Nicholas Kristof called out professors today, saying we’ve “fostered a culture that glorifies arcane unintelligibility while disdaining impact and audience.” While the snarkmeister in me is tempted to return serve — couldn’t one say the same thing about the Times? — I actually concur with Mr. Kristof on several key points.
To paraphrase, he cites dreadful writing, a lack of political and ideological diversity, a dearth of public intellectuals, obstructionist professional associations, little social media presence, “hidden-away” journals, and a reward structure that privileges technique and abstraction over relevance, clear thinking, and broad dissemination. In truth, we at TSP make largely the same claims in pitching our li’l project to authors, readers, and potential partners. We use different words, of course, but the whole point of TSP is to help bring social science to broader visibility and influence. This mission drives all the choices we’ve made: to stay open-access, to put our resources into a best-in-the-business professional editor and site designer, and to partner with other groups who “get” our mission and vision — like WW Norton, the Scholars Strategy Network, and Contexts magazine.
While many academics feel marginalized by mainstream media and society, Mr. Kristof points out that we’re also self-marginalizing. As a scholar, an editor, and an academic administrator, I’d agree that at least some of our injuries are self-inflicted. For example, I was gratified when Attorney General Holder used some of my felon voting research last Monday. We’d undertaken the project with both science and policy in mind, in hopes of doing good sociology that would also encourage the sort of national conversation now taking place. When the Times wrote a characteristically smart op-ed on Tuesday, friends asked why they linked to an old working paper rather than the polished journal article. This is likely because the article remains “hidden away” behind a paywall. I suppose they could have secured permissions from the authors, the journals, and the professional association that owns the journals, but we all tend to work on timelines that are a wee bit more protracted than the speech-on-Monday/op-ed-on-Tuesday news cycle.
While we can’t solve all of the problems of academic self-marginalization, we can at least offer Nicholas Kristof a free subscription to TheSocietyPages.org. And we’ll continue to extend the same offer to every one of the million-plus readers stopping by every month.
Comments 14
Kyle Green — February 16, 2014
I agree that he picks up on many of the self-marginalizing problems that plague academia. Many of them are the exact reasons that I love being part of the TSP crew.
I thought that one of the more important points he makes about sociology is that it is “so dominated by the left that it is instinctively dismissed by the right.” This is a difficult critique and one worthy of further thought. It is hard for me to imagine good sociology that would not frustrate the right to some degree because of our interest in power and inequality of all types. However, this raises the question of whether we too often let our own politics determine what counts as good scholarship. I’ll let wiser and more advanced scholars speak to whether that is something that happens in the field…
Also, Pierre Bourdieu might respond by saying that the social world is complicated and therefore discussions of the world will also be complicated. And he probably would say it in a complicated way. I don’t agree with him completely but I do think there is a key difference between writing in a clear, jargon-free manner and providing overly simplified answers and sometimes the two are conflated.
Chris Uggen — February 16, 2014
Agreed, Kyle. I like your point that sociologists' emphasis on power and inequality is likely to frustrate the beneficiaries of unequal power relations. That said, while 40-50% of the country seems to be right-of-President-Obama, I'm guessing that perhaps 5-10% of the ASA membership might categorize themselves as right-of-Obama (Neil Gross might know the actual percentages). And they'd probably be a little nervous about saying so publicly.
fyi, just found this sharp discussion on crooked timber: http://crookedtimber.org/2014/02/16/look-who-nick-kristofs-saving-now/
Community Sociology – sociology WITH community | Community Sociology — February 16, 2014
[…] the first to lament the limitations of academia and I’m certainly not the first to respond (The Society Pages editors, Janet Stemwedel, Corey Robin, Dayne Sherman, and all the fine folks chiming in with […]
Letta Page — February 17, 2014
dang, chris, that's some high praise -- thanks for giving me some added editor-fuel for the day, your admiring associate editor, slayer of jargon, and translator of academia.
Chris Uggen — February 17, 2014
...and thanks for saving us from arcane unintelligibility, L.
Monte Bute — February 17, 2014
Well done. Your little essay is a welcome contrast with the snarky and overly-defense diatribe on "Crooked Timber." http://crookedtimber.org/2014/02/16/look-who-nick-kristofs-saving-now/
He blames all the faults mentioned by Kristof on the academic labor market. He must have taken the column personally, "And what of me? Am I chopped liver?" He goes on to list 15 of his articles! He also cites numerous academic exceptions to the assertions of Kristof. Me thinks his exceptions prove the rule.
Monte Bute — February 18, 2014
This article is a little more toughtful that "Crooked Timber."
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/no-kristof-academics-aren-t-cloistered-like-medieval-monks
Sarah — February 18, 2014
Thanks for linking to the Talking Points Memo piece, Monte. It raises nicely one of the issues I've been contemplating since reading Kristof - the level of analysis. It seemed to me that Kristof's complaining about a perceived dearth "public intellectuals" mainly at the national/federal level. But I think many of us know smart, articulate academics at the state/local level who are publicly engaged, whether through writing, media appearances, or community partnerships. And, although a bit tangential, I am also reminded of all the unsung "embedded sociologists" out there... http://contexts.org/articles/spring-2011/embedded-sociologists/
Monte Bute — February 18, 2014
Thanks, Sarah. Exactly. Focusing on superstar academics writing for elite, national non-academic venues is to miss the target. I agree that there are many "smart, articulate academics at the state/local level who are publicly engaged," however, they remain somewhat of an aberration. The vast majority of academics still genuflect to the "professional paradigms" of their disciples. I wrote this essay last year as a manifesto for re-thinking our sociological practices and re-examining who are the audiences we seek to reach.
http://contexts.org/articles/spring-2013/a-populist-sociology/
Anne Kaduk — February 20, 2014
I think Kristof's piece is notable because it supports the need for the work this site (and many others) do well.
While it's about business school professors, rather than sociologists, The Economist also recently called out the need to produce research that is useful and accessible to a broad audience, rather than "papers with little genuine insight ... published in obscure periodicals that no manager would ever dream of reading." So yet another "vote" in support of the TSP mission.
Friday Roundup: February 21, 2014 » The Editors' Desk — February 21, 2014
[…] “A Free Subscription for Nicholas Kristof,” by Chris Uggen. Agreeing that social scientists need to get their data into the public policy arena more forcefully and explicably, Chris Uggen offers NYTimes’ Nick Kristof—and the rest of the world—a free lifetime subscription to The Society Pages and other open-access arenas. […]
Kyle Green — February 25, 2014
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2014/02/the-work-of-public-work/
Kristof Panel Podcast: Find it Here! » The Editors' Desk — March 12, 2014
[…] of social issues has resulted in a myriad of academic responses including one from TSP’s own Chris Uggen who offered the New York Times writer a free subscription to this website. (For a […]
There’s More to Methods than Tweaking and Critiquing » The Editors' Desk — March 31, 2014
[…] so much recent hand-wringing over the relevance and impact of social research, it was inspiring to connect with researchers […]