Eighth Day Books
Seller Rating: 4
Location: Wichita, KS
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According to our author, not only do we inhabit a postmodern world, but we are now entering a new [...]
According to our author, not only do we inhabit a postmodern world, but we are now entering a new period: the post-secular. And nowhere is this more evident than in academia. Sommerville's thesis is that secularization (and please note that he has a very nuanced definition of that word) has left the American university impoverished and increasingly irrelevant. He portrays an American culture in which religion is pervasive and influential, while the intellectual class gradually becomes unknown or ignored. Sommerville's prescription, if the university is to again become a significant cultural institution rather than just a vocational and technical one, is to admit that religious perspectives can inform and enrich a fundamental deficiency in the understanding of what it means to be human. The terms of that discussion are inescapably religious, and the logic of academia's mantra of tolerance should involve a place at the table-not only in the humanities, but in science and law-for those who understand and speak its language. Despite its slim profile, this book bristles with substantial arguments that consistently reveal the self-contradictory premises of ideological secularism, and underline the absurdity of academia's rather astounding assumption that everything but religion belongs in the classroom.
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$25.88
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