[lbo-talk] One Michael Moore is worth a hundred cult-crit

Charles Brown cbrown at michiganlegal.org
Sun Aug 22 07:43:31 PDT 2004


Isn't practice the ultimate test of whether theory is true ? Isn't theory the means and practice the end ?

Charles

From: "Dennis Redmond"


> One Michael Moore is worth a hundred cult-crit professors
> by John Lacny
> But where I come from, theory is supposed to flow from practice

Not necessarily. Sometimes it flows from other theories, sometimes from situations where there is no practice.


> and I
> think it's high time that our theorists and thinkers on the left also made
> themselves useful to grassroots movements

As much as I bash mainstream academia for being worthless, sinecured and clueless, I have to disagree. Theory should not and cannot be useful. Theory should critique -- which means, grappling with what exists. (Sometimes that will be useful to a campaign, sometimes not.) The academic norm is already frightening close to the ethos of "being useful" - it's called the corporate university, where everything is measured by enrollments and tuition dollars.

If you teach three classes a quarter, you're feeding 360 young minds a year with vital information, narratives, stories, concepts, etc. they otherwise would never have. That could be just as revolutionary an act as an anti-war demo, or organizing a union.

-- DRR



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