i think if discussions of media / disciplines based around it took a more descriptive and less prescriptive approach the whole council of elders thing would be improved. i believe that stories, symbols, and beliefs are enormously important to humans and there should be fields dedicated to analyzing them, but the generic oldass white dude book should be analyzed as a historical document and should not be forced onto bored high schoolers or libart freaks any more than they should be forced to read an 18th century shipping manifest - sure human experiences can be universal but a hell of a lot of things that are held up as high culture are impenetrable and don't connect, especially when they're taught and held up as something Very Important (aka, drink your milk and take your vitamins in book form) linguistics figured out the pres-des thing, i wish it would spread into the social from the social science