Marianne Moore once said that she was punishing certain
politicians "by not thinking about them." That's the way I've
punished Martin Heidegger. It was the only way I could punish him. He was a philosopher. I was a teacher of English
composition in a public school. I wasn't capable of getting back at him for
confusing my students but I was capable of dismissing him from my thoughts and
my classroom. His fame as one of the great minds of the twentieth century would
stop right there.
As if he would care. In Heidegger's view the public I speak
for is a negligible quantity. My students and I are "practical agents,
concerned about [our] projects in the world," and have "forgotten the
basic question of what it is to exist, what the nature of Being is"
(Wikipedia, condensed). A philosopher discrediting one of his ideas might pain
Heidegger but a writing teacher dismissing them? Never.
So you can understand a writing teacher's pleasure when he
finds a philosopher discrediting a Heideggerian idea on the same ground he
dismisses it. I am thinking of Rudolf Carnap showing Heidegger's word
"Being" to be meaningless and of myself dismissing big words in a
freshman theme.
Carnap and I come together over our demand that a writer
have something clearly in mind when he uses a word. My new freshmen used big
words because they thought readers up at the university were too smart, too
intellectual, for the ordinary words they knew the meanings of. After they
found themselves unable to tell their teacher what, exactly, they had in mind
they started to get rid of them. I was unable — I mean unwilling to work hard
enough — to say what Heidegger had in mind when he used "Being" but
when Carnap challenged him to use it clearly in a proper sentence I heard
myself. We, a graduate student teaching English Composition and a leading
logical positivist, were brothers in the same fight.
What a strange fight it has turned out to be, though, in my
part of the field. It's a dismissal contest. Heidegger dismisses the public and
the practical projects I help it with and I, in the name of the public, dismiss
him. Who names a winner? The audience? "The applause meter
shows...Composition Teachers!" Appointed judges? "We find that you,
German philosopher, have dissed the American public more effectively than they
dissed you. You win the medal." There can be no winner. It's a Caucus
Race.
That could be philosophically disturbing, seeing such
contrary dismissals in one academic tradition, but composition teachers won't
give it much thought. No more than
they'll cudgel their brains trying to figure out what Heidegger means. There are so many more important things
to worry about.
What's important? Going to war is important. Invading a
country, that project, is important. Not knowing exactly what you have in mind,
what your words refer to, who your enemy is, what his capabilities are, what
courses of action are open to you, that's important. All the things students
have to learn in order play their part — as speakers, as writers, as disputants
— in preserving a democratic society are important.
So teaching English composition is important. Teaching the
argumentative essay is extremely important. "Cite evidence, anticipate
objections, watch out for absolute generalizations, beware of catch-all explanations,
don't evade the question, don't sneer" (the main commands in the argument
section of the textbook I used) are the most important commands teachers can
give if they want their students to take part in the debate that guides and
preserves their country.
So it shouldn't surprise us that they don't worry much about
the dismissal contest with Heidegger. The only thing that might make victory in
it important to composition teachers is his influence on students. Do they
relate to him in any way?
I think that once upon a time students did have a
relationship with Heidegger. It was exciting. Now I think they're probably more
like people at the end of an open marriage: "We have one but, you know,
who has the energy?"
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