Disagreements in the Humanities

摘要

Given the proliferation of theories and politics in the humanities in recent years, younger scholars sometimes wonder what holds the fields together; what gives the practitioners a common purpose. Everybody has his own modus operandi and displays it confidently, but its connection to the discipline as a whole can appear tenuous. Assistant professors teach classes and revise dissertations, learning the local history of their departments as they run the tenure gauntlet, not always sure of the general requirements they must meet. Graduate students take seminars and give survey courses as teaching assistants, thereby acquiring a smooth facility in academic discourse -but ask them about the broad goals of liberal education and they falter. For most professionals, it seems, the humanities are an individual endeavor. Their sense of the discipline extends to their classroom lectures and the essays they write. People do their work in isolation, envisioning disciplinary labor as themselves in the act of reading, writing, and teaching. Humanities practice is an experiential process, filled with long afternoons with students and long nights fitting novels to recondite theories. Hiring and promotion are based on personal accomplishment (lots of publication, high teaching evaluations). Prestige comes from developing an original theory, delivering stunning lectures, writing a ground-breaking book - successes that can be tied to one's unique identity. Everybody knows this and acts accordingly.