For my Forbidden Books course, I read Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut to understand the depth psychology behind independent education and philosophy of the way cultures view life’s meanings. The proposals this novel made regarding the perspectives of life and religion were seen as negative content on many accounts of schools from the late 1960’s through late 1980’s. Deeming the novel “anti-religious and anti-sematic”. This caused the book to be banned, later causing an uproar in modifying the amount of religious influences there is in schools. My main focus by reading this book is:
Use of diversity:
Diversity challenges this monoculture because it shows that each individual who has an intellectual philosophy of life can challenge the logic behind “the absolute truth of the universe”. Where there is none; but is inspired through everyone’s unique perspectives and should not be considered “false nor accurate”, but educational. Because it helps understand how the world really works since the mind’s of people create it to be so.
Challenging monocultures of the mind:
The monoculture I want to challenge is how people view life’s meaning. “What is the meaning behind life, and how do we find it?” through education and self teaching. Religion is often a contradiction of being self-taught about how a person singularly views life and achieves wellness and goals through that experience. Religion has a concrete system that forces people to all think the same way, when in reality it is supposed to be different based on the individual’s education throughout life.
As an assignment for understanding how the content in Slaughterhouse 5 was interpreted, I broke down elements within the novel and proposed “who, what, where, when, why, and how” this book held “dangerous content” as seen by prior debates. This was done in a Powerpoint slideshow: