I am, at this point, nearing a completion of my PhD (if everything goes well, that is). With this PhD in philosophy, that would make it my fifth degree. And so, naturally, I began to reflect--why have I remained in the Academy for so long? What have I been trying to accomplish? Why didn't I just "get a job" and be done with it? What made me go into it to begin with, and how in the world did I end up with five degrees, when I only really wanted one?
I didn't intend to keep amassing degrees. As an undergrad, studying English, German and Art History at a Jesuit college, I had two plans in my mind: either to somehow get myself into film school, preferably NYU and become a director, or apply and get a PhD in English and teach at a college level. I was quickly dissuaded by a college advisor from applying to NYU or any similar film schools. "Too much risk," he said. And he was probably right...but still.
When I told him that I would like to apply to the University of Chicago, he said "Don't bother. Your GRE scores are terrible" (which they sure were!). He added, "It will be a waste of your application fee." I left his office crying, but I did end up applying to Chicago anyway. I got in, and ended up working with professor Wayne Booth, one of the eminent scholars in rhetoric, literature, and the founder of what is now known as "ethical criticism," a dialogic approach in interpreting literary works.
So, after Chicago, I worked as a high school teacher, which lasted for a year. In the meantime, I applied for a PhD in English. Rejection soon followed, which ended up being the first in the long series of PhD rejections (whether in English, Philosophy, or Theology). Here I am, finally in a PhD program, hoping to pass my qualifying exam in order to be able to actually work on my dissertation. Much of importance hinges on this passing. I try not to think about it--the existential effect, not to mention the money effect (all this student debt!)--but it is impossible.
What kind of world is the Academy? What is it composed of in the end, and does it really offer anything substantial? During one of the classes I attended, there was a discussion, which ranged from "what is redness?" to "can a thought think?" I turned to one of my fellow grad students and said to her, "What the hell am I doing here? Why am I trying to get a PhD?" She said: "So that students can have a normal teacher!"
When you are a student, whether an undergrad or grad, and if you are specifically working in the humanities, professors have a tendency to fill you full of false praise and hope that you are the best thing since sliced bread. Ok, maybe some of that praise is true, but it doesn't do anything unless you are offered real, constructive criticism in how to improve and how to tend to your talent. This lack of real, practical, and constructive attention is prevalent mainly because most professors are ideologues--mouthpieces for the ideologie du jour. This is not to say that I have not met and had the privilege to be in the company of some truly intelligent people, whose aim is not to profane the works of literature or philosophy but who preserve its sacredness while being dynamic individuals themselves. But by now, everyone who is willing to see the truth of the Academy, knows that the academic world is a cesspool of social rejects who find comfort in the separateness from reality, and who venomously impact our culture.
The logistical system of the Academy is a house of cards. And yet this wimpy paper house is full of bureaucratic nonsense (is there such a thing as bureaucratic sense?). The academics genuinely think they are free, but this is not true. The system is a series of conformities, and if you are unwilling to conform (e.g. a particular way of doing philosophy), then you are quickly labeled an outcast. None of the ideologues stand alone. It is always strength in numbers, and the result is an academic fanaticism and tyranny. The "paperwork" of the Academy may not be of great significance but the ideas are because they have consequences.
The consequences are seen in historical discontinuity and/or historical denial. Both are means by which the forms of inquiry are impositions on the particularities that surround literary or historical or philosophical work. The result is not only shoddy scholarship, but most of all, as I mentioned earlier, a negative impact on our culture.
Can the Academy be reformed? If it is reformed, then will it lose its academic status? I seem to recall seeing a similar question posed by Camille Paglia, who has done a marvelous job in the great synthesis of ideas, particularly in her book Sexual Personae. Is there such a thing as a "public intellectual?" And what is learning? We have to go back to the basics, it seems to me. Why do we read? Why do we want to know and where does this desire come from? Seeking pleasure in books and being edified by what we find in them is a thing of beauty. Academics have done a great job in sucking the life out of literature and art and philosophy. The beauty of books and learning must be restored, and I fear that it will not be done in universities.
The basic question, which has not only been lost in the Academy for decades now, but also in our post-whatever world, is "what does it mean to be human?" This is an ever evolving, ever revealing question. So many possibilities. The possibilities of human life and the question of ethics, aesthetics, and politics (as is the subtitle of my blog) will not be revealed if truth, goodness, and beauty are continuously suppressed.
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