Lessons of an Academic Nobody

I was surprised how anxious I felt about publishing last week’s post, an “Open Letter to Heterodox Academy.”

I’ve been offering my opinions here for more than nine years, so I’m used to criticism. I have no position or standing in the academy to lose, save perhaps potential speaking gigs should I offend someone who hypothetically has the power to invite me to a campus (or these days, a Zoom).

I’d said my piece, and stood (and stand) by my perspective, and yet, when I informed the Inside Higher Ed editors that it was ready to post, I even remarked how this was a time I was glad comments were no longer allowed because I knew it would stir up some sentiment.

As critical as I am of the outsize influence elite institutions have on our culture and the way I believe they siphon both attention and resources from public institutions that serve the vast majority of students, I cannot deny the power that those institutions and the people who inhabit them have on my psyche.

The fact that I do not have the status and stature of the people and organization I criticize in that post was not lost on me as I prepared to publish it. I couldn’t even tell you what I feared, really, given that I didn’t think anyone or anything I criticized would even attempt to do me harm, and there’s no harm they could do anyway, but yeah … I was nervous.

While there are no longer comments on posts at Inside Higher Ed, I do have email, so I have heard from a number of people who read the piece.

One in particular, as part of a detailed critique of the post which included some reasonable points, also called me “an academic nobody” and suggested I was incapable of even understanding the importance of the debates that they believed I had dismissed.

Ouch. No, seriously … ouch.

An academic nobody.

Let me be clear, none of the negative feedback that crossed over to this kind of personal dismissal that I received in my email or on Twitter came from anyone affiliated with Heterodox Academy. In fact, I heard from a couple of HxA folks who said they appreciated my different perspective, which was wonderful. I’ll even be publishing a piece from HxA people next week that provides a worthy extension of the conversation.

The outrage seemed to primarily come not from members but, let’s call them “fans” of HxA, people who believed HxA was fighting for people like them, presumably conservatives who had been marginalized by academia and or people who feel that “wokeness” (a commonly used word/concept in the critical emails that went otherwise undefined) was going to destroy the academy. To them, HxA was an ally in the battle against wokeness. As a critic of HxA, I was, apparently, an enemy.

I received a number of positive responses via email as well, and the tally of positive to negative was about equal, which is interesting. Though, some of the positive comments tipped over into an enmity for HxA that felt a little extreme from my personal perspective, those folks seeing HxA as an organization that was actively working to marginalize those emailers’ perspectives.

As I reflect, combining my trepidation about sharing the post, as well as the most extreme positive and negative responses all point toward a culture of scarcity, where each group is convinced there is not sufficient room or resources for their inclusion, so their success must come at the expense of another.

It makes for a poor atmosphere for the kinds of debates HxA wants to have, and how they want to have them. When it feels like you have to fight for your existence, the stakes of the debate are far too high to employ intellectual generosity.

I would like to have the luxury of generosity, but having been excluded from the arena, it is difficult. I peruse the RHSU Edu-Scholar rankings and look at the names and ranking criteria and while I am not a top-20 superstar, by the selection metrics, I’m pretty sure I’m solidly in the top 100, though you will not find me listed.

I guess I’m not eligible because it is a list for “university-based” scholars. I’m based out of my spare bedroom/office, and not just because there’s a pandemic going on.

This may sound strange, but I think the solution to my discontent is to not spend too much time criticizing HxA or elite higher education spaces, but instead to keep trying amplify the narratives of what postsecondary education is like for the vast majority of students. Every time I express resentment that HxA (or Yale, or Harvard, etc. …) is hogging the mic (so to speak) is a moment where I reinforce their pre-eminence.

I’m sure I’ll slip from my personal pledge, but I’m going to try to live by it going forward.

Here’s to the nobodies of academia!