so good. You need this in your life.
I found this recipe on a YouTube channel not too long ago and I knew it was one I had to try. I finally got around to getting all the ingredients and a little container to keep it in and I am very, very pleased.
I like to try new recipes as often as I can, but I still have several recipes that have become an absolute staple in our household. They're the dishes I make quite often and we haven't tired of (yet). Last night I made one of our favs and decided it was yummy and easy (so easy) enough to share.
*This is not my recipe. I found it online somewhere and wrote the recipe down. This is in no way my creative genius (though I wish I could take credit).
Cook the popcorn chicken as directed on the package. In a large saucepan, whisk together the honey, ketchup, sugar, vinegar, soy sauce, salt and pepper over medium/high heat. Toss the popcorn chicken into the sauce and stir it around, coating the chicken with the sauce. Serve over rice. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,406 | Finally Saw Prometheus and Sequel Thoughts
Not just once nor twice. But three times now! I have to say that despite all the rants from people on imdb and other spots, I was pretty impressed by the film. I do believe it is a film that improves upon multiple viewings. Visually, it's stunning but there's so much detail put into the movie that you require multiple viewings to fully absorb each element on its own merit.
I did a long write up a while back analyzing the film and possible implications. This blog will encompass my perspective just as a viewer. First, the film remains quite puzzling and feels like there's a bit of Kubrick. One of the biggest criticisms has been the lack of answers. But part of that feels as though those answers will be revealed in the upcoming movie (granted it gets filmed). No doubt there are many questions left unanswered:
What is the black goo exactly?
Who are the engineers?
Are the engineers connected to the one at the beginning of the movie?
Why aren't there any females seen with the engineers?
What is the connection between the non-engineer life forms and the Alien saga?
Why, indeed, did the engineers want to assault man/earth?
Do the engineers, indeed, want to assault man/earth?
What happened to the crew of the engineers?
Why are there multiple ships on the planet? And if so why didn't Shaw and David locate more engineers who could've been alive?
Why is the engineer in stasis when they found him? And how long has he been in stasis?
Was Vickers, indeed, a robot?
Some of these questions possibly can be answered within the movie (if no sequel is made). For instance, Janek's acumen about what the engineers have done as well as the recent release of his cut scene with Vickers further allude to the purpose of the engineers in creating a secret weapon. Also, we see the engineer speaking to Weyland as well as an egotistical expatiation for Weyland's purpose in accompanying the crew to the planet.
Those deleted scenes absolutely added a great deal more depth to the movie. Similarly, the battle scene between Shaw and the engineer demonstrated just before they fight how the engineer seemingly was gazing in wonder at the aesthetics of Vickers' life boat. It seemed as though he admired what we had created, hinting that perhaps his species had long lost something special of their own.
If I found a flaw in the movie, it could've been the pacing. For instance, I felt that Fifield's sudden cowardice to be revealed far too early in the movie and needed more time to develop. There wasn't enough build up for him to suddenly turn and run away. Same with Milburn's decision to accompany Fifield. It was obvious that their presence was primarily for comic relief as well as instigators for the ooze and hammerpede. However, the lack of development for them made their death scenes seem like cliches from any standard horror film.
Some people argued that there were simply too many characters to develop in the movie. I think that part is definitely true. David's character felt the most developed ironically. But take Holloway for instance. I thought that there wasn't as much tension between him and David that made it justifiable to inject Holloway with the goo by David. Then you get Vickers who, imo, was a completely wasted character. I love Charlize Theron but her character needed a lot more. For instance, what's her true relation to Weyland? With her supposedly getting squashed by the alien ship, we won't have a chance to see much of her in future films (unless they pull some soap opera twin sister deal).
That said, in seeing the movie and extras as well as reading a few high level rumors put out by people (including Ridley Scott himself), I'm already starting to think about the follow up. First, the movie will certainly be about Elizabeth Shaw and David searching and discovering the engineers' home world. This aspect Ridley Scott has admitted. The other part is discovering what these engineers are: hostile beings as opposed to the angelic inspirations man has believed in.
With that being the premise, the questions that need to be answered are the fill and linking back to Prometheus and possibly the entire Alien genre. The biggest question people are probably wondering is what the black goo exactly is. While I've covered some possibilities, I think the next Prometheus might go into more detail about the origin of the substance as well as the possible intent.
Next, I feel that the questions that Shaw asked the engineer need to be answered. Those questions are what happened to the engineers? What killed them off? And why is there a perception that the engineers want to kill humans and have a hatred for them? While Janek did propose one theory in his anecdotal in the extras portion, we cannot say for certain that he is 100% correct.
Another major issue that must be addressed is if more characters will be introduced. Obviously, Shaw and David will be a major part of the story. However, the characters of Vickers and Weyland still play a huge background role. In the case of Weyland within the context of the Alien genre, his presence is too big to be ignored. With him dead, there cannot be any denial that it's impact will be felt on Earth and to humans. So the Weyland corporation will want to find out what happened to him and perform some kind of investigation for the expedition. In short, you cannot just fund $1 trillion dollars into a science expedition for fun, especially with the possibility of the discovering the most significant finding in human's history.
With Weyland dead though, we open up the connection to the Alien universe in figuring out what the Weyland-Yutani corporation is. While the non-movie books/comics address this detail, we may very well see the union of names come into play. This is where Vickers can make her re-appearance. Her character is very strong in the movie and too brief as I mentioned. Yet since Janek suggested the possibility of her being an android, there's a lot of room to play around her character. We know very little about the Weyland family outside of the fact that David is considered a surrogate son and that Vickers is the daughter. But what kind of daughter? Is Weyland like Dr Tyrell in that he has created androids for the sake of being a God and considers them all his children? And in assuming that Weyland has a great deal of power (and ego), it's completely feasible to believe he has some biological family.
Next we need to determine what the relation is between LV-226 and LV-446. The system that LV-226 is part of heavily resembles that of LV-446. Yet when Holloway does the briefing at the beginning of the movie, he mentioned that only a single moon in that system can support life. So does LV-226 become LV-446? Or perhaps is there another moon in that system where the engineers are setting up some sort of military research post (as Janek alluded to)? Although Scott is attempting to veer away from the Alien series, the universe still is interconnected. I feel strongly that part of what we will see is how the ship and space jockey that the crew of the Nostromo found arrived on LV-446. If there's a personal question that Scott himself must fulfill, it should be to answer what Alien, his original movie, hinted at.
From there, I think we need to see the connection between the vials and eggs on the original derelict space craft shown. All this time, we've assumed that the aliens were manufactured and/or tamed biological weapons for the engineers. For myself I've assumed all this time up until Prometheus that the eggs were the remnants of the crew from the derelict space craft. But with the introduction of Prometheus, the vials have made it less clear where the eggs were derived from as well as their real purpose.
Of course, we need to include the original alien itself. We have three elements to work with in the original alien adult form, the new deacon and the mysterious idol that the crew discovers in the chamber with the vases. Even if Scott included the deacon as a tribute to Alien, there's no way that you can avoid such a critical character in the alien universe without a share of the spotlight. I feel that we'll get more insight into the creature's life cycle.
In general though, what has to be answered are the larger questions in life. I think we'll see that the engineers themselves are not gods but are actually attempting to discover the answers to these questions themselves, which is partly why they manufactured humans. Maybe at a certain point they stopped caring about the questions and focused more on creating answers.
At any rate, I'm looking forward to the sequel. I think there's plenty of bits that make a sequel deserving and I hope that Scott will direct it again. Maybe we'll get to see a return of the hammerpede if anything since honestly it was the coolest alien in Prometheus.
World of Warcraft: Where Cross Realm Zones Shines
Prior to Cross Realm Zones, Blizzard had implemented a system that allowed players between realms to group with each other in some raids and instances using their Battle.net ID (and now tags). So the other day my friend invited me to an ICC 25 man raid. I was summoned into the instance. At one point, we decided to switch it down to 10 man and had to go outside. Upon leaving ICC, I found myself on the Stormreaver realm. I immediately was marked for PVP and had some issues getting back into ICC. Once it cleared though, I was back inside.
Today, my friends asked me to join up with them again to do a few achievements for Forge of Souls. Once again, I was summoned and entered their realm. After completing the instance, we decided to hit Serpentshrine Cavern (SSC) for some achievements and transmog gear. I still was on their realm. After finishing it up, we decided to keep the group but hang around a bit more.
So I ended up back in Shattrath and found myself once again in my friend's realm. We decided to go check out the Auction House and I found that it was closed to me. Afterwards, I quit the group and found myself back on Saurfang. That intrigued us so we decided to play around a bit to see how the whole CRZ worked.
Turns out it's somewhat convoluted. The rules aren't exactly clear. For instance, it seems that if you're the leader of the group and invite a higher level toon, you'll go to that toon's realm. But when you're of equal level, then it seems that the other person will appear on your realm if you're once again the group leader. What was kinda nice was that my friend's PVP timer eventually wore off when he came to my realm. So we figured that coming to a low population PVE server is advantageous as he could go around looking for rare spawns in peace.
But the whole thing to me is that now we have the possibility of doing cross realm raids. This is going to be great for MoP since I'm located on a low population Oceanic server and have trouble finding people on at my time. However, the few people in my guild can accompany my friends and I to larger raids in the future potentially. One possible thing is that we might be able to get 25 mans in the future given the ability to recruit people from multiple realms.
At any rate, this ought to be quite interesting. I'd love to see more of this in the future.
World of Warcraft: Cross Realm Zones, the Clusterfuck
Patch 5.0.4 went into a effect two weeks ago and already patch 5.0.5 is scheduled for tomorrow. Part of it ought to address the clusterfuck called Cross Realm Zones (or CRZ). As always, Blizzard completely underestimated their gaming community when implementing CRZ and it's become a gigantic mess. I won't go into details about why CRZ is a big mess, but I do want to go into what I feel their ideal was vs what it should've been.
Here's Blizzard's interpretation of what CRZ should've been:
"Hey, even after revamping all of Vanilla areas, people still won't quest in Desolace!"
One person at Desolace, "Wait, I'm here!"
"Ah! That means, we need to put more people in there so that it'll be fun and social for the guy leveling!"
Um, Desolace is empty because it's a shit place to level. The vast majority of the zone is just boring and people won't go there because there are better spots to level. People didn't go there in Cataclysm because most people probably already had an 80th level toon and wanted to hit 85 to go raiding. Any veteran players figured that questing is a complete waste of time for the most part and just instance grind their way to 80. The few people who do level in Desolace do it maybe once and promptly forget the whole place as it's dreary and boring overall. Putting a little bit of foliage did nothing to make the area more appealing.
Instead, the places where you really see people are popular spots so that they can grab ore and other resources. This doesn't sound like the way the CRZ was originally intended. It sounds like Blizzard's disease called…..
LAZY PROGRAMMING
But let's put that aspect aside and attempt to define what CRZ should've been all along….
Player in LFG.
"Hey, this guy in the dungeon is pretty cool. But damn, he's in another realm and I probably won't ever see him again. Let's exchange email/battle net tags so we can keep in contact!"
New Friend in Other Realm.
"Man, my realm sucks because I'm in an Oceanic realm where everyone is awake at 4am my time and I can't really play with this guy I just met. But hey Mist of Panderia is around the corner and more than likely, I'll be soloing content again for the entire expansion."
Zing…..
The way CRZ should've been is those who want to group up across realms should be able to the way LFG (and some raids) are being done now. Exchange email or Battle.net tags. Then hit a special button that allows a player to bring others in their realm (and vice versa).
Oh wait! But now we're hurting Blizzard's revenue because this will lower the incentive for overpriced realm transfers!
No, because most of the time players will more than likely solo the content they've been wanting to do. Many players want small populations to either avoid gankings on PVP realms or to avoid social griefing and have more resources available to them. So grouping up still means that the resources will be more limited overall. However, for a few hours now and then, players who group up would be able to at least enjoy hanging out and leveling together.
At any rate, Blizzard fucked up big time in this. They had a huge opportunity to improve the world but completely screwed it up, along with LFR loot rules in patch 5.0.4. It's doubtful even with fixing bugs that CRZ is going to improve the perception of Blizzard as well as the social aspects. But Blizzard is overhill and their shit does stink without them being able to tell anymore. Good thing I got a busy CTO position because damn I'd hate to waste more time on a shitty ass feature. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,407 | Seeking asylum is a human right. No matter our differences, all people deserve to live safely, free from violence and harm. In Australian media, and disappointingly from the mouths of politicians, language and certain words are used to dehumanise refugees. In response to this, her words shares the rarely heard perspectives of four women - Ayan Shirwa, Fadak Alfayadh, Akuol Garang and Nayran Tabiei.
Ayan Shirwa is a producer and presenter at 3CR Community Radio. She is also a young Somali woman who came to Australia in 1992. Ayan shares her story - talking candidly about the impact that growing up, not only as a refugee, but as an African muslim woman in white Australia, had on her mental health.
Fadak Alfayadh is a community lawyer and advocate for refugee rights. Fifteen years ago, she was also a refugee. Fadak migrated to Australia from Iraq, after it became unliveable for her family to stay during the war. They were forced to leave.
More than twenty years ago, Akuol Garang's family fled Sudan to escape the war and made the long walk to Ethiopia. That walk took them about a month, and at the time, Akuol's mother was nine months pregnant with her. She gave birth during that walk, and they then safely made it to Kenya where Akuol spent the first eleven years of her life growing up in a refugee camp.
Nayran Tabiei has always loved her home but she was forced to flee Syria and leave behind her sons who were conscripted in the military. With her husband and young daughter, they travelled to Lebanon, then Thailand, and finally made the dangerous journey by boat to Australian waters in 2012. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,408 | So this week I set out to change that, and Invited friend of the show Jonas over to drink some beers, eat some pizza, and talk about the 6 watches which make up the core of my collection.
There are some mistakes in here, some questions I just don't have answers to, and I'm sure I got some things totally back to front, but hey, I never claimed to be an expert.
I'm just a guy who likes watches.
And beer and pizza. Clearly.
As promised in this weeks show, there are a few people that deserve a shout out for helping me to build out, and maintain the watches that form the core of my collection.
Robert is my former colleague, and fellow horology nerd who helped to get the 145.013 flightmaster into my hands all the way from Oklahoma City, via Austin, Texas , and he posts some cool stuff about watchmaking to boot - go follow Robert on Instagram!
Tony is the owner (and deeply knowledgable Omega collector) of Swiss Time Services, who along with his team of highly trained watchmakers, has successfully brought the two flightmasters (along with a lot of other Omegas I've owned) back in to service. If you're looking for someone to service your Omega watch, Swiss Time Services should be on your list of people to talk to. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,409 | At Guardian Services, we are proud to offer skilled Dallas-Fort Worth exhaust and HVAC duct cleaning services. From routine maintenance to your HVAC ducts, kitchen exhaust system, cooling tower, or industrial exhaust ducts, to emergency servicing in the event of a breakdown, our team has the experience and training to handle anything you may need. With a company philosophy that puts people before profits every time, you can rest assured that we are providing the services you need at a fair price.
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We make it our mission to protect our customers' lives and property by offering exceptional maintenance and cleaning services for their critical systems. No matter what services your home or business requires, we have the services you need.
Schedule your free estimate by calling our exhaust cleaning experts in Dallas-Fort Worth today at (214) 760-6776. We are committed to offering unrivaled customer service, each and every time! | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,411 | Joel Rottier
Houston Based Digital Strategy, Website, Email & Social Media Professional
Quibi enters the Streaming Wars amid the Quarantine Era, but are they about to disrupt a different industry?
This week the long awaited launch of Quibi, the new short-form, mobile-only streaming video platform, arrived to a lot of interest from both consumers and advertisers, and a closer look at the platform suggests that they may not be gearing up for the Netflix battle that the industry has set up for them.
Targeting Micro-Moments
Unlike other streaming platforms, Quibi has differentiated itself by creating bite-sized pieces of content that consumers can digest during the little gaps in their day. Instead of spending two hours on your couch binge watching a show, Quibi hopes you'll spend your bus ride or your lunch break watching their 7–10 minute daily episodes.
This differentiator may be why the platform has accumulated $1.75 million in funding prior to launch and the attention of some of the most sought after directors and celebrities in entertainment. These short videos are specifically designed to fit into the time you would typically spend scrolling your social media feeds, which begs the question:
If Quibi isn't going to bat against the streaming giants, are they actually entering the social media wars instead?
The Status of Busy
In the last decade, we've seen a dramatic shift in the types of status symbols that individuals use among their friends, family, and even strangers. What once was a focus on designer handbags and luxury cars has turned to the concept that the busier you are, the more successful you must be.
Take delivery services such as Instacart, Shipt or UberEats for example. The idea that we are too busy to grocery shop and need to have these goods delivered to us implies that our time is worth more than to spend it at the grocery store. The same goes for tech pieces like AirPods that strangers utilize to complete phone calls in public. Being busy isn't an excuse anymore, it's a sign of status. By deemphasizing the praise surrounding the consumption of high-priced goods, we've created a focus on a more socially acceptable way for individuals to #humblebrag their social status.
As individuals focuses on promoting their own personal "Status of Busy", a spot in the niche that social media, YouTube, and TikTok have found could be integral to the success of a platform like Quibi. If they are able to work their way onto the home screen's of their subscribers' iPhones next to Instagram and Twitter, they could find success in the ability to draw attention away from the endlessly scrolling photos and tweets into highly produced content on a paid platform that allows advertising.
Capitalizing on their Target Audience
On top of that, the service is setting itself up to attract a group that has traditionally been difficult for big brands to connect with. By focusing on challenging social media platforms for those precious, sometimes-mindless minutes of free time and providing meaningful, quality content, Quibi is undoubtably making a play for the millennial demographic, even going as far as reviving childhood favorites of the group like Legends of the Hidden Temple, Reno 911 and Punk'd.
Seemingly taking a play from the TikTok platform, Quibi has put a huge focus on mobile-first video content by prioritizing the vertical or portrait video format. All 175 of the original shows planned for the platform's first year will utilize a feature they're calling "Turnstyle" which allows the viewer to gain a different perspective into the story. By watching content horizontally on their phones they can expect a traditional cinematic experience, while turning their phones vertical will result in a more character-focused experience.
Turnstyle also allows the user to feel more connected to the content and actually invokes somewhat of a "Choose Your Own Adventure" type storyline, placing the viewer into the scene with the portrait format allowing the character's phone to take over the viewer's screen. See the example Quibi shared below:
One show. One screen. Two perspectives.
Hold the phone horizontally = Cinematic perspective.
Hold the phone vertically = The character's phone takes over your phone. #QuibiCES pic.twitter.com/mANwJJKsGU
— quibi (@Quibi) January 8, 2020
How will this effect the advertising industry?
With all this attention and investor power behind the platform, it will be interesting to see how advertising dollars are allocated in the future, especially with a limited availability of space. While traditional broadcast advertising delivers around 15 minutes of ads every hour, Quibi plans on offering just two and a half minutes for every hour of content. The company also said that it has already pre-sold all $150 million in available ad space for the platform's first year to brands like PepsiCo, Google, Discover, General Mills, Anheuser-Busch, Progressive, Taco Bell, P&G and Walmart.
With streaming giants like Netflix, Disney+ and Apple TV+ forgoing the traditional advertising play, it's not surprising to see brands jump on board the first ever mobile-first media service in hopes of reaching millennials during their on-the-go moments, but the limited availability of ad-space could prove challenging or costly for brands that don't have the big budgets to flex.
In 2020, as the world continues adjusting to life in the Quarantine Era, it is an interesting time for a platform such as Quibi to launch and target users' "downtime". While we would typically be commuting to work, standing in line for lunch, or doing a quick 15 on the treadmill at the gym, we are instead in our homes for the vast majority of the day staring at computer, mobile phone, and TV screens.
On the other hand, maybe this is the ideal time for a platform like Quibi to launch, with the opportunity to lock in their subscriber base that will likely tire of scrolling their news feeds each morning, noon and night. Time will tell, but in the meantime, expect ads from the worlds biggest brands, because without sporting events and new traditional broadcast shows, they're the only only brands that will be able to afford taking the chance on the new platform.
Filed Under: News Tagged With: advertising, quarantine, quibi, social media wars, streaming, streaming wars
Texas transplant & proud Wisconsin native with a penchant for travel, strong margaritas & 90s rom-coms. Digital Strategy Manager at Love Advertising in Houston, Texas with a background in design and a passion for development.
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1,004,412 | As an educationist any aspect of change in the teacher student relationship impacts me deeply and leads me to introspect and reflect on my role in modern day India. We have long been proud of our traditional methods of education and such hallowed relationships like the one between the teacher and the learner (the guru and the shishya) have been seen as sacrosanct.
Recently there have been many instances which portray this beautiful relationship in a new light – not always positive. Are these rare incidences or do they symbolise the deep chasm that seems to have developed between the tutor and the taught and are they a sign of the times? This has struck at the very basic root of the educational system in India and has created unease and led to soul searching. Indeed it is a wakeup call. If only we could open our eyes, look with compassion and listen with our hearts.
More than that, we have to lend our ears to the pleas of the teaching fraternity toiling under great duress and struggling to enlighten the minds of the future citizens of our nation. Education should be the one area of constant revision, change and improvement for any country which seeks to establish itself as a world power. Revolutionary progress is much needed at all levels of our education system. A complete overhauling of the system and a more open minded approach to teaching and learning should be our clarion call.
Much needs to be done. A constructive and effective dialogue has to be set up between the teachers, the parents and the students. The channels of communication and facilitation should be opened and widened so as to allow for more awareness and understanding. Parents and teachers both have a great impact on the psyche of a young child. If the home environment is conducive and children are encouraged to respect their teachers, then the school too will become a place of illumination and learning. Creating an optimistic feeling towards school and teachers will only help parents to enable their children to establish strong bonds with their alma mater and their teachers. Similarly, school staff too needs to be sensitised to the pressures faced by parents and children today and be facilitated to handle them with sensitivity and sensibility. This will lead to mutual respect and acceptance and further strengthening of the teacher student symbiotic relationship.
Let us begin this noble task. Let us build bridges. Let us make platforms that will enable our future citizens to fly high.
Completely agree with Ms Sahay's point of view. Innovation, that too an ongoing one – the need of the hour.
It is time we approach this entire process of teaching -learning from the children's perspective – the perspective of the GEN Z! And by using all forms of bridges and flyovers, we will not only strengthen the essence of guru-shishya bond will but also ensure responsible and sensitive future citizen !
Very well expressed! This article hits the bull's eye. Communication is an effective tool to bridge gaps in every relationship and the lack of it is a major reason for differences and chasms between people. It is truly, then, our responsibility as teachers and parents to collaborate and get together to lead our children towards success and happiness. In doing so we build a brighter future for our children and make this world a better place to live in..
Great article! Thanks for sharing. Education system changed a lot and the relationship between teacher and students is not as strong as it was in our time. Teachers should make efforts to make their relationship stronger with their students and parents should help them. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,413 | I DID IT!!! I finally reached my weight loss goal this past week!!!!!!! OMG I'm SOOO HAPPY!!!
I wanted to lose weight for almost two years and just didn't have the dedication or motivation to actually DO it. I tried to eat good and exercise, which helped me lose around 1 pound a month, but I wasn't getting serious results and I was really discouraged. I am SOOOO thankful that Dukan Diet approached me about reviewing this diet because I never would have heard about it otherwise and I would still be unhappy with my weight.
I'm not totally in love with my body right now. I've had two kids and pregnancy was not kind to me… BUT I can finally fit back into all my favorite clothes and I look GOOD in my clothes instead of looking… well… uncomfortable. All those days where I wanted to give up and I wanted to quit because people were waving pizza and ice cream in my face… well it paid off!
Writing about the diet every few days or every week has really helped keep up my motivation. Sharing my results with you and getting positive and encouraging feedback has been incredibly helpful as well.
Never in my wildest dreams did I think I could lose 15 pounds in just 5 or 6 weeks. It's like a miracle to me. I had actually gotten rid of most of my "skinny clothes" after having baby #2 because I never thought I would ever be able to get back into them. Now I've brought out the box of size 2/4 pants and am doing cartwheels over the fact that they FIT!
I can't seem to stay within my "goal" weight range. The Dukan Diet recommended a goal weight of 114lbs for me. I personally would prefer 110lbs since that is where I am comfortable and feel the best. I am waiting to hear back from my Dukan Coach to see what I should do next. If I should stay on the Cruise Phase for one more week or if I have to move on to the "Consolidation Phase".
The reason why I haven't written a new post since Day 30 is because I've just been bouncing back and forth between 115 and 114 and it really wasn't that exciting.
On top of that, I haven't been wearing my Zaggora Hot Pants as faithfully as I should be. I'm only wearing them every other day or so and you're supposed to wear them daily for 2 weeks. I'm going to try to do better this week so I can let you know by the end of the week what I think about these hot pants. While I haven't seen significant loss in inches or weight from wearing them last week, I HAVE noticed (and so have several other people) that the skin of my thighs is a lot smoother. No more visible cellulite! That's made me want to wear SHORTS which is one of the reason why I haven't been wearing the Hot Pants every day! :-P I'm just hanging around the house today though, so I have them on!!!!
And yes, I did make it down to my goal weight (114lbs) just in time for My Best Friend's Wedding though!! That was a huge success and it felt SO GOOD!
Head to Amazon.com or your local bookstore and buy The Dukan Diet: 2 Steps to Lose the Weight, 2 Steps to Keep It Off Forever and The Dukan Diet Cookbook: The Essential Companion to the Dukan Diet . You've got nothing to lose, except for the weight.
Wow, you look GREAT! I'm glad you stuck with the diet and exercise. I swear by the SB diet myself I am 5'1″ and weighed a massive 150+ lbs. I did the same thing and started the SB diet and went to the gym 2-3 times a day/ 7 days a week. I got down to 100 lbs as well. However I have put on some weight, I'm up to 124 lbs right now. I'm working to get down to less than 100lbs right now.
Don't yo-yo back and forth. It's not good for your body. Get on the Dukan Diet and stick to it for life and you'll be able to maintain your weight easily!
I only just saw it – and WOW, you look fantastic!
Am having a little happy dance myself as I have lost 16.5 pounds on Dukan – woweeee!
We should be so proud of ourselves!
I've been studying the topic of wghiet loss for about 10 years now (I'm a personal trainer for a living) so I think I can shed some light on the topic. HOW TO LOSE FAT1) Cut out carbs in the evenings (eat low glycemic carb sources in the day).2) Choose the exercises that burn the most calories (NOT sit ups and curls). Squats, Lunges, Pull Ups etc. are great examples.3) Use the software and meal plans from FatLossCustomized. com4) Perform high intensity interval training.
Shop White Gowns, Gowns For Sale, Candles, Mules and more. Get this widget. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,414 | 70%69°47°Night - Clear. Winds variable at 6 to 7 mph (9.7 to 11.3 kph). The overnight low will be 49 °F (9.4 °C).Mostly cloudy with a high of 70 °F (21.1 °C) and a 35% chance of precipitation. Winds variable at 2 to 12 mph (3.2 to 19.3 kph).
70%59°43°Scattered thunderstorms today with a high of 59 °F (15.0 °C) and a low of 43 °F (6.1 °C). There is a 70% chance of precipitation.
Today - Mostly cloudy with a high of 70 °F (21.1 °C) and a 35% chance of precipitation. Winds variable at 2 to 12 mph (3.2 to 19.3 kph). | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,415 | Amaretti (Einzahl: Amaretto) oder Amaretti di Saronno sind kleine italienische Makronen aus Eischnee, Zucker, gemahlenen Mandeln und/oder Aprikosenkernen, wie sie typisch sind für die Gemeinden Saronno in der Lombardei und Sassello in Ligurien. Beim Backen gehen sie zu einem sehr luftigen, knusprigen Gebilde stark auf. Sie sind lange haltbar und gehören zu den Dauerbackwaren.
Amaretti werden gerne zu Espresso serviert und finden auch als Bestandteil diverser Nachspeisen Verwendung.
Geschichte
Die Gebäckfamilie der Makronen, zu denen Amaretti zählen, hat eine vergleichsweise lange Historie. Die Ursprünge gehen auf Konfekt zurück, das von sassanidischen Schahs zur Feier des zoroastrischen Neujahrs (Nouruz) verzehrt wurde. Von da aus verbreiteten sich ähnliche Rezepturen, bei denen geriebene Mandeln mit Zucker und Rosenwasser verarbeitet wurden, im Nahen Osten und gelangten im neunten Jahrhundert mit der arabischen Expansion auch nach Europa, wo sie entsprechend die europäische Küche beeinflussten.
Literatur
Gillian Riley: The Oxford Companion to Italian Food. 2007, Seite 7.
Dan Jurafsky: The Language of Food: A Linguist Reads the Menu. W. W. Norton & Company, New York 2014, ISBN 978-0-393-24587-5.
Weblinks
Einzelnachweise
Feine Backware
Italienische Küche
Kulinarisches Erbe der Schweiz
Schweizer Küche
en:Amaretti_di_Saronno
pl:Makaroniki | RedPajamaWikipedia | test |
1,004,416 | Security Token Offerings (STO) are quickly becoming a common way for blockchain projects to raise money. This next generation of Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs) has stricter rules and regulations which in turn provides greater assurances for investors.
A means for accounting, tracking, distribution, etc.
Securities are tradable financial assets such as bonds, options, shares (stocks) and warrants. These financial assets, particularly public stocks, enable an individual to own a piece of an organisation without having to buy it outright. There are strict rules, regulations and assurances to ensure that if the organisation does well, the individual shareholders are rewarded proportionately.
Security tokens are generally backed by an asset, such as a company's profits or shares. STOs require licensing and approval by the SEC or other regulatory bodies. This means that security tokens will have the features and protections of traditional assets, such as shares of company stock, while also leveraging the benefits of being a digital asset.
Security Tokens are an Investment. They follow well established local laws. Projects launching an STO will need to register their intention to offer a security with the relevant jurisdiction. This will include the submission of their background check documentation. The main use-case and reason for contributors to buy the token is an expectation of future profits in the form of dividends, revenue share or valuation increase.
Almost all coin offerings to date have been done under the guise of a utility token. Utility tokens provide access to a product or service or are otherwise required to make the system operate. Specifically, utility tokens MUST NOT make any offer of valuation increase or other incentives to return a profit to the owner. Nor do they give token holders any rights to the profit made by the organisation.
There are many projects operating in a very grey area here. There are also projects that want to offer more value to their token holders. However, in order to stay on the right side of the law, they have limited their projects.
What is the difference between a Security Token and Utility Token?
Fortunately, there is case law from 1946 which outlines a set of questions to determine if there is an 'investment' under the terms of the US Securities Act. A project would need to prove its tokens are not securities by answering this series of questions with positive responses.
"An 'investment contract' under the Securities Act of 1933 is one that involves an investment of money from an expectation of profits arising from a typical enterprise depending solely on the efforts of a promoter or third party."
--SEC v. W. J. Howey Co.
Are the expectation of profits derived mostly from the efforts of others?
Additional considerations for Security Tokens.
Can't mix and match. Specifically, exchanges will not be able to list Security and Utility tokens alongside each other. There are no Security Token exchanges currently. You will need to look at a new exchange to be able to trade Security Tokens. tZERO are looking to create the first licensed security token trading platform . The current security exchanges (ASX, NYSE, FTSE, etc) are not able to handle blockchain based assets at the moment. However, given the popularity of digital asset trading, I do envision the next generation to support blockchain based assets.
Securities should not have a utility. While it may be easy to understand that utility tokens cannot be a security, the inverse is also true. Given the complex requirements for securities, any utility function (such as gaining access to the platform with tokens) may be considered a security buy-back by the project. Under strict securities regulations, this may be a breach of their requirements and cause significant attention from the regulator.
Requires regulation for projects looking to raise funds. This will hopefully bring legitimacy to projects by reducing the opportunity for fraudulent projects to raise money. The requirements for raising millions of dollars of investment should be a first level filter to prevent malicious actors from flooding the market with fraudulent claims.
Could reignite current security markets. Stock exchanges are already looking at blockchain technology to back their platform . There will be a lot of opportunities for both blockchain and the current financial system to grow together if they can be integrated with each other.
Advanced financial conditionals written in smart contracts. Financial institutes could get creative with their marketing material while being transparent with their conditions. For example, higher interest rates could be offered if certain conditions are met by the account owner.
We expect Security Token Offerings to dominate the 2019 blockchain market. They will require an often decried, but perhaps necessary, regulation which will bring assurances to investors. STOs will enable a new range of investors to enter the market and give confidence to old investors through regulated certainty.
Finally, Blockchain-based tokens will give investors legal weight which many had incorrectly assumed they already had. They bring verification of the projects and rights to those investing in them. It will kickstart the next democratisation of funding, enabling those currently excluded from participating in these opportunities. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,417 | Lifeguards >
Lawsuits Filed in Aquatic Deaths
Legal action follows summer 2009 drownings.
Several drownings last summer have resulted in legal action.
The family of Hassan S. Itani has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Kalahari Resorts seeking financial
compensation in excess of $75,000 to cover medical and burial expenses, mental anguish and other losses. Three-year-old Itani drowned Aug. 2 after reportedly wandering away from his mother while the family was visiting the Kalahari Resort in Sandusky, Ohio.
The family alleges that Kalahari Resorts did not live up to its claim that "in all cases Kalahari Resort exceeds the staffing requirements set forth by the Ohio Department of Agriculture." According to the complaint, the defendants also failed to enclose the children's pool area to prevent kids from accessing other deeper-water amenities; ignored stated policy requiring all children under 48 inches to wear life jackets; employed poorly trained guards; allowed overcrowding in pools; and failed to clearly denote a change in pool depth using barriers and float lines.
"This case emphasizes the high degree of responsibility that an amusement park operator undertakes when they make an advertisement to the public of safety," said attorney Shereef Akeel, who represents the plaintiffs.
No one from Kalahari Resorts responded to requests for comment.
In Providence, R.I., family members of 9-year-old drowning victim Jameson Auciel have filed a $15 million wrongful death claim with City Hall. On Aug. 21, Jameson was discovered floating face down in a 4-foot-deep area of the McGrane Pool in Providence. The official investigation report noted that at the time of the drowning, fewer than 70 people were in the pool area, which has a capacity of 230 bathers.
Lary I. Zucker, an attorney with Marshall, Dennehey, Warner, Coleman & Goggin, said both sides are always profoundly affected in these kinds of tragic cases.
"One of the issues that I think the aquatics industry as a whole should focus on is the goal of trying to remind parents that a waterpark can only do so much," said Zucker, who specializes in aquatic and amusement claims and risk management, and is also the founder of the International Amusement and Leisure Defense Association.
"As a risk management measure," he added, "perhaps greater efforts should be made to enforce the idea that safety of individuals, especially children, is a shared responsibility."
NDPA Initiates Collaborations to Advance Drowning Prevention and Education
Lifesavers Lifeguard Trainers: Now's the Time to Develop Your In-Service Plan
AOAP, NDPA Events to Hit Centennial State
Lifesavers Lifeguard Training: Getting in the Mix | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,418 | Looking to get out and about this Bank Holiday weekend? Perhaps you're in the mood for some gastronomic delights? If so, the We Love Hythe Life Food Festival will prove the perfect Bank Holiday activity, with more than 70 food, drink, and craft stalls taking to the grounds at Hythe Cricket Club to demonstrate the best of local food.
Of course, we at Chives Catering couldn't resist being a part of such an exciting weekend of culinary charm, with our very own Graham Green set to host a cookery demonstration during the event. Not only that, he will be cooking with one of the more unusual - yet, increasingly popular - ingredients: kangaroo.
"I am really looking forward to my demonstration alongside some awesome local chefs such as John Bingley from the Hythe Imperial," said Graham. "The Food Festival is a great way to meet local producers and suppliers and try new ingredients as well as catching up with fellow chefs.
This year represents the third annual We Love Hythe Life Food Festival, and it promises to be the best yet. In addition to food and drink options, there will also be stallholders showcasing handicrafts and artworks, and there will be the return of last year's exclusively brewed ale, 'Festiv-ale'.
For those seeking a bit of entertainment during their Bank Holiday weekend, the festival is also set to feature live music and entertainment from a selection of local performers. From the 60s-influenced rock band, Spinner, to the Kent Military Wives' Choir, there is almost certain to be something to suit all tastes.
We're delighted to be able to appear at this year's food festival and cannot wait to showcase Graham's skills during his demonstrations. Graham will be in attendance on Sunday, August 26 and Monday, August 27, and will be cooking up some kangaroo in his demonstrations at 3pm on both days. Ensure you don't miss out on your chance to watch - and try - his incredible dishes. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,419 | Fancy Fare
Waterfront Dining
Wine Wednesday
Dive Bar Drinks
Local Beer
Dining with Dogs
West Oceanfront Magazine
A Newport Beach Lifestyle Publication
By: Melissa November 13, 2018 December 7, 2018
Awards, Film10 to Watch, Crazy Rich Asians, Deadpool, Eight Grade, featured, film festival, Gemma Chan, Henry Golding, Hollywood, Letitia Wright, movie stars, movies, NBFF, Newport Beach, Variety
Hollywood's Awards Season Just Kicked Off in Newport Beach
In a room twinkling with some of Hollywood's brightest, new stars, you'd think there'd be a least some small hint of ego. A sideways glance, an eyebrow raise, a question left unanswered, dangling in the awkward silence of a "Don't you know who I am now?" stare. But at the 2018 Variety 10 to Watch Actors celebration Nov. 11, the mood inside the grand ballroom of The Resort at Pelican Hill was light, set afloat by humility and a genuine spirit of unpretentious gratitude.
Henry Golding and Gemma Chan attend the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
The day started with the obligatory red carpet, though for this event it was ocean-blue, offset by a sumptuous buffet of appetizers and craft cocktails. More than two hundred guests indulged in and sipped on the libations as they walked a sun-bathed patio perched above the immaculate greens of the Pelican Hill Golf Course.
"I love the movies!" Henry Golding told a reporter as he made his way down the blue-carpeted media line. When he spoke about upcoming projects in his richly smooth British accent—new films include "Monsoon," "Last Christmas" and "Toff Guys" with Kate Beckinsale, Matthew McConaughey and Hugh Grant—you could almost see the shine emanating off this ever-rising star.
Golding was one of ten actors to receive the Variety honor, named as "10 to Watch" among what Jenelle Riley, deputy awards and features editor at Variety, would later in the day call a "blood bath of people who want to be on the list." Other honorees included: Zazie Beetz ("Deadpool 2"); Gemma Chan ("Crazy Rich Asians"); Elsie Fisher ("Eighth Grade"); Russell Hornsby ("The Hate U Give," "Creed II"); Anthony Ramos ("A Star is Born"), who couldn't make the event due to scheduling reasons; Cailee Spaeny ("On the Basis of Sex"); Marina de Tavira ("Roma"), John David Washington ("BlacKkKlansman"); and Letitia Wright ("Black Panther").
In addition to the Variety accolade, Elsie Fisher and John David Washington garnered Golden Globe nominations for Leading Actress and Leading Actor.
Gary C. Sherwin, president and CEO, Newport Beach & Company, speaks onstage at the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
"This is the first time many of [you] have been south of LA," joked Gary C. Sherwin, president and CEO of Newport Beach & Company, who took the stage following a minutes-long sizzle reel of Newport Beach—The waves! The sand! The sunshine!—and spoke briefly about what it meant to have the coastal city host such an iconic event. (Variety 10 to Watch was produced this year in partnership with the Newport Beach Film Festival and Visit Newport Beach.)
After Sherwin came Newport Beach Film Festival Executive Director and CEO Gregg Schwenk. For his presentation, Schwenk couched the importance of the day inside the 20th anniversary of one of the fastest-growing film festivals in the world. "The Newport Beach Film Festival was born out of passion," he said, before introducing a Newport Beach Film Festival Fall honoree.
Colman Domingo speaks onstage at the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
Colman Domingo nabbed the afternoon's first Artist of Distinction Award for his ability to write, direct and produce with enviable creative aplomb. Domingo delivered a moving acceptance speech about path to success—"I just wanted to be a working artist"—explaining how his late mother, Domingo's greatest confidant and supporter, passed before seeing ever seeing his name in bright lights. "I don't know what to do with all this love," the actor had told a friend at the time. The friend replied: "You're going to put it into your work."
So, he took the advice to heart and put that love into every piece of work he produced. And though the award affirmed Domingo's rightful place among the new Hollywood elite, the entertainer said he's felt like a real actor all along.
"If you wake up every morning and you want to write, then you're a writer," Domingo said.
"And I like that sentiment of even if you're not working but you want to, and you're waiting tales and trying to get a job, you are still an actor."
Topher Grace attends the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
After eyes were wiped and happy tears shed, Topher Grace ("Spider-Man 3," "That '70s Show," "Win A Date with Tad Hamilton") accepted his own Artist of Distinction Award, an honor also given to Mary Elizabeth Winstead ("10 Cloverfield Lane," "Scott Pilgrim vs. the World") later in ceremony.
NEWPORT BEACH, CA – NOVEMBER 11: Mary Elizabeth Winstead speaks onstage at the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
The final award was given at the end of the day to Robert Forster, ("Twin Peaks," "Jackie Brown," "The Descendents") who accepted the Icon Award with signature humor, asking if "career over" was also etched onto the glass plaque. (It wasn't.)
For several moments of unexpected motivation, Forster outlined his own philosophy for success: "You've got to do the best you can do with what you've got to work with right now, and that will give you the best future you've got coming," he said. "And never quit. You can win it in the late innings. It's not over 'til it's over. Unless you're dead. Then it's over."
Robert Forster speaks onstage at the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
Between Forster's impromptu comedic stylings and Domingo's impassioned artistic elocution, Variety Features Editor Riley moderated a panel with the 10 to Watch winners, asking questions about the life and times of their dewy, fresh stardom.
Henry Golding attends the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
Henry Golding, who shot to fame earlier this year with a winning turn in "Crazy Rich Asians," detailed how despite the film's popularity, he still didn't feel like a real actor until he wrapped several more movies. The one-time hairstylist and broadcast reporter had left his honeymoon to audition for the now-iconic "Crazy Rich Asians" role and laughed with the crowd as he explained that he's "still making amends" with his wife. (In the end, she was fine with it.)
Golding also spoke about how his foray into the entertainment world was about moving in the direction of what felt right. He said: "I follow my passion and I've always thought that will be your greatest fuel in life, if you throw yourself into something you love to do."
Gemma Chan speaks onstage at the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
His co-star, Gemma Chan, spoke in broader terms about the far-reaching impact of the messages actors deliver onscreen and off. "I think the stories we tell and to each other will really shape how we see each other going forward," she said.
(L-R) Russell Hornsby, Henry Golding, Elsie Fisher, Gemma Chan and Zazie Beetz speak onstage at the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
Deadpool 2's Zazie Beetz discussed the dichotomy of on-camera glitz and off-camera humanity. She said as the "fingers of her fame" spread, Beetz sees an image building in the general public that's vastly different from the person she is at home with her cat. (Her Instagram offers an unfiltered glance at the latter life.)
In a sobering moment, the Deadpool 2 star recognized the pitfalls of celebrity for those at the top, referencing Jennifer Aniston and a story she heard about how the A-lister once had to get thrown in the back of a car to avoid a mob of fans, but Beetz said luckily, she's not there yet. Her followers, so far, have been supportive and "cool."
Letitia Wright, breakout star of "Black Panther," waxed poetic about what it means to have people know your name. "There's gratitude but also the sense of, 'you haven't changed,'" she said, describing acting as not a search for fame but a hunt for truth. "Just chasing that [truth] is like a euphoria," she said.
(L-R) Letitia Wright, John David Washington and Marina De Tavira speak onstage at the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
And John David Washington, the son of Denzel Washington but a veritable star all his own, referenced Ralph Waldo Emerson in his reply about the realities of fame: "Once the mind expands it can never go back to its original form," he said, explaining how he now nods at those who recognize him on the New York subway.
(L-R) Jenelle Riley, Deputy Awards and Features Editor, Variety, Letitia Wright, John David Washington, Marina De Tavira, Cailee Spaeny, Russell Hornsby, Henry Golding, Elsie Fisher, Gemma Chan and Zazie Beetz share a laugh onstage at the Newport Beach Film Festival Fall Honors and Variety's 10 Actors To Watch at The Resort at Pelican Hill on November 11, 2018 in Newport Beach, California. (Photo by Joe Scarnici/Getty Images for Visit Newport Beach)
The sentiment was a fitting descriptor for a day of mind-expansion, as some of the most trailblazing celebrities working in Hollywood today shared a stage together and after, spent almost an hour mingling with the crowd, snapping selfies, sipping coffee, watching us as we watched them, as if the marquees of multi-million-dollar movies didn't bear their names. ♦
Posted by:Melissa
On the Beet
Fiction Tuesday: The Tale of Astrid the Beautiful
1 reply to Hollywood's Awards Season Just Kicked Off in Newport Beach
Alex50 says:
Wow , what great writing I felt as though I was attending the event.
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1,004,420 | We gotta be honest: 4-story, 5000 square foot home moves aren't our forte. But small apartment & small office moves? That's right up our alley. Bungii was specifically designed for people who needed help moving but didn't quite need a massive U-Haul truck with a team of movers. Whether you're moving a few large items or lots of smaller ones, Bungii is here for you.
If you are needing a full moving company service, see a list of the local businesses here. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
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1,004,422 | From our signature events to community partnerships, the VBSPCA remains actively engaged with the Hampton Roads Community throughout the year. We offer all kinds of opportunities to have fun while also supporting a great cause. Learn more about what we have going on below, and we hope to see you out at one of our events!
Download our 2019 VBSPCA Events Calendar by clicking here. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,423 | As laptop user, we may find that we usually connect to the internet using wifi, modem, or lan cable in public rooms, we usually get an IP address from dhcp, so that we dont need to configure manually our interface address. In some occasion, for example if we want to set our ubuntu to work as a server or to be kept in permanent place we need to set its IP address to static IP.
it can be done by modifiing /etc/network/interfaces file.
its just example, u need to change all the number according to your own setting, ask your system administrator if you dont have any information about IP address allocation on your workplace. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
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Indiana Gov. Mike Pence leaves a press conference March 31, 2015 at the Indiana State Library in Indianapolis, Indiana.
Photo by Aaron P. Bernstein/Getty
To see Mike Pence as 'normal' is to grade on a generous curve
10/04/16 01:07 PM —Updated 10/04/16 03:01 PM
By Steve Benen
Last week, ahead of the first presidential debate, Donald Trump seemed to have certain structural advantages: expectations were so low, many pundits said he'd win simply by showing up and pretending to be normal for 90 minutes. It was a bar the Republican nominee failed to clear.
Ahead of tonight's vice presidential debate, Mike Pence is in a tougher spot. His ticket is struggling and his GOP partner is at the center of a variety of damaging controversies, each of which are difficult to defend, suggesting the Indiana governor will have to play some defense during his showdown with Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.).
Complicating matters, NBC News noted this morning that Pence "has the toughest job in politics tonight," not only because of Trump's troubles, but also because the far-right governor "has to defend Trump on issues where the two men are at odds." It's not a short list: Pence supported NAFTA, voted for the Iraq war, backed the TPP, and opposed Trump's Muslim ban. Pence also endorsed congressional Republican leaders when Trump would not, praised the Khan family when Trump criticized them, blasted Saddam Hussein when Trump praised him, and condemned Russia's computer hack when Trump was urging Russia to do even more.
In a debate, it's a recipe for some awkwardness.
But in one important area, Pence has the advantage of being perceived as a mainstream pol. Politico published a piece yesterday that characterized tonight's vice presidential debate as "Battle of the Normals," and a "sane moment" in a campaign cycle that's often seemed insane.
It looms as the most normal political encounter of this paranormal political year: two middle-aged career politicians, experienced legislators and governors, debating for 90 minutes over their sharp but presumably civilized policy differences on the issues of the day.
There'll be no Donald Trump-style invective. No Bernie Sanders ideological fireworks. No crowded field of GOP contenders vying to outdo each other for one good sound bite or memorable attack. Just two conventional pols reverting to form.
On a certain level, I can appreciate where analysis like this is coming from. As a matter of tone and temperament, Mike Pence is hardly scary: the governor is a mild-mannered, soft-spoken Midwesterner. Unlike the man at the top of the GOP ticket, no one would ever expect Pence to start tweeting at 3 a.m. about his disgust for a beauty-pageant contestant and encourage Americans to seek out a "sex tape."
But to shift one's focus from tone to policy is to see one of the most extremist politicians to seek national office in over a generation.
Let's circle back to our coverage from July for a minute. About four years ago, Nate Silver published an interesting analysis of Paul Ryan, who'd just been named to Mitt Romney's ticket. Nate wrote at the time, "Various statistical measures of Mr. Ryan peg him as being quite conservative. Based on his Congressional voting record, for instance, the statistical system DW-Nominate evaluates him as being roughly as conservative as Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota. By this measure, in fact, which rates members of the House and Senate throughout different time periods on a common ideology scale, Mr. Ryan is the most conservative Republican member of Congress to be picked for the vice-presidential slot since at least 1900."
Nate added a chart, highlighting the fact that Ryan's record put him slightly to the right of Dick Cheney, who was slightly to the right of Dan Quayle.
But before Pence became governor, he was a longtime member of Congress – which means we can turn to the same DW-Nominate statistical system to get a better sense of the Indiana Republican's ideology. And the data shows puts Pence well to Ryan's right.
In the 107th Congress (Pence's first, covering 2001 and 2002), for example, out of 435 members of the U.S. House, Pence ranked #428 – meaning that 427 members were to his left, putting the Hoosier on the far-right-wing fringe. The results were roughly the same in the 108th Congress and the 109th.
By the 110th Congress, Pence was at #432, putting him to the right of nearly everyone in the chamber. The results were roughly the same in the 111th Congress and the 112th.
Let's put this another way: during his congressional career, Pence wasn't just more conservative than Paul Ryan. His voting record also put him to the right of Michele Bachmann, Todd Akin, Steve King, and even Louie Gohmert. That's not an exaggeration. Bachmann, Akin, King, and Gohmert all had voting records less extreme than Mike Pence.
The problem is the gap between perceptions of Mike Pence and his actual record. To use Politico's phrasing, the Hoosier is seen as "normal" and "conventional." But on a substantive level, we're talking about a politician whose claim to fame is an anti-LGBT law that did real harm to his state. Pence is a climate denier. He rejects the idea that cigarettes are deadly. He doesn't believe in evolutionary biology, but he does support "conversion therapy."
Long after it was obvious Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction, Pence was still insisting that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. Soon after, when the Bush/Cheney administration pushed partial privatization of Social Security, the Indiana Republican was outraged – because he said the plan wasn't nearly right-wing enough. In 2011, just a few months after the GOP took control of the U.S. House, Pence's big idea, to the annoyance of his party leaders, was to shut down the federal government.
Pence also once accused Disney of hiding political propaganda in an animated film to convince people that women can serve in the military.
By most sensible standards, Mike Pence has earned a reputation as an extremist. If this guy is what passes for "normal" and "conventional" in Republican politics in 2016, standards have shifted in a politically unhealthy direction.
The MaddowBlog, Debates, Election 2016, Elections and Mike Pence
Tuesday's Campaign Round-Up, 10.4.16
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Americans remain divided on impeachment, polling shows
'A damn shame:' Cory Booker on lack of diversity in race amid Harris' exit
Michael Phelps: 'It's okay not to be okay'
Republican women look to make up lost ground in House
Jay-Z is an 'American original,' says Michael Eric Dyson
Democrats struggling with black voters
Cory Booker: Polls have never been predictive
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1,004,425 | Saturday december 8, 2018 ica/boston harbor market 11am-4pm. sunday december 9, 2018 boston hassle black market 12-6pm.
WE'RE THRILLED TO RETURN TO THE BLACK MARKET BY BOSTON HASSLE: SUNDAY, FEB 11 12-6PM @ CAMBRIDGE ELKS!
This december why the long face? was part of the ica/boston winter harbor market, and the mit women's league craft fair. thanks to all that brought your faces by!
SUNDAY JUNE 18 11-5 @ CAMBRIDGE ELKS, BISHOP ALLEN DR. CAMBRIDGE. BLACK MARKET BY BOSTON HASSLE!
SUNDAY MARCH 19 12-5 @ Aeronaut brewing co. somerville ma: activist art market. 20% of Game sales wIll go to the natural resources defense council!
Game designer Pennie Taylor and L.C. Bates educator Serena Sanborn play Why the long face? in the very galleries from whence its faces sprang!
Writer Jacob Kramer, fellow Somerville Arts Council grant recipient (and Why the long face? support team) prepares for our collaborative event encouraging story telling using the animals in the Why the long face? deck as inspiration.
Why the long face? was in the Tabletop Games Showcase at the 2015 Boston FIG. Thanks to everyone that stopped by and made some faces! Early prototype deck and board pictured. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,426 | Mailson Francisco de Farías (* 23. Dezember 1993 in Almas), auch bekannt als Mailson, ist ein brasilianischer Fußballspieler.
Karriere
Von 2012 bis 2013 spielte Mailson bei den brasilianischen Vereinen Camboriú FC, Morrinhos FC und Itumbiara EC. 2013 wechselte er für ein Jahr nach Portugal, wo er sich dem AC Alcanenense anschloss. Der Verein aus Alcanena spielte in der dritten Liga, der Campeonato Nacional de Seniores. 2014 ging er wieder in seine Heimat und unterschrieb einen Vertrag bei SER Caxias do Sul in Caxias do Sul. Über die Stationen EC Juventude, Paysandu SC und Clube de Regatas Brasil ging er 2017 nach Südkorea, wo er einen Vertrag bei Jeju United unterschrieb. Mit dem Verein aus Jeju-si, der in der ersten Liga, der K League, spielte, wurde er 2017 Vizemeister. Anfang 2018 verließ er Südkorea und wechselte für acht Monate nach Brasilien, wo er für den Criciúma EC aus Criciúma spielte. Im August 2018 wechselte er nach Katar. Hier unterzeichnete er einen Vertrag bei al-Arabi. Der Verein aus Doha spielte in der höchsten Liga des Landes, der Qatar Stars League. Anfang 2019 zog es ihn wieder in seine Heimat. Die erste Jahreshälfte spielte er für seinen ehemaligen Verein Clube de Regatas Brasil, die zweite Jahreshälfte für Vila Nova FC. Für die Saison 2020 hat er einen Vertrag bei Chiangrai United in Thailand unterschrieben. Der Klub aus Chiangrai spielte in der ersten Liga, der Thai League, und war amtierender Meister. Für Chiangrai absolvierte er zwei Erstligaspiele. Im November 2020 kehrte er in seine Heimat zurück. Hier schloss er sich dem Sampaio Corrêa FC aus São Luís im Bundesstaat Maranhão an.
Erfolge
Jeju United
K League: 2017 (2. Platz)
Clube de Regatas Brasil
Campeonato Alagoano de Futebol: 2017
Chiangrai United
Thailand Champions Cup: 2020
Weblinks
Einzelnachweise
Fußballspieler (Itumbiara EC)
Fußballspieler (SER Caxias do Sul)
Fußballspieler (EC Juventude)
Fußballspieler (Chapecoense)
Fußballspieler (Paysandu SC)
Fußballspieler (Clube de Regatas Brasil)
Fußballspieler (Jeju United)
Fußballspieler (Criciúma EC)
Fußballspieler (al-Arabi Doha)
Fußballspieler (Vila Nova FC)
Fußballspieler (Chiangrai United)
Fußballspieler (Sampaio Corrêa FC)
Brasilianer
Geboren 1993
Mann | RedPajamaWikipedia | test |
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Manipulate real-world data sets using advanced nested logical functions (IF, OR, and AND).
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Transform and rearrange columns and rows within spreadsheets to prepare data for analysis.
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Derive insights from data by highlighting cells based on conditionals.
Make predictions about larger populations using sample data.
Practice the fundamentals of Structured Query Language (SQL).
Use database schema to design appropriate queries using SQL.
Explore the differences between relational databases (tabular data storage) and document-based databases (key-value pairs).
Collect data using standard SQL commands (Create, Update, Truncate, etc.).
Create relationships between tables and data points (including has_many and many_to_many) using Join tables.
Write Boolean statements with SQL conditional operators (=,!=,>,<,IN, and BETWEEN) and null functions ("IS NULL," "IS NOT NULL," and "NVL").
Create a local database using data sets you bring into the classroom.
Upload and export data using a local database.
Use bubble graphs to visualize data.
Display geocoded information for your data. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
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1,004,431 | EyeEm's new products aim to understand brand aesthetics
Anthony Ha @anthonyha / 2 years
EyeEm is unveiling new tools to help the brands and marketers using the site to source their images.
Underlying these tools is a technology called EyeEm Vision, which we described in-depth earlier this year. The goal is to expand image recognition so that it's not just identifying the objects in the photo, but also its aesthetic qualities.
EyeEm's co-founder and chief product officer Lorenz Aschoff described EyeEm Vision as an extension of the photography marketplace's broader mission to address "the content crisis" — namely the fact that when EyeEm was founded in 2011, Aschoff felt that there was a "massive flood of images" that had "completely destroyed the visual aesthetics of the web."
EyeEm aims to fix that by helping brands find beautiful photographs. And Aschoff said EyeEm Vision has been trained to identify many of the visual elements that make for a good photograph — it is, in his words, "technology that understands, in general, beauty."
At the same time, he acknowledged, "What I think is beautiful might be different from what you think is beautiful." Plus, individual brands are going to have their own specific standards and guidelines that go beyond beauty. So each customer can upload photos that train EyeEm Vision to identify photos that match their own aesthetic — Aschoff said EyeEm's analysis is looking at around half a million different factors.
One of the ways EyeEm is actually deploying the technology is by launching a new Missions Dashboard. Brands use Missions to crowdsource campaign photos from the EyeEm community, and the new dashboard allows them to track how their Mission is going — how many photographers are participating, how many photos have been uploaded and so on. EyeEm says that the average Mission results in more than 100,000 photos, which why it's important to use EyeEm Vision to surface the photos that best match the brand's style.
EyeEm is also incorporating Vision into a personalized search product, where marketers can search the EyeEm image library, filtered based on their own brand guidelines. For example, BCG's 11,000 consultants can now search for images to use in their presentations and marketing materials, and EyeEm will only show the images that are a good fit with the BCG brand.
And while this is less directly related to Vision, EyeEm is also announcing a new program called Custom, where brands can work with EyeEm photographers on custom shoots.
Lastly, if you're curious about Vision, you can try it out for yourself on the EyeEm website. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,432 | We realize that the days after a death can be overwhelming; therefore, we have provided a list of reminders to help serve your family in this most difficult time.
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Select your pallbearers (if needed) and notify the funeral home. It is a good idea to call them ahead of time to ensure there are no physical limitations.
If a will exists, locate and contact the lawyer and executor.
Promptly check all debts or payment installations. Many times, companies offer clauses or benefits that cancel them in the case of death.
If the deceased lived alone, notify the landlord, post office and utility companies.
Check to see if there was a safe deposit box where important documents may be kept. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,434 | Thadi Balaji, an actor who has primarily appeared as a comedian in Tamil films as well as in Tamil teleserials and is a judge in Star Vijay's Kalakka Povathu Yaaru.
A model and actress known for her roles in the films Dhuruvangal Pathinaaru (2016) and Iruttu Araiyil Murattu Kuththu(2018).
An actress best known for playing the lead role in the films Thegidi (2014) and Adhe kangal (2017).
An actress known for her roles in the films Madras (2014) and Kabali (2016). | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,435 | Search for Brake Discs in our Elgrand E50 auto car parts catalogue.
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1,004,437 | Homenewspresenting percy could return at punchestown
Presenting Percy Could Return At Punchestown
Presenting Percy
Last seasons Cheltenham Gold Cup favourite Presenting Percy could start this seasons campaign off at Punchestown in the John Durkan Memorial Punchestown Chase as it looks a big potential comeback race for the eight year old.
Last season Pat Kelly's gelding was primed for a huge run in Cheltenham's feature contest of the year but throughout the season his stable star was only given one run in preparation which proved to be to the detriment of the horse.
He raced at Gowran in a hurdle contest and although winning nicely it became evident that with the horse not jumping a fence on his way up to the festival it put him at an disadvantage and ultimately was the reason why he never ran his race and saw him finishing eighth.
The season before the Phillip Reynolds owned horse was superb landing the RSA Chase at the festival by a huge distance and looking like a potential Gold Cup horse, but last season it was not to be.
Another win for Ireland! Presenting Percy has won the RSA Insurance Novices' Chase pic.twitter.com/7iNtU75kaL
— ITV Racing (@itvracing) March 14, 2018
The owner subsequently revealed his pride and joy was suffering from a back problem and had bone bruising but he is pleased to report Presenting Percy is in fine form once again ahead of a potential return to competitive action on December 8th.
(Credit At The Races) Reynolds said: "He's in great shape and is working away. Pat (Kelly) is delighted with him and he's entered in the John Durkan at Punchestown.
"We haven't done much fast work with him yet, so I'm just hoping the wee injury he had at the end of last season doesn't come back to haunt him. But it's so far, so good." | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,438 | Bob Gluck's Blog
re-visiting, re-visioning, re-newing at Burlington "Discover Jazz"
We just returned from a weekend (as listeners) at the Discover Jazz festival in Burlington, Vermont. The headliners were Herbie Hancock and his Imagine Project, and Bitches Brew Revisited. Why write about either of these shows in my blog about a book on the Mwandishi band? About Herbie, it is simply to comment on his continued growth as a pianist and the manner in which his recent projects have returned him to aspects of the searching qualities of those earlier days. Drummer Billy Hart made a similar comment to me about Herbie's Joni recording, a couple years ago. And regarding "Bitches Brew Revisited," the show called to mind the many ways Miles's original project differed from Herbie's, differences that came to the fore during this "revisit."
First a few words about Herbie Hancock's performance. This was the third time I've seen Herbie's show in the past 18 months and it was closing night for the tour. What struck me the most about this particular performance was how much a year of nearly constant touring with relatively the same band and repertoire has benefited his playing. Like the previous shows, it included a mix of material from the recording, often treated elastically and freely, and older tunes, this time showing seemingly endless flowing and melodic, harmonic, and textual expansion. While not a new concept for Herbie, the musical directions and influences brought into the mix have grown and deepened.
One important feature was his ability to rely on the solid and wildly empathetic drumming of both Vinnie Coloiata and the electric bass of James Genus. Genus is of a rare breed, a bass player who sounds no other bass player than himself. Indeed he has tremendous chops, but these were always brought to bear, like Coloiata's skills, on supporting and adding to the joint effort. There was no freelancing or showing off. If anything, some of Genus' wildest forays were unusually quiet, in contrast to his booming sounds during more funk driven tunes. Singer Kristin Train continued to add a purity of tone embellished with very sweet displays of her Irish-inflected violin playing.
By way of introducing my comments about Graham Haynes's "Bitches Brew Revisited" band, I'll begin with some broad, historical comments, not specific to this performance. I tend to differ from some observers in my assessment of the role of "Bitches Brew" as a reference point for the Mwandishi band. While "Bitches Brew" was surely inspirational and impossible for Herbie Hancock to have ignored, my feeling is that the Mwandishi band had closer cousins in Miles's previous Quintet and in the early days of Weather Report. It is easy to over-generalize, but "Bitches Brew" (which I love) often seems to me more driven by steady riffs, and less characterized by improvisation that is fully collective – with the exception of the "brewing" multi-keyboard and multi-percussion rhythm section. In contrast, the other two bands, while their music sometimes contains driving bass riffs, tended towards more inclusively collectively free improvisations. Buster Williams and Miroslav Vitous assume far more freedom to alter their lines, sometimes radically, constantly, and at will. I experience the bass and percussion on "Bitches Brew" as a unit rather than as individually discernable elements. In part, this is due to the substantial role of post-production in crafting the final results. Were it not for the brilliance and flexibility of Dave Holland and Jack DeJohnette the rhythmic structure might not remain as fresh. In short, the two are great accompanists whose big ears can subtly renew music that is structurally steady; the presence of Chick Corea continually shook up any tendency towards over-stability. Also, despite the prominence of Miles's solos, "Bitches Brew" these have always seemed to me as less core organizing structures than the center of gravity Hancock created through his Mwandishi solos.
Despite the substantial role of post-production on the recording, "Bitches Brew" was actually being "Revisited" constantly in the hands of Miles' "Lost Quintet," the smaller touring band, beginning in the months prior to the sessions and continuing afterwards. Every performance refracted the material through a unique lens depending upon the dynamics of the band as it developed through constant experimentation. The rhythm section of Chick Corea, Dave Holland, and Jack DeJohnette blazed a wild and forward-pushing course that led as much as followed Miles's direction. Thus, the live performances of this music treated the basic material as highly malleable and never really fixed in the manner of repertory bands. Each tune might sound radically different from one show to the next. Miles himself rarely seemed to use his band's previous playing, including the recorded version, as a reference point for what he might play on "this" night. Maybe a reminder is useful here: the post-production of the "Bitches Brew" recording was a very detailed "Revisit" (some might call it now a remix) of the studio performances.
Turning to this past weekend's performance, I ask what exactly does it mean to "Revisit" the iconic recording "Bitches Brew?" If the original recording was subject to a substantial compositional process during post-production and live performances of the music resisted becoming fixed, then the idea of "Revisits" would seem highly in order. "Revisiting Bitches Brew" is of course not the first 21st Century "Revisit." Among its precursors were Bill Laswell's late 1990s studio remixes and instances where musicians have loosely drawn upon the material to create highly personalized new works. My own "Electric Brew" (2007) in part fits this category. I do not think of "Bitches Brew" as repertory music – the original band never treated it as a set of charts to be followed remotely closely. For me, a revisit requires substantial reinvention and re-visioning. During this evening's show, I puzzled over the title: was it Bitches Brew "Revisioned"? "Renewed?" No, its "Revisited." There were indeed novel, creative moments, particularly during the exploratory atmospheres that appeared in the midst of Wayne Shorter's 'Sanctuary', but this performance seemed less a re-vision or a re-new than a re-visit.
Graham Haynes's "Revisit" was built upon his own meticulously transcriptions of the melodies, beats, trumpet solos, and changes of mood found within the originally released recording. This means that some features revisited originally emerged only in post-production. The risk is that the original material can become an overly literal reference point. At times this proved problematic. Another potential challenge is that "Bitches Brew" as originally released, displayed a highly dense sound fabric, from which details emerge thanks to post-production: spatialization, adjusted levels, loops, signal processing. Performing this music with a frontal stereo sound system, with the multiplicity of activity mixed down to two integrated channels, meant that with the exception of the most distinct solos, details could become garbled. The kind of clarity needed requires either a careful studio mix or a live treatment of each instrument as its own individualized sound source on stage.
The highlights of the evening's often very busy playing were, as it turned out, some of the more minimal offerings, particularly Antoine Roney's bass clarinet and soprano saxophone, and Vernon Reid's often very quiet and subtle guitar filigree. DJ Logic closely limited his range of electronic sounds and Marco Benedetto's inventive processed Fender Rhodes (which seemed to draw more from Herbie Hancock's Mwandishi band tool kit of delays, pitch shifts and sound washes than from Chick Corea's Bitch's Brew era ring modulation) had a tendency to become repetitive. More reserve and/or a broader sound pallet would have contributed to the overall sound tapestry.
I had viewed a YouTube recording from an earlier version of the band, where the combination of drummer Cindy Blackman and guitarist Vernon Reid just scorched. In Burlington, Pheeroan Aklaff replaced Blackman in the drum seat. Aklaff excelled during the more atmospheric moments, but his more conventional rhythm 'n blues backbeat, while complementing bassist Melvin Gibbs's funk-driven approach, pointed in a very different direction from the often static motion yet complex dynamism of the original. These for me are core to Miles' conception. Gibbs's orientation is more towards Miles's Michael Henderson/Keith Jarrett funk band (even with the back beat) than that of "Bitches Brew," and this was heightened by a regularity of beat by percussionist Adam Rudolph's congas (within which Vernon Reid's guitar solos were a terrific fit). Thus, I found the rhythmic texture of the evening to be a re-stitching of a slightly later Miles' band to the repertoire of the previous band. My guess is that listeners would vary in their assessment of the results. Personally, I missed the lithe qualities of Holland-DeJohnette and, more recently, the drive offered by Blackman.
On the original recording, one can hear Miles's whispered comments inducing individuals to solo. One could imagine Miles walking around the studio, speaking quietly to each of the players. His approach as a leader, however, as documented, was non-directive (although the post-production of the recording showed the strong directing hand of producer Teo Macero). During the "Revisiting" performance, trumpeter Graham Haynes stood in and at the center, behind a conductor's music stand, closely scrutinizing the scores, and pacing the stage. He spoke directly to individual musicians – who only occasionally seemed to attend to his conducting, particularly during a handful of mood or beat changing cues and preparations for particular riffs (the repeated low Cs of the title tune). The purpose of the conducting wasn't at all clear. Surely the band was comprised of well-rehearsed veteran musicians who could respond to subtle suggestions to mark shifts. The purpose behind the presence of the scores was also not clear to me – and at times problematic – particularly when Miles's own recorded lines were too closely adhered to.
I'll close by returning to Herbie Hancock's performance, which took place on the following evening. Thinking in retrospect, while much of Hancock's show was highly rehearsed, it was the more malleable, unpredictable, and improvised of the two shows. I was looking to "Bitches Brew Revisited" for the most unexpected surprises of the weekend. But Herbie's often-mysterious turns of moods, textures, and phrase, and the intricate listening and response between piano, drums, and bass offered the subtlety and surprise I most appreciate in jazz performance. Tunes I've heard literally hundreds of times sounded fresh and new, offering pathways previously unexplored. The performance was intense and exciting, recalling and yes, renewing, the spirit of the late 1960s and early 1970s.
I understand that Wallace Roney, Bennie Maupin (the bass clarinetist on the original "Bitches Brew" recording), Buster Williams, Al Foster and others, are touring in July with another take on Miles's material. It sounds as if their goal is to very freely treat the original musical ideas and select a broad swath of Miles's tunes from his electric era. I look forward to hearing the results!
~ by bobgluck on June 6, 2011.
Posted in Reflections on musical context
Tags: bitches brew, bob gluck, herbie hancock, miles davis, mwandishi
3 Responses to "re-visiting, re-visioning, re-newing at Burlington "Discover Jazz""
Interesting analysis, Bob, on Bitches Brew. Would like to have heard the Graham Haynes show (he sounds great on a number of Bill Laswell discs; his playing has reminded me of MD's, eg 'Sacred System Chapter Two'. btw, I've heard through the grapevine that Laswell has remixed more Miles stuff: 'Pharoah's Dance'. Should be out later this year (with some other DJs' remixes/iterations)
Crocodile Chuck said this on June 7, 2011 at 5:36 am | Reply
Thanks for the tip. I'll look forward to the additional Laswell work. It took some to percolate, but I've grown to really like Panthalassa. I played it for one of my classes last month and we noted the subtle but distinct ways Bill interprets the music. I also just heard Method of Defiance/Incunabula (Bill Laswell, Bernie Worrell, DJ Krush… a different trumpeter, and a wild Herbie Hancock solo spliced in beautifully by Bob Musso) and I enjoyed that a lot.
bobgluck said this on June 7, 2011 at 12:25 pm | Reply
Yes, 'Incunabula', with Toshinori Kondo is superb-best thing he's done in years. Another is 'Aspiration', on Metastation: the first track includes Nils Pettar Molvaer (tr) with Zakir Hussain. Rhythm Meltdown!
Crocodile Chuck said this on June 22, 2011 at 1:06 am | Reply
Bob Gluck, pianist and writer | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
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1,004,441 | Concert Spring 2011
Haydn: The Seasons
Anna Dennis – soprano
Ronan Busfield – tenor (replacing Jeremy Budd who was indisposed)
Ashley Riches – bass
Winchester Music Club and Orchestra, Brian Howells – orchestra leader
First-class outing for a neglected masterpiece.
Joseph Haydn's oratorio 'The Seasons' is not as well known as his earlier oratorio 'The Creation', nor is it performed as often. Winchester Music Club and Orchestra under the baton of Nicholas Wilks offered us an opportunity to reappraise the work in a fine performance on Saturday evening.
From the first awakenings of Spring through to the bleak landscapes of Winter, the Music Club chorus gave a convincing account of the text, capturing the changing moods of the seasons with singing that conveyed both power and subtlety. The fugue at the end of Spring pulsed with energy and the hunting scene in Autumn was similarly vivid. Here and there in some of the loud moments the infamous cathedral acoustic got the better of the performers, muddying the textures, but this was, by any standards, a first-class outing for a neglected masterpiece.
The trio of soloists have a huge amount of work to do and we were blessed with three very fine singers. The tenor, Rónan Busfield (standing in at short notice for an indisposed Jeremy Budd), had excellent diction and a bright, clear tonal palette that caught the differing moods of his arias very well. He blended beautifully with soprano Anna Dennis in their ensemble passages. She was on top form, producing some rapturous sounds as she sang about the joys of Summer and, in Autumn, the pleasures and passions of human love. Anna's top notes have a glorious ring to them but she also produces some lovely soft singing when required. The bass Ashley Riches gave us drama in the Autumn hunting scene and conveyed the icy mood of Winter, again with excellent diction.
Winchester Music Club are fortunate to have their own 'in house' orchestra and several of the player deservedly gained an ovation at the end of the performance. The cheerful shepherd at the opening of Summer was accompanied by a solo horn, and the horn section excelled themselves in the Autumn hunting scene with vivid and sonorous playing. There were several passages of lyrical wind playing worthy of mention and many other passages where the orchestra provided musical depictions of the text, showing Haydn's skill at orchestration. It was also a pleasure to hear a fortepiano continuo rather than the usual harpsichord.
Presiding over all this, Nicholas Wilks remained firm and clear in his direction, enthusing his forces to give of their best. It is such a shame that at least one third of the cathedral nave remained empty when the performers have devoted so much time and effort producing such an enjoyable event.. | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,442 | This country has stolen my heart – and when a heart becomes connected to a person or a place or a cause it means there is the potential for that heart to be broken. To be busted wide open. When you love something, it has the power to hurt you too and Mexico has brought me much love along with some pain. As I grow closer to the children of Manos de Amor, I see the suffering they carry. Two new little boys who are so malnourished, their shoulder blades stick out like sharp knifes pushing against their t-shirts. A sweet little 10-year-old girl who was so excited to meet the dad she hadn't seen in years and instead found herself being repeatedly raped by him. Three little girls whose mom promised to pick them up on Christmas Eve and then disappeared for 6 weeks. Just. so. much. pain.
I thought carefully about my word for this year. My guiding value. The one thing I want to focus on, remember, search for, chase after. At first, I thought compassion would be my word. More love for the people I rub shoulders with. But as a difficult December moved into January, I noticed something happening in me. I was getting discouraged and a bit cynical and even a bit hopeless. The stories were piling up and my heart was getting bruised.
That's when I read a Scripture verse and found my word – well it's actually a phrase – for this next chapter.
Whatever is lovely. I get to choose to think about what is lovely. Yes, there is pain and suffering and injustice here. Too much. I have chosen to spend each day grabbing it and fighting against it. But I know that the way to keep my heart soft is to train my mind to think about what is true. To look for what is noble. To overcome the crap by embracing the lovely.
And at least 40 more so far. Honestly, I'm finding it harder than I expected. I forget to look. I forget to rejoice. I forget to be thankful. Complaining is way easier. But that's the whole point of the 'word' – to embrace a new thing and to grow. So for this year, I choose to focus on whatever is lovely. What's your word for 2018?
This entry was posted in Things I've Learned, Uncategorized, Volunteering in Mexico and tagged expat in mexico, living in mexico, Volunteering in Mexico. Bookmark the permalink.
A shrimp salad beside the ocean with you would be a lovely thing. Our guest bedroom is always available although you might have to share with little people! | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,443 | Back when I was studying nutritional science in university, I began to seriously question what we were being taught. The alarm bells didn't truly go off, however, until we ventured into the core of the program — dietary recommendations for health.
I was quite surprised to discover these recommendations were nothing more than the USDA food pyramid developed in the early 1990s. Processed food heavy — with a staggering recommendation of 6-11 servings of bread, cereal, rice and pasta — the bottom tier of the pyramid is the result of reducing the fruit and vegetable suggestion, due to an order by the Secretary of Agriculture who wanted to push more cereal grains and cheap processed foods.
Meat, poultry, fish and eggs are ingeniously grouped with healthier protein options like beans and nuts — making no distinction between the items, only recommending 2-3 servings a day. If someone didn't know better, you would think this would give you free rein to eat meat three times a day — just imagine all the bacon and processed deli meat! Not only that, but, according to the pyramid, you can consume 2-3 servings of dairy per day. Again, no mention of the health effects of sugar-laden yogurt or full-fat milk.
I couldn't believe my nutritional science program was peddling this kind of nonsense. Needless to say, after three years, I walked away and continued my nutrition education in areas I truly believed in.
As it turns out, poor nutritional recommendations aren't limited to the USDA or universities — they are rife in our medical system and organizations such as the American Heart Association, American Cancer Society and the American Diabetes Association.
What's more, these establishments have been shown to have huge conflicts of interest with industries that have everything to gain in keeping Americans fat, sick and tired. This is exactly what filmmakers Kip Anderson and Keegan Kuhn (of Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret fame) set-out to expose. What they discovered was far more corrupt than they imagined.
He was shocked to learn from their website that, under the recommended foods, the American Cancer Society lists processed turkey and canned meats. When Anderson set-up an interview with a representative from the organization, it was cancelled when she found out the interview was about the link between diet and cancer. Maybe it had something to do with the fact the American Cancer Society takes money from Tyson and Yum! brand — the owner of Pizza Hut, KFC and Taco Bell?
It's not only cancer, diabetes is also linked to processed meat. The documentary brings into question the widely accepted belief that sugar is what causes diabetes. Several expert physicians in the film reveal that it's actually fat in the bloodstream that causes diabetes and insulin resistance. Incredibly, one serving of processed meat a day increases your risk of diabetes by 51%. Regardless, the American Diabetes Association has recipes for red and processed meats on their website, along with dairy. It shouldn't be surprising when it's discovered that the association's sponsors are none other than Dannon, Kraft, Bumble Bee Foods and Oscar Meyer.
Next, Anderson tackles the issue of cardiovascular disease, which is the leading cause of death in one out of every four people in the U.S. — about 600,000 deaths annually. Meat and dairy have both been implicated in heart disease, and yet, the American Heart Association promotes these very foods on their website, under the guise of 'heart-healthy' recipes — including pork, red meat and eggs. Who helps to fund the American Heart Association? You guessed it, the beef and poultry industries, as well as dairy producers and the fast food industry. These companies give millions of dollars each year to the organization. But it doesn't end there.
The dairy industry purposely set out to neutralize the negative image of milk fat by regulators and medical professionals — many of the studies saying butter, dairy and eggs are healthy were funded by the American Egg Board and National Dairy Council. These campaigns were designed to create just enough confusion and doubt to sway public opinion.
This in light of numerous studies that have found dairy can increase a man's risk of prostate cancer by 34%. For women who have had breast cancer, one serving of whole milk increases her risk of cancer death by 49%. You would think the Susan G. Komen Foundation — a U.S. breast cancer organization — would have thought twice before partnering with KFC, Dietz & Watson processed meats and Yoplait yogurt — all foods which have been linked to cancer.
Jump back to the food pyramid. Apparently, the people at the USDA setting the guidelines have received money from McDonalds, the National Dairy Council, American Meat Institute, the beef industry, American Egg Board, Dannon and candy companies like Mars, M&Ms, Hershey's, Coca Cola.
Then you have checkoff programs, which are government run and promote the consumption of certain foods. Examples include Beef: It's What's For Dinner — and Milk: It Does a Body Good. Both advertising campaigns were funded by checkoff programs, as was a multi-million dollar campaign for Dominos. To make matters worse, many of these advertising campaigns are found in schools and are reflected in the poor quality food offered with school lunch programs.
The film also addresses the astonishing level of antibiotics used in animals — leading to our epidemic of antibiotic-resistant superbugs, the horrors of industrial farm animal production, as well as how hospitals and pharmaceutical companies are in the business of treating sick people, not preventing people from getting sick. It's a formidable industry, one that generates $1.5 trillion in the U.S. alone. The explosion of disease is a cash cow for the medical and pharmaceutical establishments — it's not something they are going to give up lightly.
But What The Health offers a solution too. The film follows the journey of several critically ill individuals on their road to recovery using a whole-food, plant-based diet.
Everything considered, it's a film that leaves one feeling the most revolutionary act we can do — in this age of severe corruption and powerful influence — is to be healthy.
The film follows intrepid filmmaker Kip Andersen as he uncovers the secret to preventing and even reversing chronic diseases – and investigates why the nation's leading health organizations don't want us to know about it. With heart disease and cancer the leading causes of death in America, and diabetes at an all-time high, the film reveals possibly the largest health cover-up of our time. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,444 | A 2014-es labdarúgó-világbajnokság óceániai selejtezőjének 3. fordulójának mérkőzéseit tartalmazó lapja.
A harmadik fordulóban a második forduló – azaz a 2012-es OFC-nemzetek kupája csoportkörének négy továbbjutója vett részt. A csapatok egyetlen csoportot alkottak, amelyben oda-visszavágós, körmérkőzéses rendszerben mérkőztek meg egymással. A mérkőzéseket 2012. szeptember 7-e és 2013. március 26-a között játszották. A csoport első helyezettje részt vesz az interkontinentális pótselejtezőn.
Részt vevő csapatok
A fordulóban részt vevő csapatok kiléte 2012. június 6-án, a második forduló befejezésével derült ki.
Tabella
Eredmények
Források
OFC3
OFC | RedPajamaWikipedia | test |
1,004,445 | My family and I are 2 weeks away from our beach vacation. I can almost hear the ocean air calling my name.
First up on my bucket list is to dive into a book (or two) while soaking up some sun. Obviously with a tasty beverage in hand and my toes in the sand.
These are some of the Top 10 Books For Your Summer Getaway that are high up on my must read list.
Summer Sisters chronicles the lifelong friendship between two women, from their girlhood summers together on Martha's Vineyard to their more complicated adult relationship. Caitlin dazzled Vix from the start, sweeping her into the world of the Somers family, a world of privilege, adventure and sexual daring. Vix's bond with her 'summer' family had forever reshaped her relatioship to her own, opening doors to opportunities she had never imagined. Then, the summer she falls passionately in love, in one shattering moment on a moonswept beach, everything changes, exposing a dark undercurrent in her extraordinary friendship with Caitlin that will haunt them through the years. A riveting exploration of the choices that define our lives, of friendship and love, of the families we are born into and those we struggle to create, and a story for every woman who has ever had a friend too dangerous to forgive and too essential to forget.
Unique and amusing, Rainbow Rowell's Attachments follows the back-and-forth emails between two female co-workers who like to dish on their relationships — and the company's Internet security officer who finds himself falling for one of the women based only on her private exchanges.
What are your must read summer books? Any I should add to my list? | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,446 | How to turn multiple images into pdf Launceston
Convert Multiple Images into PDF prsync.com
How to convert multiple images into a PDF file in Windows 10. 28/07/2018В В· In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file., Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is.
How to convert multiple images into a PDF file in Windows 10
How to convert multiple images into a PDF file in Windows 10. Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is, So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that..
28/07/2018В В· In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file. Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF .
28/07/2018 · In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file. So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that.
So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that. If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android
So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that. Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is
28/07/2018В В· In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file. Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is
If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that.
Convert Multiple Images into PDF prsync.com. 28/07/2018В В· In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file., Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF ..
Convert Multiple Images into PDF prsync.com. If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android 28/07/2018 · In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file..
Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is 28/07/2018В В· In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file.
So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that. 28/07/2018 · In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file.
So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that. Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF .
Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF . So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that.
Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF . If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android
Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android
Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF .
How to convert multiple images into a PDF file in Windows 10. Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF ., 28/07/2018В В· In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file..
Convert Multiple Images into PDF prsync.com. If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android, Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is.
If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF .
Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF . Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF .
Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that.
Convert Multiple Images into PDF prsync.com. So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that., Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF ..
Convert Multiple Images into PDF prsync.com. So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that., 28/07/2018 · In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file..
How to convert multiple images into a PDF file in Windows 10. If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android, If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android.
Convert Multiple Images into PDF prsync.com. 28/07/2018 · In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file. If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android.
If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android 28/07/2018 · In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file.
So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that. So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that.
Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF . 28/07/2018В В· In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file.
Convert Multiple Images into PDF prsync.com. 28/07/2018 · In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file., So, if you want to create PDF image galleries, Windows 10 has all you need. We also have to mention that this feature is only available in Windows 10, so if you want to create a PDF image gallery in Windows 8.1 or Windows 7, you'll have to use a third-party program for that..
How to convert multiple images into a PDF file in Windows 10. Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is, If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android.
If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is
Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF . Picture to PDF is a batch processing tool to convert photos into PDF file. Image2pdf convert each photo into individual PDF files in batch and merge multiple photos into a single PDF file. Picture to PDF creator utility is a fast, logically and easy-to-use. PDF convertor application that is
How to convert multiple images into a PDF file in Windows 10. 28/07/2018 · In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file., If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android.
Convert Multiple Images into PDF prsync.com. If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android Besides auto converting your images into PDF, you can also automatically convert multiple CHM, PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, Word to PDF!!! Particularly, you can convert several files in different format, like PPTX, EPUB,TEXT, RTF, HTML, DOCX, CHM to PDF ..
28/07/2018 · In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file. If you are using Android, all you need to do is to follow the steps listed below. The Steps – How to convert multiple images into a single PDF file in Android
28/07/2018В В· In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file. 28/07/2018В В· In this Article: On Windows On Mac On iPhone On Android Community Q&A References. This wikiHow teaches you how to turn an image file (such as a JPG or PNG) into a PDF file.
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1,004,447 | Tag: freedom
SAKUGAN – 12 (FIN) – THICKER THAN BLOOD
The Big Twist that starts the SAKUGAN finale is that Memenpu actually is a "Rainbow Child", a child with an exceptionally advanced brain. This not only explains why she's a genius, but what the "place in her dream" is all about: it was never a dream, it was a memory. Rainbow Children retain vivid memories even from their infancy. As Rainbow Children were bred to be the guardians of the Labyrinth, they are anathema to Shibito, who want them all dead.
Fortunately, Muro's boss doesn't let her kill Memenpu right away, even though it's debatable what if anything he intends to do with her before killing her. This gives the remaining members of Team Memenpu the time they need to zero in on her location and rescue her. It's definitely a team effort, with Yuri using a second-hand computer in a store to guide Gagumber and Zackletu, then Zack distracting both Shibito and the Bureau with sheer ballistic chaos.
Gagumber locates Memenpu, but by then she's been placed in a bell jar, which soon shatters due to the Animus dripping on top of it. Memenpu seems to be immune to its deleterious effects due to her Rainbow-ness. But by the time her pops arrives, Muro's boss (I don't believe we got his name) has convinced Memenpu that she has no father. Whether their surroundings were meant to evoke that same father-y scene from Empire, I don't know.
All's I know is, this Shibito guy is a huge prick for messing with Memenpu's head, and for all her advanced intellect, Memenpu betrays just how sensitive and naïve she his, simply accepting the guy's words about Gagumber not being her father. She even puts herself between the guy and Gagumber, offering up herself in exchange for her not-dad's safety.
Gagumber, rightfully so, says fuck that, treading through the shallow pool of Animus to reach Memenpu, melting away his boots and burning his feet. He tells her he is, always was, and always will be her father, and she is, always was, and always will be his daughter. Whatever she wants to do and wherever it leads them, he'll be by her side on her journey. Memenpu, realizing she does have a dad in Gagumber after all, has herself a good cry in his arms.
Seemingly moved by this dramatic and cathartic exchange, the Shibito boss decides to let Memenpu and Gagumber go…for now. Gagumber recharges Big Tony and they take the shortest route back to Dream Colony proper—by drilling through the colony's retaining wall. There, Gagumber zeroes in on Muro and blasts her through a hole in the floor for making his daughter cry.
There's a ceremony honoring Team Memenpu hosted by Merooro, but when he produces arrest warrants and the team is surrounded by Bureau cops and bots, Memenpu unleashes a cloud of purple smoke from Tony and the quartet escapes with the Bureau in hot pursuit. Not sure why Merooro held a ceremony just to arrest them, but whatevs.
Back on the Labyrinth "road", Memenpu leads her team on their original mission: to find the place in her dreams, come what may. It's what she truly wants to do, and that's more than enough for Gagumber to accompany her, and by extension Zack and Yuri. It's been fun watching this found family iron out their warts and beat the bad guys…fun enough that I'll likely give the expected second season a watch.
Author braveradePosted on Fri, 24 Dec 2021 Categories Anime Reviews, Fall 2021, SAKUGANTags attack, battle, blood, choice, colony, crying, daughter, escape, family, father, freedom, gagumber, hug, love, mechs, memenpu, merooro, muro, rainbow child, rescue, responsibility, shibito, support, terrorists, yuri, zackletuLeave a comment on SAKUGAN – 12 (FIN) – THICKER THAN BLOOD
SAKUGAN – 11 – THE PRINCESS AND THE MARKERS
Memenpu, Gagumber, Zack, Yuri and Merooro arrive in the bustling Dream City, which true to its name is apparently a place where people can live out their dreams. Merooro got everyone tickets for a recital from the Diva Sina, who is also the colony's princess. When Memenpu catches Gagumber trying to ditch the recital for a gentleman's club, Sina literally drops in on them and basically declares asylum from her lofty role.
Sina happens to have a stack of drawings she's made throughout her life, her means of escaping to the world of dreams and possibilities when her actual future was fixed. But just for today, she wants to experience all of the things she dreamt of and drew. Memenpu notes how simple all of these things are, but like any member of royalty, the little things of normal life are what they often yearn for.
A sweet and lovely adventure ensues, as Memenpu secures the three of them disguises (the colony authorities and Bureau have branded the father-daughter a duo dangerous Shibito kidnappers) and Sina gets to wear regular clothes, gets a haircut to blend in, rides the packed rail transport, drinks beer in a bar, and plays video games with kids. Things take a turn when Memenpu tries to ask the kids what their dreams are and they don't understand.
Turns out Dream Colony has a very strict system wherein your family determines your job. If your parents are electricians, that's what you'll become. Obviously this is anathema to Memenpu's spirit of freedom and self-determination, and is frustrated both by the kids' inability to get what she's on about, and Sina's insistence she can't follow her dream to be an artist.
Memenpu moves heaven and earth to secure canvases and paint supplies so the two can paint together, and Sina gets into it, and starts to sing, revealing to the bystanders that she is indeed their Princess and Diva. That also attracts her secret service, who secure her and roughly arrest Gagumber and a very upset Memenpu. Sina flexes her political muscle by ordering they unhand her friends, but also agrees to return to the concert venue to perform. Her day of realizing her little dreams was fun, but it's over.
Memenpu and Gagumber rejoin the others in their box and Diva Sina performs as planned. Sina's seiyuu Hayami Saori sings a gorgeous song that moves Merooro to tears, but Memenpu remains upset. Even when Gagumber shows her drawings Sina made of being the very Diva she's become, for Memenpu those only represent a small part of what Sina dreamed of. She can't understand why Sina has to "lie" and remain in her current unfulfilled life. She may never understand.
I say that, because Memenpu might not have a lot of time left. Even though the episode seemed to end on a wonderfully bittersweet note, after the credits SAKUGAN brings down the hammer it didn't bring down last week. Shibito attacks as everyone expected, yet still manage to get close enough to Sina to assassinate her. Even so, Muro is singularly focused on Memenpu, and this time she seems to capture her for real.
Muro also says Memenpu neither knows who and what she really is and who her real father is. Could Memenpu be a Princess like Sina? Or an even more powerful "child" that Shibito is resolved to either control or destroy? You could say Shibito is an organization takes Memenpu's philosophy to a deadly extreme, while Dream City is the ultimate haven for people supressing their dreams in favor of maintaining the societal structure. Surely there's a happy medium to be found…
Author braveradePosted on Sat, 18 Dec 2021 Categories Anime Reviews, Fall 2021, SAKUGANTags art, attack, celebrity, choice, colony, culture, daughter, Diva, dreams, father, freedom, gagumber, kidnapped, love, memenpu, merooro, muro, princess, responsibility, shibito, sina, stuffed animal, support, terroristsLeave a comment on SAKUGAN – 11 – THE PRINCESS AND THE MARKERS
86 – 13 – Tired of Resting
In a wonderful, succinct yet detailed montage, we see that the surviving members of Spearhead have settled into normal life in the Giad Federacy.
Raiden got a job with a moving company and made some buds; Theo draws his surroundings and gains praise from passersby; Kurena frequents the shops and boutiques, Anju takes up cooking classes, and Shin studies up in the library. There he meets Eugene Rantz and his little sister Nina, who has befriended Frederica.
After their horrible ordeal getting to the Federacy, followed by the roller coaster of being confined to a facility until being adopted by Zimmerman, the five former child soldiers have certainly earned some peace and respite.
But while they're living in peace, they're still not at peace. There's a restlessness lurking behind their mundane days in Giad. These are kids who never considered what their futures might be, suddenly being given the opportunity to choose whatever futures they want.
But especially for Shin, it's a false choice. At least his immediate future seems to be returning to the battlefield, for many reasons, not the least of which is freeing all of his colleagues whose souls remain at the mercy of the Legion. They call to him in his dreams, but when he raises the pistol he used to end their lives and spare them further torment, his hand is empty; Ernst returned his scarf, but not his pistol.
Shins new friend Eugene is poor, and in order to provide for and protect Nina, he's enlisting in the service. The military is lauded in Giad the same as San Magnolia, and Eugene is eager to see the new mechs in the Christmas Eve military parade.
In a wonderful piece of cinematography, Shin looks down at The Skull Knight book, then looks up, and we see laundry flowing behind him through the window, emulating the knight's cape. There is no pageantry to the military for Shin or the others; only necessity, purpose, pride, and obligation.
After each of them witness the military parade and are each quite put off by the pageantry, it's Kurena who firsts breaks the dam of complacency. She's seen and heard enough of this "peace," and now it's time to return to where she belongs: the battlefield. The other four quickly concur, glad someone was able to finally vocalize that they've all simply spent to much time "resting."
Ernst objects to their sudden decision, but there's nothing sudden about it, the five have said from the beginning that this is they always intended. And we the audience can play the concerned parent figure like Ernst and say that they only feel that is all they can do because it's all they've done, and because the Republic and the Legion took everything else.
It's the precocious Frederica, exhibiting surprising maturity and clarity, who tells Ernst that if he keeps these kids from doing what they want to do he'd be no different than the Republic. She also decides to reveal that she is the last surviving Empress of Giad and carries the responsibility for unleashing the Legion in the first place.
The thing is, that was ten years ago when she was even wee-er than she is now, so Shin and the others don't hold it against her. It was really the Republic that took everything from them. Ernst grudgingly agrees to allow the five to do as they please, but only if they enter officer training, so that they'll have more options when the war is over.
Of course, none of them were thinking about that possibility, even though he says it's a certainty that the war will end. As for Frederica, she's determined to join them, that they might help her find and put to rest her valliant Knight Kiriya, who was taken by the Legion just like Shin's brother.
Lena takes the week off, and that's a boon here in terms of portraying Shin, Anju, Kurena, Raiden and Theo's transition from acceptance of their new lives to the realization that here, for once, they can choose what to do and where to go, and a mundane peaceful life in the Giadian capital just isnt' their scene.
Whether next week focuses solely on Lena or is another split episode of the kind the last cour did so well, I'm simultaneously happy and terribly worried for our Eighty-Six. Part of me wishes they would just stay in that capital and live quiet peaceful lives…but that's not up to me, or anyone else but them.
Author braveradePosted on Sat, 9 Oct 2021 Categories 86 2nd Season, Anime Reviews, Fall 2021Tags anju, dreams, eighty six, empress, ernst zimmerman, eugene rantz, fitting in, frederica rosenfort, freedom, future, giad federacy, iida shiden, knight, kurena, legion, making friends, nina rantz, officer training, republic, shin, shuga raiden, theo, volunteer, war
86 – 12 (S2 E01) – New Home, New Hope
86 is back…and there are some changes. San Magnolia's awful system hasn't changed, and Lena is still stuck in it (for now), but she's adjusted the way she operates within it. Demoted to captain, she wears a streak of blood red in her hair and wears a black uniform to set herself apart from her drunken peers. She has a new squadron of Eighty-Six led by Iida Shiden, AKA Cyclops.
She handles them as she handled Shin's squad; with as much compassion and care as she can. She learned their names from the start and has built a good rapport with Cyclops, who calls her "My Queen". Most importantly, Lena is doing what she promised Shin and the others she would do: live on; survive. For her, that means preparing for the massive Legion offensive she senses is coming, even if her superiors are doing nothing.
Lena is maintaining and biding her time. As for her old friends Shin, Raiden, Anju, Kurena, and Theo? Amazingly, they're all still alive, which is tremendous news. 86 really ripped my heart out, but it went a long way towards repairing that emotional damage by bringing them back without it feeling contrived or out of left field. Shin and the others are now honored guests of Giad, which is no longer the empire that created the Legion, but a diverse inclusive federacy.
That said, they should consider themselves lucky Giad's President Ernst Zimmerman is, at least on the surface, a man of conscience and compassion, who wants only to give these found children, cast out of their homeland after fighting so long and hard, a measure of peace. Of course, Zimmerman is also a politician, and while I don't know what his ultimate plan for the five is, I'm certain there is a plan, and his smiles and politeness are probably hiding darker intentions.
That said, it's hard to argue that Giad is far better adjusted nation than San Magnolia, what with there not being apartheid and battlefield slavery of non-Alba citizens. Alba and non-Alba share the same streets and have families together. Zimmerman also wants his five new guests to be as comfortable as possible, and so arranges for them to live in his presidential mansion. That mansion also happens to be occupied by a haughty little spitfire of a girl named Frederica Rosenfort (Kuno Misaki).
Her hair and eye color suggest some kind of connection to Shin, while it's clear Zimmerman is hiding the fact she is the last surviving Giadian Empress from the general public; officially, she's his adopted daughter, as are Shin and the others. You can tell after their ordeal the five are simply tired, but they also look uncomfortable and awkward in such plush surroundings.
Between their new situation and Lena's maintaining, there's going to be a lot of adjusting and adapting in store for them. The new OP also indicates it's only a matter of time before the five are back in the cockpits of war machines, but the president is right about one thing: that's probably where they want to be because it's all they know.
Giad is battling the Legion the same as San Magnolia. It's obvious that if the two nations worked together, and San Magnolia, say, was run by Lena and not opportunists and drunks, that nation would be far better off. Shin & Co. certainly seem better off, while Lena has at developed a thicker armor. We'll see if it all pays off.
Author braveradePosted on Sun, 3 Oct 2021 Categories 86 2nd Season, Anime Reviews, Fall 2021Tags albrecht, anju, brother, camping, changes, eighty six, ernst zimmerman, fate, frederica rosenfort, freedom, giad federacy, headquarters, helping, hope, iida shiden, kurena, legion, moving forward, preparations, republic, shin, shuga raiden, survival, theo, war1 Comment on 86 – 12 (S2 E01) – New Home, New Hope
TenSura – 45 – Demon Lords "R" Us
From the battles of Benimaru, Gobta, Gabiru, Geld, and the Beastketeers we rewind a bit back to Rimuru's palace, where he sees Shuna off before heading through the ominous portal from which an extremely powerful demon maid named Misery emerges to escort him to Walpurgis. Before heading off, Veldora and Ramiris tell Rimuru the names of the other demon lords: the giant Dagruel, the vampire Roy Valentine (and his predecessor …Milis?), the demon Guy Crimson, and the lazy Dino.
As Rimuru, Shion, and Ranga walk through the portal to a very important and potentiall very perilous meeting, Shuna arrives at the outskirts of Clayman's castle, flanked by Souei and Hakurou. They're surrounded by a mist that dulls their magical senses, and before they know it they're surrounded by an undead army led by Adalman, the Index of Clayman's five fingers.
While Souei and Hakurou buy time by battling a zombie dragon and knight, respectively, Shuna uses an Alignment Field to cordon herself and Adalman off so they can have a nice little magic battle. It seems like it's been ages since the good princess got something to do, but it was worth the wait, as she kicks some serious skeleton ass.
Mind you, Shuna doesn't move around much, nor does she ever raise her voice. But that's fine; the dignified, elegant princess isn't one to scurry around or shout. She stands with absolute confidence in her power as she calmly counters his Acid Shell with her Flame Wall and his Curse Bind with her Holy Bell. That last one surprises Adalman, who didn't know a monster could summon a Divine Miracle.
When she rewrites his suicidal Disintegration mega-spell with Overdrive and disperses most of the undead army, she also inadvertently lifts the binding curse Clayman cast Adalman and Co. in order to have their…er…undying loyalty. But now that he's been soundly defeated by a worshipper revere-er of Great Rimuru, Adalman is all about meeting the Lord Slime, and happily offers to guide Shuna & Co. to Clayman's castle.
As for Great Rimuru, he encounters Guy Crimson (who definitely has his game face on), Dagruel, Guy Valentine, Milis (possibly), and Frey for the first time, and has some harsh words for Leon regarding what he did to Shizu that results in Leon inviting Rimuru to his castle…assuming the slime survives Walpurgis.
That's when the other new kid on the block Clayman arrives, with a very out-of-it-looking Milim in tow. Rimuru surely could tell something was very wrong when Milim didn't immediately run to him and gather him into a warm embrace—they are BFFs, after all. But what really sets Rimuru off is when Clayman, clearly drunk on power, strikes Milim in the head. Everyone is shocked by Clayman's conduct, but Rimuru is just mad, and promises Clayman's death won't be painless. Can't wait to see it!
Author magicalchurlsukuiPosted on Tue, 31 Aug 2021 Categories Anime Reviews, Summer 2021, Tensei shitara Slime Datta Ken 2nd Season Part 2Tags adalman, battle, clayman, curse, dead knights, defeated, demon lords, dino, 転生したらスライムだった件, faith, freedom, guy crimson, hakurou, leon cromwell, magic, meeting, milim, powerful, ramiris, respect, shuna, souei, tensura, undead, zombie dragon1 Comment on TenSura – 45 – Demon Lords "R" Us
86 – 11 (Fin) – All Over but the Crying
We arrive at October 30th, the day the five remaining members of Spearhead get into a scrap with the Legion and lose Fido as well as all but Shin's Juggernaut. Things are getting desperate and they're running low on ammo, fuel, and food, which means soon their recon mission will be at an end. All of them know what that means, but rather than dwell on that, they simply keep living their lives until the time fate decides to take them.
This means taking shifts piloting the 'naut while the others rest or watch the rear from the remaining cargo bot. Thanks to Shin's instincts and a rainstorm they manage to evade another Legion patrol, but the Legion become more legion by the day. The group finds an abandoned town and decide to take shelter in a school—the first school Kurena's ever been to. They take a final roll call, and "graduate" the next day.
When they hit a literal wall of sheer rock, Shin suddenly asks to switch with Anju, who is piloting, claiming he's bored. Once they switch, he cuts the tether to split off from the others and uses his grappler to bring down some rocks so they won't follow. He sensed more Legion were coming; Legion they wouldn't escape unless he lured them away. The others aren't okay with this. Raiden, Anju, Kurena and Theo all agree to go after him.
With no Juggernauts, they have to go on foot, and arrive just as Shin's ride is trashed and a Legion prepares to crack it open like a tin of sardines and claim his head. Only the weakest of the charging Legion are susceptible to their small arms, and even then only headshots, and there are too many of them. First Theo, then everyone else goes down fighting. The light of the Legion prepares to take Shin's head—but he has his sidearm. Does it succeed?
We finally check in on Lena, who is under house arrest for her little stunt with the mortars. Even so, she pays a visit to the front lines, and to Spearhead's HQ. A new group of 86 are being processed. The cycle continues.
Lena is greeted by Lt. Albrecht, who reveals he's an Alba like her whose wife and daughter were 86 and died in battle. Thanks to Shin, he was given a measure of solace in knowing they didn't become Legion, as Shin never heard them call Albrecht's name.
Lena then walks through the now abandoned living space like a ghost looking so out of place after having been in essentially another world the whole time. It's just so heartbreaking that by the time she was finally able to make it here, everyone she spoke to over the Para-RAID was already gone.
While the cycle of using 86 as cannon fodder continues, there was at least a crucial change. Lena and Shin forged a genuine connection, and it rubbed off on the others too, as they left her a memento: Theo's drawing of her with handwritten notes from him, Shin, Raiden, Kurena, and Anju. More importantly, they left a Polaroid of the whole group, helpfully labelled by Theo "so she wouldn't cry" about not being able to tell who was who.
In the end, as a practical matter, all Lena was able to do by breaking protocol and getting in trouble was extend the five's lives by a few more days. Instead of dying on one battlefield, they died on another. But with Fido gone and his records destroyed, Lena now holds some of the last remaining artifacts of their existence—other than the wrecks and bodies they left behind somewhere out there, after reaching their final destinations.
Lena will surely treasure these things, as well as the cat left in her care, but they're also primed to fuel her continued rebellion against the broken evil system she's blindly served for too long. She couldn't end the injustice for Shin and the others, but perhaps with enough allies and some luck, she can end it for others. Or maybe not. But like them, she'll fight until fate comes for her.
Maybe then they'll all get to finally reunite…for the first time.
So ends the first cour of 86. What a powerful show. We've known since the start there would definitely be a second one, but now we know there will be a "Special Episode" in between the two. What I'm a little fuzzy on is what exactly became of Shin.
I'd like to hope he managed to shoot himself in the head, and that seems to be supported by the fact he reunites with his brother, whom we know he freed from the Legion. We also see Shin's headless body. But nothing is certain, which is why I'll just have to keep watching to find out.
Author braveradePosted on Sat, 19 Jun 2021 Categories 86, Anime Reviews, Spring 2021Tags albrecht, anju, brother, camping, crying, death, eighty six, farewell, fate, final mission, freedom, head, headquarters, helping, hope, kitty, kurena, legion, loss, moving forward, para-raid, photo, republic, scenery, shin, shuga raiden, smiling, tearjerker, theo, unknown, vision, visit, voices, war1 Comment on 86 – 11 (Fin) – All Over but the Crying
To Your Eternity – 10 – The Grand Gugupest Hotel
When the Enemy is about to attack Gugu, Fushi springs into action and shields his brother from the twisting branches by creating a number of spears to parry them. I guess he has learned a few things since his last battle! Gugu wants fight beside him, but is very lucky to survive when the Enemy throws him across the forest.
It may just be the still Booze Man installed in his stomach that saves him, as he proceeds to barf out all of the liquor stored there. When his torch ignites the liquor-vomit, Gugu gets an idea for how he can help Fushi, and races home. On the way, he turns completely red, drunk off the liquor that escaped the still, while Rean is about to be carried off by her helicopter parents.
Drunk Gugu is naturally a less inhibited Gugu, so he doesn't mince words about loving Rean more than anyone, no matter to whom she's betrothed. In any case, he's not there to solve her family drama, but to get a refill of Booze Man's best booze.
Pioran, the only other person to have witnessed the terrifying power of Fushi's Enemy, insists that Booze Man do as Gugu says. The old man fills Gugu up with his strongest stuff and sends him on his way, while Pioran stops Rean's parents from taking her and leaving…because it's not safe out there.
Gugu, having sobered up, arrives to find the Enemy has absorbed Fushi's Giant Bear form, and there is no sign of Fushi. But it's soon apparent that the Enemy, essentially being made of wood, is vulnerable to fire, and Gugu has a fresh bellyful of fuel to play with.
Using his boozy fire breah, Gugu burns the Enemy to the ground, freeing Fushi, who is only flowing light and energy before transforming into a rock, his first form. When Gugu picks him up, he transforms into a wolf dog, and the two tussle mirthfully…though Fushi keeps his promise to bite Gugu if he came back!
The next morning Gugu and Fushi return to the Booze Man's house where everyone is very confused about what happened (though Pioran probably has a pretty good idea). Gugu celebrates his return by cooking up a feast so delicious, Rean's parents deem him better than their professional chef.
Fushi, back in the same clothes and with the same rope as the boy when he died since he "reset", greets his maker, whom no one else can see or hear, outside. The creator tells him in order to become stronger, he cannot be sedentary, but like Rean with her parents, Fushi protests. He wants to stay. The creator tells him that's also an option.
Back inside, Rean prepares to leave with her folks, and Gugu dispenses some precocious wisdom: The people who keep us alive aren't necessarily good people, but we aren't so weak that we can't endure it. Granted, he's had to endure a lot more than Rean, but it's all relative!
Fast forward…four years. Gugu is no longer a pot-bellied boy, but a swole young man, having never stopped his fitness regimen. He continues to assist the Booze Man and feed him and Pioran (who still starts eating before everyone comes to the table). Rean still "runs away" from home on the regular, to see Gugu and Fushi.
And Fushi, having watched Gugu and Rean grow, has himself grown "older"; his hair growing longer and even gaining a slight stubble on his face. He also speaks a lot more naturally, which isn't surprising considering his teachers and how long he's been with them. The tenth episode of a planned twenty ends on Fushi's new family happily enjoying a meal together. If only that happiness could last…
Author magicalchurlsukuiPosted on Tue, 15 Jun 2021 Categories Anime Reviews, Fumetsu no Anata e, Spring 2021Tags arrow, backstory, battle, booze man, brothers, changing form, cooking, enemy, family, fire, freedom, fushi, gugu, individuality, liquor, mask, monster, nokkers, oniguma-sama, parents, pioran, rean, rescue, rich girl, runaway, staying, working, young love, 不滅のあなたへ
86 – 10 – We've Come This Far
86 eschews dialogue and even diagetic sound, sticking with visuals and music to tell the story of Spearhead's newfound freedom. Followed by their ever-trusty robot porter Fido, Raiden, Theo, Kurena, Anju and a far happier, less haunted Shin continue their "deep recon" mission by heading further and further from their Republic minders, camping out and keeping a low profile as columns of Legion pass by in the night.
It's so nice to finally see these good kids get to live like the kids they are, not always having to worry about going into battle or being killed or being turned into a Legion. Being in the vivid blues, greens, and purples of nature make for a nice change of pace from their usual gunmetal grays and blood reds. They wash their uniforms, and trip to an old Imperial town nets them a boiler in which to heat a much-appreciated bath.
Shin is smiling and laughing the whole time, but still seems distracted by something, though it's no longer his brother, whom he's satisfied is now at rest. Like the others, I feared the worst when they woke up to find him gone, but Raiden remembered the tunnel in the town Shin took a good look at, and it leads them to a zoo where he's found an immobile Legion with the brain of an 86, which Shin puts out of its misery.
The five stare for a long time at the skeleton of an elephant and other beasts who died locked behind bars, and wonder if they'll end up the same way. It's Fido, of all of them, who tells them to stop talking about such things and keep moving forward. While Raiden withdraws his question of whether Shin will be going across the water by himself—and possibly to the good Major, who doesn't appear this week—he probably already knows the answer.
After the credits roll with almost ten minutes left, we get a retrospective of sorts of the life of Fido, starting with him finding and befriending Shin. He's been there since this most recent cycle of Spearhead began, and probably before that, and all this time has been capturing all of these small moments of joy and grief. Shots of characters long gone smiling and playing are shown, then immediately juxtaposed of images from the day they died.
The most foreboding and indeed deeply upsetting moment we see happens at the very end, with Fido, and all of the memories he contained that for many of the 86 represented their only record of having existed on this earth, is blown up, most likely by Legion, on October 30, the latest date we've seen so far.
On one level, I have to think Shin and the others will be alright, even if Fido very clearly isn't. And even with Fido's stored "memories" have gone up in smoke, those five still carry memories of the fallen—all 576 of them, including Shin's brother. The question is, assuming they're alright, what will become of them? Will Shin find a way to get to Lena? I suspect next week's season one finale will focus exclusively on her, and what progress if any she's made in her one-woman crusade to save the soul of her nation.
Author braveradePosted on Sun, 13 Jun 2021 Categories 86, Anime Reviews, Spring 2021Tags anju, brother, camping, eighty six, fido, final mission, freedom, helping, hope, kurena, loss, memories, mortars, moving forward, para-raid, Recon, recordings, republic, scenery, shin, shuga raiden, smiling, theo, unknown, vision, voices, war, zoo
Super Cub – 03 – Calling Out to the Universe
Koguma notes how it's been a few days since her "life of emptiness" was suddenly filled by her Cub, and then by a fellow Cub rider. She acquired the Cub by actively visiting a dealership, while befriending Reiko happened more by chance when Reiko approached her. Koguma is gradually getting more comfortable with both of these things.
During lunch (the running gag of Koguma never being able to microwave her meals is great and very relatable) Reiko announces her intention to go touring during summer vacation, and is glad to have the big luggage box that comes with the Postal Cub. Koguma would like one too, so Reiko reaches out to a fellow Cubber and finds another box within walking distance.
Reiko has Koguma remove the box from the worn-out Cub, and using tools on a Cub for the first time must feel satisfying. That feeling is repeated when a teacher gives her a free front basket from his Cub he doesn't need anymore. As she vicariously revels in Koguma grinning like a goofball, Reiko tells Koguma that whenever she needs a part of something, the universe will provide if you "call out" to it.
As Koguma tries opening up the pipes on her Cub, she learns she'll have to call out for something else: a means of blocking the wind from hitting her face. I must say these three episodes have been an absolute face clinic, and Koguma's wind-in-her-face face is as priceless as her satisfied grins. It's great watching Koguma discover the simple but powerful joy of upgrades.
That night, Koguma considers how to solve this problem as she cooks a dinner of fried rice—not a microwave packet—perhaps indicating she's taking more pride in the process and effort of all things, not just her Cub. Reiko takes Koguma to the library to search the web for a face shield, but even the cheapest are around $40.
Then, as if the universe were answering Koguma's call for an alternative, she spots a custodian wearing safety goggles, which are both cheaper than a mask and tough enough to withstand the rigors of riding. Koguma had to go to the hardware store to buy a chain lock anyway, so kills two birds with one stone. Goofy grinning ensues, and that night Koguma dreams of riding her Cub on a road through a flower-strewn meadow. She's officially got the Cub Bug.
Koguma's mood extends into the morning, and Reiko notices her friend's extra pep. After school, both of them want to go riding, so they do, although I was a little confused when Reiko left first, because I thought they intended to ride together. Another time, perhaps. In the meantime, Reiko gives Koguma her cell number, tells her to call if she needs anything, and to be careful on the road.
Koguma admits that getting her licesne wasn't a particularly emotional moment, but getting Reiko's number was another thing entirely. She isn't sure yet if she and Reiko could be classified as friends, but that doesn't matter, because they're something she considers deeper and more profound: they're both members of that ancient and noble tribe of Honda Cub owners, and they are legion!
Author sesameacrylicPosted on Wed, 5 May 2021 Tue, 4 May 2021 Categories Anime Reviews, Spring 2021, Super CubTags スーパーカブ, basket, dream, freedom, friendship, goggles, honda, koguma, luggage box, parts, phone number, reiko, riding, school, scooter, slice of life, smiles, Super Cub, upgrades, wind
Super Cub – 02 – Two-Wheeled Freedom
Koguma discovers how to hang her helmet off her Cub after seeing her classmate stow his under the seat of his scooter. Once in class, she daydreams about suddenly blurting out that she came to school on a motorbike and suddenly becoming Miss Popular. Thankfully, she chooses a much more natural time to mention her new scooter—in Home Ec class when they're making drawstring bags. Her mention leads to a classmate asking if she can see her Cub after school.
While last week Koguma was thoroughly in her own little world, directly interacting only with Shino, this week we see just how socially awkward she is, first by only tentatively agreeing to meet up and then trying to make an Irish exit, only to forget her newly-made bag.
Fortunately, the other girl doesn't hold it against her, and reveals she's something of a motorbike otaku in her appraisal of Koguma's Super Cub. She also makes plain her biker girl bonafides by presenting her own steed: a red MD4=90 Postal Cub, she's souped up with aftermarket and bespoke parts.
Their interaction kind of trails off when the girl, named Reiko, has to head out, but Koguma privately hopes they'll get to talk more tomorrow. Even so, when tomorrow arrives, it takes everything she has to let out a hushed good morning that Reiko only acknowledges with a curt "Mmm."
Koguma's fear that their interactions are at an end are alleviated when Reiko takes her arm and leads her to their bikes where they eat lunch together, explicitly mentioning they're friends now. Yet even here, when Reiko tells her they can go anywhere they want with their Cubs, Koguma seems held back by a lack of imagination.
But once she's riding home after school, Koguma starts to feel what Reiko was talking about, and instead of going straight through her usual intersection, she takes a right turn. That leads to a supermarket with much better prices on her lunch packets, and she even saves a few yen by using the drawstring bag she made the other day.
You could say that inspiration fueled Koguma's imagination, allowing her to make a different turn than usual and find a new an unknown place. It's her first small step to realizing the boundless potential for freedom her new ride represents. As we see Reiko taking full advantage of her Cub to find a gorgeous Yuru Camp-esque vista featuring Fuji-san, Koguma looks forward to her next after-school side trip. So am I!
Author sesameacrylicPosted on Tue, 4 May 2021 Tue, 4 May 2021 Categories Anime Reviews, Spring 2021, Super CubTags awkward, スーパーカブ, bag, color, freedom, going places, honda, koguma, lunch, new friends, quiet, reiko, riding, school, scooter, slice of life, souped up, Super Cub, supermarket
Fruits Basket – 55 – The End Comes So Suddenly
This final season's ED pairs off all of the romantic couples, and this week we check in on a number of them, starting with Ayame and Mine. When Ayame asks Mine if she'll leave him if the curse is never broken, Mine being Mine assures him she's not leaving his side ever, so if he has a problem with that, tough!
Meanwhile at Mayuko's bookstore, she and Hatori talk about maybe going on a trip, though Hatori pointedly doesn't have anywhere in particular he wants to go.
Finally, Machi is falling for Yuki, and hard, such that she's actually taking her StuCo work seriously. Yuki knows he has to tell her about the curse at some point, but the right time keeps getting interrupted. Ultimately he may have to simply arrange a time—say, a date—for just the two of them to talk with no hangers-on.
Akito, still distraught over her fight with Hatsuharu, gets precisely zero sympathy from Shigure, who continues to mock her for thinking hiding in a dark room will solve anything. He knows that time, people, and emotions will move on in time.
Akito was sold a bill of goods about unchanging bonds and continues to cling to it, but that's not Shigure's problem. It's not often I say this about the most despicable member of the Zodiac other than Akito herself, but…good for Shigure. Scratch that; I want neither of them to win anything, ever.
But Shigure's not wrong. Would it surprise you to learn that these past four weeks when I watched both the OP and ED, I had no idea who the lanky blonde was, despite the fact that if you discount him, Momiji was nowhere to be found in either? Turns out that's because Momiji had one hell of agrowth spurt. He's a full-on man, complete with fully male school uniform.
Despite now looking like yet another handsome prince, he's still the same playful, cheerful bunny boy who'll take Tooru by the hand and walk around campus, completely oblivious to the fact it makes them look like a doting couple.
While Shigure is away getting his fix of Akito suffering, his house becomes a hub for all of the young Soumas, as Kisa, Hiro, and Momiji join Kyou, Yuki, Tooru, and Haru for a night of curry and family fun. I love how organically it all comes together; clearly these Soumas have had their fill of Akito's gloom.
But while Momiji still puts on his usual adorable act, he makes clear to Kyou that as someone who has always loved Tooru and is now big enough to confess to her, he won't accept Kyou continuing to be wishy-washy about her. If Kyou gives up on Tooru, someone else will come along and take her before he knows it—and that will surely sting.
Shigure, who acknowledges the various kinds of kindness doled out to Akito by Hatori and Kureno, but has no intention of becoming Akito's "father", quickly loses all the goodwill he built up kicking Akito when she was down by getting all creepy with a thankfully oblivious Tooru, whom he considers a more worthy "god" than Akito to be devoted to.
That night, Akito dreams of her father telling her how she was born to be loved and how there will be no loneliness or fear in her future, only to see another rope snap, waking her up in a panic.
It comes as both a huge surprise and entirely no surprise whatsoever that the next Zodiac member to be liberated from the curse is Momiji. Akito can feel it, and rushes to his place to beg him not to leave her, and in his newly liberated state he sees Akito for the pitiful, pathetic wretch she is and curses his former self for feeling otherwise.
Still, because he's also a nice guy he tells her to leave for now; he'll come talk to her once he's sorted some things out. The next day at school he is aloof and elusive, but from the roof he catches Tooru gazing at an unaware Kyou in the hall. Kyou goes to the roof and finds him there, and Momiji says "my curse is broken" and tries to pass it off as a joke, all while telling Kyou that he, Momiji, is the one truly being stung.
Later, Momiji tells Akito that he can't stay by her side all his life, and she can't tie him down, either magically or emotionally. She tries her best to tell her that neither his parents nor anyone else will welcome him back, but he already knows that. He's free now, and it's lonely and terrifying, but he also feels a sense of almost infinite potential.
Even if he can't find happiness with Akito, and even if he won't get the girl he wants, he knows deep in his newly freed heart that he can find happiness somewhere, and with someone, at some point in the future. That happiness may only be waiting for him to catch up. But he won't find it unless he walks his own life's path.
He then asks Akito how long he'll stay in that place, which I believe is the very first time someone suggested that Akito could simply give this all up and find her own path. Naturally, Akito ignores the questions and tells him to buzz off, but she's only delaying the inevitable. I have to believe Kureno and Momiji are only the beginning. The curse is on borrowed time.
While walking to school, Momiji chooses a route that goes past his birth mother and sister Momo. His mom talks about going on a trip soon, and even though Momiji can't and won't be going with them, his mood is improved dramatically simply by hearing the words "take care" from his mom.
Author magicalchurlsukuiPosted on Mon, 3 May 2021 Mon, 10 May 2021 Categories Anime Reviews, Fruits Basket: The Final, Spring 2021Tags フルーツバスケット, broken curse, couples, curry, freedom, grown up, kuragi machi, mine, mother, shiraki mayuko, souma akito, souma ayame, souma hatori, souma hatsuharu, souma hiro, souma kisa, souma kyou, souma momiji, souma shigure, souma yuki, unrequited love, zodiac
Higehiro – 02 – Freedom and Choices
A princess raised in castles is going to act like royalty, like Queen Elizabeth. A princess raised by wolves is going to act like a wolf, like San, AKA Princess Mononoke. Behaviors are learned through social interactions and time. Sayu has apparently lived a life where her choices were few and her freedom nonexistent.
Leaving home only gave her a fleeting freedom, and she eventually had to do what conditions at the time demanded her of her to survive. As a result, she still behaves around Yoshida the way she had to behave around other men with whom she treated her body for shelter. He notes that the smiles she flashes often feel forced, strange, and wrong.
It's doubly frustrating to him that someone so young had been forced into a situation where she didn't feel safe not smiling when she didn't feel like it. He calls her out on it with what I'd call "harsh kindness", assuring her that even if his home isn't hers, she's allowed to be there, and doesn't have to be "weird" or "lie to him" with those smiles.
Sayu understands what Yoshida is on about, and so tells him that she was thinking to herself why he's so nice. He reiterates that he's not being overly nice at all; he's just being decent, the way everyone should be to each other. She says she'll try her best not to refuse when he offers her things, or smile when she doesn't mean it.
But she also points out that those smiles and refusals are habits that will be hard to break, since she's still not quite used to the unprecedented freedom and choices Yoshida has given her. But through her attitude and the housework she does for him, she hopes to make him think he's glad she came into his life. Despite everything that's happened to her, Sayu remains a kind and decent person herself.
While last week focused on the establishment of Yoshida's new normal at home, here we get a look into his work environment, where his crisper shirts, enhanced hygiene, and shorter-than-usual work days have led to rumors he has a girlfriend. But when his immediate underling Mishima's code has some bugs in it, and she's forced to work late, he works late with her, and even gets takeout.
Mishima takes their ensuing alone time to learn that Yoshida doens't have a girlfriend, and was recently rejected by Gotou. Mishima considers herself "lucky" Gotou rejected him, and wouldn't mind going out for a beer sometime. Like Sayu, she tells him he's kinder than most by not simply giving up on her, but as with Sayu, he doesn't think he's any nicer than everyone should be.
When he gets home, Sayu is wrapped in her blanket like a Yuru Camp character, apparently angry he's home late after she cooked dinner. But she follows her annoyed tone with genuine giggling, as she was just messing with him. As she reads manga and he has an after-work beer, he realizes that he really should have a way to get a hold of her.
Sayu threw her old phone in the ocean, and while at the mall she refuses to let him buy a new one, so he does so when she's not around. Hashimoto, the only other person who knows about Sayu, can tell that Yoshida likes Sayu by the care he's putting into choosing a case for her. Hashimoto gently warns him that it's fine to be nice, but he should start thinking about how things are going to go, before she settles in too much, or she falls for him, or he falls for her.
Yoshida assures Hashimoto that that won't happen, but while romance is out of the question, there are already glimmers of familial and paternal love. Hashimoto didn't go so far as to say "she's not a lost puppy", but he's right that Yoshida needs to come up with some kind of plan beyond keeping her off the streets.
One day at work, Gotou approaches Yoshida and they end up going out for yakiniku and beer, which she confesses she can only go out for with him, since all other men expect her to be a "sweet, proper lady." That's now three women who consider him to be uncommonly kind and understanding to them. One wonders why she's with the man she's with if she can't be herself with him!
Gotou commences an anything-goes Q-&-A between them, starting first by asking if he's dating someone. When he refuses, she lists all the evidence that he is—leaving work on time, cleaning himself up better—and mentions how Mishima seems to have a thing for him. He repeats that there's nothing there, because in his give years at the office he's always been in love with her.
When Gotou caught wind of the rumors, she was bothered by the fact he'd immediately been "taken in by another younger girl." With the rumor staunched, Yoshida loses some points by asking Gotou what cup size she is. I know she said "ask me anything", but c'mon, man!
When Yoshida comes home, late again, and not eating the dinner Sayu made again, she can tell he's feeling down and needs a hug, so she hugs him. Like when she put her hand on his earlier, she does it because she wants to, and because she thinks it will make him feel better. And while in the bath he laments being a grown man cheered up by a teenage girl, it shouldn't be anything to be ashamed of…ask any dad!
When he presents Sayu with a new phone, we learn he chose the white case for her over the black. White, the color of purity and chastity, yes, but also, Sayu just happens to like white! In that same vein, he didn't buy it for her as a gift or a sign of his affection, but as a practical means of communication when they're not both home.
Of course, he also doesn't want her to worry if he is late. He doesn't want to do or say anything to make her feel bad. He wants her to have every choice and opportunity someone her age should have. In this and in basically everything he's done for her thus far, he's acted like a father.
Yoshida acknowledges that Sayu is a woman, but to him, she's a little kid. Someone to protect unconditionally. Someone who doesn't have to force herself to smile to make him feel better. Maybe the endgame, then, is to simply adopt her.
Author sesameacrylicPosted on Mon, 12 Apr 2021 Categories Anime Reviews, Hige wo Soru. Soshite Joshikousei wo Hirou., Spring 2021Tags behavior, child, choices, clothes, ethics, fake smiles, freedom, gotou airi, hashimoto, hokkaido, home late, housework, kindness, mishima yuzuha, nice, office, ogiwara sayu, phone, rejected, rumors, runaway, salaryman, situation, standards, tokyo, values, yoshida
Attack on Titan – 73 – Burning Bridges, Breaking Bonds
Note: This episode was interrupted ~17 minutes in by a special news report of a magnitude 4.7 earthquake near Wakamiya. As of yet are no reports of serious injuries or damage, and there is no tsunami threat. We're hoping everyone is okay.—R.S.
The first eight minutes of this episode contain some of the bitterest, most heartbreaking moments of the entire run of the show. Eren hasn't come to see his two best friends to ask them to join his cause. They aren't friends anymore, and according to him, one of them never was.
When Armin accuses him of being manipulated by his big brother, Eren turns the accusation back on Armin. Since he carries the Colossal Titan, he also carries Bertholdt Hoover's memories, and has thus partially become Bertholdt, whom Eren considers the enemy. Eren isn't wrong, either: why else has Armin been visiting Annie?
If Mikasa thought she be safe from Eren's aspersions, she is proven dead wrong, as he dismisses her as nothing but a vessel for the Ackerman blood, sworn to protect the king of Eldia at all costs. The day she killed to save him in that cabin, she was simply obeying orders, like a slave, and every time she's saved him since was for the same reason.
There's nothing Eren hates more than people who aren't free, who he calls "cattle", and blows right through Armin's "stop it" by saying just looking at Mikasa would piss him off, and that he always hated her.
Whether it is true if Eren always hated her (I tend to doubt that), no one can deny Mikasa putting Eren's safety above everything else, even defining her entire existence. She doesn't help her case when Armin, who's had enough of Eren's lip, leaps over the table to slug him, only to be immediately and easily restrained…by Mikasa, again moving without thinking, betraying her Ackerman programming.
Armin still manages to get a potshot in, and Eren decides to stir the shit a little more, telling him that they've never fought each other once in all their lives because it wouldn't be a fair fight. To drive that point home, he beats the shit out of Armin while Mikasa can only watch in tearful horror. He then asks one of his underlings to take them, and Gabi, away. They're headed to where it all began: Shiganshima.
I can't believe Eren always felt this way about Armin and Mikasa, but it is probably no coincidence that the man who has become obsessed with his idea of "freedom" isn't just breaking his bonds of bondage, but of friendship as well. Even if there was once an Eren Yeager we could root for, that Eren is long gone now.
I don't care what he says about Armin or Mikasa or how technically accurate he may be about their circumstances. The fact is they both loved him, and dearly. They didn't deserve to be shit on like this, and he didn't deserve them, period.
Levi is tired of waiting around for something to happen, and so breaks his bonds of protocol and command by deciding that both Eren and Zeke will be fed to other, more malleable hosts. But he waited a little too long, and also made the critical mistake of letting his unit drink the Marleyan wine usually reserved for the Military Police.
Zeke lets out a shout as he flees the camp, and in moments each and every one of Levi's solders transform into Pure Titans under his control. At the same time in the capital, Pyxis and a host of other officials are momentarily paralyzed and report feeling strange…including Falco, who swallowed a drop of wine after all.
Zeke may seem to have the upper hand, but makes the miscalculation that Levi would refrain or even hesitate to slaughter Titans bearing the faces of his subordinates. That's exactly what he does, including two of the three escorting Zeke out of the forest when he catches up to him, slicing them up like spiral hams. Zeke is left with no choice but to transform into the Beast, and repurposes pieces of a Titan's corpse into deadly thrown projectiles.
Unfortunately, the lumbering Beast Titan is no match for someone as small, agile, and fast as Levi in the middle of a forest full of anchors for his ODM gear. He can attack Zeke from any and all angles, and launches four nape-busting missiles right into the Beast's neck.
Zeke is thrown from the Titan body, severely injured, but still alive, and Levi's plan to feed him to someone else are back on. If Zeke was headed to Shiganshima to meet with Eren, like the final six minutes of this episode, he's been delayed indefinitely.
Author braveradePosted on Sun, 14 Mar 2021 Sun, 14 Mar 2021 Categories Anime Reviews, Shingeki no Kyojin - The Final Season, Winter 2021Tags armin arlert, Attack on Titan, bertholdt hoover, captured, disowning, eren yeager, 進撃の巨人, falco grice, forest, freedom, gabi braun, hate, jaegerists, marley, mikasa ackerman, paradis, programmed, pyxis, shingeki no kyojin, shout, slaves, spinal fluid, titans, wine, zeke yeager | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |
1,004,448 | Breast Cancer Awareness Tee Shirts: Assistance A Noble Cause!
Often the issue is not the unavailability of treatment for breast cancer, however late diagnosis. Awareness of the signs of breast cancer is the only way to guarantee that everyone with the disease will get an early medical diagnosis. Many charities and cancer foundations have actually introduced breast cancer awareness programs with this fact in mind.
Pink was picked as the color for these bracelets as an expression of the womanly character. Currently millions of dollars are being produced from the sale of pink ribbons and breast cancer awareness t-shirts, which is going towards supporting cancer research study and for spreading out awareness of the disease.
Despite the fact that breast cancer awareness bracelets first came out in pink color, they now can be found in a range of colors and materials. Generally the rubber and the silicone awareness bracelets cost around $1. These bracelets can also be made from pearl, cats eye or other suitable material and sell for around $30. These metal and pearl bracelets can be used as jewelry, and at the very same time they support a cause.
Tailor-made breast cancer awareness bracelets on which you can stamp any message that you want are likewise readily available. These messages can be of hope, or endurance, or success. Often, the friends and family of the cancer patients wear these bracelets to show their support to the having a hard time person.
For many years the sale of breast cancer awareness bracelets has actually assisted many. There are lots of conversation and information groups online on cancer that are supported by loan from the sale of these bracelets. There are 'fund-free mammogram' centers available for those who can not afford the diagnostic procedure, funded by the sale of these breast cancer awareness shirts. | RedPajamaC4 | test |
1,004,449 | T-Mobile launches the unprecedented 5G network at Innsbruck, Austria
Feb 9, 2018, 11:19 am
Oindrila B.
Two radio cells of T-Mobile Austria have started operating according to the new 5G standard. The network transmits at a rate of 2 GB per second and has a latency of 3 milliseconds, staying true to 5G's promise of Super-fast network response time and extremely high bandwidths.
Tyrol's Governor, Günther Platter, has made the following comment regarding the initiative: "I am incredibly proud to see Tyrol at the forefront of digitization. Our bandwidth initiative has laid the groundwork for building out the 5G network going forward. I am particularly pleased that Innsbruck will be a first pilot region. Looking ahead, Tyrol plans to launch a task force with all operators to further accelerate the 5G rollout."
We chose Innsbruck back in 2009 as the pioneering city for the fourth-generation mobile communication and rolled out the first test network of the then new technology LTE on air. Nine years later we are showing in Innsbruck the next evolutionary stage of mobile communication: 5G live in the city center rather than in the laboratory. Our tests are a vital milestone toward rapidly rolling out 5G in Austria. – Rüdiger Köster, CTO T-Mobile, Austria
T-Mobile is operating in the frequency spectrum of 3.7 Gigahertz with equipment from technology partner Huawei and fiber-optic infrastructure of Innsbruck's municipal companies to provide a 5G pre-standard network which is very similar to the global 3GPP standard for 5G New Radio.
T-Mobile is using Europe's inaugural 5G drone flight to demonstrate the efficiency of a super-fast 5G connection. While drones are equipped to travel on pre-programmed routes, the new and fast 5G connection will help the drone maintain better contact with controllers during unpredictable rescue missions, along with allowing it to transmit high-resolution camera images in real time.
The upcoming frequency auction will determine just how fast 5G can be rolled out in Austria. A simple auction design that reduces complexity, the national award of licenses with adjacent frequency spectrum, and support for collaborative ventures are essential to delivering 5G rapidly in Austria. – Rüdiger Köster, T-Mobile CTO
It has also used a virtual reality application, a 360-degree camera with 8K resolution transmitting images to VR glasses, by way of an example, to demonstrate the network's speed. While the high-speed data rate allows real-time transmission of the high-resolution 360-degree images to the VR glasses; a rapid latency ensures that the reaction time between the glasses and the camera is minimum, allowing the user to change viewing angles so soon as he turns his head while wearing the VR glasses.
5G New Launch Smartphone | RedPajamaCommonCrawl | test |