Lisa Delpit famous quotes

Those with power are frequently least aware of -- or least willing to acknowledge -- its existence [and] those with less power are often most aware of its existence.
-- Lisa Delpit

#Ignorance #Power #Existence

Progressive white teachers seem to say to their black students 'Let me help you find your voice. I promise not to criticize one note as you search for your song'. But the black teachers say 'I've heard your song loud and clear. Now I want to teach you to harmonize with the rest of the world.
-- Lisa Delpit

#Song #Teacher #Teaching

We do not really see through our eyes or hear through our ears, but through our beliefs.
-- Lisa Delpit

#Eye #Ears #Belief

When one 'we' gets to determine standards for all 'we's' then some 'we's' are in trouble.
-- Lisa Delpit

#Trouble #Standards #Determine

If the curriculum we use to teach our children does not connect in positive ways to the culture young people bring to school, it is doomed to failure.
-- Lisa Delpit

#Children #School #People

In order to teach you, I must know you.
-- Lisa Delpit

#Order #Teach

We do not really see through our eyes or hear through our ears, but through our beliefs. To put our beliefs on hold is to cease to exist as ourselves for a moment -- and that is not easy ... but it is the only way to learn what it might feel like to be someone else and the only way to start the dialogue.
-- Lisa Delpit

#Eye #Ears #Might

Three minutes thought would suffice to find this out; but thought is irksome and three minutes is a long time.

Ignorance of the law excuses no man from practicing it.

Who but the Atman is capable of removing the bonds of ignorance, passion and self-interested action?

I am more and more convinced that man is a dangerous creature and that power, whether vested in many or a few, is ever grasping, and like the grave, cries, 'Give, give.'

Must a government be too strong for the liberties of its people or too weak to maintain its own existence?

The government will make use of these powers only insofar as they are essential for carrying out vitally necessary measures.... The separate existence of the federal states will not be done away.... The number of cases in which an internal necessity exists for having recourse to such law is in itself a limited one.

There are contingency plans in the NATO doctrine to fire a nuclear weapon for demonstrative purposes, to demonstrate to the other side that they are exceeding the limits of toleration in the conventional area.

Curiosity has its own reason for existence.

Every species has come into existence coincident both in space and time with a pre-existing closely allied species.

All objects exist in a moment of time.