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[fiona]

Disappearing disciplines:

http://chronicle.com/article/Disappearing-Disciplines-/64850/?key=HjggdFZgNnJJZHAzeyMTLCdXYHd%2FKUssbXcUZigaYFtS.

The Fiona

[abuflletcher]

It's not that the fields themselves are disappearing (i.e. oceanography is alive and well), rather only opportunities to major in them at certain schools.  On the other hand, I think there probably are whole fields that have "run their course" and need to be wound down or transformed into something else.  I think this is the case with many traditional linguistics programs in the US, which seem to have become ever more provincial and isolated. 

[daniel_von_flanagan]

Fiona, thanks for asking the mods to open this up.

Also, kudos to the CHE; this article is one of the closest things to actual journalism I've seen on this particular topic.  - DvF

[august_leo]

The comments are interesting to read too.

Sigh.

[advil]

On the other hand, I think there probably are whole fields that have "run their course" and need to be wound down or transformed into something else.  I think this is the case with many traditional linguistics programs in the US, which seem to have become ever more provincial and isolated. 

I'm not sure what you mean by this...in what sense has linguistics run its course?

[kaysixteen]

Wouldn't it be better to eliminate degree options, such as substandard MA and esp. doctoral programs, rather than wholesale elimination of a dept., and, if the dept. eventually does indeed have to go, to work on eliminating it gradually, by attrition?  Tenure has to mean something.

[spork]

"Placing all decisions in the hands of the Faculty Senate, he says, might have led to an unnecessarily politicized process."

Yeah right.

I've seen this before, over a decade ago, when state legislatures were requiring all campuses in public systems to be "financially independent" (i.e., generate more of their operating budgets at the same time the legislature was cutting appropriations system-wide).  Programs that could easily operate in the black (e.g., law schools) were spun off into budgetarily independent entities. On the other end were programs for which no one in state government or in university administration knew how to calculate the numbers -- for example, university-based medical residency programs that operated out of community hospitals.  In the middle were the more "traditional" undergraduate and graduate academic programs.

As I've said in other threads, this is part of a long-term and permanent restructuring of higher education.  Universities are operating on a market model, and the ways in which universities have operated in the past are not sustainable given the market.  It's like Ford.  Something has to change.

As pointed out in the column referenced in the sidebar (mods, can you make "The Elephant in the Room: Curricular Glut" by Michael Bugeja a free link?), there is way too much duplication and bloat in the typical undergraduate curriculum -- call it mission creep, faculty irresponsibility, marketing to prospective applicants, whatever, but it's not efficient and it's not sustainable, because not every university can be all things to all potential students and faculty.  All those "Studies" majors? Get rid of them.  Bring back the trivium.  And geography.

[watermarkup]

Large swathes of the modern languages now fall into two camps: those that ignore everything before 1750, and those that ignore everything before 1900. The philological knowledge that used to constitute the foundation of those disciplines is well on its way to becoming a field that no longer exists.

[fiona]

Large swathes of the modern languages now fall into two camps: those that ignore everything before 1750, and those that ignore everything before 1900. The philological knowledge that used to constitute the foundation of those disciplines is well on its way to becoming a field that no longer exists.

Yes, this is the kind of thing that concerns me. There are bottom-line arguments (how many people major in philosophy?) and there are Let's-Keep-Prof-Linguist-in-His-Tenured-Job-until-he retires-and then we'll honor him by abolishing his field arguments, and then there's a lot of philistinism and closing out bodies of knowledge by attrition (prof dies, leaves) or by accident (prof dies--ha! University can scoop up his salary!)

In other words--surprise!--none of these decisions have to do with the merits of the fields, and everything to do with money, politics, and accidents. In my own dept., everyone now on the tenure track will likely be tenured, regardless of merits and achievements, because if we don't tenure them, we'll lose the hiring lines forever. Tenured profs of retirement age are being discouraged from retiring, because we'll lose their lines or be able to replace them only by adjuncts, who won't be doing research or directing dissertations.

No, I don't have a solution. I'm venting and planning to live and teach forever, so my subfield can't be dropped.

The Fiona, stayin alive, stayin alive

[enipeus]

Regardless of the merits of the closures, it sure is spooky that entire departments can be shut down without much or any compensation of employees.  Just one more thing to worry about, I guess.

[magistra]

Wouldn't it be better to eliminate degree options, such as substandard MA and esp. doctoral programs, rather than wholesale elimination of a dept., and, if the dept. eventually does indeed have to go, to work on eliminating it gradually, by attrition?  Tenure has to mean something.

I agree with this.  I can see why you wouldn't want to have certain departments at every school in the state system -- I think we've had that debate before -- but it doesn't mean the field itself should be cut wholesale.  One or two persons can support enough courses for gen ed requirements and to have a minor.  If they're sharing office resources with others it wouldn't be terribly costly.

It's not just here, either.  Palaeography at King's College, London is under the gun.

http://heritage-key.com/blogs/lyn/can-power-social-networks-save-palaeography-kings-college-london

[locutus]

It seems that some of this may be good for the schools, depending on how the changes are done. Why not combine European Basket Weaving and African Basket Weaving if money can be saved in administrative costs? Dumping tenured profs is obviously not good, but the academic organization isn't set in stone.

On the other hand, I think there probably are whole fields that have "run their course" and need to be wound down or transformed into something else.  I think this is the case with many traditional linguistics programs in the US, which seem to have become ever more provincial and isolated. 

I'm not sure what you mean by this...in what sense has linguistics run its course?

I don't know if I'd say that it has run it's course. I have heard the criticism that many linguistics programs are very insular and seem to be teetering towards irrelevance by not interacting with related areas and relying on very old theories and old ideas about how linguists are trained. It's not an issue with linguistics per se so much as how the programs are oriented.

[drlanguage]

I don't know if I'd say that it has run it's course. I have heard the criticism that many linguistics programs are very insular and seem to be teetering towards irrelevance by not interacting with related areas and relying on very old theories and old ideas about how linguists are trained. It's not an issue with linguistics per se so much as how the programs are oriented.

This may be the case with some programs, but the majority of people I know in linguistics do interdisciplinary work and are very interested in exchanging ideas with folks from psychology, cognitive science, speech and hearing sciences, anthropology, sociology, etc. The interdisciplinary nature of linguistics is in fact what attracts many young linguists to the field.

[fiona]

Everyone talks "interdisciplinary," but it's actually a career killer. Universities are divided into departments for administrative convenience, and if you don't fit into the convenience, you're less apt to be hired or kept on, esp. when there are cutbacks. You're much better off to have a degree in, say, English rather than in linguistics if you want to have a job at all.

If you're in academe for the intellectual riches, such as they are, such considerations don't matter as much.

The Fiona

[locutus]

I don't know if I'd say that it has run it's course. I have heard the criticism that many linguistics programs are very insular and seem to be teetering towards irrelevance by not interacting with related areas and relying on very old theories and old ideas about how linguists are trained. It's not an issue with linguistics per se so much as how the programs are oriented.

This may be the case with some programs, but the majority of people I know in linguistics do interdisciplinary work and are very interested in exchanging ideas with folks from psychology, cognitive science, speech and hearing sciences, anthropology, sociology, etc. The interdisciplinary nature of linguistics is in fact what attracts many young linguists to the field.

My impression, and feel free to correct me, is that linguistics needs those fields much more so than those fields need linguistics. I know to some degree it is just cross disciplinary hackling but in my experience with folks in those fields they are pretty skeptical about the linguists perspective. I can't say anything about linguistics on intellectual grounds, but it seems to me that the profession is not in a good place.