Divination Club: Trelawney vs Firenze

[xfortytwo.livejournal.com]

Activity: 24 hour debate: Trelawney vs Firenze
Points: Participation 10pts, Additional comment: 5pts. 30pts limit.
Deadline: October 28th at 2 AM UTC (Timezones) (which is in the evening October 27th for US-ers, just to make sure no one is confused!)
Details:

I have a question on my roster where I ask people if they prefer Trelawney or Firenze and it's pretty much split down the middle, so now I'm really curious about your reasons!

Which one do you prefer: Trelawney or Firenze?
Why?

And here are some additional thoughts/questions if you run out of things to talk about regarding Trelawney and Firenze:
Are there any other character in HP verse that you think would fit the position as Divination Professor?
How do you think Divination classes would've been if Snape taught them?

Please leave a fairly substantial reasoning for your choice. I want at least a few lines of reasoning.
- Your replies to others should also have substance and not only be 'I agree!', etc. Points for further comments are at my discretion :)
- Be respectful in your replies, guys. Disagreeing is allowed, but be cool about it!


PS: Remember that the Tarot Stamping is still going on until October 29th! Click here to participate in that


The spirits are telling me that you will need to sign up on The Roster!

Comments

[clzair.livejournal.com]

I don't think Snape would have any tolerance fro the subject of Divination, himself, so I feel like that class would not be interesting or educational in any way whatsoever.
I don't really think anyone else would fit the position as Divination Professor - I think some people may have more tolerance for it than others, but you would need someone really interested in the subject and willing to teach a bunch of teenage students on it, which I don't think would happen.

In terms of the Firenze vs. Trealwney debate, I prefer Firenze. While Trelawney clearly does have the power of Sight, she is not good at teaching Divination and does not really seem to have a grasp on the separate disciplines. Just because you have Sight does not mean you are well educated or trained in crystal ball gazing, tea leaf reading, dream deciphering, etc. It is one thing to be a Seer and a totally different thing to be a Divination professor. Obviously, Dumbledore had legitimate reasons to keep Trelawney around, but unfortunately, I think she failed in her teaching knowledge or abilities.
One of the main reasons I like Firenze is that he is very straightforward about the art of Divination. He admits to his students that even centaurs or people who study it all their lives will never be fully certain in things they see or predict, and seems to really convey to them that the subject is a dying practice. It becomes apparent in his class that Divination is not about seeing things in mere everyday objects (tea leaves, orbs), but observing naturally occurring things, such as the planets, fire, and nature. In this way, I think he is also better than Trelawney at showing that Divination is really a science of observing nature rather than trying to see or find something.
This is why I like Firenze better than Trelawney - while he is very upfront about the hopelessness of studying Divination, he is also clearly very wise and rather learned in the subject, whereas Trelawney simply relies on her crazy aura to assert her as educated in the arts of prediction, etc.
As Dumbledore had said (or sort of said), teaching Divination is nearly impossible. You cannot teach someone to have the gift of Sight, and if they do indeed have it, which in itself is extremely rare, taking Divination would simply not be useful at all. Therefore, it stands to reason for me to assume that Trelawney as a professor is basically useless, while Firenze can at least a little bit of Divination that can be learned, although over a lifetime rather than just a school time. I would rather have him as a professor if the class had to be taught at all.

Claire//Hufflepuff