Theory that's translated from their originals to simple to understand English so that I don't have to stare at a paragraph for 20 minutes and do an hour of research to figure out what it means
Theory that's translated from their originals to simple to understand English so that I don't have to stare at a paragraph for 20 minutes and do an hour of research to figure out what it means
Yeah but you can always rephrase things and add infographics and any other pedagogic things. I'm saying this because in things that I studied sometimes for the exact same concept you have these dense motherfuckers authors who can't for the love of anything be clear and some rando youtuber from india explain the thing in 15 minutes. It happens! Don't believe me? Go read this intro to ecology book authored by "Begon". It's the worst shit you can find and yet the professor I had loved it.
The difference is that a textbook is meant to educate and explain to someone assumed to be unfamiliar with its contents. If it struggles to do so, then it has failed in its purpose.
Theory is an argument that contributes a an already extant discourse and is generally pitched towards people who have knowledge of what that discourse has been up to that point.
Ultimately its a case of the map not being the territory. Any explanation or simplification will make choices about what is important and what is not. It will leave things out by necessity (otherwise the explanation would just be the original). It will make choices about how to interpret things that may be incorrect or misleading or ideologically motivated. To go back State and Rev, much of the text is just an argument about how Lenin's ideological enemies are misinterpreting and distorting Marx and Engels. Kautsky's 15 minute YouTube tutorial is going to be a lot different from Lenin's. Which one is ultimately correct? If it's something you care about, then you have to read it yourself.
For what it's worth annotated student editions of theory do sound cool and I endorse it
Well to learn things I like to read reviews that hit you with the concept, and then explain how it was discovered/developed, instead of a long stream of diss-tracks.
But I get it