May 22, 2009, 10:37 AM ET

Grant Writing and Binge Eating

Our academic culture turns scholars into grant writers.

Institutions increasingly place emphasis on securing “external funding” for work in the humanities, where there is no equivalent of Pfizer to fund research and development.

And, as a result, many faculty members have learned to become as persistent (but not as amicable or useful) as ordinary panhandlers. They spend their time with a hand out, but with their fingers on the keyboard; they use their writing talents attempting to secure their institutions more money in order that they might be permitted to get a small percentage for themselves.

In retail, as I remember, we called this “working on commission.”

At a national conference not too long ago, I was seated next to a distinguished administrator — once an Americanist — who spent the entire dinner explaining why those working in the humanities should be judged by the number and kinds of grants they received.

In a deep-throated drawl, he announced, “One’s recognition of value during the earliest stages of one’s work by one’s peers is the mightiest form of recognition,” or something along those lines.

All I know is that there were a lot of “one’s” and I stopped listening after two.

And then I started to wonder whether it was wise to encourage this ridiculous man in his pious and self-serving belief that work receiving the imprimatur of a grant should be held in the highest esteem.

Not that I’m bitter, but the number of works this man had actually published didn’t add up to my dress size (which, admittedly, is fairly high).

Should that matter? After all, I’ll also admit without cringing that I am a failure — as a student might say — ”grantwise.”

In contrast, he’d racked up every grant within spitting distance; clearly others believed in his work. Or had once.

But isn’t estimating someone’s work based almost exclusively on how many grants they’ve racked up sort of like saying “Let’s decide whether somebody gets promotion to full professor based on how many times he or she has engaged in binge-eating”?

In other words, should those who decide not to engage in this practice be punished for our choice to opt out and get on with the writing of books and articles rather than grant applications?