Word: insistences
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Time and time again, the effort to assert these differences, particularly in institutions that precisely insist upon certain assumptions of universality, has been met by strong backlash and not a little anxiety. From Professor Thernstrom's railings to William Cole's reactionary tirades, the signs of conservative distress are apparent. That those who call for "reopening" debate so often seem to have controlled the debate all along is an irony not without consequence. It reminds us that the slogan "politically correct" has come to identify the correcting discipline of the politically powerful...
...governments are also reinstituting preferred names and spellings that accord with their languages: not every republic now uses the Cyrillic alphabet from which the English versions are transliterated. So Belorussia is now Belarus, Moldavia is Moldova, Kirghizia is Kyrgyzstan. Belarus says its capital is Mensk, not Minsk, and Ukrainians insist that Lvov is Lviv...
Schools and hospitals are functioning, although teachers and nurses are in short supply. The Iraqis stripped hospitals of medical equipment, but most of it has been replaced. Kuwaiti allegations that Iraqi soldiers killed premature babies by throwing them out of incubators may have been exaggerated, but doctors insist that an incubator shortage did cause the death of some newborns...
...insist and insist again, by Vague Generalities. We abhor V.G.s, we skim right past them, we start wondering what kind of C to give from the first V.G. we encounter; and as they pile up, we decide C: (Harvard being Harvard, one does not give Ds. Consider C- a failure.) Why? Not because they are a sign the student does not know the material, or hasn't thought creatively, or any of that folly. They simply make tedious reading. "Locke is a transitional figure." "The whole thing boils down to human rights." Now I ask you, I have 92 blue...
...brand of deodorant, the titles of six poems in a row, even an occasional date. This, son, makes for interesting reading, and that is what gets As. Underline them, capitalize them, insert them in outline form: be sure we don't miss them. Why do you think all exams insist at the top, "Illustrate;" "Be Specific;" etc? They mean it. The illustrations, of course, need not be singularly relevant; but they must be there. If Vague Generalities are anathema, sparkling chips of concrete scattered throughout your blue book will have you up for sainthood. Or at least Dean's list...