Philosophy

This week is Banned Books Week, so designated by the American Library Association, which created the week in the hopes of motivating us to celebrate our “freedom to read.” The ALA keeps a list of the most frequently challenged books each year, including a list of banned “classics,” and my guess is that a quick…

In the Humanities, we like to emphasize the importance of what we call “close reading,” by which we mean concentrated attention to the details of a text: syntax, specialized vocabulary, nuance and conditions, logical order, the manner in which ideas develop and are connected. We do this because we aim to achieve, I hope, precision…