Comments on: Resnick and Wolff Unhelpful http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/2003/08/09/resnick-and-wolff-unhelpful/ faults | sins | abuses Sun, 07 Sep 2008 06:57:21 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.1 By: The Happy Tutor http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/2003/08/09/resnick-and-wolff-unhelpful/#comment-144 The Happy Tutor Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000 http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/archives/2003/08/09/resnick-and-wolff-unhelpful/#comment-144 Ever read Glengarry Glen Ross? In sales we rank people by commission. Those who win a sales contest get the Cadillac; the second prize is a set of steak knives, and the bottom 85% are fired. People go up and down in the rankings every year. They get a big office this year, and out on the butt the next. The top people do get conspicuous honors and perks, and it does work as Wolff and Resnick say to keep the troops motivated. But is this class? or a cruel meritocracy measured on a single criterion of merit, ie commissions? Unless you oppose or situate European inherited class with the American game of chutes and ladders I don't see how you can understand the role of education as a way to rise in our society, to go up the ladder. Ever read Glengarry Glen Ross? In sales we rank people by commission. Those who win a sales contest get the Cadillac; the second prize is a set of steak knives, and the bottom 85% are fired. People go up and down in the rankings every year. They get a big office this year, and out on the butt the next. The top people do get conspicuous honors and perks, and it does work as Wolff and Resnick say to keep the troops motivated. But is this class? or a cruel meritocracy measured on a single criterion of merit, ie commissions?

Unless you oppose or situate European inherited class with the American game of chutes and ladders I don’t see how you can understand the role of education as a way to rise in our society, to go up the ladder.

]]> By: Curtiss Leung http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/2003/08/09/resnick-and-wolff-unhelpful/#comment-145 Curtiss Leung Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000 http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/archives/2003/08/09/resnick-and-wolff-unhelpful/#comment-145 So by Wolff and Resnick's lights, if expropriators do not differentiate themselves through consumption, "Performers of surplus labor might consider appropriators to be insignificantly different from themselves and thus not to warrant their receipt of surplus labor." So why did Jack Welsh say he was a beer drinker? And why did the revelation of his actual retirement benefits cause such a outcry? Sheesh. So by Wolff and Resnick’s lights, if expropriators do not differentiate themselves through consumption, "Performers of surplus labor might consider appropriators to be insignificantly different from themselves and thus not to warrant their receipt of surplus labor." So why did Jack Welsh say he was a beer drinker? And why did the revelation of his actual retirement benefits cause such a outcry? Sheesh.

]]> By: Mike http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/2003/08/09/resnick-and-wolff-unhelpful/#comment-146 Mike Wed, 31 Dec 1969 17:00:00 +0000 http://www.vitia.org/wordpress/archives/2003/08/09/resnick-and-wolff-unhelpful/#comment-146 Tutor, I think I've lucked out in the fact that freshman composition is a uniquely American phenomenon (the closest thing to it, from what people tell me, is Australia's "English for Academic Purposes"), and so I <em>can</em> oppose -- or at least say "irrelevant for the purposes of this study" -- the European inheritance of class. Don't know if that's a cop-out or not, but I think my committee would probably say something about "usefully limiting the scope of your research". Tutor, I think I’ve lucked out in the fact that freshman composition is a uniquely American phenomenon (the closest thing to it, from what people tell me, is Australia’s “English for Academic Purposes”), and so I can oppose — or at least say “irrelevant for the purposes of this study” — the European inheritance of class. Don’t know if that’s a cop-out or not, but I think my committee would probably say something about “usefully limiting the scope of your research”.

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