From: kcalder@blueyonder.co.uk   
      
   In message <3f551982_3@mk-nntp-1.news.uk.worldonline.com>, fish   
    writes   
      
   >Has anyone else ever used Neuromancer as a book to study, and been   
   >discredited for choosing the diamond in the rough, instead of something like   
   >Brave New World?   
      
   I wrote on BNW as part of my degree syllabus and on Neuromancer in high   
   school.  I don't think it would have worked so well the other way   
   around.   
      
   BNW simply *suits* uni-type-academic type study better than N.   
      
   It fits more comfortably into the canon, and the canon of literary   
   theory.   
      
   (That said, on the first day of the tutorials on the novel I turned up   
   at the classroom just in time to hear my class-mates unanimously   
   agreeing that science fiction shouldn't be taught at uni level at all,   
   even though this particular course was dealing specifically with   
   politics and propaganda in relation to 30's era novels!)   
      
   You can do more intellectual stuff with it in uni-level essays.   
      
   The thing you (and some other posters in this thread) have to realise is   
   that there are lots of sets of criteria for judging the worth of   
   literary texts and the English Lit. institution, being fairly well   
   established comes with its own predetermined set.  The way that most   
   English Lit. degree courses approach literature will probably involve   
   favouring BNW over N.   
      
   If you don't like the way the academic institutions approach literature,   
   and aren't willing to get into it, then stay away from academia!   
      
   Seriously, you will ruin it for those who want to get with the program   
   and learn stuff. Unfortunately there isn't enough time in the academic   
   year to get the necessary work done and sit and listen to tutors and   
   lecturers get bogged down responding to every possible objection a   
   student could possibly have to the choice of course material.  Why even   
   pick a course that has material on it that you explicitly object to   
   learning about?  I did a special author course on Virginia Woolf and on   
   the first day one student admitted that they hated her and her novels!   
   Madness!   
      
   Once you get to post-grad level you will have plenty time for arguing   
   with the institution, but don't expect profs. to take your ideas   
   seriously until you have done the work.  And don't hate them for not   
   taking you seriously either, until you have done the work, they have no   
   way of telling you from any of the other 50 students-per-year who think   
   they know better.   
      
   That said, if you are interested in CP, and particularly how CP & sci-fi   
   share some roots in politics-as-propaganda then *studying* BNW within an   
   academic context can be very rewarding.   
      
   And there is no reason why you can't study BNW in an academic way and   
   still preserve your personal opinions about literature.   
      
   There really are a million ways to appraise literature, and IMHO none of   
   them are exclusive.  I would rather have a diverse understanding of the   
   subject that bridges what I have learned in uni, with other ideas I have   
   developed independently,  which I know wouldn't be well received by the   
   institution.   
      
   thanks,   
   --   
   Kevin Calder   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)