Zompist Bboard Again

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 11:01 am One more data point: in Wilhelmine Germany, in the late 19th and early 20th century, the universities were apparently seen as even more conservative and nationalist than society as a whole.

Travis B. wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 11:53 am One thing about that, though, is that prior to the establishment of the German Empire, German nationalism was actually in many ways considered left-wing and was opposed by both Prussia and the Austrian Empire, and the revolutionaries of the Revolutions of 1848 sought to be establish a unified Germany.

malloc wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 10:52 am History question: when did academia become the hotbed of the left we know today? The first universities, founded by the Catholic Church under feudalism, were obviously far from anything we'd recognize as left wing.

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 12:02 pm

Travis B. wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 11:53 am One thing about that, though, is that prior to the establishment of the German Empire, German nationalism was actually in many ways considered left-wing and was opposed by both Prussia and the Austrian Empire, and the revolutionaries of the Revolutions of 1848 sought to be establish a unified Germany.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmm. It was a bit more of a mixed bag than that. Even early in the 19th century, German student revolutionaries, despite being in opposition to the existing order of the time, already stood for a kind of romantic nationalism that saw moving too far to the left as a French thing. If they had been really left-wing or left-liberal at the time, it probably wouldn't have been so easy for the Prussian establishment to buy them off by co-opting German nationalism.

keenir wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 2:34 pm

malloc wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 10:52 am History question: when did academia become the hotbed of the left we know today? The first universities, founded by the Catholic Church under feudalism, were obviously far from anything we'd recognize as left wing.

not sure why they'd be "obviously far"...given that the Catholic Church was where most of the intellectual exploration and speculation was taking place.

maybe more of a moderate left-wing, rather than the far-left-wing that they saw as being French?

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 2:48 pm

keenir wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 2:34 pm

malloc wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 10:52 am History question: when did academia become the hotbed of the left we know today? The first universities, founded by the Catholic Church under feudalism, were obviously far from anything we'd recognize as left wing.

not sure why they'd be "obviously far"...given that the Catholic Church was where most of the intellectual exploration and speculation was taking place.

malloc described those early European universities as "obviously far from" the left, not as "obviously far from" "intellectual exploration and speculation". Those aren't the same things.

keenir wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 3:11 pm my bad; "the left" sometimes seems to sometimes encompass intellectual exploration/speculation,

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 3:15 pm

keenir wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 3:11 pm my bad; "the left" sometimes seems to sometimes encompass intellectual exploration/speculation,

Of course, but it doesn't have a monopoly on that, and as conservative or mostly conservative institutions go, the Catholic Church has traditionally been one of the more intellectual ones.

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 11:01 am More seriously, I think I remember zompist reporting that at some time before Europe even had universities, there was a more or less university-like institution in China that was a hotbed of protests and activism.

zompist wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 5:02 pm

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 11:01 am More seriously, I think I remember zompist reporting that at some time before Europe even had universities, there was a more or less university-like institution in China that was a hotbed of protests and activism.

I mentioned this in the Tiffany thread. We're talking about 2nd century Han China, where the imperial university in Luoyang had 30,000 students-- making a substantial proportion of the city's population of 200,000.

Raphael wrote: ↑Thu Jun 30, 2022 11:36 am Huh? I'm a bit confused - I thought I heard that there was already some student participation in the various Paris uprisings of the 19th century?

hwhatting wrote: ↑Fri Jul 01, 2022 8:02 am Rather than couching it in terms of present-day left or right, I'd say (a bit cynically) that students tend to be at the forefront of current fashionable ideas that engage future elites. In the early-to-mid 19th century those were liberalism and nationalism, in the late 19th century those were nationalism and imperialism, in the early 20th century those were "völkisch" nationalism and fascism. Although Marxism / Socialism had aherents among students, they were mostly seen as threat by the elites most students at that time still came from, who were more interested in ways of integrating collectivist ideas into the class system and the nation state, which was something fascism promised. As Ares noted, Marxism / Socialism became relevant for wider circles among students only with the opening up of academia in the mid-20th century; the total discreditation of right-wing alternatives to boring bourgeois democracy also played a role here.
I have the impression that the modern, more streamlined and shortened University education system leaves much less time for political and social activism, and therefore student movements have become less prominent in youth political activism.

Raphael wrote: ↑Sat Jul 02, 2022 1:23 pm Why are sour drinks and things to eat more refreshing when it's hot than less sour drinks and things to eat? What makes sour things so refreshing?