First, I have realized today more than ever that by choosing the library profession I have chosen a profession that is (for the most part) very liberal indeed. Very. And I have yet to decide how I feel about that, although I actually do like the feeling of stretching my previous conceptions about what the world is like and how it operates. I just am not quite sure how to strike the balance between previously held systems of thought and new perceptions or thoughts that I'm being introduced to. (And no, I'm not about to go off and join a gay and lesbian student coalition, but I'm learning to recognize more the right that others have to belong to such organizations. (And that totally just made me sound like a stuck-up prick.))
Second, my class today caused me to realize (or rather re-realize, because I've realized this before; I'd just forgotten about it) that higher education (at least the bits I've been exposed to) does not consist of attending lectures and gathering information about a particular subject, or at least that's not it's real purpose. You go to college or grad school to learn how to think.
I have to say: I love that. What I hate is that I personally haven't quite learned how to think, as evidenced by my class this evening. (Won't go into details. They're pretty nebulous anyway.) But I'm hopeful that I'll improve. Which is, I guess, what this is all about anyway.
1 comment:
I imbibed a lot of facts during my twenty-one years of formal education, but the most important thing I learned--as you say--was how to think and analyze more effectively.
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