IRVING, Texas (March 15, 2023) — UD professor Joshua Parens, Ph.D., former dean of the Braniff Graduate School of Liberal Arts, will deliver a plenary speech at an upcoming conference for the Association for Core Texts and Courses (ACTC).
The ACTC is an organization of scholars devoted to fostering the use of core texts in undergraduate programs, such as UD’s Core Curriculum. The organization, which Parens leads as president, releases several publications, including a journal of undergraduate research.
Their conference this year will take place in Dallas from March 30 to April 2. Parens will deliver his speech on March 30 at 7 p.m.
His plenary will focus on the Trivium, a fundamental program of medieval pedagogy — covering the three subjects of grammar, rhetoric and logic — that Parens calls overlooked today.
“Although we in ACTC are devoted to the study of core texts down through the ages, we are far less well versed in the Trivium,” Parens said.
“Interest in core texts or Great Books developed toward the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. Although the Trivium is something like the form to the content of core texts, for a variety of reasons, the Trivium has until the last decade or two been neglected. This lecture will explore the history of the liberal arts to try to determine why they have come to be neglected, why interest in them is now growing and why ACTC needs to get on the bandwagon.”
Parens has taught politics and philosophy at UD for 25 years. He formerly served as dean of the Braniff Graduate School from 2013 to 2022 and will return to full-time teaching next year.
