In the late 1960s New Left academics in America disagreed with each other over the question of relevance: should socially responsible scholars consciously seek to address topics that are relevant to the contemporary moment, or should they use other criteria to find topics for research? This question is as relevant now as it ever was!
If as I have written already, university should be a social movement aimed toward identifying and achieving beneficial changes in the world, doesn't that mean that much of the work that goes on is irrelevant and pointless? But I'm not sure that's the case. Clearly, figuring out what the world is really like, and what it should be like, and how to move from one to the other, is a big and complicated task. Who can tell how many little bits of knowledge, theory, and insight we might need to accomplish it? And who knows where those are to come from?
The New Left's calls for relevant scholarship were misplaced, because the only relevance we can judge is fleeting and superficial, whereas our goal is long-term and fundamental. It's not that I think every dissertation is a brick in the wall of knowledge, which will one day be complete. More that understanding springs from unexpected places; and if there is one thing we should expect, it's that asking everyone to think about the same things will drastically limit the potential for generating new understanding.
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