On Mon, 19 Jan 2009 08:07:11 -0800, Rick Froman wrote: >I think he is only decrying what we often commiserate about on >this list: the business model of education that seems to have won >the day.
Decrying it? I don't think so. He appears to be dismissing the entire area of the humanities as a valid academic area. In another article on his blog he says the following: |Note that what we're talking about here is the study, not the |production, of humanistic texts. The question I posed in the column |was not do works of literature, philosophy and history have instrumental |value, but does the academic analysis of works of literature, philosophy |and history have instrumental value. When Jeffrey Sachs says that |"in the real world" the distinction between the humanities and the |sciences on the basis of utility does not hold because "philosophers |have made important contributions to the sciences" and "the hard |sciences have had a profound impact on the humanities," he doesn't |come within 100 miles of refuting anything I say. http://fish.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/the-uses-of-the-humanities-part-two/ It sounds like Fish is willing to cut the sciences some slack though he may not realize that the criticisms he raises may well apply there as well. >Basic research is no longer valued and, if it can't show a practical (or at >least politically pragmatic) purpose, it is unlikely to be funded. >Universities >have become vocational training centers with only a touch of the liberal >arts left. His tone is intentionally provocative in saying that we are past >the >time when anything can be done about it but he is happy to have lived in a >time before the current revolution wiped out the niche that he inhabited: >a place where the liberal arts could be studied for their own sake and not >to serve some more pragmatic purpose. >From some other sources I've read, it seems to me that Fish would be satisfied to leave the humanities alone if they focused on things like the actual writing of plays, stories, novels, etc., because these are products that go beyond the academic context (or at least attempt to). As long as the humanities focus on critically analyzing what it produces seems to be what he is complaining about. -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([email protected])
