An op-ed in a US newspaper recently said that Jordan Peterson has become (arguably) Canada's "most famous academic ever." I'm pretty sure I've discussed Jordan Peterson in some capacity or other in other blog posts. I won't even look it up now. But the phrase seems to me a clear case of presentist bias. Surely Marshall McLuhan made a bigger splash on both sides of the border (and in the world in general) than Peterson has. Heck, McLuhan played himself in Annie Hall ! How much more high profile can an academic get! Northrop Frye, the famous literary critic and theorist, also comes to mind, though Frye is a more high-brow choice than either Peterson or McLuhan. And surely not the stuff of Hollywood movies.
