Dallas' Online Teaching Blog

Am I a Pragmatic?

In my graduate studies I have offically discovered that I am a pragmatic, which doesn't sound like a very nice thing to be . I decided to look into the whole movement toward pragmatism so I went to my old friend google and typed in "Am I a pragmatic." This led to a rather strange assortment of sites such as "The Ubiquitous Wookie"(http://www.theubiquitouswookiee.com/) and "Spamroll.com" which I won't provide a link to because it has way too many references to the Kama Sutra. The dictionary officially defines a pragmatic as:

pragmatic
A
adjective
1
matter-of-fact, pragmatic, pragmatical

concerned with practical matters; "a matter-of-fact (or pragmatic) approach to the problem"; "a matter-of-fact account of the trip"
2
hardheaded, hard-nosed, practical, pragmatic

guided by practical experience and observation rather than theory; "a hardheaded appraisal of our position"; "a hard-nosed labor leader"; "completely practical in his approach to business"; "not ideology but pragmatic politics"
3
pragmatic, pragmatical

of or concerning the theory of pragmatism.

Either I am completely lost as to what it means to be a pragmatist or this dictionary needs to be updated.

posted by Dallas Becker @ 5:41 PM