Thoughts on Academia

I will offer some thoughts on academia, since I was once a part of it.

Some few people gravitate to academia because they are extremely bright and want/need some kind of stipend in order to support their research. The vast majority of people who fit this bill (and they are a tiny minority of academicians), are in the hard sciences. The reason is because there's new data and methods being discovered all the time and therefore there's real, hands on work to do.

Another class of people are in academia where they have a special skill that in turn they pass on to students. Think some applied science disciplines, and esp foreign language study.

In literature and the social sciences another set of circumstances obtain. There are some successful novelists in literature. There are some outstanding historians of literature. And there are a lot of people who just like to read. Ditto sociology, poli sci, history, etc. in this area.

One should ALWAYS remember that the academy is a business. It promises a product: a mind that has been inculcated with the accumulated wealth of our civilization, or, at the very least, a certificate that attests to that. The price can be, say, $150,000. (It can also be a lot cheaper, and even more expensive.)

To sell the product, the academy has to tailor its curriculum to the potential buyers. This brings about a situation that is actually a little unusual. Normally, we advertise to a consumer for something that he or she will actually use. In the case of a college education, we advertise for something one person will (theoretically) use, and another person (the parents) will largely if not entirely pay for.

That means college curricula, extra-curricular activities, campus layout, and all the rest have to appeal not only to the 18 year old Jack and Jill who will be attending college, but also the the 40 something (or 50 something, or whatever) parents who will be paying for it. The kids have to be sold on fun, self-discovery, deep meaning, relevance, and so on. The parents have to be sold on practical utility and ROI.

Thus the packaging of a college education is a little bit like breakfast cereal packaging: the cereal is sweet, and delicious looking, there might even be irresistable trinkets inside. But the sidebar of the box assures the parents that the product is GOOD FOR THE KIDS.

The parents are sold by statistics. X no. of Nobelists, or National Book Award finalists. X millions of dollars in research grants acquired by faculty. X % of graduates tracked to make Y amount. That sort of thing.

The kids are sold on other things. Getting past the most obvious (sex and beer), they are sold on relevance. Virtually every college has a department of middle east studies, because, it's in the news every day. Thirty years ago, there used to be departments of German and/or Soviet Studies everywhere. Where are they now? Gone, replaced by Muslim studies, Gay studies, Chinese Studies, Far East Studies, etc. etc.

Part of this is driven by geopolitical realities (we really should be graduating more Arabic and Persian mavens), but a large part of it is driven by what an 18 year old thinks is relevant. And what an 18 year old thinks is relevant, is, 99% of the time, usually just a reflection of the surrounding popular culture, which, by definition, will be shallow and short-sighted.

The people who work in academia, I mean, the professors, have to service the students in this manner. They have to teach about the things the students want to hear. Not necessarily WHAT they want to hear (in terms of interpretation), but subject matter.

At the same time, for any job security, the academician has to produce a lot of papers, reviews, and generally one or two books, to go into their CV so they can get job security, otherwise known as tenure.

That's not all they have to do. They generally have to teach three courses simultaneously, that involves lecturing perhaps nine hours a week. In addition, they have to allow about four hours a week to listen to students complain about their lives or about how to write their papers. If a professor is conscientious, there will be another four hours a week for group discussions, and LOTS of reading and writing assignments for the students, which in turn have to be read, graded, and evaluated with an eye to the student's improvement.

Also, since the college is essentially a bureaucracy, there will lots of meetings, and any professor, especially a novice, will have to "volunteer" (because tenure tracks this also) for committees that have significant student participation. The Black Students Union, Gay Lesbian Bisexual Tranvestite Congress, Asian Students Union, Traffic Committee, American Indian Union, Halal Breakfast Menu Committee, and, of course, the dreaded American Indian Indian American Revolving Door Committee, not to mention department meetings, faculty meetings, and pep rallies will normally take up another 10-15-20 hours a week, in addition to teaching and prep, and in addition to the research and writing that will generate the paper trail that ensures tenure.

It is NOT an easy life. And it doesn't pay very well either, comparatively.

So: Outside of the geniuses and the savants in academia (comparatively few), who really makes a career in this? People who are gregarious, who like directing the lives of young people to a better place, IOW, the same qualities that make good elementary school teachers, except usually better read, but not necessarily more intelligent. Because they are in continual symbiosis with the darlings whose parents are paying for a piece of paper, the faculty tends to adopt the youthful idealism and values of the generally non-adult student body. To be sure, one can avoid this, and be independent. Then one likely will face ostracism from one's faculty peers, and even from the students (poor course evals, no one signs on for your lectures, etc.)

Is it any wonder that the academy is overrun by people with immature world views and opinions? Those who are not, esp those who have to face the reality of raising children or just earning a decent living, generally do not stick around.

There are some exceptions. But we are making a HUGE MISTAKE if we choose to denigrate the life of the mind, that is distributed in and out of the academy. There are significant things being done in many fields, inside and outside the academy. Broad brush dismissals of the sciences, philosophy, or even the humanities, because of the academy's dependence on selling their sheepskin product, are quite unfair. While the percentage of ACADEMICS who are making, or who make, substantial contributions to our continuing knowledge may be smaller than one might think, that doesn't mean that they make no contribution, and, furthermore, in addition to all of their other duties they are, faute de mieux, the CUSTODIANS of our intellectual tradition, going back thousands of years. However silly their political opinions might be, EVERY academic understands their duty in that respect. If they don't know the books, the lineage, the background, then no one will. They know this, they study it, but it's not the type of thing the ordinary person asks, nor is the kind of thing that ever gets quoted on the Internet.

In sum: The people in academia are the way they are because they are engaged in selling a product. They are not necessarily fonts of wisdom (though sometimes they are.) They are the repository of accumulated knowledge, and they have to work hard. Yes, they tend to write and speak about the world we live in in stupid and silly ways. But they usually do have an expert knowledge that no one cares about. Meanwhile, they work very hard, and are not paid very well, for the work they do. It is true they tend to arrogate to themselves the voice of wisdom and irreproachable authority: well, anyone who falls for that has only himself to blame.