چکیده (انگلیسی):

Recently a student in an American high school was asked on a test whoSocrates was. He answered that Socrates was an Indian chief. Whether thisincident is apocryphal is difficult to say. It does have the ring of authenticity:One can imagine the hapless student, in desperate search for an answer, as-sociating Socrates with Seneca, the ancient Roman philosopher, then con-necting Seneca to the Indian tribe of the same name. In any case the story isa favorite of former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education Chester E. Finn,Jr., and has been used repeatedly to illustrate the cultural illiteracy of Amer-ican students and to dramatize the urgency of restoring the nation's culturalknowledge. In fact, a formidable educational reform movement has devel-oped, aimed at improving the teaching of American culture within theschools.