Jews -- Periodicals; Jews -- United States -- Periodicals
There is another quite as notable distinction between our Menorah and
the Jewish students' organizations in Germany. With us the Menorah is
primarily an undergraduate society. When graduate Menorah Societies
arise, they may be confederated with the undergraduate organization,
but they will of course retain their separate character. In Germany
this distinction between undergraduate and graduate does not exist.
Matriculation in the University, not the taking of a degree in it,
introduces one into the society of the educated with its appellative
"intellectual" corresponding to our "high-brow" rather than to our
"college grad." Joining the membership of a student organization marks
the entrance into that large class of "intellectuals." And once you
join such an organization you are a member ever after. In Germany, in
fact, nobody graduates from a university in the same sense that we do.
There the taking of a degree is merely an episode. If you take it, you
will thenceforth be addressed as "Herr Doktor"; if you do not take it,
you will keep on printing on your visiting card "Kandidat Philosophie"
all the rest of your lifetime, and be addressed by the uninitiate as
"Herr Doktor" just the same. Thus the achievements generally ascribed
to Jewish students' organizations in Germany are in reality the
collective work of all the Jewish men of academic training, and not
necessarily of students actually engaged in university studies. Read
over the names of contributors to publications issued by what are
known as "student organizations," and you will notice how loosely that
term is used.
_Intellectual Problems of the German Jewish Youth_
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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