The American Scholar of Today

The American Scholar of Today

Reading was always a task. But not at first.

At first reading was fun, it was the story before bed or the book you read because it was exciting and gave great pleasure. That was before school took over.

School made reading a task. Read this book. Check. Read that book. Check. It became a chore, something I had to do because my teachers said I had to. And there was always the incentive. At first it was pizza. Personal pan pizza at Pizza Hut. That was cool, I liked pizza, so of course I would read as many books it took to get the little golden dish of cheesy goodness. As time went on the incentive to read was a good grade. If you read you would surely be guaranteed a good grade.

Reading became an action done out of necessity rather than want or desire.

The fun was sucked right out of it and for all of the American scholars in my generation.

For Emerson, the American scholar needed three things: nature, action, and reading. While reading is necessary, Emerson also says that reading makes a student into a satellite and not a system. Instead of developing minds we are hindering them with books. We need to break free from the models that have been driving into our minds for years and discover and create new ways of thinking and learning. Let creation take over imitation.

So here we are, years after Emerson, and my generation would agree with throw out the books part of Emerson’s assertion, but would they believe in the creation part? If my generation doesn’t even read the books in order to point them to others things, then will our generation be without inspiration? Can people create without inspiration? Are books the source of inspiration? Is our increasingly bookless, reading less, generation doomed of creation and imagination? What has happened to our American scholars of today and what will happen to the American scholars of tomorrow without books and reading?