The Eminently Quotable Letters Page
“U-M business school needs a massive tree,” runs a headline on the News letters page about how the business school needs a massive tree. This tree would teach the aspiring MBAs a few lessons, among them that “a storm will blow down limbs,” and “most of the tree is underground, unseen and unheard,” writes Catherine Jones of Ann Arbor. She is probably more optimistic about the ability of business students to take away such lessons than is warranted. We’re imagining the new bestseller “What a 300-Year-Old Ann Arbor Tree Taught Me About Business and Life.” “Lesson 1: A storm will blow down limbs. Massive layoffs are an inevitable and natural part of management to clear away the old branches and make room for the new. Lesson 2: Most of the tree is underground, unseen and unheard. Environmental laws? OSHA regulations? Accounting creativity? What your stockholders don’t know won’t hurt them — they just have to be confident that your roots are underground doing what they need to do, sucking up sustenance from the earth.”
Fortunately, this management classic is unlikely to be written, since the oak in question is being chopped down for the “new” Michigan campus (scare quotes hers), to create “room” (quotes again hers) for a new (this time it doesn’t get the quotes) building.
Is this a new grammatical convention of which we weren’t aware, to put quotes around things you don’t like? Sure, you see them around terms that the writer doesn’t like, to indicate that this is the language of the opposition — the “death tax”, the “MSM”, the “war on terror” — but when did it become acceptable to scare-quote anything that one has a problem with? If we did that, this blog would be a mess. The “Friends of the ‘Ann Arbor’ ‘Greenway’” are going to the “city council” meeting to “speak” about their “plan” to put a “park” in “downtown ‘Ann Arbor’”. See what we mean?
Yes, the writer makes the “assumption” that Michigan B-School students are “smart” enough to understand “metaphors” such as wind “blowing” down a tree. Have you ever spoken with a B-School “student”? “Student” is a generous word, “retarded asshole” is probably more appropriate. I’m fairly “certain” these “students” “wouldn’t” “understand” “a” “hidden” “message” “if” “it” “hit” “them” “on” “the” “head” “like” “a” “fallen” “branch” “of” “a” “400″ year” “old” “oak” “tree.”
Catherine Jones: thank you for your stupid NIMBY opinion, and for your creative use of the quotation mark.
posted by DrMandrake on May 23rd, 2005 at 1:50 pmOhhhh, “irony”.
posted by Annie on May 23rd, 2005 at 1:54 pmI get irony.
Chauncy Gardner for president!
posted by OFWinsurgent on May 23rd, 2005 at 2:36 pmDon’t knock it, folks; I think irony’s still got a lotta life, despite what Roger Rosenblatt (or whoever the hell it was who declared the “death of irony” after Sept. 11) says.
“Irony,” however, I’m fucking sick of.
posted by Lazaro on May 23rd, 2005 at 4:02 pmAhh, extended metaphors. Teacher, mother, secret lover.
posted by Jen on May 23rd, 2005 at 5:10 pmLazaro, I believe it was Graydon Carter who notably declared the “end of the age of irony” in the NY Times.
posted by Some Arab Guy on May 23rd, 2005 at 6:10 pmWouldn’t the proper use of quotes be
“downtown” Ann Arbor
?
posted by Constantine on May 23rd, 2005 at 7:53 pmShe sounds like an angry kindergarten teacher. Maybe she got a bad batch of paste?
posted by Ryan on May 24th, 2005 at 10:05 amThe door to the chemistry building on North U is now labeled “After Hours Access Door.”
Their quotes, not mine.
posted by Dan on May 24th, 2005 at 10:31 amDr. Mandrake,
I am a b-school “student” to be and I can garantee you that I get the hidden message: the storm blows of the branch and it hits one on the head and one, like, gets it?
I am told we lurn about hidden messeges in our b-school “classes,” so I will be even better at this soon. I’m shure you’re at the top of your game tho; do you see the hidden messege here?
posted by Retarded Asshole on May 24th, 2005 at 4:35 pmB-school students can’t spell?
posted by js on May 24th, 2005 at 7:14 pm