From the 2013 CiRCE Conference: A Contemplation of Judgment
July 2013; Baltimore, MD 

The making of judgments requires some sort of standard against which to make measurements. While the normal nihilism of contemporary culture is often described as being thoroughly without standards, all judgments assumed to be merely expressions of preference, very few people possess the Promethean confidence to assert their preferences requires some sort of standard against which to make measurements. While the normal nihilism of contemporary culture is often described as being thoroughlywithout standards, all judgments assumed to be merely expressions of preference, very few people possess the Promethean confidence to assert their preferences rful arbiters of quality.

In this week's episode of Quiddity, the CiRCE podcast and the audio companion to this website, David Kern chats with author and culture critic Brett McCracken, whose new bookGray Matters: Navigating the Space Between Legalism and Liberty, came out earlier this month from Baker Books. They talk about why he was motivated to write this book, how to cultivate cultural discernment in young people, and why so many recent books have challenged common Chrisitian conceptions of cultural engagement. 

In this week's edition of Quiddity, the CiRCE podcast and the audio companion to circeinstitute.org, David Kern chats with Cindy Rollins and Dr. Chris Perrin about starting the year off well. Topics of conversation include how to avoid biting off more than you can chew, what to do when you inevitably do, and how to keep learning from being a "School year" thing. 

In this week's edition of Quiddity, the CiRCE Podcast and the audio companion to circeinstitute.org, Dr. Brian Phillips and David Kern offer a follow-up conversation to last week's discussion about teaching literature without killing it, this time a contemplation on fairy tales, the Moral Imagination, and why stories should never end with the words "and they all lived happily ever after". 

In this edition of Quiddity, the audio companion to circeinstitute.org, Dr. Brian Phillips and David Kern discuss the art of teaching great literature in such a way that reckons with the fact that many students will hate the process. What is the nature and purpose of literature and how can we can teach it according to both? What role does "the spark notes" approach play and how do we deal with what Flannery O'Connor referred to as the "mystery and manners" of literature? 

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