I disagree that it's a personal preference. Just as some tastes need to be acquired, so does much of understanding (as with art). The first 10 times I heard Bob Marley (& Tom Waits, Arcade Fire,...) I didn't get it. Then, suddenly, I understood and now I love it. The first time I saw Van Gogh sunflowers on the wall of a friend's house I was 16 and I said, WTF? It's not a "personal preference" and I don't believe it's something you let kids decide on their own. (Picasso is crap? Ok, Billy, if you say so!) Instead, you push them a bit to essentially "listen to Bob Marley ten times". If they don't get it after that, too bad, but at least they had a chance.
Learning Perl isn't value-less, but it doesn't compare on any scale to trying "to acquire the understanding" of Huck Finn.
As my other comment perhaps makes clearer, I agree with you on the value of the understanding of the work. I forget that there are people who don't see the point in such things at all, so I forget to make clear that I am not one of them. What I disagree with the orthodox methods of trying to teach that understanding.
Would it be fair to ask you to prove your understanding and appreciation of Bob Marley by asking you to write an essay on him and then judge that essay based on whether it's contents matched up with what other people before you have said? It doesn't seem like that would help you understand if you didn't. It also takes away your own authority on whether your appreciation of the work is valid, which isn't educational at all.
I think your comment highlights the fact that it's normal to not "get" everything, too. That's something that seems to be disregarded in the curriculum, where everyone is supposed to get everything equally at the same time. If someone were to tell you their favorite albums were Kind of Blue, A Love Supreme, Legend, Pet Sounds, Thriller, Dark Side of The Moon, and Revolver, you wouldn't consider them a paragon of refinement so much as a liar. And yet, we're expecting something like that out of students by testing them this way.
I really don't see any way to prove that one topic is more valuable than another.
I agree about acquired tastes; I've had a few myself. But people run away when something's pushed on them too harshly. Sometimes the cool assignments are the ones with a list of options (say, choose two from this list). It's an independent choice but still related to the material.
Learning Perl isn't value-less, but it doesn't compare on any scale to trying "to acquire the understanding" of Huck Finn.