Sir Roger Scruton, “A Thing Called Civilization”

it's a great honor to be named defender of Western civilization for the year 2019 by is I an organization with which I've been connected for a long time and whose work seems to be ever more important and ever more necessary not just for the young people but also for us the older generation who are trying to communicate the things that we know Western civilization has come in for a lot of attack because it's Western the word Western has been taken to be a standard term of abuse by so many people in the world today and in particular by people who don't have the faintest idea what it means historically metaphysically or poetically our Western civilization is not some peculiar narrow little obsession of people who happen to live in a certain geographical part of the world it is an inheritance constantly expanding constantly including new things something which has given us the knowledge of the human heart which has enabled us to produce not just our wonderful economies and the wonderful ways of living in the world that are ours but also the great works of art the religions the systems of law and government all the other things which make it actually possible for us to recognize that we live in this world it's a far as possible successfully let's leave aside the idea of Western civilization after all depends which way you're going around the globe whether it's west or east look instead at the idea of civilization what is it what is a civilization it is surely a form of connection between people a way in which people understand not just their languages their customs their forms of behavior but the way in which they connect to each other eye to eye face to face in the day to day life which they share this is something which has ordinary dimensions of in the workplace and in the community in our day to day making do a thing with things but also it has a high culture built upon it works of art literature music architecture and so on ways of changing the world so as to be more at home in it and I think that is the distinctive feature of Western civilization that it is a comprehensive civilization constantly giving us new ways of being at home ways of being in relation to each other which bring peace and interest as the primary bonds between our neighbors now I myself have obviously got into an awful lot of trouble through defending Western civilization and it seems a strange feature of our times that the more you are disposed to defend it the more you are regarded as some kind of narrow-minded bigot but the people who make that accusation are the real ones at the narrow mind they're people who don't do not see exactly how large and comprehensive our civilization has been and still is we were brought up on for example the Hebrew Bible Bible an ancient document which perpetuates the civilization of the pre classical Middle East gives us a sense of what people are like in tribal communities when wandering through deserts and so on we learned and studied the the great epics of Rome and Greece which taught us different languages dead languages but languages which showed the world in a different light from our own languages today we were brought up again on the literature of the Middle Ages much of it influenced by a Arabian literature of course and did we all were put to bed with bedtime stories from the Arabian Nights if you're the further you look into it the more comprehensive and universal do you see the inheritance of our civilization to be and that is something that we tend to forget today it isn't a narrow bequest it is something which actually is open to all kinds of innovation which which accepts the whole of human being as a as its subject matter and certainly that is the way I have looked at it I've always rejoiced in being a teacher of the humanities because I recognized that humanities is what it's about it's about being human and all the many ways in which that way of being is diversified and comprehensive in the world in which we are today whatever we do we must fight back against this accusation that somehow our civilization is narrow dogmatic bigoted exclusive this is not so going to compare it with what after all compare it with the Chinese are we narrow bigoted and exclusive when it when set beside the great Confucian tradition not at all I was brought up like many others with an interest in the Chinese civilization we read the Confucian ODEs in ezra pound's translation where all of us fell in love with malice deathly thunder and I think one of the greatest settings of Chinese poetry in all music certainly greater than anything I've heard in Chinese music and there you are as a bigoted remark but let's recognize it's not bigotry at all it's a proof of the open-minded and generous aspect of our culture that a composer like Marla could pretty good extend his romantic Viennese emotions in the direction of those lonely poems that he set to such beautiful music leaving us at the end of the last of them with that incredible chord which as Benjamin Britten described today is printed on the air why are we now being forced into a defensive position when it's so obviously the case to anybody who knows anything about it that what we call Western civilization is another name for civilization as such and for all the achievements of civilization that young people need to know about and if possible to acquire the problem it seems to me stems largely from the invasion of the academic and intellectual world by activist groups who do not take the trouble to learn enough to know who what they're up against but nevertheless define their position in terms of political agendas these political agendas are all about belonging together in a Salvation List group you know we we save ourselves because we believe the right things and we're looking everywhere for those poisonous presences which are trying to exclude us from possession of our rightful heritage and all the new causes are chosen on these grounds their causes of people who want to feel that the existing order of things excludes them and therefore they are justified in overthrowing that order in order to give themselves a place at the top of it and being at the top they then will rearrange it so as to purify it of all those old and corrupting influences which have so far have had too much of a deal now I think this invasion of political activism into universities and into the humanities and enter all the channels of civilization is one of the great disasters of our age but it didn't have to occur we don't have to listen to these people we don't have to we don't have to engage in the show trials the letters of denunciation all the the ways in which people have been which hunted and driven from the community it's only because we join in that these activists have any success we don't have to join in it's quite possible to stand back and even to laugh at some of the things that are being said if you look at all the frenzy about trans transgender activism and so on much of this is sheer confusion and confusion that people want to be rescued from much of that anger is a kind of call to be rescued to stay calm and say that you know there are other views than yours that you may have a point it's not the only point let's get down and discuss it let's see it in the context of the whole of civilization and where it's going to do that would be enough to defuse a great a great amount of the tension that has been afflicting us and I feel that now is the time and through institutions like ISI especially to bring courage and conviction again to young people who know that there's something wrong with this activist witch-hunting of the of the of the old curriculum the time has come at seems to me to - for people like me and and the older generation of teachers to give courage to young people to say that look you have a civilization and inheritance which helps you to understand these things giving way to activism of this kind activism which excludes whole realms of human knowledge is not doing yourself a favor it's not it's not bringing to you the things that you actually need in the world into which you're going to progress what you need to do is engage in dialogue as which is what civilization is about try to understand the human condition in all its complexity and when people try to radicalize and and and politicize the curriculum and that what is taught and thought about in universities don't necessarily even laugh at them it's still it still actually is legally permitted to laugh of people in our country and in our civilization and after all comedy is one of the great gifts of civilization and it's up to you I think to exercise it so I my concluding message is that we shouldn't despair of Western civilization it's just that we should be careful to recognize that we're not talking about some narrow small-minded thing called Western we're talking about an open generous and creative thing called civilization

Channel: Intercollegiate Studies Institute

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Length: 11min 22sec (682 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 31 2020