I knew I wanted to be an English major before I arrived at Brown because I loved to read. I thought literature would provide a personal and vocational pathway for my life after high school. But I didn’t know exactly how my vague goal of being a lifelong reader would work within the professional academic system at a school like Brown. Academia trains students to be scholars on narrow sub-topics, avoiding the “generalist” label that many professors fear. Newly minted PhDs write books and articles for academic presses and subsequently teach others to become scholars of very specific academic subjects.
Whatever happened to just liking books? I experienced a personal disconnect with academia sometime around my sophomore year, wondering if there was any compromise to the systematic function of the University’s goals to better accommodate those not seeking a doctoral degree.
I see the same disillusionment in my peers during some of my literature classes. Many students walk into English classrooms expecting a broad vision of literary texts with big themes, just like in high school, only to be bombarded by theory and idiosyncratic interpretations of obscure books. Though I am picking on English because I have the most experience with that particular subject, I’m sure students in every discipline discover their supposed passion must be narrowed down in order to be examined at the university level. Thought you were interested in making and talking about films? Here’s an Introduction to Media Theory class that may completely shatter your interest in the topic. The key to concentrating in many disciplines usually relies on one’s endurance in an esoteric introductory course.
Mark C. Taylor, chair of the Department of Religion at Columbia, wrote compellingly and convincingly in 2009 about the disconnect between the American college and our contemporary lives, arguing that the system needed an overhaul. He lamented the facts that PhD graduates outnumber available jobs, professors and students don’t produce relevant scholarship and different departments and universities don’t communicate with each other.
Though I agree with Taylor’s description of the downfalls of professional scholarship, I disagree with his odd solution of centering universities on specific issues to force them to solve the world’s problems. True, academia should be more applicable to “real-world” problems, but there must be a better way for that change to take place. Though I understand the call for a more generalized educational model and an end to ridiculously specific dissertation topics, I don’t think mobilizing professorial minds to solve all of society’s ills is a viable solution.
Before I meditate on any steps universities should take to make their academic studies more appealing to an increasingly diverse populace, we must first analyze the functions of a professor. What is the ultimate goal of being a professional academic anyway? Professors specialize in a subset of a discipline that is by definition esoteric and exclusive. They read and study a variety of sources, but their research focuses on topics that do not interest the majority of the population.
The specialization and narrowing of research is the problem that causes the divide between novice students and veteran professors. What good is it to be specific when only a few peer scholars care about the work a given professor is producing? It is easy to see why this model of professional academic work is troubling and frustrating for those who do not wish to earn a PhD in anything?
This brings us to the task of devising a solution. Though I feel strongly that professors should work to make their teaching more relatable to student interests, I am a firm believer in specialization in the humanities, sciences, arts and any other discipline. We wouldn’t even have broad and generalized concerns without highly trained specialists producing knowledge. It is simply not enough to say one loves Chaucer or ethnographies or chemistry. An academic must question and analyze and reflect closely on a topic. The only problem is that this specialization often leads to the production of scholarship only an elite few can appreciate.
This mastery in a specialized topic is the lifeblood of any university. But introducing undergraduate students to any new field runs counter to the push for more specialization. To resolve this problem, Brown should offer more introductory courses, and professors should emphasize the immediate relevance of seemingly inapplicable theories and sub-topics. Not every academic subject is applicable to real life concerns, but most subjects are. All students need is appropriate framing from a good professor to show them the many uses of a liberal arts education.
David Romero ’14 is totally into reading the classics just for pleasure but recognizes there are important lessons in them, too. He can be reached at david_romero@brown.edu.
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