On Mon, 19 Jan 2009 07:44:30 -0800, Paul Brandon wrote: >I haven't read this article, but I do occasionally read him for >amusement. He's a philosopher,
Well, no, I believe not. According to his Wikipedia entry (standard disclaimers apply), this is academic career: |Fish did his undergraduate work at the University of Pennsylvania [1] |and earned his Ph.D. from Yale University in 1962. He taught English |at the University of California at Berkeley and Johns Hopkins University |before becoming Arts and Sciences Professor of English and Professor |of Law at Duke University from 1986 to 1998. From 1999 to 2004 |he was Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the |University of Illinois at Chicago. He also held joint appointments |in the Departments of Political Science and Criminal Justice, and |was the chairman of the Religious Studies Committee [2]. During his |tenure there, he recruited professors well respected in the academic |community and garnered a lot of attention for the College [3]. After |resigning as dean in a high-level dispute with the state of Illinois over |funding UIC [4], Fish spent a year teaching in the Department of English. |The Institute for the Humanities at UIC named a lecture series in his |honor, which is still ongoing [5]. In June 2005, he accepted the position |of Davidson-Kahn Distinguished University Professor of Humanities |and Law at Florida International University, teaching in the FIU College |of Law. He is also identified as a "literary theorist" (?) and a legal scholar and one of the foremost John Milton scholars (which brings to mind Steve Carell's character in "Little Miss Sunshine" who kept saying that he was the world's second leading authority on Proust). >which means that he doesn't feel any need to tie his statements to >reality, and has no appreciation for systematic data collection. Perhaps, but it is also possible that he is being super ironic or playing a game in which one moment he's is being literal and other he's ironic or mocking what he's just said. I assume some people in English/humanities like to play such language games. >Internal consistency is all! >Sounds like he's talking about himself. Possibly. Clearly he likes the limelight but does he really want to say that, hey, y'know, everything I've been doing is a waste of time. -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([email protected])
