Academy of Dunces: A Decade of Campus Censorship
4/20/202633 min
Today we're talking about the breakdown of discourse — the culture wars.
It's not just in universities, it affects our interactions with everything from the government to schools, workplaces, and more. After over ten years of it, it seems more pointless and degrading than ever.
Ric Bienstock is a director of the new two-part CBC documentary series, Speechless. It explores a variety of student protest movements from Evergreen College in 2017 to today's protests against what's happening in Gaza.
Her film poses some key questions. How did we get here? What is bringing the worst out of all of us? And can we learn how to speak to each other again?
Host: Stephen Marche
Credits: Tristan Capacchione (Producer), Bruce Thorson (Senior Producer), max collins (Director of Audio), Jesse Brown (Editor and Publisher)
Additional music by Audio Network
Fact checking by Kallan Lyons
More information:
- Speechless Part 1 — CBC
- Speechless Part 2 — CBC
- Summary of Evergreen College Protest — Duke Law, Wikipedia
- The politics of culture wars in contemporary Canada — Macdonald-Laurier Institute
- Carole Hooven: Why I Left Harvard — Minding the Campus
- Teaching standardized English isn't racism—it's education — Fair For All
- Tufts University student targeted by Trump administration completes PhD — The Guardian
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Clips
Transcript preview
First 90 secondsSpeaker 00:00
[whistles] Canadaland, funded by you.
Stephen Marche· Host0:03
I'm Stephen Marsh, and today we're talking about the breakdown of discourse.
Eric Smith· Soundbite0:08
It's a strange feeling to be called a white supremacist by a white person. I was not expecting that at all.
Stephen Marche· Host0:14
Wait for that.
Speaker 30:16
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Speaker 40:37
This episode is brought to you by Hot Docs. The Hot Docs Festival is back April 23rd to May 3rd in Downtown Toronto. This is one of the best things that happens in this town. I love Hot Docs. This year, Hot Docs is bringing over 100 of the best new documentaries to Toronto. In some cases, this is the only opportunity you will have to see these incredible films on the big screen, often with the filmmakers in attendance. Also, there will be popcorn. Check this out, Hot Docs, April 23rd to May 3rd in Toronto. Tickets and packages now on sale. Learn more, check out the lineup, and buy your tickets online at hotdocs.ca. That's hot, H-O-T, docs, D-O-C-S, .ca. This episode is brought to you by Fizz Mobile. If you have ever been at a concert or an event and everybody's using the internet and your data slows to a crawl, you might not be on a 5G or 5G+