>If you have spent any time in post-baccalaureate English/cultural/media-studies environs then you know of the brilliant Terry Eagleton – that noted literary critic and author of the beloved grad-school crutch, Literary Theory: An Introduction (1983). Recently Mr. Eagleton gave four lectures at Yale University. For most Americans these lectures will both fascinating and seemingly impenetrable. We are not so used to the higher levels of British academia. But they are worth taking the time, and ultimately thoroughly enjoyable – not least of which because Eagleton has a wry sense of humor.

These lectures are probably most famous for the term “Ditchkins.”

“…someone like Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens, a couplet I will henceforth reduce to the solitary signifier Ditchkins…”

Of course there is much more than that in the lectures. Below are video versions, but they are also available through iTunes.