Prof. Paglia is one of the very few American scholars who has the language skills, historical savvy, and cultural with-it-ness to pen this sweeping missive.
The opening salvo: "Education has failed to adjust to the massive transformation in Western culture since the rise of electronic media."
I read the first two pages - aloud - to the Ironman, and we had a spirited discussion about several of Camille's points (which are mostly aimed at products of pub ed and higher ed). However, we agreed that the mass media - in, at least, one of its forms - continues to be a Herculean force in the lives of almost everyone we encounter. For us - as folks who enjoy the simple life - the never-ending challenge is how to use the medium without being enslaved by it or overestimating its value to society. For the young, however, it's an entirely different matter.
As Camille put it: "Education must strengthen and discipline the process of visual attention. Today's young have a modest, flexible, chameleonlike ability to handle or deflect the overwhelming pressure of sensory stimuli, but perhaps at a cost to their sense of personal identity."
