首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Americans today don’t place a very high value on intellect. Our heroes are athletes, entertainers, and entrepreneurs, not schola
Americans today don’t place a very high value on intellect. Our heroes are athletes, entertainers, and entrepreneurs, not schola
admin
2015-12-01
38
问题
Americans today don’t place a very high value on intellect. Our heroes are athletes, entertainers, and entrepreneurs, not scholars. Even our schools are where we send our children to get a practical education — not to pursue knowledge for the sake of knowledge. Symptoms of pervasive anti-intellectualism in our schools aren’t difficult to find.
"Schools have always been in a society where practical is more important than intellectual,"says education writer Diane Ravitch. "Schools could be a counterbalance. " Ravitch’ s latest book, Left Back: A Century of Failed School Reforms, traces the roots of anti-intellectualism in our schools, concluding they are anything but a counterbalance to the American distaste for intellectual pursuits.
But they could and should be. Encouraging kids to reject the life of the mind leaves them vulnerable to exploitation and control. Without the ability to think critically, to defend their ideas and understand the ideas of others, they cannot fully participate in our democracy; "Continuing along this path," says writer Earl Shorris. "We will become a second-rate country. We will have a less civil society."
"Intellect is resented as a form of power or privilege," writes historian and professor Richard Hofstadter in Anti-Intellectualism in American Life, a Pulitzer-Prize winning book on the roots of anti-intellectualism in U.S. politics, religion, and education. From the beginning of our history, says Hofstadter, our democratic and populist urges have driven us to reject anything that smells of elitism. Practicality, common sense, and native intelligence have been considered more noble qualities than anything you could learn from a book.
Ralph Waldo Emerson and other Transcendentalist philosophers thought schooling and rigorous book learning put unnatural restraints on children: "We are shut up in schools and college recitation rooms for 10 or 15 years and come out at last with a bellyful of words and do not know a thing. " Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn exemplified American anti-intellectualism. Its hero avoids being civilized — going to school and learning to read — so he can preserve his innate goodness.
Intellect, according to Hofstadter, is different from native intelligence, a quality we reluctantly admire. Intellect is the critical, creative, and contemplative side of the mind. Intelligence seeks to grasp, manipulate, re-order, and adjust, while intellect examines, ponders, wonders, theorizes, criticizes, and imagines.
School remains a place where intellect is mistrusted. Hofstadter says our country’s educational system is in the grips of people who "joyfully and militantly proclaim their hostility to intellect and their eagerness to identify with children who show the least intellectual promise".
What do American parents expect their children to acquire in school?
选项
A、The habit of thinking independently.
B、Profound knowledge of the world.
C、Practical abilities for future career.
D、The confidence in intellectual pursuits.
答案
C
解析
从文章第1段的内容可知,美国人现在不太重视才智了。我们崇拜的是运动员、演员和企业家,而不是学者。甚至我们的学校也是一个我们送孩子去接受实用教育的场所。在我们的学校,不难发现普遍的反才智主义的现象。从第2段的内容可知,作家Diane Ravitch说,“学校总是处于一个实践重于智慧的社会之中。”据此可知,美国人期待他们的孩子在学校学到实际本领。C项与文章的意思相符,因此C项为正确答案。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/ezGO777K
0
考博英语
相关试题推荐
Smallbusinessownersmustaccepttheburdensofentrepreneurship.Beinginbusinessforyour-selfrequiresyourfullattention
ThehistoryofAfrican-Americansduringthepast400yearsistraditionallynarrated【21】anongoingstraggleagainst【22】andindif
Forsomeonewhoselifehasbeenshattered,HiroshiShimizuisremarkablycalm.InacrampedTokyolawoffice,thesubdued,bitte
Accordingtoonesurveyof12,000people,about30percentofthosemakingNewYear’sresolutionssaytheydon’tevenkeepthem
Accordingtoonesurveyof12,000people,about30percentofthosemakingNewYear’sresolutionssaytheydon’tevenkeepthem
Aninvisibleborderdividesthosearguingforcomputersintheclassroomonthebehalfofstudents’careerprospectsandthosea
Realpolicemen,bothBritainandtheUnitedStates,hardlyrecognizeanyresemblancebetweentheirlivesandwhattheyseeonTV
Inaperfectlyfreeandopenmarketeconomy,thetypeofemployer—governmentorprivate--shouldhavelittleornoimpactonthe
ThechangesingloballyaveragedtemperaturethathaveoccurredattheEarth’ssurfaceoverthepastcenturyaresimilarinsize
Everysuccessfulpersonhasonethingincommon.Ifyouaskedhowtheywereabletoreachtheircareergoals,theanswerwouldu
随机试题
行政管理过程研究主要起源于【】
A.龙胆泻肝汤合涤痰汤加减B.逍遥散合顺气导痰汤加减C.生铁落饮加减D.定痫丸加减E.涤痰汤加减治疗痫证痰火扰神证首选方为
A.自体移植B.同种同基因移植C.同种异基因移植D.异种移植E.骨髓移植异卵双生子之间移植称
使用约束带时应重点观察:
当工程实际进度偏差影响到总工期而需要调整进度计划时,可采用()等方法改变某些工作的逻辑关系。
下列关于资本金制度的表述,不正确的是( )。
某市场监督管理局对甲企业作出责令停产停业的处罚,甲企业欲申请国家赔偿,下列不属于赔偿范围的是()。
设A,B为两个随机事件,其中0
Scatteredaroundtheglobearemorethan100smallregionsofisolatedvolcanicactivityknowntogeologistsashotspots.Unlik
下列关于栈的描述中错误的是
最新回复
(
0
)