ON JESUIT HIGHER EDUCATION

Fall 2006 • Number 30 Is ‘Reading at Risk’ in Jesuit Universities? TAKING A LOOK AT OUR LIBRARIES Forum • Talking Back • Student Essays • Reviews FALL 2006 NUMBER 30

Members of the National Seminar on Jesuit Higher Education ON JESUIT HIGHER EDUCATION Sara van den Berg Saint Louis University Joseph J. Feeney, S.J. Saint Joseph’s University Features Laurie M. Joyner Loyola University New Orleans 2 Facing the Reading Crisis: An Interview with Dana Gioia, Stephen R. Kuder, S.J. Raymond A. Schroth, S.J. Gonzaga University Cheryl C. Munday 6 UnReading America? Dean Rader University of Detroit-Mercy John J. O’Callaghan, S.J. 10 Facing the Book Gap, JoAnne Young and Betty Porter Stritch School of Medicine Loyola University 13 Reflections of an Alumnus Author, Jim Dwyer Raymond A. Schroth, S.J. Saint Peter’s College 14 Common Reading and the First Year Experience, Wilburn T. Stancil Rockhurst University Mary McCay and Melanie McKay Timothy H. Wadkins Canisius College Anne Walsh, R.S.H.M. Fordham University 18 Student Essays Charles T. Phipps, S.J. Santa Clara University Reading is a Committed Act, Cristina Baldor Conversations is published by the National Seminar on Jesuit Higher A Nation of Readers? Justin Goldman Education, which is jointly spon- sored by the Jesuit Conference Reading is a Chore, John Matthews Board and the Board of the Association of Jesuit Colleges and The Private Voyage, Ray Dademo Universities. The opinions stated herein are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the JC or the AJCU. Libraries Comments and inquiries may be addressed to the editor of 22 Building Together on our Strengths, Janice Simmons-Welburn Conversations Raymond A. Schroth, S.J. 23 The Robot’s Grip, Ronald Danielson Saint Peter’s College 2641 Kennedy Boulevard 25 Don’t Touch, Cory Wade Jersey City, New Jersey 07306 Phone: 201-432-8083 Fax: 201-432-7497 26 The Campus Bookstore, A Live-Action Tour, Steven Elwell e-mail: [email protected]

For information about subscriptions to Conversations: Charles T. Phipps, S.J. Secretary to the National Seminar 27 FORUM: What Shall We Read? on Jesuit Higher Education Santa Clara University Edwin Dickens, Eileen Z. Cohen, Dean Brackley, S.J., 500 El Camino Real Santa Clara, CA 95053-1600 Astrid O’Brien, Eloise A. Buker, William Neenan, S.J., Phone: 408-554-4124 Fax: 408-554-4795 Faith J. Childress, Alice V. Clark, John Coleman, S.J., e-mail: [email protected] Eric Gansworth, Tim Healy Conversations back issues are available online at www.ajcunet.edu

We would like to thank the Rev. Joseph R. Hacala, S.J., President of Wheeling University for providing Talking Back us with the cover shot, an untitled painting of a boy sitting with a 37 Feminist Theology and Education People for Others, Tim Wadkins book at a table, which is displayed in the Hodges Library at Wheeling 40 Gender Matters, Laurie M. Joyner Jesuit University.

Design and layout by Pauline Heaney. 43 Book Reviews: Mark Mossa, S.J., Ronald Modras Printed by Peacock Communications, Fairfield, N.J. From the Editor

Reading, Risk, and Freedom

n his classic article in Thought (1955), “American volunteerism, philanthropy and political engagement. Catholics and the Intellectual Life,” John Tracy Ellis Jesuit education, especially in America, has trained Iquotes a letter from the 15-year-old John LaFarge, the men and women for citizenship. They will not become 19th century painter and stained glass artist and father of “men and women for others” if they do not read. John LaFarge, S.J., the interracial pioneer. Away at school, Among the report’s key findings: the decline in lit- the boy asks his father to send him some books — erary reading (fiction and poetry) parallels a decline in specifically the works of Herodotus, Plautus, Catullus, total book reading; the decline has accelerated; women Theocritus, Dryden, Goldsmith, Michelet, Moliere, read more literature than men, only one third of men Corneille, and Victor Hugo. Monsignor Ellis regrets that read literature; the decline includes all groups, but the the modern Catholic family has not sustained that read- situation is worse among African Americans and ing tradition. Hispanics; the decline correlates with increased use of In 1935 a young, would-be writer asked Ernest the electronic media. In 1999 the average household had Hemingway what books should a writer have to read? 2.9 TV sets, 1.8 VCRs, 2.1 CD players, 1.4 video game Hemingway replies, “He should have read everything players, and 1 computer. We can imagine more today. so he knows what he has to beat.” A few more interesting facts: about one in six liter- Pressed, Hemingway names about 30, including ary readers (17 percent) read 12 or more books a year; War and Peace, Anna Karenina, Madame Bovary, The literary reading is most popular in the West and least in Brothers Karamazov, The Dubliners, Portrait of the the South; about one in 14 people (7 percent) said that Artist as a Young Man, Ulysses, The Turn of the Screw, they wrote creative works during the survey year. Huckleberry Finn and all of Turgenev. The articles that follow, we hope, do several We chose to build this issue around the NEA 2004 things: allow NEA director Dana Gioia to speak direct- report because our experience as teachers and our dis- ly to us; submit the NEA report to critical analysis; cussions with faculty and students in our three annual describe what libraries, English departments and spe- campus visits have convinced us that the problem is cial programs are doing in Jesuit Colleges and univer- real and that we in particular should respond because sities to respond; let students tell us why they do or reading is so central to Jesuit liberal arts education. don’t read; guide us through a familiar campus book- Also, for many of us who teach literature, history, the- store; in the forum, invite our own faculty to step into ology and philosophy, a book is a moral force — a the contemporary shoes of LaFarge and Hemingway; door into the human heart, a prod to the reader’s con- and finally invite a Pulitzer Prize-winning alumnus of science faced daily with decisions to tell the truth or two Jesuit institutions to relate his reading to his work. deceive, take responsibility or flee, to love or to betray. Let me close with a story from Doris Kearns Recently New York Times columnist David Brooks, Goodwin’s Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of referring to the National Endowment for the Arts study, Abraham Lincoln. When the eloquent former slave and Reading at Risk, points out that the percentage of young abolitionist Frederick Douglas was still in captivity his men who read has plummeted over the past 14 years. second master’s kindly wife taught him to read. When The answer, he suggests, is to assign boys more “manly” the master discovered this he ordered the instruction authors, like Hemingway, Homer, Tolstoy, and Twain. stopped. It would be unsafe to teach a slave to read he Times readers answered that Brooks is stuck with “gen- said, because it would make him discontent and der myths” and that when boys are old enough to read unhappy, forever unfit to be a slave. In a sense, he was an adult book they are already addicted to video games. right. Douglas said that “learning to read had been a With this in mind, the two most significant findings curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of of the NEA survey, based on a sample of 17,000 adults, my wretched condition, without the remedy.” It was six are: for the first time in modern history, less that half of years before he would be free. Meanwhile he secretly the adult population now reads literature; and since learned to write. n readers play a more active part in their communities, their loss diminishes civic and cultural life — including RAS sj

Conversations 1 Facing the Reading Crisis

FACING THE READING CRISIS Will American Catholics Take the Lead?

An Interview with Dana Gioia National Endowment for the Arts

Raymond A. Schroth, S.J.

Introduction. Three things led Conversations to Harvard. He gave up the vice presidency of General Dana Gioia, chairman of the National Endowment Foods to become a full-time poet, published poems for the Arts, as we prepared this issue on what is in the New Yorker and the Hudson Review, and a often termed the “crisis” in reading in American much talked-about article in the Atlantic in 1991, education. First, the report itself, Reading at Risk: A “Can Poetry Matter?” in which he charged that Survey of Literary Reading in America (2004), with American poetry was controlled by a coterie and its findings that less than half of the adult American failed to speak to the public. population now reads literature and also that there is a correlation between reading literature and one’s At the 2000 Pew conference he said, that, “The active involvement in volunteer and charity work, as U. S. Church has never quite known what to do with well as various art events, in one’s community. the human hunger for beauty,” but that the “arts Second, articles in the New York Times (September have always been a vital part of the Catholic identi- 7, 2004) and Commonweal magazine (November ty and that Beethoven and Mozart, Michelangelo 21, 2003) depicting Mr. Gioia as someone who, and El Greco, Dante and Saint John of the Cross, though not a Jesuit student, embodied ideas which Bernanos and Mauriac, the anonymous architects of Jesuit colleges and universities strive to communi- Chartres and Notre Dame, have awakened more cate. Born on Christmas eve in 1950, in Hawthorne, souls to the divine than all the papal encyclicals.” California, of a Sicilian cabdriver father and a Mexican and Native American mother, he had 12 We recorded this conversation in March. years of Catholic education in grammar school and a Marianist boys’ high. Then to Stanford and RAS sj

2 Conversations Ray Schroth: What has been the response to your reading report?

Dana Gioia: The response to our Reading At Risk report was overwhelming. We had over 1,000 arti- cles here right away commenting on it, and the report is cited virtually every day by someone in the United States or abroad. So I think that the report has been successful in alerting the nation to the enormity of the problem with readers. It has also been successful in stirring up interest among many parties in how we might solve the issue.

RS: Any particularly brilliant programs that have been suggested?

DG: We are right now in the process of creating the largest literary reading program in American history. The program will be called The Big Read. It takes a grass roots idea, the notion that a community gathers together to read a single book, and it develops that idea into a multi-media campaign that no single com- munity could afford to execute alone. So we are devel- oping programming and materials for classic American books and providing them to communities across the nation. It will involve television, radio and print pro- gramming that will reach everyone in the community Dana Gioia from viewers at home, to school kids, from people shopping in bookstores to the patrons of libraries. The books we are using right now are, Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, Harper Lee’s To Kill A RS: How will this affect colleges? Mockingbird, F.Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, and Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching DG: We would love to have colleges participate, but God. We picked Bradbury and Lee because they are what we are focusing on is all members of a com- the most widely used books in these grass roots pro- munity from basically adolescence through to senior grams. Then we added Fitzgerald and Hurston to citizens, and so it includes academic institutions but offer two widely acceptable American classics. We does not focus on them single-mindedly. We are, for will add books like My Antonia, Grapes of Wrath, A example, putting together special materials, CDs, Farewell to Arms and Joy Luck Club and we are also posters, websites, teaching material just for high creating a panel of distinguished Americans that school teachers, but we are also going to provide range from literature to public life to help us chose them to libraries and bookstores and things like that. the next sets of books. We try to do everything as much as possible at the NEA by creating outside RS: Now who will pick the books? panels of experts to make the decisions on our grants so that we can free up the political system. DG: Eventually the communities will choose their own books, but what we are doing right now is RS: This next question may stretch you a little. I developing some material, and the communities will know you didn’t go to a Jesuit university. You’re choose from the books that we are offering. We deprived I guess! hope every month to add materials for new books. With our first books, we are just testing this now in DG: But I had 12 years of Catholic education. I gave ten cities. Let me tell you the four titles and why we the Jesuits my oldest son. He’s at Gonzaga High chose them. right now. It has been tremendous.

Conversations 3 Facing the Reading

RS: Great. When you consider the audience of read 35-40 books per semester was considered nor- this particular interview, which are mostly lay mal. I don’t know what it’s like now, but my sense faculty in Jesuit institutions, can you see a partic- is that it has dropped catastrophically. The kids ular response that these 28 colleges and univer- don’t read the books they are assigned. They are sities could make that would be special to us? being assigned less and I don’t know how one becomes educated in those fields unless one reads DG: Let me say this. Traditionally one of the glories and rereads. of the Catholic Church has been how well it under- stood culture. The greatest artists, composers and What we have to do, I think, is reconfirm two things writers of the age used their gifts to ad maiorum about reading. First the pleasure of reading and sec- dei gloriam, to the greater glory of God. I would ondly the spiritual necessity of reading. Reading love to see American Catholics take the lead in illus- awakens things inside us that make our lives more trating the necessary links between artistic and spir- vivid and active. One of the things we discovered, itual life, and The Big Read could be one of those and this is research you haven’t yet seen, is that ways. Jesuit institutions have also traditionally people who are readers are 100 percent, that’s three played a very important part in the cultural as well times more likely, to do volunteer or charity work. as the spiritual lives of the communities they serve, They are more likely to exercise. They are more and so it would be terrific if Jesuit institutions, not likely to take part in every aspect of civic life and to simply universities but high schools, participated in do all kinds of more positive individual social The Big Read. It would be a way of increasing the behaviors than non-readers. impact and broadening the reach of the program. RS: In your preface you describe reading as an One of the scariest things we discovered in our irreplaceable form of focused attention and study Reading At Risk was that the younger genera- contemplation that makes complex communi- tions of Americans are reading significantly less than cation and insights possible. Now, does that they used to. In the past 20 years the younger apply to reading online? Americans have gone from the people who read the most in society to people who read the least. DG: Well I don’t think so. We’ve talked to a number of experts. First of all I have nothing against the RS: Do you think that’s attributable at all in any internet, except when it stops people from reacting sense to their teachers and schooling? to one another in person.

DG: I think there is something not happening in RS: That’s true of all online courses. school. One of the scariest things is that we are pro- ducing a generation of college graduates that reads DG: Everything that we have learned at the NEA less than they used to. So to a degree that the Jesuit about how people read online indicates that they do universities could show leadership by becoming not read in a sustained linear way. They jump around involved in this program as parts of the communi- a lot. So the internet is a very powerful information ties they serve, I think that would have a tremen- tool. It is not a very powerful reading tool. dous symbolic as well as practical value. RS: What about this connection between read- RS: Let’s imagine that you are on a faculty and ing books and moral development? teaching an English class and it’s both fiction and non-fiction. How big a demand would you DG: It’s huge. I’ve always felt that the development make on your students? How many books of western democracy was inseparable from the would you have them read in a semester? rise of the book and especially the rise of the novel. The sustained daily meditation of other people’s DG: I don’t know. When I went to college, if it were lives from the inside, which is what a novel does, a humanities or social science course you were was one of the major contributing factors to insist- expected to read one book per class per week. I ing on a just society, because people saw the lives took mostly humanities and social science classes of unfortunate people from the inside and the dai- and maybe a language class on top of that, so to lyness of their existence. I do believe that every-

4 Conversations Dana Gioia, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. thing we have seen statistically indicates that read- DG: The third, let me think. We’ve chosen a book ing awakens something that enlarges and refines of theology and a novel, so the third would be a your humanity. couple of Shakespeare’s comedies, especially As You Like It and Much Ado About Nothing. So if you RS: If you had to pick three books — and not want to say Shakespeare’s comedies then that cov- necessarily American books like A Farewell To ers poetry and drama. You get the tragedy from Arms or To Kill A Mockingbird, and other than Dostoevsky and the comedy from Shakespeare. the Bible that everybody should have read by the time they get out of college — what books RS: Terrific. What are you reading now? would you recommend? DG: I’m reading Garry Wills’ book on Saint DG: Well one would probably be St. Augustine’s Augustine and I am rereading A Farewell To Arms City of God. That’s one of the most important books because we are using that for one of our programs. that I have every read in my own development. Another would be Dostoevsky’s The Brothers RS: It holds up. I’ve taught it about five times. n Karamazov.

RS: Thank God you said that. I was afraid no one would say Dostoevsky.

Conversations 5 UNREADING AMERICA?

Taking a hard look at the NEA report and asking what it really means.

By Dean Rader

e live in a complicated age in a contradic- of this issue of Conversations and the springboard for my tory country. Things are changing so rap- comments that follow. It’s true that students don’t seem to be idly and to such a degree, we often are reading as much as they did when you or I or were in col- not aware of exactly what we are losing or lege, and anecdotal evidence suggests a decline in Great what we are gaining. When a country’s Books program and literature majors over the last 40 years. valueW climate is as unstable at the United States’ seems to be So, what’s going on? Are we experiencing a reading reduc- at this point in history, people tend to hold on rather tightly tion? If so, is it related to academic programming? If our to practices and belief systems that provide security. Indeed, country is less literate, are the literati of the academic com- at times, we may even find ourselves becoming nostalgic for munity to blame? And, if that is the case, what, if anything, a mode of being that never even existed in the first place but can be done? Of course, the answers are layered and com- one that nonetheless makes us feel safe. plex and require more space than I have here, but I will try, For many educated Americans, reading has always been in the remainder of this piece, to unpack the NEA’s report in a form of security. The ability to read and the act of reading a way that allows me to address the interrelated issues of are fundamental tenets of responsible, ethical, learned living. reading, education, work, and culture. Literacy is the pathway not simply to knowledge but to the middle class. As a matter of fact, in the United States, read- The Intersection between “Literature” ing remains one of the few non-religious, non-romantic sacred acts. Walking into a library is like entering a church, and “Reading;” or Why This Report Is while, record stores, art museums and even movie theaters Not a Red Flag can be downright rowdy. In America, we value reading, and we remain impressed by readers. ’ll begin with some intentionally provocative asser- It is no surprise, then, that teachers, journalists, publish- tions. I believe that more literary reading is being ers, and educators flew into a panic at the 2004 report com- done now than in the last 40 years; I believe that missioned by the National Endowment for the Arts, entitled more reading in general is being done now than at Reading at Risk, which argues, rather passionately, that read- any time in history; and, most importantly, I believe ers in America have gone the way of the phonograph. thatI the NEA’s Reading at Risk is less about reading and According to the study, the percentage of Americans who more about economics. read literature plummeted from 61 percent in 1992 to 47 per- Before I go further, I want to say how much I appreci- cent in 2002. These numbers spooked the NEA—so much so, ate the NEA and how much I admire Dana Gioia — both do the report comes to the conclusion that reading will, remark- fabulous work. The NEA is one of the most valuable and one ably, cease altogether: “Indeed, at the current rate of loss, lit- erary reading as a leisure activity will virtually disappear in half a century.” Dean Rader is the academic dean at the University of The NEA’s study, and the apparent decline of literary San Francisco. reading in America and American academia, are the genesis

6 Conversations of the best-run government programs. I knew the NEA had the best intentions when commissioning the survey, and they truly care (and worry) about American reading habits; so my criticisms are not directed toward the NEA, simply at the anxious rhet- oric surrounding their survey. Let me underscore that I am, in many ways, pretty old school about reading. My graduate degrees are in comparative lit- erature, I assign a great deal of reading in my litera- ture and writing classes (even the whale-innard chapters of Moby Dick!), and I am convinced that there is no better educational foundation than a rig- orous writing and reading curriculum. So, I, too, worry when I hear that my fellow colleagues and country people are trading in Will Shakespeare for Will and Grace. But, is this really the case? A closer look reveals two reasons why the NEA report is no cause for alarm. First, the report only measures a certain kind of reading, and secondly, it doesn’t take into account all of the reading being done outside that supplied by the publishing industry. According to the NEA report, 76.2 million Americans managed not to read “literature” in 1992. Unhappily, their ranks grew to 89.9 million by 2002. This sounds truly dire. But if one looks at population growth, the number of readers actually increases by 11.4 million over ten years. This means that 11.4 mil- lion more American adults are reading writers like Toni Morrison, Phillip Roth, and Billy Collins in 2002 than in 1992. I concede that the percentage of read- ers of literature drops slightly, but the NEA suggests that the logical chain of events indicated by this sta- tistic is that the 18-24 year-olds currently reading lit- erature will just stop and that the younger genera- Students work together on a project at Bapst Library, Boston College. tions will quit reading literature altogether. I question this assumption. It is a classic hasty Gladwell is out. Michelle Reid yes; Michel Foucault generalization fallacy that I would scold any under- and Michel de Montaigne no. According to the NEA, graduate for employing. But, even more to the point, reading this very essay—in fact this entire issue devot- I also question the genres the NEA chooses to fore- ed to reading—won’t count as literary reading. ground in its survey. For example, the NEA narrowly The problem is that the NEA chicken littles a defines “literature” as poems, plays and narrative fic- decline in the reading of only three genres when tion. Newspapers, blogs, magazines, non-fiction they should be celebrating and facilitating all the essays, biographies, autobiographies, comics, self- reading already happening, most notably in non-fic- help books, business studies, textbooks, history, phi- tion. Even if we discount self-help books and pop losophy, social criticism, religious books, and cultural psychology, no one can deny the overwhelming cul- criticism do not count as “literature,” nor do they fig- tural and intellectual contributions of memoirs, biog- ure into the alarmist reaction about reading and liter- raphies, cultural studies, and histories. Literature is acy. That means that under the rubric of “literature,” overflowing the traditional generic levees, and the Joan Collins’ romance novels count but Joan Didion’s NEA seems just as ill equipped to assess that situa- memoirs do not. Thomas Pynchon is in; Malcolm tion as FEMA was in New Orleans.

Conversations 7 The Opportunity Cost of Reading; or Why This is all Really about Economics

ut, if so many people are reading poems, and as even the NEA report suggests, more books are being bought in the U.S. than ever before, then what accounts for the drop in the number of readers of lit- erature?B Well, on one hand, the NEA report may tell us more about the publishing industry than American readership. Are fewer people reading books, or are fewer people buying books? Interestingly, finances never really enter into the NEA’s report, which I find troublesome. If we look beyond the statistics and focus on the lives of real people, it’s obvious that the main reason people are not reading literature has less to do cultural forces and more to do with economic ones. Reading is and has always been a leisure activi- ty, mostly for the upper, the upper-middle, and the educated classes (and this is especially the case with literature). Just about every indicator—from an Economic Policy Institute study on wages to an Upjohn survey on moonlighting to a study by the Greater Boston Food Bank charting the dramatic Read-Aloud day. Fairfield University student, Marta Matselioukh, from increase in food stamps—reveals a shrinking middle Mahopac, New York reads to students in Mrs. Patricia Hassan’s class at class and an expanding lower class. The NEA report blames TV, video games and the Internet for a Bryant School Bridgeport. decline in literary reading, but in my mind, the real culprit is American economic policy. Fewer And then there is the Internet! Who can even Americans are reading literature not because they begin to estimate how much new reading happens are dumber or because of Beavis and Butthead but online? For example, my home pages are the New because more and more people are working longer York Times on my office computer and Slate on the hours for less money, and they don’t have the time one at my house. I try to read both every day, which or the energy to read a complex novel, nor do they was certainly not the case pre-Web; yet such reading believe that the effort it takes to read a novel is would fly under the radar of the NEA’s study. Even worth what little spare time they have. if we remain within the generic parameters of the How bad is it? A 2004 study by the Economic NEA report, there is no question that the Internet has Policy Institute shows that Americans are working provided unparalleled access to literature. According harder at their jobs and at a faster pace than any time to Tree Swenson of the Academy of American Poets, in history; yet wages have risen at the slowest pace the AAP website (http://poets.org) receives 650,000 in history, resulting in less free time and less dispos- hits per month. That means over 6 million visits—I’ll able income. According to statistics from the type that again: 6 million visits—to a poetry-only site International Labor Organization in 2002, Americans per year. And http://poets.org is a hard URL to con- were “putting in more hours than anyone else in the fuse with, say, http://porn.org, so you can be rea- industrialized world.” Other studies on labor trends sonably sure that people are not winding up there show that Americans have to work more hours not by accident. Similarly, a recent survey by the Poetry to get ahead but to keep afloat. These numbers may Foundation found that around 30 percent of their be great for productivity, but they are bad for read- respondents had either received or sent a poem by ing—especially the reading of literature. email. That is a dizzying number, and to me, these Even worse for reading are the changes involv- are encouraging statistics. ing women in the workforce. For decades, educated,

8 Conversations middle-class women have comprised the bulk of that forges connections between reading, enjoyment, American readers, so it’s no surprise that reading success, and society. trends have decreased as women’s work demands But what does this mean? have increased. Women are now working as many Part of me wants to write a call to arms, a mani- hours as men, and since 1970, the number of women festo that catalyzes people into action. That part wants working two jobs has exploded, fast outpacing their to type, “We have to take on the system. We have to male counterparts. According to the Bureau of Labor change the current political discourse, and we have to statistics, in 1970, 636,000 women worked two jobs; do what we can to mitigate the economic factors now that number is around 9,000,000. It’s hard to read inhibiting readership, because like it or not, econom- a play while you are in transit from one job to the next. ics and culture are connected. If economic forces are It’s hard to read a novel while you are making dinner working against us, then we have to make cultural for your kids. It’s hard to read a collection of poems forces work for us.” It’s the same part that wants to while you are cleaning your house, folding laundry, urge academics, writers, and scholars to turn their doing dishes, paying bills, taking your children to attention to the commons, to remind professors that baseball practice and dance class, all while maintain- we have the ability (and the responsibility) to shape ing a relationship with your spouse or partner, who is public perception through public articulation. That himself probably commuting from one job to the next. part of me wants to push the readers of this essay to The NEA report puzzles over where all of the readers start public literacy programs, participate in citywide are; well, according to these numbers, they are proba- reading projects, take your students into communities, bly at Starbuck’s serving lattes, after which they will be write op-ed pieces and start blogs. In short, the part at Target ringing up diapers. that was driven to write this essay in the first place Walt Whitman said that in order to have great wants you to change the world because it believes if poets you need great audiences. True, but to have anyone can, it’s you. great audiences you need an economic and cultural But the other part of me knows it is zealotry that climate that allows reading to happen, one that fosters got us here, and it is painfully aware that nothing is a reading populace. Reading literature is important for more arrogant than telling other smart people how you people who have the time and the learning to believe think they should change the world. That part believes that reading literature is important. John Milton writes an impassioned narrowness of vision has enabled the that “a good book is the precious life-blood of a mas- power discourse of the United States—the political and ter spirit; embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a social rhetoric of our government—to legitimize a cul- life beyond life,” but for a growing number of ture of stupidity. Such discourse makes reading and Americans, there is no time for a life beyond this life. reflection seem irrelevant while making mindless, soul- Getting through this one is taking everything they’ve crushing work feel democratic and dutiful. It is impos- got; thus the yawning reading gap. sible for me to lay out a plan to enable all of the over- worked, underpaid people in this country to find the The Worst are Full of Passionate time and the motivation to read, but it is possible for us to rethink the cultural and educational structures Intensity; or Why This Essay is that don’t really do anyone any good. and is not a Call to Arms Perhaps what is possible is to alter public percep- tion by reminding people that reading is a form of civic ow, perhaps this is where academics engagement and that walking into a library is walking and universities and even, say, English into a church of sorts—a place where people wor- and Classics departments can help. ship—and engage—lives and ideas. How amazing to Reading is our domain. We know liter- be able to marry action and understanding. Because of ature, and we spend our lives reading, the way intellectual work is often dissociated from Nwriting, writing about, thinking about, and ingesting public and political discourse, doing our jobs may texts. If anyone lives it, it is us. We have to be models seem in vain but, ultimately, it provides our students, for the reading life. When students look at us and see their children, and our neighbors with the tools to people who have made books a major aspect of their weather the turbulent issues I opened with—the rising lives, they have to see vitality. Sure, we could be waters of complexity and contradiction, for which the assigning more books, but we could also be better at most secure flotation device just may be the decision delivering and shaping a culture of reading, a culture to keep reading. n

Conversations 9 FACING THE BOOK GAP

Colleges across the country create programs to combat reading’s decline

By JoAnne Young and Betty Porter

arolyn Martin, Provost of Cornell University, Some are designed for the entire college, such as Indiana introduces Cornell’s new student reading pro- University South Bend’s One Book, One College program gram with a concern about the decline in read- (www.iusb.edu/~libg/onebook/). Others take a more modest ing, especially among traditional college—age approach and limit the common reading program to a depart- students. While they may still read, what they ment or special program e.g., University of Texas-San Antonio’s Cread has changed—contemporary communications tools Learning Communities (www.utsa.edu/lc/index.htm), and Santa promote brief, simplified communications, i.e., email, text Clara University Library’s ‘Book of the Quarter” program messaging and captions on a television screen. She points (www.scu.edu/library/info/news/boq/homepage.html). out that this kind of reading is quickly forgotten. What stu- A few programs that began as a summer common read- dents need is a return to the focused reading of literature that ing program have evolved to a more innovative experience, stimulates thinking and contributes to who we are and what such as Seattle University’s “Academic Salon.” (www.seat- we do (www.reading.cornell.edu/welcome.html). From a tleu.edu/academicsalons/index.htm). review of web sites of colleges and universities across the country, it appears that many academicians share Provost The rationales for this movement in a Martin’s concern. selection of schools offer similar Reading skills and experiences will themes not be lost if academic institutions can “The goal of the First Year Book Program (FYB) is to provide a shared intellectual experience for all new students help it! with the opportunity to discuss the book from a variety of Reading good literature as a means to forging a common disciplines…. The FYB program is also about community.” within the academic community is intrinsic to the academic (University of Maryland web site, www.firstyearbook. experience. Common reading programs are notable initia- umd.edu). “Kalamazoo’s Summer Common Reading Program tives at many Jesuit colleges and universities. Typically they helps entering students, in collaboration with faculty, staff require students to read, before arriving on campus, a book and Peer Leaders explore the world of ideas, the basis of our that exemplifies the values the institution wishes to advocate. academic life together.” (www.kzoo.edu/fye/). The books are chosen by a broad-based campus committee “…We are excited to offer you the opportunity to partic- and given or sold at cost to first year and transfer students, ipate in LSU’s first Student Reading Program, a program often as an integral component of a first year experience pro- designed to introduce you to the academic and intellectual gram. For an example of this as an orientation activity, see Marquette University’s Manresa Project (www.marquette.edu/ manresa/students/FirstYearReading.shtml); or, as a first semester JoAnne Young is associate vice president for library or year long program integrated with an initiative of another services, and Betty Porter is assistant library director of focus, check Cornell’s First Year Writing Seminars (www.cor- education services at Xavier University, Cincinnati. nell.edu/our/nsri).

10 Conversations culture of the University through a common reading experience… (www.app1003.lsu.edu/srp/).

However stated, the predominant reasons focus around: • building a sense of community among first year students, • introducing students to the expectations of the institution of higher education, • drawing the attention of students to social issues of the day, • setting a common ground for conversations in classrooms and community, • providing an example of the philosophical under- pinnings of a liberal education, • establishing an intellectual expectation for college life, • encouraging students to read.

Common reading programs have come of age dur- ing the last ten years. The University of Maryland’s First Year Book Program dates from 1994. Northwood University’s common reading program, Omniquest, dates to the 1990-91 academic year. Perhaps this sig- nals an awareness of the unique characteristics of the millennial student, or is in response to the experiential concerns heard among academics that students: An Xavier University student shares a moment with a young boy from • have not been challenged to read, Ghana, while participating in the Academic Service Learning Semester. • need a vehicle for building a sense of community, • have unclear expectations of an academic experi- accounts indicate that the reading selection is chosen ence, or by a committee or the library; a few institutions include • need an activity designed to ease the transition student suggestions, asking this year’s class what might from high school to college. be a good choice for the next. A few programs rely on the program leader, generally a faculty member, for A review of the web sites for the National Resource book selection. Center for the First-Year Experience and Students in There is an effort to select books that are contem- Transition (www.sc.edu/fye/resources/fyr/index/html), porary (The Kite Runner), controversial (The High One Book, One College: Common Reading Programs Price of Materialism), popular (Tuesdays with Morrie), (www.homepages.gac.edu/~fister/onbook.html), and easily read (Riding the Bus with My Sister). Topics most Read Like a College Student (www.smu.edu/alec/read- frequently address issues of like.html) present more background on the rationale social justice (Dead Men Should students for common book programs. These sites also offer sug- Walking), social conscious- gestions for topics, texts, programming and relevant ness (Nickel and Dimed), gen- get the books free program development. der and ethnic diverse Some are advocated and led by the institution’s (Reading Lolita in Tehran), or buy them? library, others are guided by an academic team, while environmental sensitivity a few are under the umbrella of student development. (Evolution), globalization Whoever the parent organization is, the programs are (Travels of a T-Shirt in a Global Economy) and under- generally broad-based involving professional staff, standing others (The Curious Incident of the Dog in the librarians and teaching faculty. Some include more Night Time). Examples of text choices from most col- experienced students as peer leaders or mentors. Most leges and universities can be found on the National Recourse Center for the First Year Experience web site

Conversations 11 Nickel and Dimed • Reading Lolita in Tehran • Dead Man Walking

and at the Library of Congress’ list of “One Book” lated initiative. Most successful programs have mul- Reading Promotions (www.loc.gov/loc/cfbook/one- tiple dimensions: reading the book, participating in book.html). discussion sessions, attending lectures and visits by Among proponents of these programs there is the author, text-relevant web sites, and most valued, considerable dialog on discussion lists (Summer the integration of the book and its topic into a [email protected]), blogs and emails about the course or courses. Success of a common reading best approach, who should lead and other opera- program is not without costs. A successful program tional issues. For example a recent exchange requires an institutional commitment that is compre- addresses the value of giving students the book vs. hensive and ongoing. All dimensions of the institu- having students purchase it, perhaps at a subsidized tion — academic, student life, and library — should cost. Here the question is whether students will have a vital role. The commitment must be shared by place less value on a book that is ‘free’ than one they administrators, faculty and staff. Integration of the must buy. Another addresses how to reinforce the goals of the program into academic offerings and value of the experience for students. Is the reading social programming is fundamental. Resources in program just one more requirement, or is it a segue staff time and a realistic allocation of dollars are to an experience that will benefit them directly. essential. In a world of tight budgets, strong compe- Operational concerns such as the cost of bringing a tition from other programs and increased competi- speaker to campus, the speaking skill of individual tion for the best students, continued common read- authors, and relevance of particular texts to themes ing program success and expansion will also need are openly investigated. nurturing. The program goals, while complex, must Instituting a common reading program within a be clearly stated and measurable. Both students and first year experience or independently is not an iso- faculty will have to demonstrate that they work. n

Boston College ...... 80 Canisius College ...... 20 College of the Holy Cross ...... 11 SOLIDARITY AROUND Creighton ...... 50 Fairfield University ...... 34 Fordham University ...... 58 KATRINA Georgetown University ...... 65 Gonzaga University ...... 17 John Carroll University ...... 18 n our last issue (Spring 2006) we published an article by A. “Larry” Le Moyne College ...... 14 Lorenz about the effects of Katrina on two Jesuit educational insti- Loyola Chicago ...... 252 Itutions in the south: Loyola University New Orleans and Spring Hill Loyola College ...... 62 College. It gave a good picture of the hard work and generosity the Loyola Marymount ...... 51 catastrophe inspired, and especially of the solidarity shown by other Marquette University ...... 42 Jesuit colleges and universities around the country. Unfortunately, the Regis ...... 42 list of those schools published with the article (not supplied by its Rockhurst ...... 20 author) turns out to have been unofficial and very incomplete, naming Saint Joseph’s University ...... 38 only 16 of our 28, while in fact every one of them pitched in to offer Saint Louis University ...... 130 support of various kinds. With sincere apologies to those left out, we Saint Peter’s College ...... 8 now publish the official data supplied by the AJCU. It prompts Santa Clara ...... 33 Seattle ...... 25 renewed admiration for the combined resources of our network and Spring Hill ...... 76 reiterated gratitude for the generosity of these sister schools. University of Detroit-Mercy ...... 5 University of San Francisco ...... 70 John J. O’Callaghan, S.J. University of Scranton ...... 8 Chair, National Seminar on Jesuit Higher Education Wheeling ...... 1 Xavier University ...... 11 1241

12 Conversations READING BOOKS TO Pulitzer Prize winner Jim Dwyer is a graduate of Loyola READ OURSELVES School in Manhattan (1975) and Fordham College in the Bronx (1979), where he By Jim Dwyer majored in general sciences and was editor of the Fordham

o there they are. Five years later, Ray Schroth at Fordham Ram. He served as a campus Abandoned cardboard boxes, a taught a breathtaking book – A Time to Die, by stringer for the New York colony of them, stashed beneath the Tom Wicker – about the events in Attica. In class- Times. He attended the staircase in a summer house, unseen es led by Schroth, a Jesuit, a journalist and my for years. mentor, I saw that facts could become literature. Columbia University Graduate Inside are class assignments, carbon And those years seemed to bring a new tuning School of Journalism. Since copies of articles, notes from events and lec- fork every day. then he has been on the staff tures and interviews that took 30 place years ago: A Loyola Jesuit, Vince Butler, screened of six newspapers, the Hudson the first mulch spread across a life in writing. Eisenstein’s Battleship Potemkin for the 16-year “Poetic,” says one comment on an essay. old boys in his film class and showed us how Dispatch, the Elizabeth Daily “But again, that clarity problem. B.” narrative could climb a ladder of images. Gerry Journal, the Bergen Record, Nearly all that mulch was the byproduct of Moylan, a layman, brought us to the Mercer New York Newsday, the New education in Jesuit institutions, Loyola School in Street Arts Center to see One Flew Over the Manhattan, Fordham College in the Bronx, plus Cuckoo’s Nest, and tipped us off about the great York Daily News, and now The my boyhood parish. columnists then writing in The New York Post, New York Times. He has writ- By the time I graduated college in 1979, I Pete Hamill and Murray Kempton. ten or co-written four books, had spent nearly two decades in and around One of the most useful lessons came from a Jesuit places, and even though I had taken only layman, Dan Tramontozzi, after he graded a Subway Lives: 24 Hours in the one class in writing - my official college major social studies term paper. He red-marked a few New York City Subways; Two was “general sciences” – I knew that I would try pages, then ordered me to figure out what was Seconds Under the World, an to live as a writer. It never occurred to me that wrong with the rest. It is hard to quote anyone I was unprepared. with confidence 33 years later, but the gist of his account of the 1993 bombing In the first place, the teachers in those words – “This is garbage by anyone’s standards, of the World Trade Center; schools, Jesuits and lay people, taught me to especially yours” – were as much about expecta- Actual Innocence: Five Days write by teaching me to read. Certainly, the pri- tions as they were a rebuke. mal joys of reading are experienced much ear- A classmate and I ran the student paper, typ- to Execution and Other lier than high school. The child learns what the ing stories onto mimeograph sheets then handing Dispaches from the Wrongly human voice sounds like on a page and feels them out, a few hours from thought to publica- Convicted; and 102 Minutes: the enchantments of narrative. tion. A basketball game won. A dance scheduled. The best teachers pushed on. Tom Ambrose, A favorite teacher unjustly pushed out. The Untold Story of the Fight a Jesuit who taught English and theology in my On a modified Ignatian retreat, Tom to Survive Inside the Twin freshman year at Loyola, naturally used different Blessin told us about the “plus sign” – short- Towers. He was a Ferris books for each class – Native Son in the morning hand for the precept that we ought to assume Professor of Humanities at session, Night in the afternoon — but the same the best of people when we are not sure. The tools. Take notes as you read; track the argument, idea that you could be liberated by doubt, not Princeton University in 2003. the story and the characters; summarize the day’s manacled with suspicion, was the most purely Jim grew up in Manhattan and reading in a few paragraphs. exhilarating fragment of Catholic teaching to lives there with his wife, In short, interrogate the page. Interrogate penetrate my head. yourself. Those men and women taught us to give Cathy, a professor of computer One afternoon, Father Ambrose came to books the same moral scrutiny – and to find in science at Pace University, and class, anguished. Inmates at Attica State Prison them the same delight— that they urged for our their children, Maura, a junior had been holding hostages, but that morning, the lives. They questioned received wisdom, they governor sent in state troopers, and 41 people urged us to be self-critical without being self- at Oberlin College, and had been killed. In the newspapers, we would destructive, and they gave us freedom to make Catherine, who is in her first read that inmates had mutilated and killed the mistakes. year at Stuyvesant High hostages. Some months later, we learned that vir- They passed on a discipline of tempera- tually all those first reports were untrue. ment that transcends craft or career. By reading School. Add to the list of Ambrose lessons: interrogate books, we read our minds. n your society.

Conversations 13 COMMON READING AND THE FIRST YEAR EXPERIENCE Students meet both Helen Prejean and the prosecutor who sends men to death row. Then Katrina comes through...

By Mary McCay and Melanie McKay

ike many Jesuit universities, ies for incoming students and sparked A Program Evolving Loyola New Orleans con- an interdisciplinary learning experiment To select a text suitable for inclusion in fronts the challenge of inte- geared to the core curriculum. many disciplines, the College convened grating Ignatian values into a committee of seventeen faculty mem- students’ academic course Beginnings: Discussion bers who worked throughout the year Lwork. One way we pursue this goal is Groups at Orientation nominating books, reviewing them, through our common curriculum, in and narrowing choices. This wide fac- which philosophy, rhetoric, literature, The common reading program began in 2002 as a component of the College ulty representation was crucial for the history, and religious studies courses program’s expansion as it raised facul- explore disciplinary subject matter from of Arts and Sciences’ first-year experi- ence project. Over the summer, all ty awareness of the importance of the perspective of core values. coherent first-year programs. It also Students take these courses incoming students were sent “The Vulgar Soul,” a short story by Professor resulted in enthusiasm for curricular throughout their four years, but it is the integration of the text. foundational, first-year courses that John Biguenet of Loyola’s English department, from his collection The The committee chose Sister Helen introduce students to the values-orient- Prejean’s Dead Man Walking, a har- ed education that underlies our Jesuit Torturer’s Apprentice. The story follows a lapsed Catholic who inexplicably rowing account of a death penalty case mission. The first-year experience is for with relevance to the foundational this reason especially important in receives the stigmata and in his medical quest finds a spiritual awakening. courses of our common curriculum as Jesuit education, and we continuously well as first-year sociology, political sci- worked to strengthen it. During each of three summer orienta- tion sessions, faculty from different dis- ence, psychology and the natural sci- A key to this effort in recent years ences courses. The chance for students has been a first-year common reading ciplines led discussions of the story. The author met with students and dis- to meet and talk with the author had program that grounds incoming stu- been a key strength of our earlier com- dents’ approach to academics in cussed his work, telling them how the story germinated. mon reading experiment, and we Ignatian values from the time they decided to make this a permanent arrive on campus. The program turns These discussions encouraged stu- on the sustained scrutiny of a common dents to think about vital issues in the text chosen for its embrace of a social college experience: the value of open Mary McCay is the Moon and Verna justice philosophy; readings and dis- discussion, the necessity of listening to Landrieu distinguished teaching cussions of this text are incorporated opposing views, and the importance of professor and chair of the English into first-year courses across the disci- critical thinking. Based on the success department. plines so that students explore academ- of this modest common reading exper- ic subjects within a context of ethics, iment, we decided to expand the pro- Melanie McKay is associate professor of social choices, and spiritual values. As it gram by moving to a longer text that English and director of writing across has grown, the common reading pro- faculty could take beyond orientation the curriculum at Loyola New Orleans. gram has broadened the course of stud- and adopt in their first-year courses.

14 Conversations component. Accordingly, the College sent a copy of Sister Helen’s book to each incoming student in early summer and invited Sister Helen to campus for a public lecture and meetings with stu- dents in the fall.

Special Events and Activities In September, Sister Helen spoke to a capacity crowd, including upper-level students and off-campus visitors, about issues surrounding the death penalty and her journey as an activist, ground- ed in New Testament values. Joining Sister Helen that night was Ray Krone, the 100th death row inmate to be exon- erated since the Supreme Court restored capital punishment. Other events that semester involved first-year students in examin- ing the morality of capital punishment: a production of The Exonerated, a play composed of monologues by death row Jessica Martin helps out in the Beatrice Rafferty School on the Passamaquoddy Reservation exonorees, and a trip to the state penal in Maine. Fairfield University students were on spring break and took this Mission trip to farm at Angola, Louisiana, which for northern Maine. many students was the most eye-open- ing experience of their lives. as the question of punishment in gener- Fostering Intentional Discussions surrounding these activities al. Readings included articles and sto- Learning showed deep divisions among students ries on prisons and prison reform to While the activities and assignments on the issue. While a number of stu- complement the campus activities. associated with Dead Man Walking dents had already decided that the As the course unfolded, however, it generated spirited discussions and death penalty was wrong, many others became clear that the material was thoughtful writing among our first-year held to the contrary view, as reflected slanted in favor of Sister Helen’s posi- students, the death penalty focus in society as a whole. tion, opposing capital punishment. To prevent a one-sided treatment of the remained for the most part remote from their daily lives and therefore, finally, Common Reading in the Classroom issue, the professor invited an Assistant abstract. The choice for 2004, Jonathan These differing opinions provided an District Attorney from New Orleans to Kozol’s Savage Inequalities: Children in excellent springboard to critical think- lay out the state’s position in the prose- America’s Schools, more effectively ing in courses that incorporated Dead cution of death penalty cases and to bridged the gap between explorations Man Walking. English department fac- discuss his stance in a moral context. of social justice and students’ lives. The ulty found the book particularly useful This exchange was important for stu- educational failures Kozol scoldingly in the first semester freshman course dents at Loyola, which has a well- describes—public schools in at-risk “Critical Thinking and Writing,” in known clinic in the Law School that communities, mired in poverty, crime, which students are challenged to think works against the death penalty by and violence—outraged our students, analytically about the works they read researching and assisting in appeals whose education had been privileged. and the ideas to which they are cases for death row inmates. Exposing And studying the book in New Orleans, exposed, to see themselves as thinking students to a working prosecutor where public education had sunk to beings, using ideas to shape their lives helped them appreciate how men and travesty, brought questions of social and plans. Fifteen English teachers used women in the working world must justice to their own front doors. parts of Dead Man Walking. grapple with the moral dynamics of a In one of these courses, the instruc- given public policy. The students began Service Learning tor assigned the book along with other to understand how such issues are Kozol’s public lecture in September gal- texts that examined different sides of often more complex than their teachers vanized interest in the book and the the capital punishment question as well or politicians let on. issues presented. In reviewing the

Conversations 15 history of public education and lat- lenge was clear to all who had read year experience projects, we ter-day failures, Kozol sharply criti- and discussed the book: how to find placed students from one of the fall cized the tax-cutting patterns, ways to make good education avail- English classes into a learning com- begun in California in the late able to all. In English classes, stu- munity, spring 2005. The course 1970s, that starved schools and dis- dents tackled these questions by extended the theme of educational tricts most in need. His condemna- envisioning ideal schools and opportunity throughout the aca- tion of the regressive tax policies in describing them in essays; they dis- demic year, focusing this semester New Orleans framed a discussion cussed their secondary school expe- on the meaning and values of a lib- of the crippled public school sys- riences and compared their educa- eral education. tem, which became a flashpoint in tions to the schooling received by All twenty students from the fall media coverage of Hurricane children in Kozol’s book. course enrolled in a special section Katrina just one year later. With their own educational of English composition team taught Many Loyola students were backgrounds as a touchstone, stu- by the English instructor from the fall already volunteering in New dents began thinking more critical- course and a student affairs profes- Orleans public schools as tutors; ly about their goals at Loyola and sional. Students focused on planning with Kozol’s book as the common longer-range plans. That byproduct their courses for the next three years reader and his public lecture as cat- of the Savage Inequalities discus- and wrote essays on their life path alyst, several faculty included serv- sion supported a central goal of the beyond graduation. ice learning projects in their cours- First-Year Experience initiative: cre- The students were intrigued by es, projects that integrated student ating more intentional learners, the presence of two instructors volunteer work at the schools with who seek out and structure their who often had different interpreta- readings, class discussions, and own learning, through thinking tions of the texts, as well different written reflections. process anchored in analytical skills ideas about liberal education. Class from text and dialogue. discussions were more spirited than Class Discussions usual, as students warmed to the Unlike Dead Man Walking, Kozol’s From Class idea of how their own selection of book did not polarize opinions in courses, semester by semester, class discussions. Everyone could Discussions to Learning reflected choice making through see how educational inequalities Communities critical thinking and clarification of haunt a student throughout life, To integrate the common reading their value systems, key goals of blocking the chances for human program into other developing first- Jesuit education. wholeness and success. The chal- Living Learning Communities In 2005-06, the College built on the learning community model by cre- ating a number of living learning communities, grounded in that year’s common text, Barbara Ehrenreich’s Nickel and Dimed: On Not Getting By in America. Students would not only study together but would also live together to live in the residence halls, take linked common curriculum courses that incorporated the common reader, engage in service learning and social activities together, and partic- ipate in a first-year seminar taught by their course instructor, a Jesuit faculty member, and a student affairs professional. Each living Joseph M. O’Keefe, S.J., dean of the school of Education at Boston College, holds students in learning community would consist discussion. of twenty first-year students who

16 Conversations would stay together throughout the will never succeed and others can the service learning, others com- academic year. hardly fail. As they moved through plained about the workload and what We welcomed the students to the exercise, students wrestled with they described as a “disconnect” the living learning communities on the notion that many people are among the course components: the August 26, 2005, as Hurricane formed by their positions at birth, classes on the Ignatian tradition, the Katrina churned through the Gulf their place in society and the oppor- transition-to-college workshops, the of Mexico. By the 29th, Loyola was tunities they are given or are blocked common reader and the academic empty, with students and faculty from ever getting; with the notion material from the linked courses. spread across the U.S.--, and the that the rich would continue to be Given our limited planning time after first semester cancelled. rich by using the system to enhance the storm, these weaknesses were When we returned for the their power; that the poor will stay understandable. As we look to the Spring 2006 semester, we adapted poor – most of them, at least – future of the living learning commu- the living learning Communities to because they never learn how to nities, however, we envision a closer the new, post-Katrina environment, negotiate their way into a society that collaboration among the team teach- despite limited planning time. We provides a ladder to better life. ers guided by an anchor faculty mem- knew that the shared living, study- ber from one of the linked courses; ing, and social experiences would First-Year Seminar extensive planning to agree upon be especially valuable to students The common reading issues of pedagogies, reading materials, incor- who had been scattered by the poverty and injustice were central poration of the common reader, and storm. Moreover, he aftermath of to the one-hour seminar as well. themes from the academic courses. Katrina brought the issues of Nickel Focusing on the Jesuit tradition of The positive results from the living and Dimed into painfully sharp education and the transition to col- learning community pilot were so focus. As the book explores the lege life, the seminar comprised strong, however, that we are commit- lives of the working poor through classes and discussions led by ted to continuing and expanding the the author’s excursions into jobs Jesuit faculty, workshops with stu- program. Students bonded strongly with low pay, it introduces students dent affairs professionals, and serv- with one another, not only within to a strata of the American experi- ice learning projects combining their own twenty-student groups, but ence unknown to most of them. volunteer work and written reflec- also with students from the other Before the storm, few could have tion. Through these projects, stu- groups as well. They reported talking imagined the actual lives of the dents experienced Ignatian values frequently in the dorms together working poor; after the media in action, as they helped New about issues from classes and the spectacle of flooding and suffering Orleans’ poor in the aftermath of seminar, studying together and social- of people (mostly black and poor) the hurricane. Students helped gut izing. Consistent with the literature on in New Orleans, the life challenges and rebuild houses; they worked at first-year experience programs, Ehrenreich describes became neighborhood rallies to “Bring almost all the students formed strong increasingly real. Back New Orleans”; they distrib- bonds to Loyola as well. uted food and supplies to homeless The Common Reading New Orleaneans; they formed Ongoing Conversations work crews to pick up debris from The common reading program was Program Since Katrina sidewalks and neutral grounds; one born of conversations—among Linked Courses student even joined a band that Jesuit faculty, lay faculty, adminis- Several of the linked courses in played at worksites to keep volun- trators, students, and staff. Spring 2006 focused on the issues teers’ spirits up. By working in the Conversations spurred the pro- raised in Ehrenreich’s book. In the devastated neighborhoods of New gram’s evolution into living learn- English and philosophy courses, for Orleans’ working poor—so differ- ing communities; conversations are example, discussions of Nickel and ent from the high-and-dry, affluent shaping its improvement and its Dimed led students to examine neighborhood around the universi- changing role in the lives of first- poverty not merely as a condition for ty—our students saw the conse- year students. We hope the pro- a given percentage of people, but as quences of social inequality in stark gram itself will serve a catalyst for a function of socioeconomic forces terms, an object lesson in the issues productive conversations at other that block people from achieving Barbara Ehrenreich discussed. Jesuit schools. n their potential. An exercise called “Star Power” helped reinforce these Looking toward the Future examinations. The exercise fixes the While many students participated roll of the dice so that some people enthusiastically in the seminar and

Conversations 17 STUDENT ESSAYS

value of literature, its ability to spark the report, Reading at Risk, the finding that Reading Is A imagination and to cultivate the intellect. the readership decline among In an anthropology course last semester, Hispanics tops that of other ethnic and Committed Act I completed a research project analyzing racial groups. Again, I can at least say the readership decline in Japan. The arti- that I am a first generation Cuban- cles I read cited the intense competition American, and I read. The greatest By Cristina Baldor to enter universities, where standardized challenge in assimilation to the United test scores are the only criteria for States for Hispanics lies squarely on the acceptance. These students grow into issue of language. This is not just the adults who see reading only for its utili- struggle to attain English, but also the ty, and have no motivation to read with- nostalgia of leaving behind Spanish. In out an explicit purpose such as studying many Hispanic households, conversa- for an exam. tions flow between the two languages Reading is a committed act. It seamlessly, sometimes mid-sentence. requires substantially more energy and Reading a piece of literature, whether concentration than does sitting on the in English or in Spanish, means having couch and watching a movie. In the to commit to one language. Since life high-stress environment of competitive for Hispanics in the United States is not colleges, the temptation to sink into a in only one language, identifying with thoughtless state in front of the televi- a text is that much more difficult. sion screen prevails. When I asked my I was not surprised to see that friends to share their thoughts on read- while reading has decreased, the inter- ing literature, they overwhelmingly est in creative writing has increased. expressed a desire to read. However, Seats in creative writing classes at Holy many struggle to complete even the Cross are hard to come by, reflecting required reading for their classes. They the general trend reported by the NEA. he cause behind the decline in view reading literature aside from I belong to a small group of creative readership, especially for coursework as a luxury that they wish writers that meets weekly with a pro- those between the ages of 18 they had, but simply cannot afford. fessor for an independent writing and 24, seems simple on the One young woman I spoke with even workshop. We share our latest short sto- T said she kept a list of books that she ries, learn about sending our work to lit- surface. We are the videogame genera- tion; if it isn’t flashing lights or making planned to read “once I graduate and I erary journals, and read other authors we noises, it seems that most of us are just have the time.” would not have had the opportunity to not interested. Unfortunately, I have to Of course, that’s not to say that if cover in class. If more budding authors agree with this sentiment to some only we decreased the workload, realize that that the first step in creating a degree, but as an English major at Holy everyone would pick up that Jane quality piece of writing is learning to rec- Cross, I can at least personally stand as Austen they’ve been dying to read. ognize the tools used by other writers, an example against the findings. Clearly students find time for a variety the reading of literature will soon be on Reading is a habit. Something as of activities besides schoolwork. the rise. Writers are inspired by other simple as a nightly bedtime story soon However, they are losing the concept writers, and the best writers are skilled blossoms into a lifelong appreciation of reading for pleasure; it reminds them readers. n for literature. I am fortunate enough to too much of the homework they read literature every day, but students should be doing. The preferred way to in other departments must concentrate spend free time is one that allows an Cristina Baldor is a student at the on the required reading in their own escape from this reality, anything from College of the Holy Cross. field of study. Outside the realm of the spending time on the Internet to head- liberal arts institution, many students ing to the bars. choose a career path and never learn the I would also like to address one of the other issues brought up by the NEA

18 Conversations The literacy study, along with oth- tackle today’s job market they cannot A Nation of ers by scholars such as David Mindich, ignore global trends that impact public, suggests that a small percentage of private, and non-profit sectors. As stu- Readers? young adults take the time to read seri- dents graduate and the grace period ends, ous news coverage. Those who do fol- they will have to begin to repay those stu- low pertinent issues display the ability dent loans on which the Congress chose By Justin Goldman to present nuanced arguments. not to reduce the interest rates. Speaking from my own experience, it When a young American consumer has been invaluable to make the time to dials up the call center over a difficulty read about current events. I am con- with their iPod, it may often be a skilled cerned about the question, “Is that worker from India on the line trou- book for a class?” It is troubling that bleshooting the problem from often students would only associate Bangalore. Terence Chea writes in the reading with class requirements. It Seattle Post-Intelligencer that with its comes as little surprise that older gener- numerous call centers and software ations view the students of Generation firms serving foreign clients, Bangalore Y as children of the happy-go-lucky is the center of the global outsourcing nineties who have faced little adversity. debate. According to The Associated Press, IBM, Dell, Microsoft and Oracle are expanding their Bangalore work forces to tap into India’s huge pool of well-trained, relatively inexpensive engineers and other professionals. We live in an uncertain world; a world where volatility from the East Asian Financial Crisis of the late 90s spread to rom my point of view, so Brazil, Russia, and the United States. much in life has a political connotation. A positive trend is the number of hese days, it seems that every- The lack of interest in current affairs faculty members who bring current F print journalism and scholarly writing day expressions such as global- has created a trend that threatens a core ization, the information revolu- aspect of representative government into classroom discussions. Professors tion, and knowledge on-demand and to precipitate the decline in civic can encourage good reading habits, but T at the end of the day students must take are thrown around, often without a sense virtue and engagement. It seems easier of depth or context. The Internet has for a young person to go through life ownership of this critical tool of learn- opened the door to a world of informa- with little or no awareness of his/her ing. David Ignatius wrote in the tion and profoundly changed the way our connection to the state or of the Washington Post, in response to the society functions. Yet, it has also, I believe, responsibility that goes hand-in-hand. Congressional rejection of the Dubai created the illusion of understanding and Take the case of H.R. 609 which failed Ports World deal that, “It sent a message competency. With all likelihood, today’s in the House of Representatives by a that for all the U.S. rhetoric about free traditional college-age students began vote of 200-220 last week. This legisla- trade and partnerships with allies, developing apparent Internet savvy prior tion would have cut student loan inter- America is basically hostile to Arab to their teenage years. But I sense that est rates from 6.8 percent to 3.4 per- investment.” This era demands an many young adults do not make the most cent. According to the Kansas City Star, understanding of the political, econom- of this unprecedented access, due to lim- the recent budget signed into law by ic, social, and historical tensions under- ited interest and proficiency in reading President Bush trims approximately $12 lying national decisions and priorities. about serious, newsworthy matters. billion in funding for student loans over We need a nation of readers. n This past December, Michael a five-year period. Gorman, president of the American I believe that college students need to Library Association, responded to a study make the time to read—for the common Justin Goldman is a senior majoring assessing adult literacy by telling the good, and their own enlightened self- in international policy at Regis Washington Post, “Only 31 percent of col- interest. The current global system has University in Denver. Opinion editor of lege graduates can read a complex book social justice consequences for people the student paper, The Highlander, he and extrapolate from it. That’s not saying worldwide that need to be fully under- served as a marine in Operation much for the remainder.” stood. Also, when today’s college students Enduring Freedom.

Conversations 19 book over the internet. Some say, with they were believed to be in some way Reading Is A computer usage rising and television possible, even though a stretch in some being enhanced, that the brain is actu- circumstances. Today, most of the ideas Chore ally being mesmerized by the dazzling in those classics have either been colors. A more compelling theory is proven right or wrong. Maybe some By John Matthews that the colorful visual and audio new classics would trigger fascination images are actually quicker and there- with our generation. Even text books, fore easier for the brain to translate into although new, often have the same meaning than lines of black letters. In a ideas they’ve had for decades. Only the society where everything seems to be stories change in order to relate to the about time and how valuable it is, it reader. The issue then becomes the really shouldn’t be a surprise that read- education of the students. If the student ing is losing its appeal. cannot learn through reading anymore, teachers must become innovative and explore new methods. Many instructors have already begun by utilizing power- point presentations more, which many students enjoy as alternative to or in conjunction with reading a textbook. Much also rests on the shoulders of the student’s personality. Different stu- dents learn better with different styles, imple desires for instant and in order to maximize potential, the gratification have become common- student must discover how he or she place for many Americans. Marketing learns best. It is not reasonable to S blame the teacher or some other prob- has manipulated people into believing that if something does not satisfy in the lem for personal learning. It seems as if short-run that it is not worth pursuing. students everywhere are being “diag- In this instance, reading an entire book nosed” with attention deficit disorder sat on my bed yesterday sorting (ADD), or even better, attention deficit through week-old newspaper will probably lead to more long-run sat- isfaction, but watching a T.V. show will hyperactive disorder (ADHD). Are these clippings and printed emails that really disorders that have always been my dad sent me about ways to lead to more delight in the short-run, so I a person should watch T.V. Moreover, around that just recently have been dis- improve my career search, better my covered, excuses conjured up to resume, or simply a chain email with why should U.S. marketers be con- cerned with the lack of reading? It is not explain the recent trend of illiteracy, or some goofy story. Although I am one are they society’s explanation for a who never gets sick of trying to figure as if they are making money from peo- ple reading books, so of course they youthful reaction to a diverse techno- out if the email-story I’m reading is true logical world? Personally, I have no or false, I can’t help but wonder what’s are going to promote a strategy that involves enticing more T.V. viewing. If answer to these questions nor have I on T.V. or if I have any new emails. It’s been diagnosed with either disorder. hard to make it through all of that read- more book-reading is what everyone wants, then the solution may be to That is not to say that I wouldn’t be if ing without wanting to check facebook tested, but I guess I’ve just been too dis- or myspace, recently developed interac- allow marketers to advertise in books. tracted to make an appointment. n tive internet yearbook-like sites. What’s Let them throw an ad in every ten most interesting is not my desire to do pages or so. It sounds silly, but then something else, it’s the inability to fin- again so is consciously choosing to focus attention on little black characters John Matthews is a 2006 graduate ish the simple reading without being from Xavier University in Cincinnati. distracted. over large colorful images. There is much speculation as to For me, reading is a chore. Let’s just why people my age are falling behind say dipping into a novel or indulging in the reading of books. An obvious myself with a textbook is not my ideal initial response is to say that people are nighttime activity. Perhaps the reason reading more online than in a physical I’m not fascinated is that the books I’ve printed source, but it is hard to con- tried to read are outdated. Many fiction- ceive of someone reading an entire al selections became classics because

20 Conversations rest of the world via our cell phones, on the beach somewhere. To read a The Private laptops, blackberries, and pagers. For book is to fill space in between activi- members of this “Millennium ties and, as a result, we like books that Voyage Generation”—my generation—the art keep up with our Attention Deficit of reading has been rendered obsolete Disorder. Lilliputian-size chapters, fresh by 21st century technology. Instead of events on every page, and a brisk nar- By Ray Dademo devoting time and energy to a novel, rative are the basic requirements of we “Millennials” prefer to waste long Millennial beach reading. For this rea- afternoons in front of a computer son, Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code — screen, simultaneously e-mailing, text third-rate Philip Marlowe on Adderall— messaging, blogging and facebooking. isn’t merely a cultural phenomenon, but We’re multitasking, yes, but what are perhaps the definitive novel of the 21st we really accomplishing? century. In today’s world, a generation that I fear that in staying perpetually insists upon “staying connected” simply tethered to mass communication, we has no use for something as insular and are losing the ability to connect with lit- burdensome as reading. This is no one’s erature. Leafing through the pages of a fault; merely a symptom of the new mil- book can be, in the best of circum- lennium. Even among “book nerds” like stances, a journey, an experience. But myself, it’s difficult to find the proper unlike technology, the voyage is a pri- amount of time between e-mails to vate one; a one-at-a-time hobby that squeeze in a book. For example, if given places the reader face-to-face with his an hour of free time and a choice or her own powers of imagination, between Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood intellect, and introspection. Whenever I and myspace.com, I will invariably make the time to truly read, I feel an choose the website. Why? Because my almost uncomfortable level of intimacy brain is slowly decaying. I have an iPod with my own thoughts. Nano for music, youtube.com for stream- Why do I identify so strongly with ing video, AOL Instant Messenger for Augusten Burroughs? How could I or an English major with an mindless chit-chat and, best of all, I don’t allow myself to be seduced by a mon- internship at a publishing house, waste one neuron of brainpower con- ster like Humbert Humbert? Why can I I spend an awful lot of time templating any of it. With so much excuse Blanche DuBois for lying, but avoiding my bookshelf. The instant entertainment at my fingertips, not James Frey? What are these books F reading for leisure doesn’t seem so trying to say and, most importantly, enthusiasm I once had for reading has twisted and frayed into something ardu- leisurely anymore. Not unless the prose what do they say about me? ous. The pastime has become the chore. is divided into manageable text-message- When we can find the wherewithal As a portly, “indoor” child, I tended sized portions. to stay focused, reading leads us to a to devour any book I could get my level of profound truth that no smok- hands on. (When parents’ library was inggun.com could ever unearth. After exhausted, I found great solace in the all, it was only through reading, sturdy prose of instruction manuals.) through exposure to art and philosophy These days, however, I’d be hard that Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya realized pressed to recall my last substantial the futility of his own existence. stretch of extracurricular reading. What Nowadays, he wouldn’t have time happened along the way? For young to ponder such morbid notions. He’d people—bookworms and dimwits eading, as a form be too busy posting blog entries at alike—reading doesn’t enter the equa- of entertainment, seems relegated to morose-russian.net. n tion easily, and it’s tempting to wonder Rthose occasions when we are required what we’re all doing instead. to break away from our computers and I’ll give you a hint. Whatever it is, it force ourselves to disconnect from this Ray Dademo is an English major at probably involves typing. constant flow of communication. When Fordham College at Lincoln Center Today’s youth must remain con- you think of it, most people read in one and opinion editor of The Observer. stantly reachable, or else risk isolation. of three situations: waiting to fall Our days are spent “connected” to the asleep, commuting to work, or baking

Conversations 21 A Look at Libraries Building Together on Our Strengths

By Janice Simmons-Welburn

Last year, two libraries at Jesuit universities, Loyola New Orleans and Marquette, received AJCU awards as outstanding examples of how Jesuit libraries are looking to the future. We asked the Marquette librarian to discuss how they won this award.

recent survey of nearly needs of our faculty, how they use print building on strength. As institutions 14,000 college and university and digital materials to do their research that share values, we have opportuni- students found that, in stu- and to prepare for teaching in a hybrid ties for collaborations that will maxi- dents’ decisions about which environment. mize the availability of resources for college to attend, libraries Our libraries are also poised to fos- our users. We will want to work togeth- Aranked second among the important ter student learning. For instance, our er on digital initiatives. The AJCU facilities of a college campus. No facility integrated information systems enable Conference of Library Deans has received a higher satisfaction rating rela- users to do much of their work from already started an ambitious collabora- tive to its importance to students than home or, if they so choose, in libraries, tive digitization project. They are taking libraries, which led the investigators to either by themselves or with their col- on new initiatives intended to digitize conclude, “These facilities will be impor- leagues. Thus we can give greater atten- our unique parts of our archival and tant areas to continue to address to tion to working directly with users with special collections that will provide ensure higher satisfaction levels.” special needs, including individualized broader access and facilitate research. More than student unions, exercise instruction and creating physical space It is also plausible to employ the insti- facilities, dormitories, or even technol- that simultaneously accommodates indi- tutional repository models to encour- ogy centers, libraries weigh heavily in vidual and collaborative work. age self-archiving of faculty and stu- the minds of our students in their deci- We also know from experience and dent research and to create opportuni- sions on where to go to college and in research from educational sociologists ties to share that information across their satisfaction with campus physical that students find that the library is a safe institutional boundaries. features. As Jesuit institutions, we have place to study, to work, and to socialize. In the end, we are all engaged in built our academic strengths on our Many wonder about the fate of the building organizational capacity on our respective identities. As we proceed to library in a community of digital, Web- campuses. For Marquette and Raynor meet the challenges of higher educa- based information. This is the kind of Memorial Libraries, this has meant that tion in the 21st century, we will want to discussion that underscores the need for we have invested in a facility that build together on our strengths. continual renewal of the library as a blends print and digital worlds. We College and university libraries will physical place on our campuses. must also create and maintain good continue to show leadership in working Libraries add wonderful cohesion on will with our respective communities of with new methods of providing access what we fear to be an increasingly frag- support. None of this should stand in to and preserving scholarly information. mented campus. At Marquette we have the way of collaboration across our We do this in support of scholarship, and created a place that fits under what soci- institutions. Together we can build on in particular in response to the needs of ologist Elijah Anderson recently called our respective strengths. n our faculty in their research and teaching the “cosmopolitan canopy” those free through the acquisition of print and elec- and open spaces where we meet and Janice Simmons-Welburn is the dean tronic resources. More than that, we interact with one another. of the Raynor Library at Marquette must spend time learning about the Finally, collaboration is key to University.

22 Conversations A Look at Libraries The Robot’s Grip Santa Clara University Adopts High-Tech Library Storage

By Ronald Danielson

anta Clara University’s new Commons and Library shares many design characteristics with other recent library buildings, but one aspect of Sthe new library is unique among AJCU institutions. When the Commons and Library opens in the fall of 2008, approximately 250,000 volumes of the library’s collections will be on tradi- tional shelving. The rest of the library’s 800,000 volume collection will be stored in an Automated Retrieval System (ARS) and fetched in response to a request from a library patron sub- mitted through our online catalog. The ARS is a three story, 8,000 square foot component of the library, filled with six ranks of floor-to-ceiling racks which house nearly 12,000 two foot by four foot metal bins that hold the library materials. The request from the online catalog is passed to the ARS control computer, which determines in which bin the desired item is locat- ed and dispatches one of three mechanical cranes to fetch the bin and deliver it to a “picking station.” A student employee then removes the item, updates the computer record with the item’s new status, and deliv- ers it to the circulation desk. When the item is returned, it doesn’t have to go back in the same bin from which it was removed, but can be stored in any appropriately-sized bin, speeding the process of putting materials back into the ARS. The decision to build the ARS was a compromise between anticipated Crane and bin operation of the Santa Clara University library.

Conversations 23 A Look at Libraries needs and economic reality. In the cur- rent situation of extremely high con- struction costs and, for most of us, very limited real estate on campus, holding library materials on traditional shelving is a very expensive option, something that may come to be seen as a luxury. Construction estimates based on the new library’s original program were 50 percent higher than initially planned. Santa Clara’s design team evaluated a number of alternatives for reducing that cost, including dramatically limiting space for collection growth, widespread use of compact shelving, off-site remote storage, and the ARS. We decided the ARS was the best compromise between price and good customer service. It will save Santa Clara more than $15,000,000 compared to providing traditional shelv- ing for a similar number of volumes. The ARS provides a number of benefits: very dense, cost-effective stor- age for library materials (full capacity is more than 900,000 volume equiva- lents), relatively rapid response to retrieval requests (typically three to seven minutes), and very reliable stor- age (existing units report significantly fewer lost items in the retrieval system than on open shelves). An additional benefit is that the ARS will hold virtual- ly the entire print collection during the construction period for the new build- ing, which will be built on the site of the existing Orradre Library. The prin- cipal drawback, of course, is that mate- rials in the ARS are not browsable in the traditional sense, although features of the online catalog permit some vir- Crane and rack library system at Santa Clara University. tual browsing. A critical issue is the choice of which items from the library’s collection ARS that circulate frequently will agrees. For a contrary viewpoint, see should go on open shelves and which become candidates for placement on Professor Fred White’s article in the should be stored in the ARS. The ARS is open shelves, and those items on the Chronicle of Higher Education, ideal for items that are infrequently open shelves that don’t get used will be “Libraries Lost: Storage Bins and used, so circulation history will be one candidates to move to the ARS. Robotic Arms,” Volume 52, Issue 6, factor considered. Santa Clara’s subject Our belief, supported by the expe- Page B8). n specialist librarians will work closely rience at other libraries where similar with faculty in various departments to systems have been used for more than Ronald Danielson is the chief select the items that will be placed on 10 years, is that this combination will information officer at Santa Clara open shelves. The decision, however, provide a high-quality experience for University. need not be permanent. Items in the our students and faculty. Not everyone

24 Conversations Common Readings – Jesuit Colleges and Universities

All are 2005 unless otherwise noted. Source Institution web sites.

Don’t Touch Boston College The Odyssey, Homer (Honors Program) (2001)

The Tech World of Books College of the Holy Cross The Book of Job, (transl. Raymond Scheindlin) (2004-05) Wit, Margaret Edson By Cory Wade All Quiet on the Western Front, Erich Remarque At the Mind’s Limits, Jean Amery The Hangman’s Knot, Eliza Steelwater Will High-Tech Fever Work sadly, serve as a metaphor for the Year of Wonders, Geraldine Brooks Against Literacy? nightmarish consequences of The Dialogue Between Voltaire & Rousseau, inverted priorities. Russell R. Dynes What could be the rationale for Becoming Human, Jean Vanier lthough fewer than half The Death of Ivan Ilych, Leo Tolstoy a dozen campuses in the adoption of such a high-tech the United States have plan on a Jesuit campus where con- Fairfield University chosen such an templative, humanistic values have Dead Man Walking, Helen Prejean traditionally been fostered? During extreme path, Santa Fordham University the debate surrounding the ARM, AClara University has recently dis- Oresteia, Aeschylus mantled its conventional library one argument which was offered in support of robot retrieval was that Georgetown University system and replaced it with an The Map of Love, Ahdaf Soueif ARM, or Automated Retrieval “warehousing books” had become Mechanism. Despite strongly- too expensive. Is the use of the word John Carroll University voiced objections from faculty, warehouse in any way synonymous Mountains Beyond Mountains, Tracy Kidder staff, and students, the University with library? Will literacy improve Evolution, Carl Zimmer elected to close the stacks, thus with a facility where people can Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser never explore the shelves directly? permanently precluding the fruitful LeMoyne College Will students read more as a result of and enjoyable option of browsing. Heroic Leadership, Chris Lowney Under the high-tech format, having to fill out a card every time they want to examine a book? Loyola College Maryland prospective borrowers will request Galileo’s Daughter, Dava Sobel specific titles to be retrieved from As a concerned academician in the closed corridors by an automa- Silicon Valley, I would gladly send Loyola Marymount University ton. Instead of a library where visi- you via conventional mail an excel- Partly Cloudy Patriot, Sarah Vowell tors see and physically handle the lent library book about the hazards of high-tech seduction. Unfortun- Loyola University Chicago books, Santa Clara University will The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy, (2006) ately, the title which I had in mind provide a robotic arm programmed Pietra Rivoli to locate items by barcode number. could not be found by the ARM: the Loyola University New Orleans Readers will never enter the area volume had slipped to the floor, and Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich where the books physically reside. the robotic eye could not see it lying They will therefore never experi- there, a few inches out of the range Marquette University ence the delight of removing from of view. A Lesson Before Dying, Ernest Gaines the shelf a volume whose con- Perhaps we have become a lit- Hunger, Lan Samantha Chang (fall, 2006) tle myopic. Perhaps it is time to tents—and very existence—were Saint Joseph’s University unknown to them until they walked rethink, not reboot. Perhaps we need a new pantheon. Riding the Bus With My Sister, Rachel Simon among the stacks. Mountains Beyond Mountains, Tracy Kidder With the ARM system, neither Perhaps we need to unplug. n borrowers nor staff members will Saint Louis University Napoleon’s Buttons, Jay Burreson & Penny Le Couteur enter the domain of the books. Cory Wade teaches the history of Only the robotic arm will remove the English language, medieval Santa Clara University the volumes from their com- literature and ancient culture at The Piano Lesson, August Wilson pressed housing. The eerie isola- Santa Clara University. tion of books from humans might, University of San Francisco The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini

Conversations 25 THE CAMPUS BOOKSTORE, A LIVE-ACTION TOUR

By Steven Elwell

ey freshman, welcome to the bookstore read that it’s all some big misunderstanding. Apparently portion of our campus tour! My name is they’re supposed to be pronounced “sweet” shops, Corky, part-time student employee. For because it’s such a sweet deal to get a job in one! OK, the next few minutes I’ll be showing you don’t start preaching to me about Christian social ethics; the smartest, most efficient way to get I’ve been through Moral Theology three times now. Heverything you need for class. So stay close, and try not There’s another thing I meant to point out. We’ve left to get lost in the magic! behind traditional school colors in favor of brighter, First, take a look over here at our collection of cheerier clothing. Purple and beige are so 1955. Tangerine school-logo emblazoned stationary. Let’s face it, some of sunset and medium sea green are much more versatile, you just aren’t getting a degree, but at least you can buy and you should have seen the Internet sales skyrocket this paper and write CHAMP on it. Everyone wants to when we started carrying those puppies! Rudy is serious- hire a champ! ly considering changing the school colors with every issue And over here we’ve got the Top Ten Bestsellers, dis- of Vogue, just to stay chic. The guy’s a genius! played on classy little shelves, just like you’d find at Come on, we’re reaching the final part of the tour. Barnes & Noble. What’s that? Frog and Toad Hit the Vegas Ladies and gents, I give you the Useless Knickknack Strip was never a bestseller? Well, maybe you don’t under- Section! I mean, uh, Gift Section! Don’t worry about stand how we work around here. This is our head man- Christmas presents this year; grandma gets a snow-globe ager Rudy’s bestseller list. And Rudy let me keep this job of the student center, and uncle Dave gets a golf club after my little student-code infraction, so I’m not going to sock with the school mascot! But hey, as a word of tolerate any more lip about him on my tour. advice, ignore those shot glasses that say “Welcome All right, moving on. As you can see, there are plen- Freshman” on them—take a page out of old Corky’s ty of textbooks in stock for the beginning of classes, and book: you don’t want to go there. you can find just what you’re looking for by following Well, that’s the end of the formal tour, so I’d like to our simple three-step system. One: Find the age of your open the floor to questions. Yes, you in the back. You professor’s oldest living relative and divide that by the found a used copy of Emma that costs more than your number of pages in the textbook you seek. Two: car? Ha, look at this guy, he must drive a bicycle! Oh, it Translate this number into Demotic Egyptian using the says $4,000. Well, um, it’s a pretty nice copy, isn’t it? I Rosetta Stone, and then translate that message into bina- mean, sure it’s missing a few pages and it’s still wet from ry computer code. Three: Travel over a lake of fire and someone’s coffee spill, but the main story is intact. And punch your binary code into the main computer. It’ll tell you claim you found the same book on the Internet for you exactly what aisle your book is on! How’s that for three bucks? efficiency? OK, I’ve had enough of you kids. Unless you were Now, here’s, everyone’s favorite part of the book- going to buy that book. n store — the school apparel section. We pride ourselves in having a wide variety of XXXL and XXXS clothes stamped with the school name. There’s no changing room, but who said school-spirit needed to fit? Who makes the sweatshirts? That’s a good question. I Steven Elwell is a recent graduate of Saint Joseph’s guess all these tags do say “Made in Indonesia.” But hey, University. listen, don’t get bent out of shape about sweatshops. I just

26 Conversations WHAT SHALL WE READ? FORUM

always respect the dignity and the common humanity TO DISREGARD SELF- of our fellow human beings. INTEREST Historians of economic thought may someday be able to shed light on why so many economists, partic- Adam Smith, The Wealth of ularly in the twentieth century, were inspired by a selective reading of Adam Smith to build models of Nations and The Theory of Moral human behavior as if we are motivated only by self- Sentiments interest. Meanwhile, the major task of economists in the twenty-first century is to make these models more Edwin Dickens realistic by reformulating them to take into account the fact that many people are motivated by a sympa- dam Smith’s famous investigations of why thetic understanding of others, and by a commitment people do what they do inspired a long and to inviolable laws of right and wrong. In undertaking imposing line of economists to construct this task, it is ironic that we can turn to Adam Smith’s models in which every individual is moti- two great books for inspiration and guidance. n Avated only by self-interest. It was thus a rev- elation for me to discover that self-interest is just one Edwin Dickens is assistant professor of economics of three factors that Smith uses to explain human and finance at Saint Peter’s College. behavior in the model he develops in his two great books, The Wealth of Nations and The Theory of Moral Sentiments. The other two factors which motivate us are, for Smith, a sympathetic understanding of others and a sense of moral duty. The problem of torture can illustrate the three fac- tors at work in Smith’s model of human behavior. If people are motivated by self-interest alone, torture is justified to the extent that it is required to obtain infor- mation about imminent terrorist attacks. Since the end is said to justify the means, torture may be censured only if it exacerbates, rather than diminishes, the threat of terrorist attacks. If people are also motivated by a sympathetic understanding of others, then the grounds for censure expand from unintended conse- quences to questionable motives. In other words, we may judge an act of torture to be a disproportionate response to the circumstances that seemed to necessi- tate it. Finally, if a sense of moral duty is included in the model as a determinant of human behavior, then we can contemplate the sublime possibility that people may disregard their self-interest in being safe from ter- rorist attacks and their sympathetic understanding for why people sometimes resort to acts of torture in favor of a commitment to the inviolable law that we must Burns Library, Boston College.

Conversations 27 arrogant and self-serving those who would glibly The Garden Within attempt to read blame into natural disasters and us All human suffering. His narrative style denies such cause and effect. Voltaire, Candide Instead, he tells us how to live in the world as it is. He Eileen Z. Cohen enjoins his characters, after much distress and misad- ventures, both cosmic and self-inflicted, to “cultivate ven as a child, when I heard the story of their Garden.” Thus come together a disparate and Adam and Eve and of their innocence in the desperate group of people, among them a former Garden of Eden, I was discomfited. Then, it prostitute, an arrogant priest, a foolish long-winded was because I could not conceive of professor, and a wise old woman — none totally good E“Paradise” as a place without lamb chops. As or evil — to make a working community. One charac- I matured, my distress, I am happy to say, became ter is good at carpentry, another bakes, a third cares more nuanced. I liked being “human” and respected for the linen. Thus, through humor, work, and toler- human talent. I saw the Eden of the Old Testament as ance, they keep at bay “boredom, vice, and need.” a place where talent and art could not flourish. Marble Candide tells us that diverse, ordinary people can could not be quarried for Bernini to sculpt, nor trees live together and even find moments of peace and felled to build a great cathedral. No one would ever pleasure, eating “candied citrons and pistachios.” He have heard of Newton or Galileo. Human talent and suggests that the Garden’s possibilities are within all of suffering in Eden seemed to me to have been reduced us; we need to stop asking questions about the why of to applesauce. human suffering and try to ameliorate it instead. Good And then I read Candide! Occasioned in part by humor, hard work, and generosity to others make this, Voltaire’s reaction to the Lisbon earthquake, 1755, as Dr. Pangloss says, and this long-winded Professor when many people were at Mass on All Saints Day and agrees, “the best of all possible worlds,” It is the only to the responses of some of his contemporaries to this one we have! n natural disaster of enormous proportions Candide rejects suggestions that natural disasters occur to pun- Eileen Z. Cohen is professor of English literature at ish sin or that “everything happens for the best.” We Saint Joseph’s University. have recently heard such comments after Hurricane Katrina and the Tsunami of 2005. Voltaire mocks as

Students of art concentrating on their pieces at Xavier University.

28 Conversations Getting a Life We are incomplete The Letters of Paul and Poor Dean Brackley S.J. Johannes B. Metz, Poverty of s a nineteen-year-old Jesuit novice, I began Spirit to stay up an extra half-hour each night to Astrid O’Brien read the New Testament. What I read in the Letters of St. Paul stunned me: We are for- he book which, after the Scriptures, has had Agiven and make peace with God, not the greatest impact on my life is a very brief because of good works we have done, but only when one: Poverty of Spirit, by Johannes B. Metz. we accept the forgiveness that God freely offers. This In a mere 52 pages, the author has given us is justification by faith, or by grace, alone. Along with Ta profound meditation on the meaning of this, our sole obligation is to love our neighbor; and, the Incarnation and its implications for our own lives. to do that, follow principally not norms (“the Law”), After a forward in which he presents his main theme but the Spirit that prompts us from within. This was – our reluctance to recognize and accept the poverty good news that set me off on an adventure that led, of being human – he considers in turn what it meant eventually, to understanding life and God in less hide- for God to become man in Jesus and what it would bound ways. mean for us to follow his example. Metz is convinced Years later Karl Mannheim’s Ideology and Utopia that even if we acknowledge Jesus as our role model set my head spinning. Written in the 1920s, this pio- in theory, our daily lives often bear witness to a very neering work in the sociology of knowledge helped different standard. me appreciate how all our worldviews are highly vul- We do not want to be poor and dependent on nerable to criticism; they all float on basic assumptions God for everything. We would rather be rich: self-suf- that cannot be proven in a strict sense. Years before, ficient, and in full control of all that affects us. Are not while in college, after discovering Paul, my own child- these the goals our society holds out to us? We prefer hood view of the world had come crashing down not to face our inescapable finitude – the limitations around my ears, introducing me in a painful way to placed on us by our culture, our opportunities, our tal- the “crisis of foundations” that Mannheim described so ents, our physical energy, our financial situation and well. Later I learned from Karl Marx (The German especially our mortality, which entails the impossibili- Ideology) how our worldviews are rooted in our prac- ty of realizing all our hopes and dreams. Metz chal- tice and our social location — so much so that “the lenges his readers with the “categorical imperative” of dominant ideas of each age are the ideas of the dom- the Christian faith: “You shall lovingly accept the inant social class.” Stephen Toulmin’s The Uses of humanity entrusted to you! You shall not continually Argument helped me steer clear of the seductive pre- try to escape it!” tensions of positivism. Toulmin persuaded me that, Although an academic himself, Metz does not while some arguments are better than others, almost focus specifically on the dangers of the intellectual life; none are air-tight, and certainly none that claim to it seems to me that the temptation to believe in Jesus prove what is real, or right, or important. and live, nevertheless, as a Platonist is especially Instead of leading to skepticism, these insights strong for those of us who are engaged in university helped convince me that the search for truth and for teaching. The world of ideas is so fascinating, exciting the right thing to do is far more than a matter of the and logical compared to the stubborn opacity of the head. It’s about “getting a life.” It’s about confronting world of material reality! All too easily we can forget the world, especially responding to suffering, and, yes, that we are “beings in process”: incomplete, and, in thinking things through, and also, crucially, taking that sense, poor. We must choose to become fully those leaps of faith that are more reasonable than not human. Success is not guaranteed; it is possible for us leaping at all (St. Augustine). When we commit our- to fail. We can betray our humanity by running away selves to such an authentic search, we can expect that from its burdens and difficulties, instead of accepting same Spirit that Paul talk about to confirm that we are these as Jesus accepted his. He “held back nothing” – on the path to truth and that we are really discovering during his passion he surrendered everything “even some of it. n the love that drove him to the cross.” On the other hand, teaching and writing offer Dean Brackley, S.J., is a theology professor at the many opportunities to let go gracefully: of our insights, University of Central America in El Salvador.

Conversations 29 Bringing Women to Full Citizenship Hans-Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method Jean Bethke Elshtain, Public Man, Private Women: Women in Social and Political Thought Eloise A. Buker

or me, it is hard to say what books have changed my life because they all seem impor- tant and often the last really good book may seem the most exciting. Nevertheless, I have Fselected two books: Hans-Georg Gadamer’s Truth and Method and Jean Bethke Elshtain’s Public Man Private Woman: Women in Social and Political Thought Gadamer’s work enabled me to figure out how to integrate epistemological traditions in the social sci- ences with those in the humanities under the umbrel- la of hermeneutics. Hermeneutics gave me a way to find a way to turn political science into a playing field that allowed both rigor and imagination with a focus on language and politics. This brought together my interests in literature, narratives and politics. Gadamer’s hermeneutics has not become as central in the social sciences as has poststructuralism, but the interpretive insights offered in Truth and Method draw on “method” (so cherished in the sciences), and “truth” (so necessary in the academy), while showing how methods produce types of truth. Gadamer avoids the trap of relativism as well as the perils of various fundamentalisms. He cherishes a generous playfulness and believes every person to be a gift which makes Bapst Library, Boston College. each one of us worthy of joining conversations which are themselves methods for producing truth. our pet theories and approaches, of our students as While Gadamer’s notion of conversation partners they graduate, of our self-importance as our views are has guided my academic life, it has been anchored by argued against by our colleagues. For all of us there insights offered by Jean Bethke Elshtain in Public will come a time to let go even of our academic career, Man, Private Woman. This book came out the year I no matter how much we enjoy both research and began my first full time teaching position at Gonzaga teaching. These experiences can help us to recognize University, and it gave me a solid basis for understand- “the poverty of our provisional nature…the dire ing how patriarchy has shaped Western philosophy. poverty of hope,” and move us to prayer. Only in sur- Beyond this, however, Elshtain draws on the history of rendering everything, even our poverty, to God can Western political philosophy to show how it can be n we become truly human. interpreted to help bring women into full citizenship. She provided both critique and hope, and grounded Astrid M. O’Brien is associate professor of philosophy both in Western political philosophy. and acting director of peace and justice studies at Armed with my understanding of Gadamer and Fordham University. patriarchy, I was able to move into women’s studies

30 Conversations and political science with an edge on the side of gen- fiancée. Imagine further that his fiancée was an expert der justice and a compassion that said that no matter swimmer but now incapacitated. Thus accompanied, where people stand they are people with something to Jean-Baptiste hears cries for help. Would he now be contribute to conversations. The two books offered more or less inclined to attempt a rescue than the soli- two values that shaped my work: one, to speak up for tary Jean-Baptiste of Camus? He might have been or women, and two, to listen to all who might want to not. But in either instance it would merely be a tale of talk about the matter. Both Elshtain and Gadamer con- one individual’s struggle and not a statement on the struct their political philosophies with deep respect for human condition. Christians believe we are not alone each individual while stressing the importance of com- in the world. God’s presence is guaranteed with the munity and the common good as part of who we are Word made flesh. We believe we are embedded with- as fully developed persons. n in various social webs: family, friends and communi- ties that offer us support and structure. Thus as an Eloise A. Buker is a professor of political science and older Jesuit I now see Camus’ novel the riveting tale of director of women’s studies at Saint Louis University. one person’s failure rather than a description of the universal human condition. n

William B. Neenan, S.J., an economist, has been an academic administrator at Boston College for many One Person’s Failure years. As a young Jesuit, he was schooled in Missouri Valley Thomism at St. Louis University. Albert Camus, The Fall William Neenan, S.J.

lbert Camus’ 1956 novel, The Fall, has been a companion of mine for decades. That com- Experience Reshapes panionship, like all friendships, has evolved over the years. As a young Jesuit, I was the Self Aattracted to the principal character of The Fall, Jean-Baptiste Clamence. His honesty and chal- M.K. Gandhi, An Autobiography: lenged integrity appealed to the naïve individualism of The Story of My Experiments with youth. As an older Jesuit, I am no longer entranced by the ideal of the individual alone in a vacant universe. Truth Trans. M. Desai Camus has been categorized as an existentialist, but Faith J. Childress personally he is more attractive than his contemporary, the hypocritical poseur, Jean Paul Sartre. t is easy to learn a life lesson from Mohandas K. The story line of The Fall is simple. Jean-Baptiste Gandhi’s An Autobiography: The Story of My in the first person relates how his life centers on one Experiments with Truth. Gandhi, better known defining moment. While strolling along the River Seine as the “Mahatma,” is famous for his leadership one evening, Jean-Baptiste hears cries from one who Ifrom the 1920s to the 1940s of the nationalist, has fallen into the river. What to do? Alone with his non-violent struggle against British colonial rule in conscience, Jean-Baptiste realizes he must choose India. When I first read this memoir nearly twenty-five either to respond or not to those cries. “I have forgot- years ago, the Gandhi whom I “met” was not yet the ten what I thought then. ‘Too late, too far…’ or some- Mahatma of later fame. In recounting his experiences thing of the sort. I was still listening as I stood motion- in India, England, and South Africa, Gandhi paints a less. Then, slowly under the rain, I went away. I distinctly non-Mahatma-like self-portrait: selfish son, informed no one.”? I see three falls in this scene: first, imperious husband, caste-breaker, bad dancer, indif- a person falling into the Seine, second, Jean-Baptiste’s ferent violin student, and unsuccessful lawyer. moral fall and third — did Camus envision this also? What, then, was there to learn from a Gandhi with — an echo of that primal fall whose consequence St. a host of human failings? Gandhi’s “experiments,” Paul describes “I do not do the good I want, but the including diet, religion, clothing, simplicity, leader- evil I do not want is what I do.” (Romans 7:19) ship, non-violence, and service, were part of his quest After a long Jesuit life, I have come to read The for “self-realization” and his search for moral princi- Fall in an explicitly Christian context. Thus let us imag- ples that transcended culture. In each aspect of his life ine Jean-Baptiste as accompanied that evening by his and career he tried to figure out what constituted the

Conversations 31 truth about himself and about the societies in which he lived. He demonstrated the willingness to integrate A Textbook, Yes. new knowledge into old, to seek experiences that may But... challenge the status quo, and to decide what ideas, skills, and personal qualities contributed to a greater Donald Jay Grout, A History of sense of self, of purpose, and of worldview. In his experiments, Gandhi did not merely accept the prac- Western Music tices and beliefs he encountered, but assessed the Alice V. Clark strengths and flaws in each culture and society. Critical of the “superstitions” in his own traditions, in s strange as it may seem to anyone who has the West he embraced ideals of legal equality (even if survived the music-major history survey imperfectly realized). He was forced to reassess these (popularly known as “Music Mystery” or Western ideals in light of racial and religious discrimina- “Music Misery”), I have to admit that one of tion and legal injustices that he experienced. His “exper- Athe books that most profoundly changed iments with truth” speak of the quest to find moral truths my life is Donald Jay Grout’s A History of Western that could be applied to all humanity. He built his lega- Music. While I wouldn’t necessarily recommend even cy by adhering to principle, pursuing a goal unrelenting- the latest edition of this famously difficult book to the ly, striving for social justice, and believing that people, unwary, it opened my mind to the idea of music as no matter how far from the seat of power, can change part of cultural history. I entered college intending to their society by changing themselves. become a high-school music teacher, largely because Through Gandhi, I learned that experiences could that was all I knew aside from performance. The be used to reshape oneself. I realized that every cul- notion that music could be studied, like Shakespeare’s ture and society has something to offer and something plays or Monet’s paintings, allowed me to combine to learn. These lessons supplement, and sometimes academic interests with the music that I loved. challenge, that with which I am most familiar and most Of course, Grout is a textbook, so we read it in comfortable. If what I learned from Gandhi did not combination with lectures and an anthology of musi- change my life in a single, blinding flash, it certainly cal works compiled by our teacher. I therefore have to shaped my interests, my goals, and my worldview. n admit that what excited me may well have been the context in which I read the book as much as the book Faith J. Childress is a history professor at Rockhurst itself. Ever since then, I suppose much of my most University. important reading has been a sort of communal act, tied up especially with the act of teaching. Since part of the purpose of this essay is to discuss books others may want to read, I should suggest some perhaps more suitable for an educated lay audience. The Cambridge Opera Handbook series contains many books that serve a broad spectrum of readers; some technical discussion may be a bit difficult for non-musicians, but there is much in this series that does not require specialized musical train- ing. James Hepokoski’s volume on Otello, for instance, has a fascinating discussion of how Arrigo Boito and Giuseppe Verdi developed the libretto from Shakespeare’s play, while Peter Branscombe’s study of Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte has the most nuanced discussion I’ve seen of the relationship of that work to Masonic thought. Susan McClary provides a lucid explanation of the musical languages of Carmen and their interactions, culminating in the annihilation of both Carmen and her music. Sometimes we forget that music does the same cultural work as a novel or film and Rev. Jim Mayzik, S.J. helps students with their projects, Fairfield University. can be studied in similar ways. I challenge you

32 Conversations to pick up a book on a musical topic related to your inter- Tocqueville’s insistence on the pre-conditions of ests. Even if your life isn’t changed, you may find a new democracy (rough equality of conditions, a middle way into a world you thought you knew. n class, separation of powers, an independent judiciary) in their quixotic quest to export democracy to places Alice V. Clark is associate professor and coordinator which lack all such pre-conditions. of music history and literature at Loyola University Much of my own scholarly writing has focused on New Orleans. key motifs in Tocqueville: civil society, the public church, the nexus between religion and morality, a balance between liberty and equality. But, in a more religious sense, I have found Tocqueville’s work help- ful in doing what I like to call “cultural discernment.” The Providential Tocqueville saw democracy as a ’providential fact’, something which would emerge willy-nilly. He knew it Fact had shadow and destructive sides and wrote to coax out its promise. I have recently been teaching and writ- Alexis deTocqueville, Democracy ing about globalization, which I see as a ‘providential in America fact,’ and trying, in the spirit of Tocqueville, to tease out the pre-conditions for a humane rather than a John Coleman predatory globalization. n

ocqueville’s two-volume, Democracy in John Coleman, S.J., is a professor of sociology at America is a book more often cited than truly Loyola Marymount University. read, let alone studied. Like the bible, it allows evocation by people of widely different politi- Tcal stripes.. An often claimed Tocqueville quo- tation, “America is great because America is good” does- n’t actually exist anywhere in its pages. Some commentators evoke Tocqueville as if the Finding a Voice America he described still exists. Who in his right mind from Home would believe that an enlightened foreign visitor would now come, as Tocqueville and his friend Louise Erdrich, Love Medicine Beaumont did in 1831, to study America’s uniquely Eric Gansworth humane prison system, with its emphasis on rehabili- tation? As John Noonan displays, in a tour de force ouise Erdrich’s novel, Love Medicinme, recipi- chapter on Tocqueville in The Lustre of Our Country ent of a National Book Critics Circle Award for there were things about the America of 1831 that Fiction in 1984, was heralded as an intimate Tocqueville either missed or purposely omitted since and sweeping lyrical view of contemporary they did not fit his vision for democracy in France. LAmerican Indian life, exceeding implicit crite- Patently, it was democracy more than a snapshot of ria for fiction of merit, moving its readers with subtle America that Tocqueville sought: “I confess that in portraits of its complex characters, who breathed with America I saw more than America; I sought the image their impassioned lives and familiar heartaches we of democracy itself with its inclinations, its character, each experience. For a majority of readers, it was a trip its prejudices and its passions, in order to learn what into an exotic pocket of this country: reservation life we have to fear or hope from its progress.” through the 20th century, as viewed from within, but Tocqueville saw many shadow sides of America. for me it was a view into a possible life. He thought its capital punishment barbaric. He warned This novel traces the intricate connections among of the anti-democratic instincts of industry, and, after reservation families in North Dakota from the 1930s to 1840 in his letters, he shows strong misgivings about the 1980s with an unflinching yet considered eye, allow- an emerging American imperialism, poor political lead- ing its characters to tell their own necessarily compro- ership and the reckless spirit of American capitalism. mised versions of their life histories and asking the read- Presciently, he wrote: “All those who seek to destroy er to realize we each own our personal stories and that the liberties of a democratic nation ought to know that the burden is on us to understand those narratives. war is the surest and shortest means to accomplish it... I grew up on a reservation not unlike the one “Recently, one of my students lamented that the cur- described in Love Medicine, among equally tumultuous rent administration never seems to have heeded

Conversations 33 people. My family did not value books and, incongru- Drina and the little town of Vishegrad along its banks. ous to my mother’s vehement insistence that I get an He ordered the building of a great bridge that would education, our home contained only a set of outdated make the lives of his people easier. It took seven long encyclopedias and five other books, including one years to build the great stone bridge. As is true of so novel: James Dickey’s Deliverance. I knew some peo- much that is new in life, the new bridge was not antic- ple who had books, and perhaps this is where my ipated fondly by all. Some of those who sought to interest developed. impede its growth paid a terrible price at the hands of I can’t say, really, when I began to love reading, but the Turkish masters. But, as is also often true in life, I found Love Medicine at a critical time in my development the bridge born in blood and strife became the center as a writer. In the middle of writing my first novel, I used of people’s lives. the only model I had known, the work of Stephen King, At the highest point on the great arch there stood his rural settings similar to my environment. However, I a kapia, a wide place where stone seats had been began to realize I was writing about the reservation and carved out. And it was on this kapia that the young its unique culture and that the horror novel trappings played their first games, where later they flirted and were tangential at best. In finding Erdrich’s novel, I came talked of love, where their wedding procession to the understanding that our lives, the lives of contempo- stopped to celebrate, where they debated the town’s rary indigenous people, were as worthy of chronicling great matters over a cup of tea, and where in the end and celebrating as any other. Had I not found, at that par- their funeral procession stopped one last time. ticular time, strong echoes of my family and the ways we The Bridge on the Drina tells the little stories of lived in the world, I might never have tried to go further these people through the centuries. But really these in pursuing writing. I heard Erdrich’s voice, strong and are our stories, our lives, our friends and family. These clear, recognized its celebratory tone and decided then to are the stories that all of us live because we are all real- speak as well, finding the determination to add my voice, ly the same in the end, connected together by bridges as it were, to the chorus of indigenous writers. n seen and unseen, bridges that remind us that life is indeed an incomprehensible marvel. n Eric Gansworth is a novelist and professor at Canisius College. Tim Healy is a retired engineering professor at Santa Clara University. For some wonderful pictures of the bridge see: http://skyscrapercity.com/ showthread.php?t=222505) These Stories are ours Ivo Andric, The Bridge on the Drina Tim Healy

o, on the kapia, between the skies, the river and the hills, generation after generation learnt not to mourn overmuch what the trou- ‘sbled waters had borne away. They entered there into the unconscious philosophy of the town; that life was an incomprehensible marvel, since it was incessantly wasted and spent, yet none the less it last- ed and endured ‘like the bridge on the Drina.’” In 1961 Ivo Andric was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, largely in recognition of his greatest novel, The Bridge on the Drina. The bridge was real. It was born in 1516 in the mind a ten-year old boy, torn from his mother’s arms as part of a blood tribute to the Turkish Court. Decades later the boy, who had become Grand Vezir, remembered the swollen river

34 Conversations Feminist Theology and Educating People for Others: A Personal Perspective

By Tim Wadkins

y wife and riences in the world and partly speak autobiographically, as a I have two because they have different genet- man and as a theological histori- y o u n g ic wiring, tend to interpret reality an at a Jesuit institution, about children. through relational lenses that many how feminist perspectives have Zachary is men find difficult to wear. fundamentally altered and contin- four and It is commendable that the ue to affect how I perceive the Abigail is quantitative rise of women as fac- world, what I teach and write two. It is ulty, administrators and students about, and even how I relate to an understatement to say that they was highlighted in the last issue my wife and children. If my story Mare different. I must admit we of Conversations, particularly is even a small reflection of a larg- were very surprised that they because right up until the mid er narrative being played out at seemed to have come out of the twentieth century women were other Jesuit institutions, it strikes womb with stereotypical gender virtually absent from Jesuit institu- me that feminist perspectives characteristics. It is not just that tions of higher learning. I was have already and will continue to Zach likes Bob the Builder and particularly struck by Barbara J. positively infiltrate, challenge, Abby prefers little Dora. It is rather Busse’s essay on the need for lis- and reshape the way we under- that they often see the same things tening to women and her point take the task of educating men and imagine them differently. that “it is impossible to listen to and women for others. Sometimes Abby likes to play with those not present.” Very true. Mine is not some kind of Zach’s trucks, but unlike her broth- Nevertheless, I was disappointed Pauline conversion story, as er, who delights to see them crash that the issue focused primarily though from the moment that I and pretends that they are armed on quantitative presence rather first encountered feminist theolo- with weapons, she prefers to put than qualitative influence. It said gy I immediately shed the scales little people in them who take almost nothing about how the of patriarchical blindness. But if I trips, and, in two year old glosso- Jesuit educational enterprise has lalia, have lively conversations. been affected by the voices and Watching my daughter I am con- values of feminist scholars. Timothy Wadkins is a theology stantly reminded that women, per- I am certainly not an authori- professor at Canisius College. haps partly because of their expe- ty on these affects. But I can

Conversations 35 Talking Back

have become more feminist, it did begin in a rather abrupt way. In 1988 I was a PhD candidate and an adjunct professor in Santa Clara University’s religious studies pro- gram, hired to teach Introduction to Christian theology. Since I was an historian, I felt rather confident that I could survey the develop- ment of ecclesiastical institutions, the ideas of prominent theolo- gians, and major doctrinal contro- versies, all of which were neatly laid out in such classic texts as Williston Walker’s History of the Christian Church (1918, now in 4th edition). Although I uncon- sciously imagined the Christian tradition, as, in the words of Robert Bellarmine, S.J., primarily “A Company of Men,” I was begin- ning to be aware of the growing complaint by my women col- A student works on a paper at the O’Neil Library, Boston College. leagues that such treatments left out the contributions of women. imagined the world. Reality as we of St. Paul, were tainted by misog- In deference to their concerns, I know it, says Schieiders, is not just yny. But I had never pondered decided to add the recently pub- an empirical given; it is rather a the extent to which the dominant- lished Women and the Word, by dynamic relationship between subservient model derived from Sandra Schneiders from the Jesuit what actually exists and the way patriarchy had become the inter- School of Theology in Berkeley. humans imagine or interpret it. pretive basis for all relational sys- This book is slender in pages but Because of this, human perception tems in Western history: man over it was not slight in its jarring chal- of “the way things are” is greatly woman, parent over child, master lenge to my naïve assumptions affected by experience, and expe- over slave, clergy over parish- about God, Creation, Christ, the riences are not static—they can ioner, teacher over student, cul- Bible, and social reality! change across cultures, between ture over creation, empire over sexes, and over time as new colony, etc. Nor had I ever con- insights replace old ones. sidered the extent to which this Because of feminist Schneiders goes on to say that tra- model had been the basic inter- ditionally, the fundamental per- pretive principle within the Bible insights my attitudes ception of reality in Western histo- and Christian tradition, rendering about the way in which ry was rooted in patriarchy, a mas- God as a male father figure who culine power structure, believed to enjoys absolute power over sub- God relates to the world be created by and permanently servient creation and persons, have changed. fixed by the Divine male patriarch, who bequeaths a son who is the as the way in which all relation- male savior and model of true ships were to be understood. humanity, and who, in turn, What particularly caught my I was not completely numb to places all males over females, and attention was Schneiders’ analysis feminist concerns. I believed that puts some males in charge of all of the imagination in human con- women had been historically mar- lower ranks in the hierarchical structions of reality and her point ginalized by men. I was beginning order of society. that patriarchy has been the major to agree that that some parts of This insight, shared within lens through which the West has the Bible, especially the writings the growing ranks of feminist the-

36 Conversations Talking Back

ologians and liberation theolo- ate the feminist notion of a moth- white men and the West, I have gians at the time, became for me er God who lives in organic unity also begun to think that in the the beginning of what Schneiders with the world — a God who can pedagogical process itself, the would call “a therapy of the imag- be known sacramentally in and professor needs to be de-cen- ination,” challenging, as it did, through and by the creation. This tered. Increasingly, I have opted almost everything I took for natural theology has also enabled for a style of teaching that could granted within Christian history me to face pressing ecological be termed experiential, where the and theology. Since then my the- issues with more theological con- professor is a leader in an other- ological horizons have gradually viction. Can we easily cut up, dig wise egalitarian learning commu- expanded, often because of con- up, bomb, and pour our waste nity and where students are often versations and committee work into a world that embodies God? removed from the classroom and with women colleagues, and Because of feminist insights I from an exclusive reliance on often because of other feminist have also begun, in the words of abstract ideas and immersed in scholars — Rosemary Radford Marcus Borg, to see Jesus again for situations where people actually Reuther, Elizabeth Johnson, Sally the first time. Far different than the practice religion. McFague, Caroline Merchant, traditional image of Jesus—the Caroline Walker Bynum, Elizabeth male savior who complements the Schussler Fiorenza, to name only status quo of male dominance — I want my son to a few. I have not always agreed the Jesus of the synoptic gospels is with them. As with other interpre- a prophet who rails against the sta- learn that real men tive grids, I think feminist theolo- tus quo, and, in doing so, models do not need to gy sometimes fails to see com- a different kind of masculinity. As plexity and reduces everything to Rosemary Reuther points out in dominate and control the patriarchal construction of the her classic essay Can a Male world. Nevertheless, the funda- Savior Save Women?, “Jesus pro- everything they touch. mental insights of feminists about claims an iconoclastic reversal of the pervasive, victimizing effects the system of religious status…The Finally, my understanding of of patriarchy and their articulation leaders of the religious establish- what it means to be a man and a of a more relational and egalitari- ment are blind guides and hyp- father has been stretched. Along an way of looking at the world ocrites. Instead the outcasts of with my wife, who is the primary have been the primary catalysts in society are able to hear the mes- feminist influence on my life, I am my theological, ethical, and peda- sage of the prophet. This reversal trying to raise our children to be gogical development over the of the social order doesn’t just turn “people for others” in attitude and past two decades. hierarchy upside down; it aims at deed—as Christians who are com- a new reality in which hierarchy mitted to the world, who are and dominance are overcome as shaped by egalitarian values of principles of social relations.” radical kindness, and who func- Because of feminist insights tion as creative participants rather my teaching has taken a different than consumers and competitors turn. My survey of the Western in a system of dominance. Not Christian tradition, for example, is only is my teaching increasingly now peppered with critical shaped by this emphasis, I want awareness that the “story” of my son to learn that real men do Christianity was written by and not need to dominate and control ecause of femi- about European white males and everything they touch, that they nist insights my attitudes about their institutions. My teaching can solve conflicts through the the way in which God relates to now includes the underside of values of servant leadership mod- Bthe world have changed. Far this portrait—those who were left eled by Jesus, and that they do more than an aloof, often angry, out of the picture—the poor, not have to employ their toys, transcendent father who domi- women, and most people from pretend or real and dangerous, nates a subservient and neutered the southern hemisphere. If, in for preemptive strikes or as creation, I have begun to appreci- my courses, I now de-center weapons of mass destruction. n

Conversations 37 Talking Back

Gender Matters Expanding the Conversation to Include the Diversity of Women’s Lives and Their Experiences of Inequality

By Laurie M. Joyner

n the spring 2006 must expand to recognize the ships as well as to question how issue of Convers- diversity of women’s lives and the structure and culture of our ations, the issue of their personal experiences of institutions either reinforce or equity as it relates to inequality. If we are to affect the “undo” some of the harmful women in Jesuit lives of women on our campuses effects that have emerged around higher education is we must create an organizational these socially-constructed cate- addressed from mul- climate that: a) recognizes that gories. The importance of under- tiple perspectives. women’s private and public expe- standing the nature of institution- Collectively, these articles docu- riences are diverse based on vari- alized inequality is critical in mentI the progress women have ables such as race, class, age, sex- developing policies that address made in terms of their numerical ual orientation, marital status, and the most pressing needs of all presence on campus and the the presence or absence of chil- women and fulfill the Jesuit establishment of institutional poli- dren; and b) invites our female promise to work in solidarity with cies regarding such matters as colleagues who have experienced marginalized groups within the maternity leave and sexual differential treatment to share their context of an explicit social jus- harassment. However, it remains stories with others across campus tice mission. clear that this presence has not to raise awareness of the harmful translated into women achieving effects of gender inequality. The Actual Lived parity. For example, empirical Experiences of Women evidence in study after study The Diversity of reveals that as faculty rank increases or the power and deci- Women’s Experiences The experiences of women in our sion-making authority connected institutions are profoundly influ- with administrative positions While the significance of gender as enced by organizational culture. increases, the number of our a variable influencing our social Numerous writers have raised female colleagues decreases. relationships and institutional awareness of both overt and sub- Further, the continued existence opportunities, it is clear in the tle discrimination that has had of an earnings gap and the per- pages of the magazine, there is lit- tle attention to the diversity of ception that women face multiple Laurie Joyner is associate dean women’s experiences based on the obstacles to promotion are well of the College of Arts and intersection of other social vari- documented. Sciences at Loyola University ables such as race, class, age, sex- While the articles are excel- New Orleans. She has taught in ual orientation, and family status. lent starting points, discussions the sociology department at Given this, future discussions about the presence, roles, contri- Loyola since 1992 and has should create safe spaces for indi- butions, and challenges facing served in the dean’s office viduals and groups to explore the women in Jesuit higher education since 2003. complexity of these interrelation-

38 Conversations Talking Back

Students studying near the Gallagher Center on the campus of Xavier University.

detrimental effects on women, fessors or administrators being from such opportunities and their productivity, and their referred to by their first names sometimes even questioned chances for advancement. Over while their male counterparts are about their “readiness” for the years, I have become con- routinely referred to by formal advancement. cerned about the differential title; female faculty members treatment of women that often shouldering disproportionate goes unnoticed by both women teaching, advising, and/or service and men because it is viewed as responsibilities; female faculty “normal” or “acceptable.” Authors members being questioned or have highlighted examples of complimented about balancing subtle discrimination that resem- personal and professional com- ble my own conversations with mitments in ways that male col- dozens of female students, staff, leagues escape; female faculty faculty, and administrators members having an emphasis The following examples in placed on their physical appear- isolation might not raise signifi- ance versus their professional ollectively, cant concern but, taken together, competence and accomplish- these examples have powerful illustrate a pattern of women ments; female administrators consequences because they being perceived as less capable locked into support positions; Cundermine women’s confidence and respected than men. pay differences between women and bolster inaccurate percep- Selected examples illustrating and men not easily explained by tions of them being less than the point include: females not discernible differences in educa- capable. No doubt such experi- being credited with comments or tional background, experience, or ences result in talented female suggestions as often as males in performance; and males being colleagues opting out of the acad- public settings; males and females encouraged and/or selected for emy or choosing to play it safe by being differentially evaluated on key administrative roles while never fully bringing themselves or work of similar value; female pro- qualified females are excluded their experiences to the table.

Conversations 39 Talking Back

Ultimately, these outcomes inhibit Such efforts will highlight areas individual development and frus- that must be addressed in order to trate institutional interest in nur- work toward incremental change turing the talents of lay leaders on in an effort to create more campus. humane work environments. In conclusion, this is a call for How Shall We men and women at Jesuit institu- tions to expand the conversation Proceed? about gender equity by exploring the objective and subjective reali- Numerous excellent examples hese groups can ties of diverse women on campus emerged from the spring 2006 heighten awareness of the chal- and then agitating for social Conversations authors in terms of lenges facing women and also change that will assist our col- strategies to address gender Tprovide baseline data from which leagues in fully developing their inequality in higher education. to start program initiatives (e.g., talents to make the greatest contri- The overarching strategy of get- offering faculty development bution to our students, campuses, ting the status of women on the geared toward creating gender- and communities. If success is best institutional agenda strikes me as inclusive classrooms, creating ini- measured by distance traveled, most promising. The creation of tiatives to improve the status of then women have certainly come a broad-based groups representing and support for our female col- long way in higher education. Yet, multiple constituents on campus leagues from recruitment to reten- we are part of the proud and noble with responsibility for systemati- tion and promotion, and monitor- tradition of Jesuit education that cally investigating and reporting ing efforts to ensure that work- calls for a higher standard of suc- on the presence, roles, experi- load distribution and evaluation cess. This standard is nothing short ences, contributions, and distribu- of performance are consistent of fair and equitable treatment for tion of rewards across groups is across faculty and staff members). all women and men. n encouraging.

Jesuit and Feminist Education: Join us in a dynamic dialogue that will enliven and impact our campuses for years to come Transformative Discourses for We invite faculty, students, and administrators from Jesuit universities and colleges to participate in a conference that focuses on how feminism, in dialogue with Jesuit edu- Teaching and cation, can form, inform, and transform each other, our institutions, and the people in them. We will consider questions such as what role do gender and diversity play in Learning Conference Jesuit education, and how might we explore the intersections and methods inherent in Jesuit and feminist pedagogy?

at Fairfield University, Panel topics include: The “Her-Story” of Jesuit Education; Campus Ministry and Women’s Fairfield CT Studies Programs: Discerning Meaning in a Diverse World; Sexual Orientation, Ignatian Pedagogy, and Feminism: A Most Unholy Trinity; and Foreign-Educated Women Faculty: Global Perspectives on Jesuit and Feminist Education. October 27-29, 2006 For further information, please contact the conference organizers: Dr. Jocelyn Boryczka, Politics Department, Fairfield University at [email protected] Keynote Speaker: or Dr. Elizabeth Petrino, English Department, Fairfield University at Dr. M. Shawn Copeland [email protected]. See our website at http://www.fairfield.edu/jfemconf. Associate Professor of Systematic This conference is made possible with the support of The Humanities Institute of Fairfield University. Theology, Boston College Book Review

WONDERFULLY UNTRANSLATABLE EXCHANGES A Student’s Guide to the Liberal Arts Edited by Wilburn Stancil

Rockhurst University Press, $35 cloth, $20 paper By Mark Mossa, S.J.

hose who have taught college freshmen know the diverse chal- lenges that can come with that e n d e a v o r . Despite the fact that the SAT scores of the students Twe accept may be higher, the kind of preparation we can presume them to have seems harder and harder to predict. Thus, as Wilburn Stancil notes in the preface to A Student’s Guide to the Liberal Arts, “Approximately three-quarters of all American colleges and universities have some type of first-year seminar for freshmen.” This collection of essays, edited by Wilburn Stancil, is meant for just such a seminar. An Bill Abbott & Kathryn Nantz co-teach an honors class at Fairfield University. introduction to the liberal arts, it includes thirteen essays by scholars which led to the formation of fresh- readings, when more might indeed who each address one of the liberal man seminars in the first place. be expected of the students. As a arts disciplines, considering commu- Schall immediately launches into a remedy, the might simply switch nications, psychology, religion, polit- discussion that involves Crito, Plato, Schall’s introduction with Stancil’s ical and social science, mathematics Socrates, Callicles, Gorgias and and the other major disciplines of philosophical eros, presuming a the liberal arts curriculum today. level of knowledge and sophistica- Mark Mossa, S.J., student at Though I wish ultimately to rec- tion which, unfortunately, we can Weston Jesuit School of Theology in ommend the book, I must point out no longer presume of our freshmen. Cambridge, MA, has taught intro- what I take to be its immediate Rather than engender enthusi- duction to English composition & handicap for the type of seminar for asm, this dizzying survey of philos- literature to college freshmen, and which it is intended—the introduc- ophy, history, metaphysics, ethics, more recently taught introductory tory chapter by James V. Schall. and oratory is likely to be discour- philosophy courses at Loyola Entitled “What Are the Liberal Arts,” aging. This chapter would better be University in New Orleans. it is emblematic of the tension placed at the conclusion of the

Conversations 41 Book Review

far less daunting conclusion. This well as some important caveats essays. Those who enjoy the pas- is also indicative of something regarding their use. sionate approach of Madigan will which instructors must be aware As for the essays, each is well- be drawn also to the essays on of in using this book. The essays written, taking a variety of music and art history (by C. Randall included in the book draw heavi- approaches to the virtues of a Bradley and Roger C. Aikin, respec- ly—though not exclusively—on given discipline, and offering a tively). Those who prefer a more classical and medieval sources strong sense of their interconnect- dispassionate clarity will be drawn like Plato, Aristotle, and edness. This is the book’s greatest in by the essays by Robert D. Augustine. Some faculty members virtue. In addition, the essays are Hamner (literature), Joseph W. will have to bone up on their own sufficiently dissimilar to appeal to Koterski (philosophy), and Trudy understanding of the classical tra- students of various learning styles, A. Dickneider (science). dition to make use of it. while still managing to answer the I expect that this would not question: Why on earth would I be used as a stand-alone text. First want to study that? My favorite, of all, because it fails to address and one that is likely to have itself directly to the virtues of broad appeal among students, is careful reading and writing neces- M. Kathleen Madigan’s essay on sary to the liberal arts (and often “The Study of Language.” It made sorely lacking in students). me eager to study another lan- Secondly, it has the limitations of guage! She shares passionately an introduction. Hamner’s litera- “How I Fell In Love With ture essay, for example, while a Languages” and offers a challenge fine introduction to literary inter- eeping “to think of your study of lan- pretation, offers almost no con- this in mind, this guide is never- guages as a lifetime journey which crete examples of fiction or poet- theless quite appealing. Among its will transform you and increase ry. Additional resources will be appealsK is the obviously con- your understanding of your own needed to sufficiently engage the scious effort to make students language and culture, while merits of this volume. Nonethe- aware of some of the internet enabling you to enter into wonder- less, this is a fine introduction to resources in each field. Each fully untranslatable exchanges with the liberal arts (and among the chapter includes a list of both others.” This, in some ways, sums few of its kind). And what espe- print and electronic resources, as up the message of each of these cially recommends this volume is the striking way in which its essays complement one another. Only the most stubborn of stu- dents will be able to close this book unconvinced of the rele- vance of the liberal arts to their studies and their lives. n

Political Science Professor/Chair, Dr. Jon Ray, leads a discussion among Xavier University students.

42 Conversations Book Review

Jesuit Postmodern: Scholarship, Vocation, and Identity in the 21st Century Francis X. Clooney, S.J. (ed.)

Lexington Books (Rowman & Littlefield), 2006. 220 pp. $24.95. By Ronald Modras

ike Tertullian, generations of Jesuits.” That invi- shared purpose that rises above who asked, “What tation initiated a project entitled platitudes. Does “educating men has Athens to do “Jesuit scholarship in a and women for others” require with Jerusalem?” Postmodern Age,” a series of con- hiring faculty cognizant of the reader may versations lasting several years Catholic social teaching for cours- ask, what does whose purpose was to spell out es in business or economics, he Jesuit have to do and explore some of the implica- asks. (Why not? this reviewer with postmod- tions of postmodernism for Jesuit responded.) ernism? Unlike Tertullian, whose scholars and Jesuit education. Certainly Clooney is correct in answerL was a terse nothing, the Eight of the essays in this col- pointing out that our institutional contributors to this collection lection originated out of that con- mission statements no longer answer with an extended conver- versation, one written by an include the classical Ignatian sation. Conversation about their English professor, four by philoso- objective of helping our students personal and professional lives phers, and three by theologians. A to save their souls. A widely and about their identity as Jesuits ninth consists of a rejoinder by a respected scholar of Hinduism, and scholars in an era, quite dif- sympathetic but critical non-par- Clooney is also painfully aware of ferent they argue, from that of ticipant at Saint Louis University, how “other” he has become from even forty years ago. Conversa- William Rehg, who assures read- his patron saint and subsequent tions about mission and identity ers in an epilogue that none of his Jesuit forebears, whose conversa- are commonplace on Jesuit cam- fellow Jesuit contributors is taint- tions with non-Christians were puses these days, and most read- ed with the full-blown skepticism conversionary in intent and ers of this journal have engaged in that is usually associated with whose study of other religions them at one time or another. But postmodernism. Rehg’s critique was for the sake of an apologetic few of us have done so with the comes as a good turn in a time one-upmanship. But he also per- critical intensity and soul-search- when the antennae of Vatican ceives a disconnect between the ing of the authors represented in censors are sensitive to the slight- postmodern participants in this Jesuit Postmodern. est intimation of relativism. conversation and the administra- It all began around 1990, Why the authors describe tors and public relations officers when Ronald Anderson and themselves as postmodern is not who represent Jesuit education to Francis X. Clooney invited fellow argued so much as demonstrated the public, sensing that the two Jesuits in and around Boston by the diversity of their personal groups, though friendly enough, College to grapple with the mean- and professional lives and per- ing of their “intellectual aposto- spectives. Their emphasis is on Ronald Modras author of late” in a situation in which Jesuits the particulars and a particularity Ignatian Humanism, is a work in institutions no longer that, as Clooney maintains in his theology professor at Saint their own and in “worlds marked- introduction, make it difficult if Louis University. ly different from those of previous not impossible to speak of a

Conversations 43 Book Review

Liturgist Bruce Merrill remi- nisces about how attending Mass in a massive 1850s neo-gothic church as a youngster charged his nascent faith-life with a sense of tragedy and beauty; both qualities now characterize how he sees theology and liturgy amidst the “ruins” of pre-Vatican II cultural Catholicism. As someone who grew up in a German-Jewish neighborhood in northern Manhattan, James Bernauer reflects on the Nazi persecution of Jewish and gay people, the inac- tion (complicity?) of Catholic lead- ership, and the call G.C. 34 made for Jesuit participation in Jewish- Christian dialogue. Ronald Rev. Jeffrey von Arx, S.J. reads to students at the Bryant School in Bridgeport, Anderson connects his émigré CT . Fairfield University staff and students were part of the Read Aloud Day at experiences leaving first New Bryant School. Zealand and then Australia with are “vaguely disappointing to one appealing to the reader’s analo- his negotiation of Jesuit spirituality another.” gous experiences, all the while with the study of particle physics. In an endnote (no less!), the- allowing other views to also claim The diversity suggested by ologian Roger Haight sums up the some truth. even these brief descriptions warrant for the postmodern self- demonstrate the point the authors descriptive. In contrast to univer- wish to make. Yet, despite their sal reason admired by apparent lack of coherence, there Enlightenment modernity, post- is a motif that runs through all of modernism views all ideas and them. As Rehg points out in his values as tied to a particular time epilogue, all the narratives exem- in history. Modern philosophy plify the commitment to dialogue, focused on the abstract individual articulated at G.C. 34 as critical to subject, whereas postmodernism Jesuit mission and identity, dia- is much more attentive to the soci- logue with other religions and dia- ology of knowledge and group logue with contemporary culture. bias. Postmodern respect for per- rthur Madigan Jesuit Postmodern is worth a spective threatens universal and William Stempsey are both read, especially by Jesuit faculty claims made for overarching philosophers, but Madigan asks and administrators but by their non- essences (like nature and natural questionsA out of his Aristotelian Jesuit colleagues as well. Mission law) just as globalization threatens studies instead of laying down and identity officers might also the local standards and norms of definitive conclusions; Stempsey want to suggest making it the topic traditional cultures compelled to reflects on the peculiarity of his of a campus conversation. If ours is rub up against and interact with position as a Jesuit physician and a postmodern culture, we need to one another. Haight also explains philosopher who thinks about the talk about it. Postmodernism does how the autobiographical refer- value judgments that go into a not have to be relativistic, but it def- ences in all the narratives can be medical diagnosis. In “A Tale of initely is dialogic. n more persuasive than a logical Two Comings Out,” English litera- argument in accounting for a posi- ture professor Thomas Brennan tion; biography permits the discusses how teaching a text, he authors to make general claims by himself can become a text.

44 Conversations MEMBERS OF THE NATIONAL SEMINAR ON JESUIT HIGHER EDUCATION

Sarah van den Berg is professor of English at Saint Louis University, Saint Louis, Missouri. Joseph J. Feeney, S.J., is professor of English at Saint Joseph’s University. Laurie M. Joyner is associate dean, College of Arts and Sciences at Loyola University, New Orleans. Stephen R. Kuder, S.J., is director of the honors program at Gonzaga University, Spokane, Washington. Cheryl C. Munday is professor of psychology at University of Detroit-Mercy, Detroit, Michigan. John J. O’Callaghan, S.J., chairman, is chaplain at the Stritch School of Medicine, Loyola University, Chicago, Illinois. Raymond A. Schroth, S.J., editor, is Jesuit community professor of humanities at Saint Peter’s College, Jersey City, New Jersey. Wilburn T. Stancil is associate professor of theology at Rockhurst University, Kansas City, Missouri. Anne Walsh, R.S.H.M., is mistress of Queen’s Court Resident College and assistant academic adviser for student athletes at Fordham University, Bronx, New York. Timothy H. Wadkins is associate professor of religious studies at Canisius College. Charles T. Phipps, S.J., secretary, is a professor of English at Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, California.

A Note to Contributors COMING UP The next issue, January 2007, will examine the “disconnect” HOW THE SEMINAR WORKS & HOW TO between the two cultures: that proposed by the ideals of WRITE FOR US Jesuit education and that it which the students live. The Seminar plans each of the two annual issues during its Topics under discussion. three annual meetings, each at a different Jesuit college or Philosophy and Theology were once the center of the university. For the most part, an issue focuses on one theme; traditional Jesuit education. Have they faded? Has religious but, at the same time, through the various departments — let- studies replaced theology? Does anyone teach Thomism? ters, Talking Back, occasional forums, other articles, and book reviews — there are opportunities to keep the conver- “Physicality” — the education of the whole person. Can sation going on a variety of concerns. we integrate mind, spirit, and body in the same curriculum? Our ten Seminar members come from across the spec- trum of our colleges and universities, representing varied aca- demic disciplines and a broad range of experience with the HOW TO WRITE FOR US Jesuit educational tradition. The themes we choose to Please keep the article to fewer than 3000 words. Do NOT explore come out of our common reflection on that experi- include footnotes. Incorporate any references into the text. ence and from the discussions we hold with faculty, admin- Please, DON’T capitalize: chairman of the biology depart- istrators, staff, and students as we rotate among our schools. ment, names of committees, or administrative titles, unless So, although most of the major articles are commissioned the title precedes the name, as in President Woodrow by the Seminar, we welcome unsolicited articles from the Wilson. We welcome photographs, fully captioned, readers. Ideally, they should be written to explore an idea preferably action rather than posed shots. Preferable format: which will generate discussion rather than describe a news- a CD containing digital images scanned at not less than 300 worthy project at one’s institution. Please understand that, dpi. Or a traditional print. since the Seminar meets only three times a year, it may take several months for each issue to take shape. Send the article both as a MicrosoftWORD:mac attachment to [email protected] and in hard copy to the editor RAS, sj at Saint Peter’s College. Georgetown University Washington, DC, 1789 Saint Louis University Saint Louis, 1818 Spring Hill College Mobile, 1830 Xavier University Cincinnati, 1831 Fordham University New York, 1841 College of the Holy Cross Worcester, 1843 Saint Joseph’s University Philadelphia, 1851 Santa Clara University Santa Clara, 1851 Loyola College in Maryland Baltimore, 1852 University of San Francisco San Francisco, 1855 Boston College Boston, 1863 Canisius College Buffalo, 1870 Loyola University Chicago Chicago, 1870 Saint Peter’s College Jersey City, 1872 University of Detroit-Mercy Detroit, 1877 Regis University Denver, 1877 Creighton University Omaha, 1878 Marquette University Milwaukee, 1881 John Carroll University Cleveland, 1886 Gonzaga University Spokane, 1887 University of Scranton Scranton, 1888 Seattle University Seattle, 1891 Rockhurst University Kansas City, 1910 Loyola University New Orleans New Orleans, 1912 Loyola Marymount University Los Angeles, 1914 Weston Jesuit School of Theology Cambridge, 1922 Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley Berkeley, 1934 Fairfield University Fairfield, 1942 Le Moyne College Syracuse, 1946 A statue of St. Ignatius Loyola on the campus of Xavier University. Wheeling Jesuit University Photo: Jason D. Geil. Wheeling, 1954