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This is long, but I just had to post it. Too funny to ignore!
Ted
Student Book Offers a Twisted History 'Coarse'
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Experience history from the Stoned Age to the Blintz Krieg! From Middle Evil Times to the Age of Now, from the Land of Milk and Chocolate to the Iran Hostess Crisis and the fall of the Berlin Mall!
Welcome to the wonderful world of "Non Campus Mentis," (Workman) a book of mangled moments of Western Civilization culled from actual term papers and exams of today's "brightest" students by incredulous college professor Anders Henriksson who, while grading exams, chose to laugh, rather than cry, at his students' most egregious mistakes.
History, after all, is nothing more than "the behind of the present," according to one student, who aptly added: "This gives incites from the anals of the past."
The once-mighty British Empire is in a "state of recline. Its colonies have slowly dribbled away leaving only the odd speck on the map." Chairman "Moo" has passed away, as has former President "Franklin Eleanor Roosavelt," and civil rights leader "Martin Luther Junior" was slain in the 1960s, shortly after making his famous "If I Had A Hammer" speech.
Hitler, a depressed "Nazi leader of a Communist Germany" who spurred a huge "anti-semantic" movement through a terrifying "Gespacho," launched "Operation Barbarella" while the English "vanely hoped for peas." The war began turning around, though, when the "Allies landed near Italy's toe and gradually advanced up her leg.
Hitler ultimately "shot himself in the bonker."
'CRETINALIA HISTORICA'
At its best, the 150-page book "illustrates the ingenious and often comic ways we all attempt to make sense of information we can't understand because we have no context or frame of reference for it," according to Henriksson, chairman of the history department at Shepherd College in West Virginia. He began compiling samples 20 years ago at the University of Toronto where he also taught.
Shortly after he began his collection, he published an article in the "Wilson Quarterly" titled "College Kids Say the Darndest Things," which prompted amused colleagues at more than two dozen universities in the United States and Canada including West Point, University of Alberta and McMaster, to regularly send him their own inane prose collections. Last year, when he realized his office overflowed with funny samples of "cretinalia historica" the idea for a book was born.
While Henriksson declined to identify all the schools involved he said they ranged from moderately to highly competitive, about half were in Canada, no Ivy League schools were represented, and that one of the entries came from Oxford in England.
At its worst, the book may reflect a generation raised in ignorance by bad schools and disengaged parents.
"This is not the norm," Henriksson told Reuters in an interview. What you have here is almost 30 years of my collecting from students' (works) at various institutions. This really represents sort of the creme de la creme of the creatively inane."
Did he make it up?
"No!" he said. "Who could make this stuff up except Mel Brooks. I'm not Mel Brooks." Which prompts the question: Should people sound the alarms and search for an "escape goat?"
Maybe. Hundreds of student contributors received passing grades with such statements as: "When the Davy Jones Index crashed in 1929 many people were left to political incineration. Some, like John Paul Sart, retreated into extraterrestrialism. The New Deal was an idea inspired by Franklin Eleanor Roosavelt."
(The Boston Tea Party, by the way, was held at Pearl Harbor.)
Gravity of the misstatements aside, the bloopers make a great reference whether one seeks information on the Canadian Missile Crisis, clashes between Israelis and Parisians, or the Gulf War in which, according to one scholar: "Satan Husane invaided Kiwi and Sandy Arabia."
(No doubt an act of "premedication.")
'NEW INCITES'
Henriksson said the errors fall into three major categories. Some are simply caused by bad spelling or a lack of proofreading, and come out funny. Some were prompted by a "profound lack of preparation, while others, just seem to be "really out at sea," he said.
"You get the ones who don't really even seem to understand there's a line between past and present and they tell you that the first airplane was flown by the Marx Brothers. I had this one kid who wrote that Spartacus led a slave rebellion in ancient Rome and then appered in a movie about it later."
The book offers fresh new "incites" on history from "prehistoricle" times through "King Toot" and the birth of "monolithic" religion.("Judyism had one big God named Yahoo").
The book goes on to "chronicle" the birth of Christianity ("Just another mystery cult until Jesus was born") and, his pronouncement, later, that "The mice shall inherit the earth."
The book sheds new light on the lives of Martin Luther (he nailed 95 theocrats to a church door), "Florence of Arabia," and General George "Custard" who managed to stand up anyway.
("Martian Luther King's" four steps to direct action, by the way, included "self purification," when you "allow yourself to be eaten to a pulp.")
In its final pages, the book includes students' geographical misconceptions as represented on several world maps bearing such labels as "The Land of Milk and Chocolate" and "Home of Golden Fleas" (in the Ancient World) to "Bulemia," "Whales," "Roam," the "Eel of France," and the "Automaton Empire" (as they were known in the "Middle Evil" Times).
And it notes that, yes, there has indeed been a change in America's "social seen," over the centuries. The last stage, according to the book, is "The Age of Now. This concept grinds our critical, seething minds to a halt."
Until then, however, we Americans, "in all humidity" are nothing less than "the people of currant times."
TEd
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Dear TEd: I really enjoyed it. As my favorite uncle said, quoting his hired man:"They don't teach brains in college."
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Loved it, TEd. I once had a student write in a test that "Eliza Doolittle helped Babbage to progrom the first computer". The only comment I could make while grading it was that "progrom" isn't a verb, never mind a transitive one. Through a veil of tears, of course.
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Ted, I love this phrase (and thanks for the story, too): the creme de la creme of the creatively inane."CK--"veil of tears"--good one!  I can hear your laughter.
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CK--"veil of tears"--good one!
CK, you spooneristically eveiluated a tale that veers so wildly.
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Oh, Ted! Every entry worth a post. (tears of laughter running down face -e)
Thank you. It's being cut and pasted and sent to several teachers I know.
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sad but true-- NYC makes a point of not teaching "conficts" in all (including HS)history classes-- so Viet Nam war is glossed over-- since the current crop of teacher are likely to have differing views of the conflict(and creating new ones in the classroom)
they just started to teach about the irish potato famine...7 years ago. There was a strong anglophile group involved in education, and most irish went to parachial (RC) schools.. but since the curriculum was for the state.. and the RC schools used the same books.. that little bit of history simply got recorded as " a record number of irish immigrated to US starting in 1848 and for the next 20 years.." with never a mention of why.. or what was happening in ireland at the time..
most of the history of israel is not taught.. there is a single line. "israel was founded in 1948.." not any history of ottoman empire, english influence, confict with Arabs... all just not mentioned.. just a little bit about european jews moving to mid east post WWII.
if you want your kids to know history, you have to teach it to them your self, or recognize they are not getting the full story. i suspect other school districts do some of the same..
maybe Jazzo can give us some info..
how much of VN war was covered?
or Cold War? and fall of Berlin wall?
was the irish famine covered? or the ottoman /kurd genoside?
or in central africa, what do you know about patrice lumumba, and the congo?
the last is one i am schetchy about.. all i was taught about was lumumba was a communist (and the was a code word for being as evil as satan,) and he murdered 8 nuns. the CIA involvement, and all the other politics (colonial power, explotation of resourses, ethic groups in the area.. all just ignored.. i know enough about it, to know, i don't know enough
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Permit me a little tangent. I teach a rhythmic chant of the United States presidents each year to second grade children as part of a big patriotic program we perform in March. For many of the presidents, I work in mnemonic devices with the chanting of presidents' names.
For instance, when we chant William Howard Taft, we pretend to be a very heavy person riding an encumbered pony. We bounce the rhythmic line of Taft's name. This leads into stories about Taft's having been the heaviest of the presidents, and, true to fat and jolly, beloved for his sense of humor.
Anyway, the point here is, even though these second graders chant these names and learn a lot of stories, there is that rare child who, by the fifth grade social studies project, will say that Benjamin Franklin or Martin Luther King was a president. I no longer get upset as I did when I was a young teacher. I just try to improve the stories, and also try to get any current set of second graders to laugh at the stories of fifth graders saying that Franklin and King were presidents. I assure you that I never tell names and tales--just amusing generalizations.
Most of the children will remember; however, there are some who simply won't think things out. They're the ones who make it into the darndest-things-that-are-said lists.
Wordwind, who is not a United States president
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Dear WW: though I do not wish to alienate you, I have strong mental reservations about the value of teaching the kids the names of all the presidents, so many of them were non-entities. I think it would be more valuable to tell them about the problems during each administration, and the men who contributed to the solutions.
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wwh, no, you won't alienate me. You would have to be in class to witness the children's interest in learning a little about the presidents, and see how from week to week they come back with research they've done on their own. I'm a music teacher, so my emphasis is on performance skills--specifically, taking a rhythmic chant of names and showing the kids how to make the names musical through use of dynamics, accents, articulation, and so on. We spend not more than ten minutes in a 45-minute lesson on the chant, and many lessons we don't cover the chant at all. Those are the weeks that these second graders are disappointed that they don't get to learn a few more names. This chant is the one point in the March performance that gets a standing ovation from the parents. I've had high school students come back to visit me at the elementary school to say things like, "That president chant got me through U.S. history"--certainly an exaggeration, but a nod my way that learning the chant and the stories related to the names was of some help. It's also a motivator for me to dig up better and more meaningful facts that a second grader could reasonably understand.
The exercise sounds dry-as-dust, but it really isn't. There's a lot of life in its final musicality, and the kids are visibly proud of their accomplishment, as are their parents.
Best regards,
Wordwind
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Dear WW: I had wrong impression. But as a jest, you could teach them some of the campaign ditties, like the one aimed at Grover Cleveland, if I remember right. "Ma, Ma, where's my Pa? Gone to the White House! Ha Ha Ha!" However the allegation appears to have been false. The candidate who used it was defeated.
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I teach a rhythmic chant of the United States presidents each year to second grade children as part of a big patriotic program we perform in March.Are you sure it shouldn't be "progrom"? 
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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they just started to teach about the irish potato famine...7 years ago. There was a strong anglophile group involved in education, and most irish went to parachial (RC) schools.. but since the curriculum was for the state.. and the RC schools used the same books.. that little bit of history simply got recorded as " a record number of irish immigrated to US starting in 1848 and for the next 20 years.." with never a mention of why.. or what was happening in ireland at the time..
This sounds similar to the way in which the current US "war on terrorism" manages to avoid mentioning awkward details like NORAID, and the fact that US money has kept the IRA alive for decades.
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... and they still teach that Columbus *discovered America... We're supposed to stay away from politics here... that's reserved for state sponsored public institutions... 
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... and they still teach that Columbus *discovered America...
Nonsense. That was Slartibartfast. And he didn't discover America, he helped to create it, didn't he? Although I do understand that his speciality was fjords. Understandable, really. Continents are such impersonal things, aren't they?
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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...and they never did tell me what they fed the Irish potatoe to keep it from starving.
Continents are such impersonal things, aren't they? Yeh, all that conquering and the great divide still remains.
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Dud-Dub said, "I teach a rhythmic chant of the United States presidents each year to second grade children as part of a big patriotic program we perform in March." CK said, "Are you sure it shouldn't be "progrom"? CK, what is a "progrom"?
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I've deleted what I wrote Sorry; I think there could be a misreading of what I intended. Sometimes words get in the way of one's intended meaning. Please forgive the deletion.
WW
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maybe Jazzo can give us some info..
Well, I can say I was very surprised when you said conflict was glazed over in NY. We covered everything. Perhaps my school was very liberal about what could be taught. I've thought about that quite a bit recently. It's apparently one of the most conservative parts in the US outside the Bible Belt, but I know we talked about evolution extensively in both my Earth Science and Biology classes, no mention of creation. But you want to know about history.
Let's see. In AP English last year we had a detailed account of British History. Conflicts: Thomas A'Becket, Norman Conquest, War of the Roses, Bloody Mary, Plague, Potato Famine, Imperialism, Protestant/Catholic arguments. We The Plague, A Doll's House and Heart of Darkness. For group reports we had to read either 1984, Lord of the Flies, Hard Times, Pride and Prejudice, Jane Eyre, or Brave New World.
The year before that I had American History and American Literature. I don't know of anything we didn't cover. We watched The Crucible, 1776 and Glory and clips of Amistad and Saving Private Ryan. We also watched a series called Eyes on the Prize about Civil Rights in the 60s. We discussed the controversial issues like Vietnam, Sacco and Vanzeti [sp?], McCarthyism Japanese-American Concentration Camps and of course Slavery and Reconstruction. As far as I know is was all very objective and two-sided. The summer before the class we had to read The Scarlet Letter, The Jungle and Uncle Tom's Cabin and we had to watch The Front.
Sophomore year I took a world history course that went up to the Renaissance. I can't remember too much specific that would have been controversial, but I don't recall discussing slavery in Greece or gladiator battles in Rome. The teacher was a bit of a kook though.
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The teacher was a bit of a kook though.In my humble opinion, based on personal experience, Them's the best kind!
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>CK, what is a "progrom"?
perhaps he meant "pogrom"; you can never be quite sure about these hypercorrections.
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his sounds similar to the way in which the current US "war on terrorism" manages to avoid mentioning
awkward details like NORAID, and the fact that US money has kept the IRA alive for decades.
Just so we stay on word-related subjects, I suggest we all read linguist Noam Chomsky's books on the power of words to brainwash Americans into thinking ourselves innocent of terrorism ourselves. There - wasn't that nice and apolitical?
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In reply to:
There - wasn't that nice and apolitical?
Yes it was. My post ws only intended to show that "terrorism" means different things to different people. It has also been pointed out to me that I should make clear that the "US funds" I mentioned came from private citizens (Bostonians mostly), not the US government.
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CK, tsuwm: treating pogroms as a subject of levity is grotesquely repulsive -- far beyond even the tasteless "rape" jokes to which of troy justifiably took offense.
CK, reiterating my question: in this thread you have stated that progrom cannot be used as a verb, but you have laughingly used it as a noun. To what noun were you referring?
Explain yourselves, gentlemen -- carefully.
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>CK, tsuwm: treating pogroms as a subject of levity is grotesquely repulsive...
I have no comment as I was not a party to any levity -- I was as puzzled as you by 'progrom' and was merely suggesting the only alternative which came to mind.
incidentally, pogrom is a Russian word which had a broader sense of devastation or destruction.
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not so, tsuwm. You and CK, so erudite, surely know that "pogrom" is a much more specific word.
bartleby: "pogrom NOUN: An organized, often officially encouraged massacre or persecution of a minority group, especially one conducted against Jews.
ETYMOLOGY: Russian, outrage, havoc, from pogromit', to wreak havoc". typically including rape amid the pillage
"Keiva" was the name of my Russian Jewish grandfather, who lived though the pogroms. Whose niece -- blood of my blood, who I knew personally in her old age -- was raped in a pogrom at age 14 (!) Indeed that 14 year old girl, to protect her ten-year old sister, had taunted the pillaging cossacks in the hope that they, occupied with enjoying her, would not search out and find her sister's hiding place.
Not a subject of wordplay, CK; not one to be dismissed as mere "hypercorrection," tsuwm. How would you feel if others made so light of the rape of your blood-relative?
Or is rape -- organized, state sanctioned rape -- of (by definition) a mere jewess somehow a lighter matter of less import to you?
And if so, what am I to think of your values, sirs?
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not so, tsuwm. You... surely know that "pogrom" is a much more specific word.
I surely do, but this is what I said, with emphasis added. it differs not from the etymology you quote:
incidentally, pogrom is a Russian word which had a broader sense of devastation or destruction.
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I must admit here that I winced when first reading the whole "progrom" comic references because it was too close to pogrom for comfort. I agree with Keiva that even inadvertently comic references to tragic atrocities should be avoided. And this comes from a fairly lenient jokester...
Best regards,
Wordwind
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I can't disagree more... "specifically" since *this inadvertency is/was clearly of the unintentional variety... but not "especially".
Glove slap, baby glove slap
Bayonets at sunrise!
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musick, I am most grateful for your good grace in implying (by calling the choice of words "inadvertent" and "unintentional") that the word used was in fact offensive.
Fortunately, we need not poll opinions of what meaning was intended, since the gentlemen who spoke earlier can speak for themselves as to what they intended.
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