Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Think Like a Wiseman
During class today, I noticed the quote on the board by W. B. Yeats saying, "Think like a wiseman, but communicate in the language of the people." At the beginning of class, we discussed how we have become insensitive to others who lack certain English abilities we have accumulated in AP English. Not only in English, but I have found that individuals from priveledged schools have neglected to recognize the fortune of having a strong educational school system. I feel that this quote symbolizes how individuals must not advertise their magnitude of knowledge, but reach out to others by communicating on an understandable level and furthermore, help others to become wiser. This quote reminded me of the substitute teacher we had on Friday. While Ms. Serensky told us her reactions to our treatment toward the substitute, I felt ashamed for not respecting his eagerness to learn and our inability to recognize how we could utilize our knowledge to teach another. In retrospect, knowledge travels in a cicrle. If individuals refuse to return to the basics and communicate in the language of the people ( the substitute), we deprive individuals from our knowledge. Like Ms. Serensky stated during class, we must perform then go home. Our confident attitudes in no way enrich the knowledge of others. Therefore, we must recognize that we should not continue to show off our wisdom outside of English class. In the language of the people, Ms. Serensky has taught me to "think" rather than speak "like a wiseman".
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Kelsey, i too noticed this quote and the more I thought about it, the more I realized how important it is. Like you said, knowledge does travel in a circle and we must all be willing to help the person next to us. Also, we owe it to humanity to try to pass our knowledge along to fellow students today and sometime in the future to pass our knowledge to our own children, because knowledge is the key to progress in a society. This quote is also very important politically because it is saying that politicians should think like a wiseman or an ivy league educated person but they must portray themselves as a common man in order to win an election. It is difficult to win an election when people portray themselves as elitists.
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