Karleen Weitzel

English 105

March 30, 2001

Journal Entry 17

Gitlin’s essay

 

            I have always believed that students should have a strong base in the liberal arts, whether or not I have admitted it.  All my friends, from both high school and college, would tell you that I’ve always been rather quick to complain about my history, English, philosophy, and psychology classes.  However, if you let me talk about it long enough, I’m also very quick to point out that I know it’s good for me to take the classes and know the material being taught.  Where the subject of history is concerned, an obvious reason for learning about wars, famines, suppression, etc. is to avoid making the same mistakes in our lifetime or to at least know a successful way to handle such situations.  It is also important for one to be able to think for himself.  So often nowadays people go along with what everyone else does or says.  We see this in everything from fashion trends to popular T.V. shows and music to politics.  By presenting students with different theories in politics, psychology, philosophy, and the sciences, different styles of writing in English, and music and art from other cultures, those students are able to discover what aspects of all these arts they enjoy and agree or disagree with.  If they don’t fully agree, they have the ability to develop a theory or style of their own because of the knowledge they’ve acquired.