"Ignorance of what real learning is, and a consequent suspicion of it; materialism, and a consequent intellectual laxity, both of these have done destructive work in the colleges"
About this Quote
Then she names the engine driving that suspicion: “materialism.” Not just greed, but a worldview that measures value by immediate return. The subtext is that colleges, tasked with cultivating judgment and depth, have begun acting like service providers: keep the customer happy, keep the outcomes legible, keep the friction low. Out of that comes “intellectual laxity,” a wonderfully damning phrase that suggests softness in standards and slackness in thinking. It’s not that people are incapable; it’s that the surrounding incentives reward the easy, the digestible, the job-adjacent.
The context matters: Gerould is writing in the early 20th century, when American higher education is rapidly expanding, professionalizing, and rebranding itself around utility, administration, and prestige. Her sentence carries the anxiety of an era watching the liberal arts get outbid by “practical” training. The rhetorical move is causal and cumulative: ignorance breeds suspicion; materialism breeds slackness; together they “do destructive work” quietly, from inside the colleges themselves.
Quote Details
| Topic | Learning |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Gerould, Katharine Fullerton. (2026, January 17). Ignorance of what real learning is, and a consequent suspicion of it; materialism, and a consequent intellectual laxity, both of these have done destructive work in the colleges. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/ignorance-of-what-real-learning-is-and-a-55684/
Chicago Style
Gerould, Katharine Fullerton. "Ignorance of what real learning is, and a consequent suspicion of it; materialism, and a consequent intellectual laxity, both of these have done destructive work in the colleges." FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/ignorance-of-what-real-learning-is-and-a-55684/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Ignorance of what real learning is, and a consequent suspicion of it; materialism, and a consequent intellectual laxity, both of these have done destructive work in the colleges." FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/ignorance-of-what-real-learning-is-and-a-55684/. Accessed 17 Feb. 2026.
