Glimpses of Youth Festival 2018 - English Department

#YouthFestival2018

Congratulations to SSCCM team and Prin. Dr. Hetal Mehta for winning general championship third consequetive time, and KPES team ( Chirag V Vyas, Jagat Bhatt) for being Runner Up.

The students of

Department of English - Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University got three ranks:

1. Zankhana Matholiya - third in Rangoli;

2. Vidhya Pandya - Second in Western Solo;

3. Vidhya Pandya, Niyati Pathak, Riddhi Joshi, Jagruti Vasani, Dipti Gohil and Avni Dave - Western Group Song.

Other photos can be viewed here: 

https://www.facebook.com/dilipbarad/media_set?set=a.10156950419312472&type=3

Planting and Nurturing Trees

The Unintelligent Americans

Books on the intelligence of the Americans

1. The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future - Mark Bauerlein

This shocking, surprisingly entertaining romp into the intellectual nether regions of today's underthirty set reveals the disturbing and, ultimately, incontrovertible truth: cyberculture is turning us into a society of know-nothings.

The Dumbest Generation is a dire report on the intellectual life of young adults and a timely warning of its impact on American democracy and culture.

 

For decades, concern has been brewing about the dumbed-down popular culture available to young people and the impact it has on their futures. But at the dawn of the digital age, many thought they saw an answer: the internet, email, blogs, and interactive and hyper-realistic video games promised to yield a generation of sharper, more aware, and intellectually sophisticated children. The terms “information superhighway” and “knowledge economy” entered the lexicon, and we assumed that teens would use their knowledge and understanding of technology to set themselves apart as the vanguards of this new digital era.

 

That was the promise. But the enlightenment didn’t happen. The technology that was supposed to make young adults more aware, diversify their tastes, and improve their verbal skills has had the opposite effect. According to recent reports from the National Endowment for the Arts, most young people in the United States do not read literature, visit museums, or vote. They cannot explain basic scientific methods, recount basic American history, name their local political representatives, or locate Iraq or Israel on a map. The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future is a startling examination of the intellectual life of young adults and a timely warning of its impact on American culture and democracy.

 

Over the last few decades, how we view adolescence itself has changed, growing from a pitstop on the road to adulthood to its own space in society, wholly separate from adult life. This change in adolescent culture has gone hand in hand with an insidious infantilization of our culture at large; as adolescents continue to disengage from the adult world, they have built their own, acquiring more spending money, steering classrooms and culture towards their own needs and interests, and now using the technology once promoted as the greatest hope for their futures to indulge in diversions, from MySpace to multiplayer video games, 24/7.

 

Can a nation continue to enjoy political and economic predominance if its citizens refuse to grow up? Drawing upon exhaustive research, personal anecdotes, and historical and social analysis, The Dumbest Generation presents a portrait of the young American mind at this critical juncture, and lays out a compelling vision of how we might address its deficiencies. The Dumbest Generation pulls no punches as it reveals the true cost of the digital age—and our last chance to fix it.

(https://www.amazon.com/Dumbest-Generation-Stupefies-Americans-Jeopardizes-ebook/dp/B0015DWN8I)

2. The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters - Tom Nicholas

In The Death of Expertise, Nichols condemns what he describes as the many forces trying to undermine the authority of experts in the United States. He blames higher education, the internet, and the explosion of media options for the anti-expertise and anti-intellectual sentiment which he sees as being on the rise. While conceding that experts do sometimes fail, he says the best answer to this is the self-correcting presence of other experts to recognize and rectify systemic failures.

“	These are dangerous times. Never have so many people had access to so much knowledge, and yet been so resistant to learning anything.	”
— Tom Nichols, The Death of Expertise

3. 

Idiot America: How Stupidity Became a Virtue in the Land of the Free - Charles P. Pierce

The three Great Premises of Idiot America:

· Any theory is valid if it sells books, soaks up ratings, or otherwise moves units

· Anything can be true if someone says it loudly enough

· Fact is that which enough people believe. Truth is determined by how fervently they believe it

 

With his trademark wit and insight, veteran journalist Charles Pierce delivers a gut-wrenching, side-splitting lament about the glorification of ignorance in the United States.

 

Pierce asks how a country founded on intellectual curiosity has somehow deteriorated into a nation of simpletons more apt to vote for an American Idol contestant than a presidential candidate. But his thunderous denunciation is also a secret call to action, as he hopes that somehow, being intelligent will stop being a stigma, and that pinheads will once again be pitied, not celebrated. Erudite and razor-sharp, Idiot America is at once an invigorating history lesson, a cutting cultural critique, and a bullish appeal to our smarter selves.

4. The Age of American Unreason - Susan Jacoby

A cultural history of the last forty years, The Age of American Unreason focuses on the convergence of social forces—usually treated as separate entities—that has created a perfect storm of anti-rationalism. These include the upsurge of religious fundamentalism, with more political power today than ever before; the failure of public education to create an informed citizenry; and the triumph of video over print culture. Sparing neither the right nor the left, Jacoby asserts that Americans today have embraced a universe of “junk thought” that makes almost no effort to separate fact from opinion.

Shitala Saatam - Religion Vs Science; Inoculation Vs Vaccination; non-acceptance of intellectuals

Sitalaa Saatam is the day which we witness the conflict between religion and science. When we observe society, traditions and rituals, we find that we, as society , are still not rational enough to consider either science or religion with authenticity. We fail to argue with religious practice as well with scientific inventions.

On the occasion of such days, we feel the conflict between science and religion in our lived experience.

Say for instance, we have to go for vaccination to save ourselves from the life threatening disease like small pox (શીતળા). We know that શીતળા is under control and is now, not able to kill people or disfigure faces as it used to happen 70 years before. 

And yet, the tradition of not making goddess શીતળા unhappy by making hot food in the homes continue. Such are the fears incepted so deeply in the collective subconscious that it is not possible for rational argument to overcome it.

Let us use such unique days to ponder about the regressive rituals and progressive rational thoughts.

1) Edward Jenner and the history of smallpox and vaccination 

By Stefan Riedel, MD, PhD

https://www.infinityfoundation.com/mandala/t_dy/t_dy_Q14_frameset.htm

2) Read paper on the claim that India first started to cure smallpox before the West

https://www.infinityfoundation.com/mandala/t_dy/t_dy_Q14_frameset.htm

(Do not miss to read that it was practiced in very small groups and was not able to eradicate the disease as Jenner's vaccination has done in much lesser time. Even with inoculation in practice in India , the disease was widespread and almost uncontrollable. Seeing thing fairly is more important than going ga ga over national pride.)

3) As the concept of worshiping goddess Shitalaa is failing and with thay questions are raised against the practice of eating cold food, the new breed of nationalists have emerged to justify it as practice to overcome deficiency of vitamin B12. See the letter in gujarati.

Before we come to any conclusion on this, we Need to read full research paper on the process of research.

We also have to survey the people who are suffering from deficiency of B12.

I know many who are observing sataam by eating cold food every year and yet they have deficiency of B12 and are taking injections rather than eating cold food.

I know many who are not observing saatam n eat hot food and yet are not suffering from B12 deficiency.

So, such research are not authentic.

Secondly, eating overnight cold roti/ભાખરી / રોટલો / દહીં / માખણ is normal practice in many indian houses. However, people may be suffering from deficiency or may be not. But eating cold food on saatam waa never ever practiced for vitamin b12 is for sure. It was practiced to safeguard from the wrath of શીતળા માં.

4)શીતળા એ પ્રથમ રોગ હતો જે લોકોએ જાતે કરીને અન્ય પ્રકારના ચેપોથી પોતાને ઇનોક્યુલેટ કરીને નિવારવાનો પ્રયત્ન કર્યો હતો; શીતળાનું ઇનોકયુલેશન ભારત માં તેમજ અન્ય દેશો માં વર્ષો થી થતું પરંતુ તેને સામુહિક સ્વીકાર ના હતો. લોકો આ બીમારી થઈ ડરી ને તેને દેવી તરીકે પૂજા અર્ચના કરતા, મંદિરો બનાવતા અને તે દેવી ને ખુશ કરવા ચુલ્હા ઓ ઠંડા રાખતા. આ બધું હજુ પણ પરંપરા ના ભાગરૂપે કરવામાં આવે છે.

લોકો નવા વિચાર કે વર્તન ને સ્વીકારી સકતા નથી. નવો કે અલગ વિચાર આપનાર બૌદ્ધિકો ની મજાક કરવામાં આવતી હતી, આવે છે. તિરુસ્કૃત પણ કરવામાં આવે છે.

આપણે ત્યાં હજુ પણ એવા લોકો છે જે શીતળા ની રસીકરણ તો કરે અને તો પણ એમાં અને એવા વૈજ્ઞાનિક સંશોધનો માં વિશ્વાસ કરવાને બદલે , ધાર્મિક રીત રિવાજો માં વધુ માને અને તેમને વિટામીન B12 ની ઉણપ દૂર કરવા માટે થતી વિધિ સાથે જસ્ટીફાય કરવાનો બાલિશ પ્રયાસ કરે. અરે એવા પણ લોકો છે જે હંમેશા દરેક વસ્તુ ની શોધ ભારત માં જ થઈ છે તેવું માને છે. તે લોકો જુના સમય માં થતા ટીકાકરણ ને રસીકરણ સાથે જોડી ને દલીલ કરતા હોય છે. ટીકાકરણ થી આ રોગ કાબુ માં નહોતો આવી શક્યો અને તેનો ઉપદ્રવ વધતોજ જતો હતો અને એડવર્ડ જેનર ના સંશોધને , તદુપરાંત WHO વર્લ્ડ હેલ્થ organisation ના પ્રયત્નો થી શીતળા ઉપર કાબુ મેળવી શક્યા છે. 

પણ જેમ આજે સામાન્ય પ્રજા ને બૌદ્ધિકો પ્રત્યે ચીડ અને ગુસ્સો છે તેવો ઈંગ્લેન્ડ માં એડવર્ડ જેનર પ્રત્યે અને તેની વેકસિન પ્રત્યે પણ હતો. આ કાર્ટૂન માં તેની મજાક ઉડાડવામાં આવી છે.

source: https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details/collection_image_gallery.aspx?assetId=146958001&objectId=1638225&partId=1

The #cartoon caricatures Edward #Jenner (1749–1823) immunising people against #smallpox, using the #vaccine he created and for which he is best known. Despite the success rate of his experiments using cowpox, Jenner – who trained as a surgeon – was #ridiculed by the #public; this satirical caricature shows people receiving the vaccine and then sprouting cow heads all over their bodies. Nevertheless, Jenner’s smallpox vaccination was eventually widely accepted and 30 years after his death it was mandatory in England and Wales. 

(The cow-pock - or - the wonderful effects of the new inoculation! Hand-coloured etching by James Gillray, published by Hannah Humphrey, 1802. Wellcome Library, London.)

Munshi Premchand Birth Anniversary Hindi Department

A Brief Talk on Munshi Premchand on his birth anniversary celebration on 31 July 2019 at Department मुन्शीof Hindi, MKBU

PG Students Orientation Programme MKBU

Speech by Dilip Barad in Orientation Programme of PG Students of MKBU