Download or read book Wendell Berry and Higher Education written by Jack R. Baker and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2017-06-13 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why the university should focus on community: “An enlightening interpretation of Wendell Berry’s philosophy for the pursuit of a holistic higher education.” —Publishers Weekly Prominent author and cultural critic Wendell Berry is well known for his contributions to agrarianism and environmentalism, but his commentary on education has received comparatively little attention. Yet Berry has been eloquently unmasking America’s cultural obsession with restless mobility for decades, arguing that it causes damage to both the land and the character of our communities. The education system, he maintains, plays a central role in this obsession, inculcating in students’ minds the American dream of moving up and moving on. Drawing on Berry’s essays, fiction, and poetry, Jack R. Baker and Jeffrey Bilbro illuminate the influential thinker’s vision for higher education in this path-breaking study. Each chapter begins with an examination of one of Berry’s fictional narratives and then goes on to consider how the passage inspires new ways of thinking about the university’s mission. Throughout, Baker and Bilbro argue that instead of training students to live in their careers, universities should educate students to inhabit and serve their places. The authors also offer practical suggestions for how students, teachers, and administrators might begin implementing these ideas. Baker and Bilbro conclude that institutions guided by Berry’s vision might cultivate citizens who can begin the work of healing their communities—graduates who have been educated for responsible membership in a family, a community, or a polity.
Download or read book Wendell Berry and Higher Education written by Jack R. Baker and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2017-06-13 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Prominent author and cultural critic Wendell Berry is well known for his contributions to agrarianism and environmentalism, but his commentary on education has received comparatively little attention. Berry has been eloquently unmasking America's cultural obsession with restless mobility for decades, arguing that it causes damage to both the land and the character of our communities. Education, he maintains, plays a central role in this obsession, inculcating in students' minds the American dream of moving up and moving on. Drawing on Berry's essays, fiction, and poetry, Jack R. Baker and Jeffrey Bilbro illuminate the influential thinker's vision for higher education in this pathbreaking study. Each chapter begins with an examination of one of Berry's fictional narratives and then goes on to consider how the passage inspires new ways of thinking about the university's mission. Throughout, Baker and Bilbro argue that instead of training students to live in their careers, universities should educate students to inhabit and serve their places. The authors also offer practical suggestions for how students, teachers, and administrators might begin implementing these ideas. Baker and Bilbro conclude that institutions guided by Berry's vision might cultivate citizens who can begin the work of healing their communities—graduates who have been educated for responsible membership in a family, a community, or a polity.
Download or read book Virtues of Renewal written by Jeffrey Bilbro and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2018-12-14 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over fifty years, Wendell Berry has argued that our most pressing ecological and cultural need is a renewed formal intelligence -- a mode of thinking and acting that fosters the health of the earth and its beings. Yet the present industrial economy prioritizes a technical, self-centered way of relating to the world that often demands and rewards busyness over thoughtful observation, independence over relationships, and replacing over repairing. Such a system is both unsustainable and results in destructive, far-reaching consequences for our society and land. In Virtues of Renewal: Wendell Berry's Sustainable Forms, Jeffrey Bilbro combines textual analysis and cultural criticism to explain how Berry's literary forms encourage readers to practice virtues of renewal. While the written word alone cannot enact change, Bilbro asserts that Berry's poetry, essays, and fiction can inspire people to, as Berry writes, "practice resurrection." Bilbro examines the distinct, yet symbiotic, features of these three genres, demonstrating the importance of the humanities in supporting tenable economies. He uses Berry's pieces to suggest the need for more robust language for discussing conservation, ecology, and the natural -- and regenerative -- process of death. Bilbro additionally translates Berry's literature to a wider audience, putting him in conversation with philosophers and theologians such as Ivan Illich, Willie Jennings, Charles Taylor, and Augustine. The lessons that Berry and his work have to offer are not only for those interested in cultivating the land, but also for those who cultivate their communities and live mindfully. In short, these lessons are pertinent to all who are willing to make an effort to live the examined life. Such formative work is not dramatic or quick, but it can foster the deep and lasting transformation necessary to develop a more sustainable culture and economy.
Download or read book The Long Legged House written by Wendell Berry and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2012-04-12 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1969 and out of print for more than twenty–five years, The Long–Legged House was Wendell Berry's first collection of essays, the inaugural work introducing many of the central issues that have occupied him over the course of his career. Three essays at the heart of this volume―“The Rise,” “The Long–Legged House,” and “A Native Hill”―are essays of homecoming and memoir, as the writer finds his home place, his native ground, his place on earth. As he later wrote, “What I stand for is what I stand on,” and here we see him beginning the acts of rediscovery and resettling.
Download or read book The Hidden Wound written by Wendell Berry and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2010-04-28 with total page 91 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An impassioned, thoughtful, and fearless essay on the effects of racism on the American identity by one of our country’s most humane literary voices. Acclaimed as “one of the most humane, honest, liberating works of our time” (The Village Voice), The Hidden Wound is a book-length essay about racism and the damage it has done to the identity of our country. Through Berry’s personal experience, he explains how remaining passive in the face of the struggle of racism further corrodes America’s great potential. In a quiet and observant manner, Berry opens up about how his attempt to discuss racism is rooted in the hope that someday the historical wound will begin to heal. Pulitzer prize-winning author Larry McMurtry calls this “a profound, passionate, crucial piece of writing . . . Few readers, and I think, no writers will be able to read it without a small pulse of triumph at the temples: the strange, almost communal sense of triumph one feels when someone has written truly well . . . The statement it makes is intricate and beautiful, sad but strong.” “Mr. Berry is a sophisticated, philosophical poet in the line descending from Emerson and Thoreau." ―The Baltimore Sun "[Berry’s poems] shine with the gentle wisdom of a craftsman who has thought deeply about the paradoxical strangeness and wonder of life." ―The Christian Science Monitor "Wendell Berry is one of those rare individuals who speaks to us always of responsibility, of the individual cultivation of an active and aware participation in the arts of life." ―The Bloomsbury Review “[Berry’s] poems, novels and essays . . . are probably the most sustained contemporary articulation of America’s agrarian, Jeffersonian ideal.” ―Publishers Weekly
Download or read book What Are People For written by Wendell Berry and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2010-06-10 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ranging from America’s insatiable consumerism and household economies to literary subjects and America’s attitude toward waste, here Berry gracefully navigates from one topic to the next. He speaks candidly about the ills plaguing America and the growing gap between people and the land. Despite the somber nature of these essays, Berry’s voice and prose provide an underlying sense of faith and hope. He frames his reflections with poetic responsibility, standing up as a firm believer in the power of the human race not only to fix its past mistakes but to build a future that will provide a better life for all.
Download or read book Hannah Coulter written by Wendell Berry and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2005-09-30 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hannah Coulter is Wendell Berry’s seventh novel and his first to employ the voice of a woman character in its telling. Hannah, the now–elderly narrator, recounts the love she has for the land and for her community. She remembers each of her two husbands, and all places and community connections threatened by twentieth–century technologies. At risk is the whole culture of family farming, hope redeemed when her wayward and once lost grandson, Virgil, returns to his rural home place to work the farm.
Download or read book The Heart of Higher Education written by Parker J. Palmer and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2010-07-26 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A call to advance integrative teaching and learning in higher education. From Parker Palmer, best-selling author of The Courage to Teach, and Arthur Zajonc, professor of physics at Amherst College and director of the academic program of the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society, comes this call to revisit the roots and reclaim the vision of higher education. The Heart of Higher Education proposes an approach to teaching and learning that honors the whole human being—mind, heart, and spirit—an essential integration if we hope to address the complex issues of our time. The book offers a rich interplay of analysis, theory, and proposals for action from two educators and writers who have contributed to developing the field of integrative education over the past few decades. Presents Parker Palmer’s powerful response to critics of holistic learning and Arthur Zajonc’s elucidation of the relationship between science, the humanities, and the contemplative traditions Explores ways to take steps toward making colleges and universities places that awaken the deepest potential in students, faculty, and staff Offers a practical approach to fostering renewal in higher education through collegiality and conversation The Heart of Higher Education is for all who are new to the field of holistic education, all who want to deepen their understanding of its challenges, and all who want to practice and promote this vital approach to teaching and learning on their campuses.
Download or read book It All Turns on Affection written by Wendell Berry and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2012-09-01 with total page 78 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An impassioned and rigorous appeal for reconnection to the land and human feeling by one of America’s most heartfelt and humble writers. When he accepted the invitation to deliver The Jefferson Lecture—our nation’s highest honor for distinguished intellectual achievement—Wendell Berry decided to take on the obligation of thinking again about the problems that have engaged him throughout his long career. He wanted a fresh start, not only in looking at the groundwork of the problems facing our nation and the earth itself, but in gaining hope from some examples of repair and healing even in these times of Late Capitalism and its destructive contagions. As a poet and writer he understood already that much can be gleaned from looking at the vocabulary of these problems themselves and how we describe them. And he settled on “affection” as a method of engagement and solution. The result is the greatest speech he has delivered in his six decades of public life. It All Turns on Affection will take its place alongside The Unsettling of America and The Gift of Good Land as major testaments to the power and clarity of his contribution to American thought. Also included are a small handful of other recent essays and a wonderful conversation between Mr. Berry, his wife Tanya Berry, and the head of the National Endowment of the Humanities Jim Leech, which took place just after the award was announced. The result offers a wonderful continuation of the long conversation Berry has had with his readers over many years and as well as a fine introduction to his life and work. “These powerful, challenging essays show why Berry’s vision of a sustainable, human–scaled society has proven so influential.” —Publishers Weekly “Wendell Berry is one of those rare individuals who speaks to us always of responsibility, of the individual cultivation of an active and aware participation in the arts of life.” —The Bloomsbury Review
Download or read book Telling the Stories Right written by Jack R. Baker and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2018-03-26 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wendell Berry thinks of himself as a storyteller. It’s somewhat ironic then that he is better known as an essayist, a poet, and an advocate for small farmers. The essays in this collection consider the many facets of Berry’s life and work, but they focus on his efforts as a novelist and story writer. Indeed, Berry had already published three novels before his seminal work of cultural criticism, The Unsettling of America, established him as an ardent defender of local communities and sustainable agriculture. And over the past fifty years, he has published eight novels and more than forty-eight short stories set in the imagined community of Port William. His exquisite rendering of this small Kentucky town challenges us to see the beauty of our own places and communities and to tend their health, threatened though it inevitably is. The twelve contributors to this collection approach Berry’s fiction from a variety of perspectives—literary studies, journalism, theology, history, songwriting—to shed light on its remarkable ability to make a good life imaginable and compelling. The first collection devoted to Berry’s fiction, this volume insists that any consideration of Berry’s work must begin with his stories. Contributors: Ingrid Anna Pierce Kiara Anne Jorgenson Doug Sikkema Ethan Bruce Mannon Fritz Oehlschlaeger Michael R Stevens Eric Miller Grace Marie Olmstead Jake Meador Andrew Peterson
Download or read book The Unsettling of America written by Wendell Berry and published by Turtleback Books. This book was released on 1996-03-01 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A critical inquiry into the ways Americans have exploited and continue to exploit the land that sustains them, tracing attitudes toward and methods of farming from the eighteenth century to the present
Download or read book Higher Learning written by Derek Curtis Bok and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 1986 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bok concludes that the competition for the best students, the most advanced scholarship, the most successful scientific research, the best facilities--has helped to produce venturesome, adaptable, and varied universities. But because the process of learning itself is imperfectly understood, it is difficult to achieve sustained progress in the quality of education or even to determine which educational innovations actually enhance learning.
Download or read book Fields of Learning written by Laura Sayre and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2011-07-01 with total page 447 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Essays from staff on 15 farms . . . illustrate the trials, tribulations and sheer joys of establishing and maintaining such enterprises.” —USA Today Originally published in 2011, Fields of Learning remains the single best resource for students, faculty, and administrators involved in starting or supporting campus farms. Featuring detailed profiles of fifteen diverse student farms on college and university campuses across North America, the book also serves as a history of the student farm movement, showing how the idea of campus farms has come in and out of fashion over the past century and how the tenacious work of students, faculty, and other campus community members has upheld and reimagined the objectives of student farming over time. Ranging in size from less than an acre to hundreds of acres, supplying food to campus dining halls or community food banks, and hosting scientific research projects or youth education programs, student farms highlight the interdisciplinary richness and multifunctionality of agriculture, supporting academic work across a range of fields while simultaneously building community engagement and stimulating critical conversations about environmental and social justice. As institutions of higher learning face new challenges linked to the global climate crisis and public health emergency, this book holds continued relevance for readers in North America and beyond. “A timely and hopeful book.” —Jason Peters, editor of Wendell Berry: Life and Work “The opportunity for students to spend time learning on campus farms is not just a good idea—it should be mandatory.” —Gary Hirshberg, President & CEO, Stonyfield Farm “An excellent book, useful for anyone interested in the past, or the future, of the student farm movement.” —Journal of Agricultural & Food Information
Download or read book Markets Minds and Money written by Miguel Urquiola and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2020-04-14 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A colorful history of US research universities, and a market-based theory of their global success. American education has its share of problems, but it excels in at least one area: university-based research. That’s why American universities have produced more Nobel Prize winners than those of the next twenty-nine countries combined. Economist Miguel Urquiola argues that the principal source of this triumph is a free-market approach to higher education. Until the late nineteenth century, research at American universities was largely an afterthought, suffering for the same reason that it now prospers: the free market permits institutional self-rule. Most universities exploited that flexibility to provide what well-heeled families and church benefactors wanted. They taught denominationally appropriate materials and produced the next generation of regional elites, no matter the students’—or their instructors’—competence. These schools were nothing like the German universities that led the world in research and advanced training. The American system only began to shift when certain universities, free to change their business model, realized there was demand in the industrial economy for students who were taught by experts and sorted by talent rather than breeding. Cornell and Johns Hopkins led the way, followed by Harvard, Columbia, and a few dozen others that remain centers of research. By the 1920s the United States was well on its way to producing the best university research. Free markets are not the solution for all educational problems. Urquiola explains why they are less successful at the primary and secondary level, areas in which the United States often lags. But the entrepreneurial spirit has certainly been the key to American leadership in the research sector that is so crucial to economic success.
Download or read book Sex Economy Freedom Community written by Wendell Berry and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2018-12-04 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ""Read [him] with pencil in hand, make notes, and hope that somehow our country and the world will soon come to see the truth that is told here."" —The New York Times Book Review In this collection of essays, first published in 1993, Wendell Berry continues his work as one of America's most necessary social commentators. With wisdom and clear, ringing prose, he tackles head–on some of the most difficult problems confronting us near the end of the twentieth century—problems we still face today. Berry elucidates connections between sexual brutality and economic brutality, and the role of art and free speech. He forcefully addresses America's unabashed pursuit of self–liberation, which he says is ""still the strongest force now operating in our society."" As individuals turn away from their community, they conform to a ""rootless and placeless monoculture of commercial expectations and products,"" buying into the very economic system that is destroying the earth, our communities, and all they represent.
Download or read book A Continuous Harmony written by Wendell Berry and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2012-04-12 with total page 119 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book is broad and leisurely and important. Something like the river itself on which Wendell Berry lives. It is full of wide and flowing thoughts and one thing leads to another in the manner that nature intended―or used to. The language ranges from the grave and beautiful to the sharp and specific, depending on the need to express the vast variety of subjects he presents."—The Nation The title of this book is taken from an account by Thomas F. Hornbein on his travels in the Himalayas. ""It seemed to me,"" Horenbein wrote, ""that here man lived in continuous harmony with the land, as much as briefly a part of it as all its other occupants."" Wendell Berry's second collection of essays, A Continuous Harmony was first published in 1972, and includes the seminal ""Think Little,"" which was printed in The Last Whole Earth Catalogue and reprinted around the globe, and the splendid centerpiece, ""Discipline and Hope,"" an insightful and articulate essay making a case for what he calls ""a new middle."
Download or read book Unmaking the Public University written by Christopher Newfield and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2011-04-30 with total page 406 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An essential American dream—equal access to higher education—was becoming a reality with the GI Bill and civil rights movements after World War II. But this vital American promise has been broken. Christopher Newfield argues that the financial and political crises of public universities are not the result of economic downturns or of ultimately valuable restructuring, but of a conservative campaign to end public education’s democratizing influence on American society. Unmaking the Public University is the story of how conservatives have maligned and restructured public universities, deceiving the public to serve their own ends. It is a deep and revealing analysis that is long overdue. Newfield carefully describes how this campaign operated, using extensive research into public university archives. He launches the story with the expansive vision of an equitable and creative America that emerged from the post-war boom in college access, and traces the gradual emergence of the anti-egalitarian “corporate university,” practices that ranged from racial policies to research budgeting. Newfield shows that the culture wars have actually been an economic war that a conservative coalition in business, government, and academia have waged on that economically necessary but often independent group, the college-educated middle class. Newfield’s research exposes the crucial fact that the culture wars have functioned as a kind of neutron bomb, one that pulverizes the social and culture claims of college grads while leaving their technical expertise untouched. Unmaking the Public University incisively sets the record straight, describing a forty-year economic war waged on the college-educated public, and awakening us to a vision of social development shared by scientists and humanists alike.
