How about the Marx brother that’s buried in England?
A couple of months ago, some high school kids came into the library where I work looking for information on an old hotel in town. They asked me when it was built and I told them I wasn’t sure of the exact year, but I knew it was built during the depression. They then proceeded to seach the newspaper archives from the 1920s to get the exact year. I didn’t have the heart to tell them…
I wish I had a nickel for every person who’s said to me
“Oh, you lived in Japan? Do you speak Chinese?”
:mad:
SW
That would be Commo.
Now, to be fair, that is a trick question. There are no “white” horses. Horses appearing to be white are either registered gray or albino.
- Rick
Much of what’s being said here would definitely NOT be considered “idiocy.” Can you blame a 10 year old for not knowing what a record is? (I’m not picking on the person who posted that…it’s just an example)
There are certain things that we don’t know, just because we weren’t around at the time, or lived a sheltered life. It had nothing to do with education, or intelligence. For example, I have no idea who Andy Warhol is. I’m assuming he was most recognized, before my time. (I’m 22)
Of course, there are some things we should all know. When I was in junior high shool, there as a girl who cried her eyes out, because of embarrassment. She could not find Africa on a map. Even after being handed a globe, she couldn’t find it.
Now, for something more cultural, I have a friend who has not seen any Star Wars films, and does not know any of the character’s names. Something is lacking there.
Adam
“Life is hard…but God is good”
Shortly after meeting my wife, whom I love dearly, she asked me: “So does Canada’s border run along the entire northern part of the US”
I feel more like I do now than I did when I got here.
Let’s not forget Volvos and Bikini Teams! 
VB
I could never eat a mouse raw…their little feet are probably real cold going down. :rolleyes:
I’m a liberal arts student, as is my girlfriend, and for us the stakes are a bit higher on what we consider `common knowledge.’ In the college environment we expect that people know that Hitler was Austrian, to recognize biblical, Shakespearean or classical allusions, to know how to pronounce Descartes, Nietzche, Godel, Goethe, Kant and the Diet of Worms. I’m not sure I know what common knowledge is. But here are a few tales of the ignorance I’ve dealt with:
[ul][li]A person on the street began to give me a spiel about how Jesus wanted me to buy him a sandwich. I told him I didn’t believe in Jesus, at which point he asked, “What are you, a Mormon?”[/li][li]A cashier at a restaurant made a comment about the fedora I was wearing, saying that it made me look like Eliot Ness (which it didn’t) and he told us, as we were cashing out, that he found out all that stuff in the movie really happened.[/li][li]As I was shelving journals at the library I work for, a woman asked me where she could find the journal Educational Leadership. I pointed out to her that we were standing right next to The Economist and she stared at me blankly. Actually, I have many such stories about Education majors.[/li][li]There was a sign at the university for a celebration on Fredrick Douglas. An old woman stopped and asked me if that was the Douglas of the Lincoln/Douglas debates. I said, “No, ma’am. Nobody celebrates him anymore.”[/li][li]I once saw a woman on a BBS who quoted the lyrics to the song Fever and attributed them to Madonna.[/li][li]My younger brother brought a couple of people over to watch The Life of Brian. When the scene came in which the People’s Front of Judea were going through the sewers, Reggie says, “And there’s a Roman feast tonight, so don’t wear your best sandals.” I laughed and got weird looks.[/li][li]In one of my classes, a woman comparing the story of Pandora’s Box to the story of Eve’s Apple referred to the biblical story as the western version.'[/li][li]A book my girlfriend read tried to draw some Jungian significance from the fact that the words for a leader in three different cultures all meant long-haired.’ The words were: Ceasar, Kaiser, and Czar.[/li][li]When my cow orkers were rearranging the circulation desk on my day off the bulk erase magnets we use were placed right next to the computer monitors. I corrected this when I came in on sunday and degaussed the monitors, but I found out that they had already replaced one monitor because of this strange discoloration they were seeing. When they described the problem to the computer guy on monday, he knew exactly why it had happened, and it astonished them.[/ul][/li]
Boy, I enjoy telling these stories. Of course, I’d be mortified to admit the number of times I’ve been caught not knowing what I was talking about. The nice thing about a liberal arts eduction, though, is that you quite often never have to admit your ignorance.
Right now I’m working with a big group of mostly college freshmen and sophomores in a survey of western art class and I’m appalled at some of the basics that are missing. I usually get around the trouble with basic christian beliefs (I didn’t grow up christian, but there are some basics you just couldn’t avoid hearing about, you know) by tieing everything in to christmas carols. It always bugs me to have to point to every country I talk about on a map–England and Italy and such.
BUT,
to implicate myself… I went to elementary school in a too-forward-thinking school district in the 70s, and they all knew that the english measurment system would be replaced by metric Any Day Now, so I still have to ask how many ounces in a pound.
I was talking to someone who works at the Education Abroad Program at my school, and she told me that one year, all applicants were asked to point to the country they intended to go to on a map at their entrance interview. About half of them couldn’t do it.
Now, if someone asked me to point out Micronesia on a map, it might take me a little while to find it, but I’m not planning to spend the next ten months there.
~Harborina
“This is my sandbox. I’m not allowed to go in the deep end. That’s where I saw the leprechauns.”
Speaking as one who completed his undergraduate degree (English/Psychology)at a liberal arts institution, I’d like to give an alternative view:
The nice thing about a liberal arts education is that, when it is complete, you have learned:
- how little you know,
- how to find out the things you need to know,
- how easy it is to be tolerant of other folks who might not have had the opportunities you have.
Eissclam.
ARG—
Andy Warhol was one of the most popular Pop Artists of the 1960s and '70s, as well as a character in his own right. He also founded Interview magazine, made a number of bizarre movies, and was a successful portrait photographer.
Gee, I introduced 20-somethings to Dietrich and Warhol, I guess MY week wasn’t wasted!
I’m 20, live in Vermont, and am only on my 2nd semester in college, but I am well aware of Andy. He more or less created the pop-culture movement, by turning everyday images (the Campbell’s Soup Can, for instance,) into “art.” He probably among the most important artists of the 20th century. So not knowing him IS a pretty big deal. And while I don’t want this to be a personal attack in any way, not knowing such a huge cultural figure probably does qualify for cultural ignorance. It has EVERYTHING to do with education. I’m not an artist, but there are things that ARE common knowledge, and Warhol should damn well be one of them.
Habit rules the unreflecting herd. - Wordsworth
[quote]
Originally posted by Johnny Angel:
[ul][li]There was a sign at the university for a celebration on Fredrick Douglas. An old woman stopped and asked me if that was the Douglas of the Lincoln/Douglas debates. I said, “No, ma’am. Nobody celebrates him anymore.”[/ul][/li][/quote]
Just to be a pain, it should be Frederick Douglass.
(Boy, I hope I’m right.)
Tinker
Just hijacking this thread to plug a favorite author, but anyone who’s interested in a different take on Andy Warhol should check out this site:
http://www.eventhorizon.com/sfzine/fiction/warhols_dracula/pages/01.html
Other than the first two examples mentioned below, I have an uncanny sense of geography. I can tell where something is pretty much by how it sounds, and can find anything on a map within seconds. I also have a good concept of where things are relative to other things, which apparently is rare.
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This first one is willful ignorance. I didn’t believe in Oklahoma (the state, I’d seen the movie of the musical) until I actually met someone from there at age 22. I mean, come on, a whole state of dirt and wind? Shaped like a saucepan? What the hell are you trying to pull? Even saw it on the map, thought it was all a big hoax.
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I can’t remember what is the difference in Holland, the Netherlands, and Belgium. Which people are Dutch? Is Holland and the Netherlands the same thing? I finally figured out that Belgians come from Belgium, but I have to think through it every time it comes up in conversation, which thankfully isn’t very often.
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Once on a church youth trip from AL to Boston, we were riding up the interstate through VA/MD, and saw the skyline of Washington DC in the distance. Since I was the bright one of the group, I pointed it out: “Hey guys, look out the window, that’s Washington. See the Washington Monument?” I patiently explained about that being the tall pointy thing, but I was flummoxed for a moment when a girl asked “Isn’t Washington by Texas?” The whole group was on the edge of their seats, waiting for my response. I had to stop and think, then decided she meant the state of Washington, which I explained was something different, and that no, it wasn’t by Texas. They were, however, both to the west of where we were. She then said, “Oh, that must be it, I knew there were a bunch of states out there somewhere, I just don’t know what order they’re in.”
Andy Warhol is also responsible for the “15 minutes of fame” quote.
One of my cousins (you know, the annoying little twerp that you and the cousin that you always hung out with had to put up with) has a signed Warhol. Of course, his step-father is director of the Fort Worth Museum of Art.
…in a state so nonintuitive it can only be called weird…
Holland and the Netherlands is the same thing. People who live there are Dutch. Amsterdam is a city in Holland. They have windmills, funny shoes and hats, and prostitution and pot is legal there. Plus, they have yellow bikes that the city government leaves on the streets for anyone to use. And no one ever steals them.
I had a friend who was Dutch, hence the dutchy knowledge. But I don’t know why they aren’t called Netherlanders or Hollanders. Any thoughts?
Habit rules the unreflecting herd. - Wordsworth
I love it when I tell people about Abbie Hoffman, and they say, Who’s she?