tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8921943383818231774.post1567862428943853402..comments2021-08-06T19:36:51.398-07:00Comments on Confessions of a Word Slut: Questioning the ParadigmDianehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13306873432523548264noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8921943383818231774.post-66716137009927831602014-09-17T10:17:57.718-07:002014-09-17T10:17:57.718-07:00Very, very impressive assessment. I wrote a blog a...Very, very impressive assessment. I wrote a blog about entitlement and privilege in which I used Steve Almond's opinions of his students as an example of entitlement (8/26/2014, www.donnatrump.org). And while I do have my own concerns about my children's generation and how they sometimes come off as owed things I don't think they're owed, it did occur to me that Steve Almond might have sounded a little like you described in your last sentence here--the grand old man who's having trouble passing the baton.Donna Trumphttp://donnatrump.orgnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8921943383818231774.post-33416461158093504992014-09-17T10:17:28.069-07:002014-09-17T10:17:28.069-07:00This is so insightful, and respectful of students ...This is so insightful, and respectful of students as their own beings with their own important motivations. After all, they are the next generation of writers. I too have found many of the "Best of" lacking in terms of the stories I actually enjoy. Not because I thought they were bad, but because they reflected a "New Yorker" sense I just did not enjoy, and often thought was simplifying experience into a very specific voice that was artificially decided upon as "better." I agree with you that we should push our students to, while being respectful of history, question the things they have been told to swallow. In the contemporary writing world there is often the hobnobbing game of popularity and the people everyone "agrees" to anoint. The question is not, are they good? but rather who decides what is good, and what framework are they working from, and are the less tidy narratives that the New Yorker might not want to take risks with, are they really not as good? Thanks for bringing up this great point.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com