Leigh M. Johnson

A Piece of the Pie

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Sports 1 Comment

For all the talk of overpaid and overindulged professional athletes in this country, it’s a wonder that we so seldom seriously discuss whether or not college athletes should be paid. As a matter of fact, the subject only comes up two times a year as far as I can tell: first, during college football’s Bowl…

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When NOT To Compromise

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Philosophy, Politics 1 Comment

As compromises go, this doesn’t seem to be a good one: the State Board of Education in Texas recently approved its science curriculum standards, which Board members describe as “a compromise between those who are critical of teaching evolutionary theories without scrutiny and those who feared attacks on evolution would lead to the teaching of…

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Catching Up

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Uncategorized Comments Off on Catching Up

I was a bit delinquent in my posts this last week, so here’s a brief update on what’s been going on: (1) The University of Memphis Tigers basketball team suffered a humiliating loss to the University of Missouri Tigers in the NCAA Tournament and were eliminated… making two years in a row that Memphians have…

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Jeremiah Wright, in his own words

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Memphis, Politics 1 Comment

I attended Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s lecture “Some Through the Fire! Some Through the Flood!” last night at the University of Memphis as part of the conference “The Obama Phenomenon: Race and Political Discourse in the United States Today.” I have to admit that I wasn’t really sure what to expect. Like most Americans, the only…

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ObamaRama

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Obama, Politics Comments Off on ObamaRama

I’m attending the much-anticipated conference at the University of Memphis this weekend, “The Obama Phenomenon: Race and Political Discourse in the United States Today.” The keynote address is this evening and is being delivered by Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Our local news broadcasts have done all they could in the past week to stir up controversy…

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The Problem With Packin’

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Politics, Teaching 1 Comment

Ahhhh, Texas. Turns out their legislature is considering allowing students over 21 to carry concealed guns on campus. Supporters say that there’s good reason for this manifestly ridiculous idea, of course, citing the tragedy at Virginia Tech almost two years ago and, I suppose, the fact that there weren’t enough armed students to make that…

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Justifying Prejudice

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Philosophy, Politics, Teaching 6 Comments

The image to the left is a postcard that someone sent to PostSecret, an online website that asks people to write their “secrets” on one side of a postcard and mail them in anonymously. (I’ve written about PostSecret before on this blog.) It is the brainchild of Frank Warren, who now travels all over the…

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Shooting Fish in a Barrel

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Politics 1 Comment

Just go ahead and file this away in the “Amazing Adventures in Double Entendre” File. In an attempt to resuscitate the revolutionary patriotism of Bostonians circa 1773, FOXNews and the Republican Party are calling on their constituents to organize their own April 15th “Tea Party” to protest President Obama’s tax policies. What’s more, they’ve also…

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Cosmopsis

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Philosophy, Pop Culture/Film, Pop Culture/Film/Literature 4 Comments

A long time ago, as an undergraduate, I took a course on contemporary American literature that included several texts by John Barth, including The End of the Road (1958, revised 1967). I was in the full glory days of my existentialist period at the time, so Barth’s The End of the Road and the twin…

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Why I Don’t Care About Cheating

June 9, 2024 Leigh M. Johnson Dr. J's Lists, Open Source Pedagogy, Philosophy, Teaching 5 Comments

First, a few caveats about this post, just for clarification: (1) By “cheating,” I mean academic cheating. Plagiarism, mostly. I don’t mean relationship cheating, or sports cheating, or cheating on your taxes. I do actually care about those… well, two out of three of them, anyway.(2) The title of this post is (obviously, I hope)…

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