New Kid On The Hallway speaks very eloquently about this and I don’t want to simply reinvent the wheel, but basically the new president of the University of Toledo is suggesting a massive shift in the college from a traditional liberal arts education to a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, which he is changing to STEMM to include medicine–his background) based education.  What I would like to speak of instead is a trend I’ve noticed in society at large to denigrate the humanities.
Periodically, I read the threads on Fark.  Any time a thread about the economy or education comes up, invariably someone pipes in with how liberal arts degrees are a waste of money, and if everyone would just get degrees in Computer Science and Engineering there would be no economic issues.1  Basically, it is the worst of the “fuck you, I got mine” strain of conservative libertarianism combined with the type of anti-intellectualism that only values disciplines that produce tangible objects.  Liberal arts, when it is discussed, is generally relegated to something that can be handled in high school.  So why then are the liberal arts (which I would remind those not in humanities includes math and science as well as the humanities) important?  Why shouldn’t we all learn engineering?
Well, ignoring the fact that not everyone is suited to math, science, and engineering, the liberal arts teach us a bit of everything. Â They assume that education and being educated is a value in itself–and in turn that we as individuals have value beyond what we produce. Â If we are going to commodify education (which is what the disturbing trend towards college as business is), then we’re in essence commodifying ourselves. Â Because we aren’t anything beyond the sum of our knowledge and the use of it, unless we’re actually doing physical labor that requires the body beyond the mind. Â And I don’t know about you, but I am more than a marketable commodity.
 1I also find it interesting that business school is denigrated as well. It’s a uniquely blue-collar white-collar anti-intellectualism that breeds there.
I have to say that the Viking Metal folks get my vote because the helmets have no horns on them and they showed up in chain hauberks to perform for the kids.
More info here.
I found out that one of the people who will be on the panel with me at Arizona has written on the Mary Magdalene before, so I took the opportunity to come down to my undergrad alma mater and get a copy of the article he wrote in anticipation of any questions he might lob at me (my current institution has all their journals boxed up because the library is still undergoing renovation). I also tried to find the other person, but they don’t seem to have anything in any of the journals in the Brepolis database, or Jstor. I haven’t tried other places as yet, but can anyone think of anywhere I might not consider? I’m going to look at Project Muse next.
I think part of the reason I’m doing this is that they’re both professors and I haven’t even gotten into a doctoral program yet, so I want to make sure I make a good impression. Unlike the last conference I went to, I’m not going to this one just to be a warm body to watch the computer equipment, and I’d like to be a presence. Not to mention it keeps me from having to do the work of paring the essay down, which I should really get to this week since I’m not going to be teaching.
So the paper whose abstract I submitted to Arizona is 22 pages long without the appendix or works cited, and I need to pare it down to about 10 to fit within the 20 minutes I’ll have to talk. I have a feeling this is not going to be a fun experience–it all hangs together well in my opinion, and I’m worried that if I cut some of the explanatory stuff in the introduction out I’ll lose my audience. I may try to convince Kara to do a pass at it, and maybe Kristy or Jerry once the semester is back in gear.
Folks on the market in medieval British Lit:
I received a letter in the mail from UM-Flint letting me know about a tenure track position they have for an assistant prof. The teaching load is 3/3 and they aren’t going to interview at MLA. If anyone gets back to me with interest, I’ll send along the contact info.
Long Beach Shakespeare is performing the Wakefield Second Shepherd’s Play right now (well, until the 22nd of December).
I’m not sure I buy the explanation of the play on their website, but I haven’t gotten a chance to see anything medieval performed professionally so I’m hoping to go. The Second Shepherd is only tangentially biblical, and is incredibly funny in a very slapstick sort of way, so it’s an interesting counterpoint to the other big pageant that gets talked about here in Southern California: The Glory of Christmas.
All of this said, I’m not sure which day I intend to go if there’s anyone who wants to go with me (it’s going to depend on how these closing weeks of the semester will go). If you are interested in going with me, please comment and we’ll figure something out.
I also suspect that the text will not be in Middle English, so those of you who aren’t medievalists shouldn’t be turned off by that.
In working on my statement of purpose, one of the commentors mentioned I don’t actually say all that much about what aspect of the field I’m interested in or what I do. This is the beginning of an attempt to rectify that, as a preliminary statement before I rewrite the whole SOP tomorrow.
I’m posting this here, as opposed to Stochastic Effluvia (where I posted the original SOP for perusal) because I believe it could serve as a sort of mission statement for the site going forward. If you’re reading this on livejournal, of course, this whole paragraph is superfluous.
At any rate…
My primary interest in medieval literature can be explained through the interstice of four issues. The first is how the definition of specific words and terms shift between the 14th and 15th centuries and what that shift allows authors to convey or not convey, the second is the use of allegory to convey shaded meanings based on implicit understandings of the allegorical figures contextually within the framework of salvation history, the third is how stage directions are used in late 15th century drama (where they are) and what these stage directions — either spoken or written in the text — imply regarding the intent of an allegorical play such as the Digby Mary Magdalene, and the fourth is the manuscript as an object and how that object both is different from and relates to the text divorced from the original (or nearest-to-original copy) manuscript.
I have not been able to work on all these aspects equally. I am currently exploring the balance in the terms nobelesse and gentilesse between nobility of blood and nobility of deed and what the balance, as well as any shift in it, means in terms of chivalric romance. I am also looking at the staging of the Digby Mary Magdalene to determine if the latter half of the play centering on Mary’s apostolic mission to Marsailles takes Jesus’ mission in the first part as its model or if there is some other work being done, as well as whether or not the allegorical figures in both halves serve a purpose beyond the model they tend to be presented in by other saint and allegorical plays such as the Castle of Perseverance.
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Does that make sense so far?
If you live in the Dayton, Ohio area your dream might come true.
“The UCLA Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, with the assistance of the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Huntington Library, and the Young Research Library at UCLA, announces a three-day conference to honor the careers and scholarship of Richard and Mary Rouse. Sessions will be held at each of the participating institutions: on Friday, October 5 at the J. Paul Getty Museum, on Saturday, October 6 at UCLA, and on Sunday, October 7 at the Huntington Library. Lectures at the conference will reflect the remarkable range and impact of the Rouses’ work: paleography, codicology, manuscript production and decoration, the transmission of the classical tradition, and the formation of libraries. Among those libraries, medieval to modern, the conference celebrates the gift of the Rouses’ own manuscript collection to the Department of Special Collections at UCLA.”
The conference is October 5th through the 7th. A pdf of the conference program is here. I’m going to attend all three days, but I’ll have to miss about half of Saturday due to taking the GRE subject test.
