General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: An odd and controversial book that our daughter has to read for 11th grade English... [View all]Chan790
(20,176 posts)I agree. In many subjects.
I majored in Political Theory in one of the best undergraduate politics departments in the US and my department chair, also the director of our Political Theory program1, is one of the most-respected academics in the field of Political Theory in the world.2 Until last month when I was working on a local campaign he donated to...I had no idea of his political leanings. He's gone 30 years as an academic steadfastly refusing to reveal his personal politics as completely irrelevant to his pedagogy or the subject matter. It's one of the games the undergraduates play: Guess Doc's personal politics? He drops no clues whatsoever.
1: The Politics dept. has three majors: Political Theory, American Government and Comparative Politics (which offers specializations in International Relations and World Politics. The other two offer specializations as well but I point out the IR and WP tracks because that's always what people ask: "Why no International Relations? Where's the major for global politics?"
2: He's one of those guys that other academics and pundits read when they want to actually understand the 200+ years of American political philosophy that got us to this point. He eschews the limelight except where the topic is very wonky and historical so no punditry on MSNBC or CNN or in Politico, NYT and WaPo for him.