Pedagogy founding co-editor Jennifer L. Holberg on MLA, the future of English Studies, and the tenth anniversary issue of the journal--
After what William Pannapacker in the Chronicle of Higher Education (27 December 2009) called “the worst MLA ever,” where does English studies go from here? As usual, MLA was full of talk and tweets about reforms, big and small. But the question remains: does the profession have the moral courage to begin to fundamentally rethink the ways in which our discipline operates, at every level from graduate student and contingent colleagues to the fullest of professors? Are we ready to examine and change, where necessary, the reward structure--both who gets rewarded and for what? Perhaps most importantly, are we prepared to reconsider what “our work” really is?
As George Levine argued in his oft-cited commentary piece in the very first issue of Pedagogy, English studies remains “a nation divided” between our work as teachers and our work as scholars. His description of our dilemma remains remarkably accurate:
“My work” usually means research and writing as opposed to work in the classroom or service to department or university. But what is most remarkable about this obvious fact of university life is that despite professional devaluing and recent years of attack on the professoriate for not caring about teaching, “my work” normally waits in second place after dedicated, even passionate commitment to students and teaching. Even those who measure academic success, as most do, by the number of course releases they get and the number of competitive leaves they can win tend on the whole to take teaching very seriously. That’s lucky.But ten years on, we’re not sure this “luck” will hold much longer. Even so, a reconsideration of “our work” will be difficult not only because we will be forced to face crucial identity questions (what should an English professor be doing with her/his time, in what proportion, and to what end), but also because such a discussion forces us to justify this work to ourselves and then to the concentric circles of constituents that we serve (students and potential students, other members of the academy in different disciplines, parents, legislatures, and the general public). In economic hard times, when calls are ever more frequent for 3-year degrees, reductions in core curriculum, and the elimination of “fluff” (read: liberal arts), we have little time to make our case. As David Laurence notes in introducing a recent issue of the ADE Bulletin, “Economic stress lends new impetus to trends in educational and public policy and gives new urgency to questions of purpose and pertinence as departments and disciplines compete to make their case, whether within their institutions or to the wider public. In good times and bad, the case for the humanities has always been an uphill battle—the hill just gets steeper when times get worse.”
In Pedagogy’s tenth anniversary issue (which examines the state of the profession, particularly pedagogically), then, several authors take up the question of the place of English (and the liberal arts in general) in our new economic environment. In particular, Colin Jager, Michael Bérubé, Paul Lauter, Marc Bousquet, and Sheila T. Cavanagh discuss various responses to this question of value. What is key, we believe, is not just reasserting the importance of the humanities in the contemporary university but imagining their value in light of the discipline required by harsh economic realities. Despite what the field of English studies might think about “our work,” despite what the profession still values by and large, the public tends to focus on the work of teaching. The question then becomes twofold: First, how do we do that work even better — even as we struggle to do it for less — and, in so doing, make the case for liberal education through our actions in the classroom? Second, how do we resist the shrinking of the tenure-track professoriate? Is it possible to convince taxpayers that we, the faculty, are doing right by students, that we are upholding our end of a bargain to educate students in habits of mind that seem to be increasingly doomed by public indifference to the ends of a liberal education? Is this something we are willing to fight for, or will English studies soon become a very different enterprise?
The answers aren’t easy and the way ahead is lined with hazards. But we must be willing to begin the journey—or we may find that we are left behind altogether. We invite you join the conversation in the Pedagogy’s latest issue and reflect with us on the solutions to the most pressing issues facing teachers and university citizens in 2010 and beyond.
Read George Levine's article "Two Nations" from the first issue of Pedagogy for free.
For more information on Pedagogy, visit dukeupress.edu/pedagogy.
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