From: ksumner-AT-bosshog.arts.uwo.ca
Date: Tue, 16 Jul 1996 09:49:17 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Re: censorship, intolerance -- raka shome


>I think we might have different definitions of "academic", that's all, Karen. I
>consider a private scholar who is nonetheless determined to take a scholarly
>approach to learning -- with respect for critical thinking, for citing one's
>work and explaining one's conclusions, and so on -- to be just as academic as a
>person working at a university, and I don't think that university education
>needs to be an "membership due" that must be paid.

This is an interesting response, but I can't agree.  Why call an
intellectual or "critical thinker" an academic if such person has no
academic affiliation?  Or a scholar if they're not in school?  I think
there is good reason to point to the fact and nature of academic
affiliation - the restraints it may produce on one's work, the structure
that encourages some kinds of scholarship and thinking over others.  And as
a grad student, I feel that that structure is both productive and coercive
in many different ways.  Universities are institutions that make money and
grant degrees - most of the work I have done has been in pursuit of a
degree and not necessarily what I would choose to do as a non-academic
(like all those essays on Wordsworth or James Fenimore Cooper).  University
is not just a site of the free-play of intellectual ideas.  I did not want
to write a paper on James Fenimore Cooper.  My thesis topic was
discouraged.  I cannot seek work outside the university (to pay rent and
buy food - I don't earn enough to do this) and stay enrolled in the
programme - it is simply not allowed.  I am an academic because that is my
job - I get paid to be one (teach and research) - and because I am working
toward a degree.  When I am no longer an academic (which I hope will be
soon) - when I'm not paid by the university to teach or paying them to have
my thesis evaluated - I don't see why I should continue to be called one.
I don't need to be called an academic or a scholar to have my "critical
thinking" skills (such as they are) acknowledged - as if the highest form
of praise is "academic"!  Yikes.

I'm not anti-academic.  Some of my best friends .... and me too. But some
acedemics are lousy teachers and lousy writers and participate in little
intellectual inquiry - and they're still academics!  Maybe you'd say, then
they're not *true* academics, but my point is that they are.  "Academic" is
not, to me, a lofty category that all who are brainy ought to be included
in.  It's a paid position with particular responsibilities and pressures
and restrictions and freedoms and publication expectations and social
relations.

And also Judith - I am seriously happy to question some of those academic
"ideals" that you cite above - critical thinking, citing one's work,
explaining one's conclusions.  I don't think that these practices are
self-evident or intrinsically good and I don't think that they are the
pinnacle of achievement.  This is the problem with academia - it encourages
a fairly strict format for discussion or publication or whatever.  "What
are your sources?  Who do you cite to support that claim?  Where exactly
was it said?  How can you disagree with X?  Provide more citational support
for your disagreement with X.  You did/did not provide sufficient
citational support for your disagreement with X, therefore you are
receiving a grade of...."

karen


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Karen Sumner
Department of English
University College
University of Western Ontario
London, Ontario
N6A 3K7

ksumner-AT-bosshog.arts.uwo.ca

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