Teaching English in a Nuclear Age
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DOCUMENT RESUME ED 257 082 CS 208 903 AUTHOR Davis, Ken, Ed. 1ITLE Teaching English ina Nuclear Age. INSTITUTION Kentucky Council of Teachers of English. PUB DATE 85 NOTE 108p. AVAILABLE FROMNational Council of Teachers of English,1111 Kenyon Rd., Urbana, IL 61801 (Stock No. 50713,$3.00 member, $3.50 nonmember). PUB TYPE Collected Works - Serials (022) JOURNAL CIT Kentucky English Bulletin; v34 n2 Win 1984-85 EDRS PRICE MF01/PC05 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS Curriculum; *English Curriculum; *English Instruction; Higher Education; Literature Appreciation; *Nuclear Energy; NuclearTechnology; *Nuclear Warfare; *Social Problems; TeachingMethods; Writing Instruction ABSTRACT Various aspects of teaching English ina nuclear age is the focus of the 13 articles inthis journal. Titles of the articles are as follows: (1) "TheFuture? Educating about the Nuclear Arms Race"; (2) "Nuclear Arms in a University EnglishClass"; (3) "Prospectus for a Course on War, Peace, and Apocalypsein Western Thought and Literature";(4) "Teaching the Unthinkable"; (5) "Hope for a Hopeless Situation"; (6) "TeachingChaucer in a Nuclear Age"; (7) "Some Observationson Teaching English in a Nuclear Age"; (8) "Resurrecting Relevance in the CompositionClassroom"; (9) "Nuclear Weapons in the Composition Classroom ";(10) "Nukespeak"; (11) The American Media and the Nuclear Threat"; (12)"An Annotated Bibliography of Nuclear Fiction'; and (13)"Poetry of the Nuclear Age: A Checklist." (DF) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRSare the best that can be made from the original document. *********************************************************************** PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS MATE R1A HA', BE EN GRANTED BY h W.1).1v l s to) THEE DT,( A TIONAL SOURC.P.., U S DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION 04,(rittrit (0 (010:AtiOry trN,JF oc,d4A 1 ION t;E N TER 'EPIC TEACHING ENGLISH IN A NUCLEAR AGE Vol, 34 Winter 19814-85 No. 2 P.he KentucKv Council .)f. Teacher.; of English KENTUCKY ENGLISH BULLETIN Volume 34 Winter 1984-85 Number 2 Introductions Teaching English in a Nuclear Age 3 The Future? Educating About the Nuclear Arms Race Sam Totten 5 Nuclear Arms in a University English Class Barbara Eckstein 13 Prospectus for a Course on War, Peace, and Apocalypse in Western Thought and Literature Dick Ringler 23 Teaching the Unthinkable Alice Budge 29 Hope for a Hopeless Situation Beverly E. Trail 34 Teaching Chaucer in a Nuclear Age Michael Foley 37 Some Observations on Teaching English in a Nuclear Age Sandi Albertson 44 Resurrecting Relevance in the Composition Classroom Peggy Stamon 49 Nuclear Weapons in the Composition Classroom Michael E. Gorman and George P.E. Meese 54 Nukespeak Daniel L. Zina 74 the American Media and the Nuclear Threat Robert D. Woodward . ............ 85 An Annotated Bibliography of Nuclear Fiction Sam Totten 93 Poetry of the Nuclear Age: A Checklist Carol Rainey 101 EDITOR: Ken Davis, University of Kentucky ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Fran Helphinstine, Morehead State University The Kentucky English Bulletin is published by the Kentucky Council of Teachers of English, with the cooperation and assistance of the Department of English, College of Arts and Sciences, University of Kentucky. Subscription is included in KCT2 membership dues ($6), which should be sent to Ruth Redel, Elizabethtown Community College, Elizabethtown, KY 42701. The Kentucky English Bulletin is a member of the NCTE Information Exchange Agreement. KCTE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE President:Fred Cornelius, Murray State University Vice President: Linda Johnson, Highlands High School, Ft. Thomas Secretary: Ernestine Jennings, Shelby County High School; Treasurer: Ruth Redel, Elizabethtown Community College NCTE Liaison Officer: George Newell, University of Kentucky Vice President, Colleges:G. Ronald Dobler, Morehead State University Vice President, Secondary Schools Helen B. Heil, Holmes High School, Covington Vice President, Elementary Schools:Rozellen Griggs, Samuel Woodfill School, Ft. Thomas Executive Secretary: Gretchen Niva, Western Kentucky University -2- . fr. C) . INTRODUCTION:. TEACHING ENGLISHIN A NUCLEAR AGE In his book The Hundredth Monkey(St. Mary, Ky.:Vision Books, 1982), Kentuckian Ken Keyes,Jr., recounts a fascinating story. in 1952, on the Japanese. island ofKoshima, scientists began giving MIMICe fuscata monkeyssweat potatoes. The potatoes, however, were sandy and thus somewhatunpleasant to eat.Then one young female found a way to solve thisproblem, by washing her potatoes in a stream. She taught the procedure to her mother and to her playmates, who inturn taught their mothers.During the next six years, the innovationspread slowly throughout the monkeys of the island. Then, Keyes reports, Something startling took place.In the autumn of 1958, a certain number of Koshlmamonkeys were washing sweet potatoes--the exact number isnot known. Let us suppose that when the sun rose one :sorbingthere were 99 monkeys on Koshima Island who had learned to wash their sweet potatoes. Let's further suppose that later that morning, the hundredthmonkey learned to wash potatoes. THEN IT HAPPENED! By that evening almosteveryone in the tribe was washing sweet potatoes beforeeating them. The added energy of this hundredthmonkey somehow created an ideological breakthrough! But notice. The most surprising thik.,1 ob3erved by these scientists was that the habit ofwashing sweet potatoes then spontaneously jumpedover the sea--Colonies of monkeys on other islandsand the -3- I. KENTUCKY ENGLISH BULLE Mainland troop of monkeys at Takasakiyamabegan washing their sweet potatoes! (14-16) So it is, says Keyes, with any social innovation.When a certain critical mass of people reacha new awareness, suddenly that awareness seems to be shared by almosteveryone. The classroom teacher) who appear in this issue of the Kentucky English Bulletin are workingto help their students achieve new awareness of the. problem ofnuclear war. In this work;'they stand in a long tradition ofteaching about such prbblems as environmental destruction, racism,and sexism. Teaching about such issues, of course, hasnever beei easy and has never gone unchallenged. But it has worked: slivery, for example, long regarded asa natural and inevitable fact of life, was abolished in this country--indeed throughout post oftae world--partly through the efforts of concerned,courageous . teachers. Today, English teachers, like others, are'beginningto realize that unless the problem of nuclearwar is solved, the solution of all other problems may be futile. Consider: as you read this very paragraph, missilesmay be already in the air, carrying weapons that can bring about the total extinction of the human race and its creations, in all their loveliness and majesty- -from the plays of Shakespeare to that first groping sentence of a first-grader. And that's why English teachers- - and everyone else--must be concerned. The articles in this issue offer ways for English teachers to put that concern to work. Perhaps you, or one of your students, can be the hundredth monkey. --Ken Davis 6 Ih THE FUTURE? EDUCATING ABOUT THE NUCLEAR ARMSRACE Sam .Tutted, Columbia Univirsity What does it mean to design a new treatment for heart attack victims if all the people'are going to be killed in the next twenty years in a nuclear war? The speaker, Dr. James Muller, an assistant professor of cardiology at Harvard Medical School, and one of the four co- founders of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), is not a fatalist,'but a realist. Well aware of the horrific medical consequences of a nuclear war, he is devoting an egtraordinary amount of time working toward a world free of nuclear weapons. Perhaps it will be easier to understand Dr. Muller's concern after reading this brief passage from John Hersey's Hiroshima: When be had penetrated the bushes, he saw there were about 20 men, and they were all in exactly the same nightmarish state: their faces were wholly burned, their eyes had run down their cheeks.... Their mouths were mere swollen pus-covered wounds, which they could not bear to stretch enough to admit the spout of the teapot. So Father Kleinsorge got a large piece of grass -nd drew ouc the stem so as to make a straw and ,e them all watet to drink that way.! -5- KENTUCKY ENGLISH BULLETIN . Horrible as that scene is, it doesnot p Jeoper medical consequences of a city full of such , possibly millions of them. If a small (by today's standa.-).bomb, a, one-megaton bomb, which is SO timesmore powerful Wan the ova . dropped. on Hiroshima, were droppedon an American city, the destruction Would be far more devastating thantaat eXperienc,d by Hiroshima. Howard Hiatt, M.D., dean of the Harvard S-hool of Public Health, professor of medicineat Harvard Medical .School, and also a member of Physiciansfor Social Responsibility, a group whose explicit purpose is to educate abouttht dangers. of nuclear weapons and nuclearwar, succinctly outlines the medical consequences of such esituationt With a decimated professional community,physical facilities largely in ruins, anda complete disruption of communications, the task of treatingthe wounded will be hopeless. If you have any doubts,you will understand my use of the'term hopeless ifter I describe a 20-year old man who was recently a' patient in the burnunit of one of Boston's teaching hospitals.lie had been .in an automobile accident in which the gasolinetank exploded, and had incurred very extensive third-degree . burns. During his hospitalization', he received 281 units of fresh-frozen plasma, 147'units offresh- frozen blood cells, 37 units.of platelets, and 36 units of albumin. He underWent six operative procedures, during which wounds involving 85percent of his body surface were closed with homograft, cadaver allograft, and aftifical skin. Despite these heroic measures, which stretched the resources of one of the country'smost compre- hensive medical institutions, the man diedon his 33rd hospital day. His injuries were likened by the person who supervised his care to those described for many of the victims of the Hiroshima bomb. Keeping that one patient alive for 33 days required the extraordinary resources ofone of the world's major medical centers.