Word: exonians
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...more adequate explanation centers around the generally recognized arrogance of these Exeter students. The Exonian is not impressed by anything or anybody. He exudes sophistication from the moment that he enters his freshman dorm. He is, after all, better than his fellows, for he has been to Exeter...
...reason is that the Exonian soon discovers that the graduate student is not as good a teacher as the Exeter faculty member with ten or twenty years experience. He is likely to conclude from this that this graduate student can teach him nothing. He also notices that his grades are not consistently related to any observable quality of his work except penmanship. He therefore concludes that these grades are meaningless and arbitrary. Both theories contain just enough truth to make them a useful raft for his sinking self confidence...
...syndrome is not restricted to anti-academic values. For while the Exonian rejects the academic, he places amazing emphasis on intellectual sophistication, subjectively defined. He feels that he is different from his classmates, and he treasures this distinction. Yet the only real difference is that he is a little older intellectually. In order to feel really different he must forget what he was like but a year before. When a classmate discovers that the truth is not always in the Bible, or that the devil did not invent Communism, the Exonian's feelings are akin to those of an older...
...effort to remain apart from his classmates comes, then, from his precarious hold on superiority. The Exonian's intellectual feelings are not unlike those of the nouveau riche. Both are seeking to prove that they have already got what only passing years can bring, while constantly afraid that their inferiors will refute the claim to superior status...
First, Exeter is more like Harvard than any other school. The Exonian, having reached the top of a very select and highly competitive group after four years of struggle, is reluctant to admit that he is on the bottom of the pile again. While he is no different from his classmates in this respect, he finds it easier to avoid recognizing his new lowly position...