The Chronicle has just announced some of the major new perspectives on academia and the humanities that were opined at the recent MLA Convention in Washington. Since I've been mulling many of these issues myself, and worrying more and more about the role of a professor who teaches a field so outside any practical application, I was happy to find that I'm not alone in my concerns. And I'm even happier that many in academia are thinking practically and inclusively rather than politically and elitistly.
Some of the topics: rethinking the role of the intellectual in the 21st century and coming up with a new set of ideals "adapted to modern times"; adopting, for that matter, a new vision of modernity "which is neither hostile nor indifferent to religion" (Julia Kristeva); and, best of all, seeing language and literature "as a way of connecting to the rest of the world" (Domna Stanton).
I like all of that very much. Now, how to transform all this talk into classroom practice?
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