scholasticide in Gaza | a public note on grammar @LitHub
A group of academics affiliated with North American institutions have1 written an open letter condemning the ongoing scholasticide2 in Gaza. This marks the most recent collective gesture in a series of statements from anti-genocidal3 culture workers.4 But unlike other expressions of solidarity,5 thi
A group of academics affiliated with North American institutions have1 written an open letter condemning the ongoing scholasticide2 in Gaza. This marks the most recent collective gesture in a series of statements from anti-genocidal3 culture workers.4 But unlike other expressions of solidarity,5 this letter—with its 2000-and-counting signatories—primarily focuses on “Israel’s systematic attacks on educational life.”6 – (source)
- No. The subject of the sentence is singular, group. In order that it is in grammatical agreement, unless this is a group of anti-grammatical culture workers (see notes 3 and 4), the verb ought to be has.
- The source, at LitHub, in an article by Brittany Allen dated 10 April 2024, links from “scholasticide” to an article hosted on the Scholars Against War on Palestine website stating that the word refers to a “pattern of Israeli colonial attacks on Palestinian scholars, students, and educational institutions going back to the Nakba of 1948, and expanding after the 1967 war on Palestine and the 1982 invasion of Lebanon.” (source)
- Just as an anti-pyramidal group would not be against pyramids but against having the structure of one, or anti-suicidal cultural workers would not be against suicide on principle, just their own, so an anti-genocidal group would be one that does not practice genocide, on its members, for example.
- There is really no problem with “culture workers” except that it sounds bacterial, and, needlessly apologetic, like a nod to the culture industry, where we the workers harvest petri dishes of art and books… cos we can handle the stink of em.
- see note 4.
- see notes 3 and 1. The education referred to here is from life. The life is educational. The intention is on the contrary that the life is not the education, to which Israel’s systematic attacks, did they not end so many lives, would contribute, but that Israel’s agenda, enacted as the system of attacks, is the destruction of scholastic institutions, including libraries. (see post)
