It's difficult to get a job and people stay in school longer because they're employed as teaching assistants or instructors by their schools, by their schools where they're graduate students, and that does become exploitative eventually because they're very cheap… — Louis Menand Copy Share Image
“For Peirce, inquiry is always communal—it is the median of many observations that gives the position of the star—and the last analysis really is… — Louis Menand Copy Share
If time is a staircase, reality is a Slinky. Decades can be parsed. Television, frequently accused of destabilizing life, is actually what stitches the… — Louis Menand Copy Share
Basically what you want in any profession - I would say the same thing if I were a lawyer or a doctor - is… — Louis Menand Copy Share
“In modern societies, the reproduction of custom is no longer understood to be one of the chief purposes of existence, and the ends of… — Louis Menand Copy Share
One of the functions of literary criticism, or reviewing, generally - and I, most of my reviews actually are not about literature - but… — Louis Menand Copy Share
You have to have students wanting to take the courses, otherwise you're not going, they're not going to be very effective. — Louis Menand Copy Share
“We do not (on Holmes’s reasoning) permit the free expression of ideas because some individual may have the right one. No individual alone can… — Louis Menand Copy Share
Literature is being taught as though it were only political medicine or political poison-a view that is not only illiberal but illiterate. — Louis Menand Copy Share
“[According to Holmes], ‘Every year if not every day we have to wager our salvation upon some prophecy based upon imperfect knowledge. While that… — Louis Menand Copy Share
It's difficult to get a job and people stay in school longer because they're employed as teaching assistants or instructors by their schools, by… — Louis Menand Copy Share
Just in higher education alone, more people go to college now, by enormous amounts, than went to college in the '50's and '60's. So… — Louis Menand Copy Share
Obviously input is helpful to faculty in trying to come up with a curriculum, but ultimately it's the faculty's job to know what students… — Louis Menand Copy Share
Universities are set up to get people to work together by having them disagree with each other. — Louis Menand Copy Share
“What [Peirce] meant was that since nature evolves by chance variation, then the laws of nature must evolve by chance variation as well. Variations… — Louis Menand Copy Share
Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the ark; professionals built the Titanic. Never, btw, ask that androgynous paper clip anything.… — Louis Menand Copy Share
