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Smittcamp Honors College
Colloquium onValues February 12, 2009
PPT originally presented at CSUF to nine doctorate
students from Tamaulipas, Mexico, July 28, 2008
by:
David Ross, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus: French, Portuguese
California State University, Fresno
http://zimmer.csufresno.edu/~davidro/
PPT assistance by Anne-Marie Ross.
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Your College Experience, by John Gardner
Chapter 15: Values: personal, moral, societal and national.
Professor Ross begins the lesson this way :
1. He asks the students to write their values
on a piece of paper, anonymously. Then
he collects and reads what the students
have written.
1. Usually students write down the same
values: family, honor, religion, faith,
justice, democracy, freedom or liberty,
education, work.
3. Gardner’s purpose is to teach a
broader notion of what is meant by
“values.”
4. Gardner defines values as:
Atitudes or beliefs that we choose and affirm
with pride, that we confirm
through our actions and behavior.
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5. Gardner’s key points are:
As a result of a university education students must realize
from the beginning that:
• Very probably they will adopt some new values;
• They need to learn to be tolerant of others’ values in order
to function better in a multiracial, multicultural, pluralistic,
and diverse society.
• They should concern themselves with the common good of society
and occupy themselves with the resolution of social injustices, with
society’s contradictions, and with value “dualisms.”
-- The U.S. Is world leader in:
Homicides perpetrated by minors.
-- Of the 18 most industrialized
countries in the world, there exists in
the U.S. :
The largest gulf between rich and poor.
At least 14 per cent of the US population has no health
insurance.
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“I believe that if a person is poor, it’s because
God wants him to be poor, and that if a person is
rich it is because God wants him to be rich.”
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(2005)
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The Enlightenment and Fundamental American Values:
The Declaration de Independence (1776)
• Self-government
• Equality
• Life
• Liberty
• Pursuit of happiness
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Jefferson, author of the
Declaration of Independence
….life, liberty and the
Pursuit of happiness…
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The Constitution (1787), preamble:
• Justice,
rule of law
• Domestic tranquility
• National defense
• General welfare
• Liberty
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The Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia.
Q u ic k T im e ™
an d a
T I F F ( Un c o m p r e s s e d ) d e c o m p r e s s o r
a r e n e e d e d t o s e e t h is p c
i t u r e.
“… in order to form a more perfect union …”
The Bill of Rights (1791):
• Freedom of speech
• Freedom of assembly
• Freedom of religion
• Freedom of petition
• The right to bear arms
• and others …
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¿Have these documents influenced other nations?
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The interpretation of basic American values continues, and
the discussion is often heated, dynamic, and vital.
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Our Endangered Values:
America’s Moral Crisis,
Jimmy Carter
(2005)
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Enlightenment:
reason, humanism,
tolerance, deism,
natural religion .
Heritage:
movement toward a more progressive,
moderate, modern, secular politics,
society, and religion.
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Diderot
Rousseau
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Candide by
Voltaire,
1759
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Question: Are there other American values that we have not
mentioned?
What do you think?
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Professional athletes, coaches, and professors: who is paid
the most and what does this say about society’s values?
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Conclusions: Fundamental American Values
From the nation’s beginning, the most important
American values have been:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Representative government;
Individual liberty;
The pursuit of happiness;
The general welfare.
Americans appear to value individual
liberty more than collective social justice.
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American Values: Opposing Viewpoints, ed, Mary E.
Williams, New York: Thompson (2005).
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Questions Concerning Values
1. What are values,
according to John Gardner?
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Values are important attitudes or beliefs that:
we accept by choice,
affirm with pride,
and express in our actions and behavior.
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2. Are there positive and negative
values?
Which are emphasized by Gardner?
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Gardner emphasizes positive values.
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3. Is there a relationship between
one’s values and one’s behavior?
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Yes, we act on the basis of our values:
as an individual,
as a member of a group,
and as a citizen of a nation.
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4. Where do values come from?
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We acquire our values from our
experiences:
family, religion, friends,
education, media, reflection
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Gardner refers to the
“human condition.”
What is the human condition?
How are values related to it?
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“The human condition encompasses all of
the experiences of being human. As
mortal entities, there are a series of
biologically determined events that are
common to most human lives, and some
that are inevitable to all. The ongoing way
in which humans react or cope with these
events is the human condition …”
Extracted from Wikipedia definition.
The creation of values is part of the
human experience.
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6. What are the different types of values?
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Gardner cites moral, esthetic
and performance values.
He also distinguishes between
personal, societal (group)
and national values.
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7. How may values change in
the process of education,
especially at the post-secondary level?
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Based on experience and the educational
process, an individual may choose to retain
core values, perhaps abandon some,
and to adopt new and additional ones.
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8. What do you suppose Dr. Ross’
values are as a university professor
and intellectual?
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He values the life of the mind:
discipline, hard work, dependability,
critical thinking, intellectual integrity,
the search for truth, the acquisition of
knowledge through life-long learning.
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9. What do you consider the fundamental
values of American society to be?
How would you explain them to someone
from another country who has not visited
the US?
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Gardner cites two key American values:
equality of opportunity,
and tolerance.
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10. What are the liberal, humanistic,
secular values of the 18th Century
Enlightenment enshrined in the US
Declaration of Independence, the
Constitution, and the Bill of Rights?
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Self-government, equality, life,
liberty, and pursuit of happiness.
Justice, domestic tranquility,
defense, general welfare, liberty …
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Freedoms: speech, press, religion,
petition, bear arms, due process.
Guarantees against: unreasonable
searches, self-incrimination, cruel
and unusual punishment.
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11. College educated individuals usually
become more tolerant of others;
why is this beneficial to society?
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E pluribus unum:
Ours is a multicultural, pluralistic,
democratic society.
In addition to some fundamental “mainstream
values,” there has to be widespread
acceptance of differences: ethnic, religious,
sexual orientation.
Employers and laws require it.
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12. What does Gardner mean by
“cultural relativism?”
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All cultural, individual, societal and
national values and practices are
equally valid. We should not judge
aspects of another culture from the
biases of our own.
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13. Are there reasonable or even necessary
limits to tolerance? Circumstances when
cultural relativism does not apply?
54.
Unacceptable, aggressive, illegal
behavior; behavior that violates basic
rights as announced in the UN
Declaration of Human Rights (1948).
Cultural practices than demean, harm,
deny basic rights, including the
mistreatment of women and children,
female genital excision. Slavery.
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14. What “value dualisms” or apparent
contradictions in US society does
Gardner mention?
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Although the US is the richest nation,
it tolerates the worst poverty among
industrialized nations.
In the US there is a larger gap between
rich and poor than exists in other
developed countries.
Gardner, pp. 299-300.
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15. What is the chief difference between
an American and a European or Candian
interpretation of liberty, freedom and
equality?
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In the US individual liberty is stressed,
whereas in Europe and in Canada
society’s collective well-being is valued
and provided for. For example, European
countries and Canada consider basic
health coverage a right.
Do you think that there may be -- in considering universal
human values -- a middle ground upon which moderate to
progressive Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Muslims,
humanists, agnostics, atheists and others can agree?
What about the following?
Protecting democracy, civil liberties, civil rights, human
rights, women’s rights, the environment, planetary
sustainability; working for peace; ending poverty,
colonialism, racism, homophobia, xenophobia,
and the growing gap between rich and poor nationally and
Identify any of the foregoing issues to which you cannot
Subscribe and explain why.