Columbia students claim Greek mythology needs a trigger warning

[flamingdem]

Oy vey..

“Not far from the walls of Enna, there is a deep pool,” begins Ovid’s version of the rape of Persephone. “While [Persephone] was playing in this glade, and gathering violets or radiant lilies, while with girlish fondness she filled the folds of her gown, and her basket, trying to outdo her companions in her picking, [Pluto], almost in a moment, saw her, prized her, took her: so swift as this, is love.”

The Greek myth has been recounted for thousands of years in hundreds of languages, scores of countries and countless works of art. It’s considered a cultural touchstone for Western civilization: a parable about power, lust and grief.

Now, however, it could be getting a treatment it’s never had before: a trigger warning.

In an op-ed in the student newspaper, four Columbia University undergrads have called on the school to implement trigger warnings — alerts about potentially distressing material — even for classics like Greek mythology or Roman poetry.

“Ovid’s ‘Metamorphoses’ is a fixture of Lit Hum, but like so many texts in the Western canon, it contains triggering and offensive material that marginalizes student identities in the classroom,” wrote the four students, who are members of Columbia’s Multicultural Affairs Advisory Board. “These texts, wrought with histories and narratives of exclusion and oppression, can be difficult to read and discuss as a survivor, a person of color, or a student from a low-income background.”


** I seriously thought we laid university PC extremism in the 90s

https://img.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=&w=1484

[Eleanors38]

1. Poor Artemis has been kicked 'round enough. She took care of bidness.

[Igel]

2. Hypervigilance and sensitivity as a form of oppression.

Hegemony of the victimized.

[snagglepuss]

3. How can history, filled with centuries of utter inhumanity, be studied

by students who are triggered by oblique references to rape? That people are traumatized by poverty and oppression is not in question, however those who want to be educated need to accept the fact that it is their responsibility to work on their issues. They need to realize that they their particular experience which has sensitized them to suffering puts a claim on them to bear witness to suffering of others either now or in the distant or not so distant past.

[mike_c]

4. not only has university PC not been laid to rest...

...but it's out of control. This semester faculty at my university have been advised not to call roll in class because hearing their birth names read aloud might be upsetting to transgender students, who make up approximately 0.06% of our current enrollment. Mind you, one of our jobs during the first week of class is to drop students who don't show up from the roll so that seats can be given to wait listed students who will show up, but rather than call roll we've been asked to request the names students would like to be called and their preferred personal pronouns, in writing to avoid those pesky birth names they're enrolled under, as that might trigger memories of being the wrong gender. My campus has a VICE PRESIDENT of Inclusiveness-- a senior administrator whose primary job is making sure students are "culturally affirmed" in academia.

I don't necessarily mean to say those examples are bad things-- but they certainly indicate something about institutional priorities. I can't get supplies for my lab classes, but I can receive training from half a dozen different offices about how to respect and avoid triggering students' fears and insecurities.

[Paka]

5. So glad that I went to school long enough ago...

to miss out on all this idiocy. Talk about extremes.

[flamingdem]

6. We were more interested

in getting high and having fun, that was more useful than pc bs!

[flygal]

7. My thought exactly! nt

[CTyankee]

8. Back in April I did an art essay here at DU on Bernini's rendering of the Rape of Persephone.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026561820

Powerful stuff and a great sculpture.

I think the myth is also very much about Demeter's love and grieving for her daughter. Some feminists have interpreted it thusly.

[flamingdem]

9. Thanks for that wonderful essay CT

I am studying the figure now and hope to visit Florence and Rome soon. Have saved your essay as inspiration!

Now to google on the topic to see the feminist angle. It's not too much to ask that this kind of material is framed if it's really relevant.

[CTyankee]

11. You can't beat Bernini for drama!

Thanks. I'm glad you are getting inspired...you'll love Florence and Rome. Let me know re Florence. I did an outline of somewhat out of the way places there that a lot of American tourists don't know about, where you can find some real gems of art. I always say that you can't turn around in that town without finding yourself in front of another masterpiece...

[flamingdem]

12. Will do!

I hope to make it there next Spring or Summer.

Is the outline of spots in Florence online?

[CTyankee]

13. No. It's in my documents on my computer. I print it out for family and friends who

are planning a trip there. It's so easy to get around in Florence. I walked everywhere (except took one bus to the Oltrarno).

In rome, a must-see is the church that has the Caravaggio St. Matthew series. Just a little church with a few people in it either praying or sitting quietly. You can hear a pin drop. And there in a walk in closet sized area are the 3 Matthews. The folks in the church pews seem unfazed by the presence of these masterpieces...amazing...in situ all those years...

[flamingdem]

14. Your opinion on Rome vs Florence for longer stay

I'm hoping to attend some kind of workshop or atelier program and have to chose between Florence and Rome. Rome would be livelier but Florence more charming. Both seem expensive!

[CTyankee]

15. Well, I liked Florence more because I could get around more easily and walk to see

so much art of the early Italian Renaissance. I hired a guide to take me to the special places in Rome I wanted to see. I think it's where you "are" in your head at the time. Rome is exciting the way New York is exciting, plus you have gorgeous places like the Borghese and the Vatican museums to wander through.

If I had it to do over I'd spend 10 days in Rome and more like 15 days in Florence. I am crowd averse so my time at the Vatican got cut short when the Pope was getting ready to come out on his balcony and do the wave thingy to people and it got crowded fast and I took off. Ditto Venice and San Marco Square -- mob scene plus no one told me that the Po River would overflow its banks regularly at about noon in the spring and I started to see people rolling up their pants legs and take off their shoes and the water started rising around my shoes. I escaped.

[HuckleB]

10. Umm. Oh, goodness.

[Doctor_J]

16. I think EVERY book should have a trigger warning.

Since they probably all offend someone's sensibilities