There's too much to read.
Of course I've known that all along at a certain level, but that was a level much below more relevant levels: the level of reading the individual course syllabus, of plowing through the single, "classic" Chinese text. Prof. Waltner's year-long special projects seminar was my first glimpse of the gaping caverns that open up on the road ahead, of projects that require me to somehow master multiple categories of secondary literature and an indeterminate (that's the scariest part, of course) amount of Chinese-language literature.
How does anyone do it, ever?
Current Reading:
Tony Buzan, with Barry Buzan, The Mind Map Book, 1990. Thumbs...used to be up, but now mostly down. One the one hand, Buzan points out that conventional outlines don't always allow the student to think freely, expressively, or imagistically. But on the other hand, he's basically the Ronco-salesman of intellectual work. Just check out his website: buzanworld.com: it's mostly advertising and testimonials from an unholy alliance of corporate America and the British public, and a rather cheesy product called "iMindMap."
Mortimer Jerome Adler, with Charles van Doren, How to Read a Book, 1974 (2nd ed.) Thumbs used to be down on this one, but now way up again. Adler's advice on how to read at the elementary, inspectional, analytic and -- most important for the graduate student -- the syntopical levels is absolutely crucial to how I see reading today. But more than that, consider the historical situation. If Buzan represents the inherent dishonesty of corporate marketing, then Adler's reading techniques reflect in microcosm his hearteningly positivist, American belief in the power of education. How to Read a Book's biggest limitation may be that it believes there is no book that can't be understood, no set of issues that can't be arranged into a straightforward analytical narrative -- ultimately, that learning and contemplation can solve everything. But honey, if that's wrong, I don't wanna be right.
Of course I've known that all along at a certain level, but that was a level much below more relevant levels: the level of reading the individual course syllabus, of plowing through the single, "classic" Chinese text. Prof. Waltner's year-long special projects seminar was my first glimpse of the gaping caverns that open up on the road ahead, of projects that require me to somehow master multiple categories of secondary literature and an indeterminate (that's the scariest part, of course) amount of Chinese-language literature.
How does anyone do it, ever?
Current Reading:
Tony Buzan, with Barry Buzan, The Mind Map Book, 1990. Thumbs...used to be up, but now mostly down. One the one hand, Buzan points out that conventional outlines don't always allow the student to think freely, expressively, or imagistically. But on the other hand, he's basically the Ronco-salesman of intellectual work. Just check out his website: buzanworld.com: it's mostly advertising and testimonials from an unholy alliance of corporate America and the British public, and a rather cheesy product called "iMindMap."
Mortimer Jerome Adler, with Charles van Doren, How to Read a Book, 1974 (2nd ed.) Thumbs used to be down on this one, but now way up again. Adler's advice on how to read at the elementary, inspectional, analytic and -- most important for the graduate student -- the syntopical levels is absolutely crucial to how I see reading today. But more than that, consider the historical situation. If Buzan represents the inherent dishonesty of corporate marketing, then Adler's reading techniques reflect in microcosm his hearteningly positivist, American belief in the power of education. How to Read a Book's biggest limitation may be that it believes there is no book that can't be understood, no set of issues that can't be arranged into a straightforward analytical narrative -- ultimately, that learning and contemplation can solve everything. But honey, if that's wrong, I don't wanna be right.
