September 5 2017

Kathaleen McDonald

Dr. Wielgos

Senior Seminar

5 September 2017

Response 2: A (Very) Brief Look at the History of Literary Studies in the U.S.

            The articles for this response are much more contemporary than the articles from last response. Jessica Yood’s “Writing the Discipline: A Generic History of English Studies,” Stanley Fish’s “Will the Humanigies Save Us?” and “The Uses of the Humanities, Part Two,” as well as Frank Donoghue’s “Can the Humanities Survive the 21^st Century?” all provide perspectives on how the humanities will play a part in the coming years in universities, and the results shocked me.

            Yood starts off her article by stating what I learned the first week of English Studies: English is always changing. Although this was surprising to me when I first heard it, it is very true. Although what we read may not change that much, how English is taught and how it is perceived has changed dramatically over the past few centuries. Yood provides a brief history of how English was taught in the United States, and starts off the history by saying that “The study of literature became a part of this new America,” (527) referencing the industrial revolution following the Civil War. This was the time that “the segregation between literature and writing, between academia and ‘real’ writing, [was] born” (527) as well. Then the genre of the “topic-question” came to be, which “mixes textual reading with history and professional critique” (530). Incorporating history into literature makes literature easier to understand and much easier to retain. Yood ends her article by stating that “Unlike as in previous periods in the history of English studies, today there is no single methodology or object of knowledge at the center of the discipline” (537). This is so incredibly true. English isn’t just centered around literature or just writing, there must be a balance. English studies is always changing, and Yood reminds us of that.

            Fish’s articles focus on how to justify the study of English, and its importance in today’s world. In his article “Will the Humanities Save Us?” Fish quotes Anthony Kronman, who says “only the humanities can address ‘the crisis of spirit we now confront’ and ‘restore the wonder which those who have glimpsed the human condition have always felt, and which our scientific civilization, with its gadgets and discoveries, obscures’” (2). He continues to quote Kronman, saying “only the humanities can help us recover the urgency of ‘the question of what is living for’” (3). Fish finishes this article by saying that there is no use in the humanities. Fish says that this is an honorable answer, and that “An activity that cannot be justified is an activity that refuses to regard itself as instrumental to some larger good. The humanities are their own good” (4). The humanities are incredibly instrumental to our world, and trying to justify it is useless.

            Fish’s other article we read, “The Uses of the Humanities, Part Two,” includes a statement that I wish so many institutions would recognize: “taking courses in literature, philosophy and history provides training in critical thinking” (5). In high school, I was trained to believe that math and science were the only classes that could teach me critical thinking skills. Not only does learning the humanities make for more interesting people, but it also teaches us how to navigate the world a little better.

            Finally, Donoghue’s article takes on the issue of how humanities will survive in the future. It’s no secret the humanities aren’t as popular as they used to be, and the amount of English students has been declining. According to Donoghue, “Curricula change over time, and the humanities simply don’t have a place in the emergent curriculum of the 21^st century” (3). This is frightening, because now more than ever we need the humanities. The humanities teach us how to critically think, and above all, the humanities teach us empathy.