When thinking about the culture of critical discourse (CCD), I thought that the whole concept would be good for any society since its not based on class or social status its simply based on whatever piece of information that one is presenting on and how they are able to prove it to their audience. We spent a decent amount of time talking about this in class and I thought it was easier to understand when Professor Riley gave examples of it.
I liked the question that someone brought up in class on whether intellectuals actually follow the culture of critical discourse because I feel like in reality, a lot of people try to cut corners based on whatever status they hold. That also makes me think about the concept of truth which was brought up in the Gouldner chapter. Specifically, Gouldner says that trust is democratized and all those claims are now considered equal within the CCD. (p59) Hypothetically, if someone were to present something that was not the truth and actually just fabricated information, does that mean that under CCD that falsified information would speak for itself?
Particularly the section on education and how institutions are producing too many people who want to work in specific types of jobs. When Riley brought up how if any student came up to him and asked about getting a PhD in Sociology, he would have them think hard on that and see what the job market would be like.
That applies to how i chose my career path. My majors do not have anything to do with my career path since at the time, I know that the job market was not looking too good for anthro and classics, especially in the archeological fields. Im on a pre-vet track and i keep getting told over and over again that we need more vets. Now especially after the height of covid, there is an oversupply of pets and not enough vets to treat them.
In the Erastz religion reading, i did not have a full understanding of what gnostic religions were or what the movement was so googling it helped me get a general idea on the subject. In the reading, it says that the gnostic mass movement was the religious movent of antiquity. In the characteristics of gnostic movements, the 5th one stood out because it reminded me of the traditions that Stils was talking about in one of the previous readings we did. Specifically, the revolutionary tradition, where basically the world is evil and then gets replaced by something good.
The part in the religion reading on symbols continued what was talked about in the Shils reading as well but in a slightly different light. In this reading, I felt that symbolism was more towards what it holds in Christianity. The Christian idea of perfection was broken down into two components which were teleological and axiological. The first meaning moving towards a goal and the second is of the highest value.