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Category: community engagement

On Living Books by Janneke Adema

On Living Books by Janneke Adema

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Janneke Adema considers the contemporary scholarly book and how it could transition from a fixed, bound object to a more fluid and evolving entity. She argues that humanities scholars should reconsider their role as authors and strive to engage with knowledge production in more open, critical, and experimental ways. Adema challenges new media scholars (such as Lev Manovich and John Bryant) and print historians (such as Elizabeth Eisenstein and Adrian Johns) for their perpetuation of the book as an unchangeable,…

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On Putting the Humanities PhD to Work by Katina Rogers

On Putting the Humanities PhD to Work by Katina Rogers

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In Putting the Humanities PhD to Work: Thriving In and Beyond the Classroom, Katina Rogers takes graduate training reform as her mission. She argues that current graduate training is not fit for purpose; i.e., it primarily trains PhDs to become tenured track faculty members when A) there are very limited TT faculty jobs, and B) most PhDs end up working in other roles or industries altogether. In doing so, Rogers suggests, academia replicates inequalities as a very small (generally moneyed)…

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On “Lend Me Your Ears: The Rise of the History Podcast in Australia,” by Honae Cuffe

On “Lend Me Your Ears: The Rise of the History Podcast in Australia,” by Honae Cuffe

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Honae H. Cuffe examines the role of the history podcast in the Australian context. She glosses a selection of Australian history podcasts—some overtly academic, some not—and concludes that this is an important mechanism for translating historical work (and even historiography) to broader publics. Cuffe acknowledges the challenges of history podcasts in the academic context; namely, that there is pushback from those who do not consider “translation” work worthwhile or intellectually robust enough, and that it is difficult to have such…

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On Generous Thinking, by Kathleen Fitzpatrick

On Generous Thinking, by Kathleen Fitzpatrick

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In the recently published Generous Thinking: A Radical Approach to Saving the University, Kathleen Fitzpatrick ruminates on the current state academia, with a focus on dominant trends toward competition and individualism and weakening public support. “The university has been undermined,” she writes, “by the withdrawal of public support for its functions, but that public support has been undermined by the university’s own betrayals of the public trust” (xi). She argues that a substantial shift in academia is required in order…

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On “The Future of the Humanities in the Present & in Public,” by Kathleen Woodward

On “The Future of the Humanities in the Present & in Public,” by Kathleen Woodward

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Woodward considers the current state of public scholarship in the humanities, specifically in the American context. She argues that by and large universities have not lived up to their civic mission of community engagement, although there are many good reasons to embrace public scholarship, and many examples of important and successful public scholarship initiatives (some of which are listed by Woodward). She calls for “more emphasis in the conversations about the public humanities on the importance of intellectuals writing for…

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On “Who Do You Think You Are?”: When Marginality Meets Academic Microcelebrity,” by Tressie McMillan Cottom

On “Who Do You Think You Are?”: When Marginality Meets Academic Microcelebrity,” by Tressie McMillan Cottom

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Using her own extensive experience as an intellectual blogging and writing in public spaces, McMillan Cottom examines the politics at play in being an engaged academic online. She argues that despite the current call for social engagement and visibility, not all public intellectuals are treated equally online; that is, women and people of colour are often targeted and harassed for speaking publicly on platforms like Twitter, Facebook, or their own blogs. McMillan Cottom writes: Put simply, all press is good…

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On “The Engaged Humanities: Principles and Practices for Public Scholarship and Teaching,” by Gregory Jay

On “The Engaged Humanities: Principles and Practices for Public Scholarship and Teaching,” by Gregory Jay

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Gregory Jay reviews the concept of engaged or community scholarship in relation to the humanities. He argues that if the humanities took up such practices, as well as integrated new media tools and techniques more fully, the discipline might gain relevance and public value in an era of funding cuts. Jay explains why engaged scholarship has not been as prominent in the humanities as it has in other disciplines: namely, for Jay, the humanities is based on extrapolative, written critique,…

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On “Higher Education as a Force for Societal Change in the Twenty-First Century,” by Brenda M. Gourley

On “Higher Education as a Force for Societal Change in the Twenty-First Century,” by Brenda M. Gourley

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Gourley, Brenda M. 2012. “Higher Education as a Force for Societal Change in the Twenty-First Century.” In Higher Education and Civic Engagement, edited by Lorraine McIlrath, Ann Lyons, and Ronaldo Munck, 31–39. Gourley focuses on the massive changes of the 21st century, and suggests that higher education needs to reorient toward community engagement in order to effectively respond to these changes and prepare generations to make ethical and sustainable decisions, moving forward. Along with the Association for Commonwealth Universities, she…

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On “A ‘Civic Mission’ for the University: Engaged Scholarship and Community-Based Participatory Research,” by Michael Cuthill

On “A ‘Civic Mission’ for the University: Engaged Scholarship and Community-Based Participatory Research,” by Michael Cuthill

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Cuthill, Michael. 2012. “A ‘Civic Mission’ for the University: Engaged Scholarship and Community-Based Participatory Research.” In Higher Education and Civic Engagement, edited by Lorraine McIlrath, Ann Lyons, and Ronaldo Munck, 81–99. Cuthill explores the construct of “engaged scholarship” as emblematic of the civic mission of the university. For Cuthill, universities have an ethical obligation to contribute to the common good, and he sees this as being particularly feasible through community-based participatory research. Significantly, part of Cuthill’s argument for engaged scholarship…

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