Jack W. Chen

And for something a bit more substantial -- over the last week, I've been reading in and around the Classical Liberal Arts movement, for reasons that have to do with my home institution. There's a lot of reason to sympathize with the aims of CLA, but there's also a lot of reason for concern.

Finally, I'd be remiss not to say how much I've learned from my colleagues at the University of the Western Cape in South Africa: Premesh Lalu (@premesh3l.bsky.social), Heidi Grunebaum, Maurits van Bever Donker, and many more. Thinking with Black institutionality guided every aspect of how I've

And for something a bit more substantial -- over the last week, I've been reading in and around the Classical Liberal Arts movement, for reasons that have to do with my home institution. There's a lot of reason to sympathize with the aims of CLA, but there's also a lot of reason for concern.

I should note that Chad Wellmon (@chadwellmon.bsky.social) has taught me a lot about the history of the university. I'm also indebted to John R. Thelin's A History of the American University. In the background of this is Kathleen Fitzpatrick (@kfitz.info) who does a better and (indeed) more

And for something a bit more substantial -- over the last week, I've been reading in and around the Classical Liberal Arts movement, for reasons that have to do with my home institution. There's a lot of reason to sympathize with the aims of CLA, but there's also a lot of reason for concern.

And don't get me started on the other straw-man arguments regarding "Postmodernism" or "nihilism" or "poststructuralism" or "relativism." I do think that (as Eric Hayot, @ehayot.bsky.social) has pointed out, we have too often ceded the insistence that we produce truth to other parts of the

And for something a bit more substantial -- over the last week, I've been reading in and around the Classical Liberal Arts movement, for reasons that have to do with my home institution. There's a lot of reason to sympathize with the aims of CLA, but there's also a lot of reason for concern.

hand in hand with good research. What I am studying has directly informed my teaching. Moreover, and even worse, I see in CLA a fantasy of the teacher not as informed scholarly expert, but as facilitator of student self-discovery. No doubt that a liberal arts education is transformative -- even

And for something a bit more substantial -- over the last week, I've been reading in and around the Classical Liberal Arts movement, for reasons that have to do with my home institution. There's a lot of reason to sympathize with the aims of CLA, but there's also a lot of reason for concern.

we have now inherited. Yet a return to classical liberal arts is a rear-guard action, one that reinforces the terms created by certain legacies of the German research university and American professional schools (looking at you, Johns Hopkins). I don't think that this is how the argument can be won.

And for something a bit more substantial -- over the last week, I've been reading in and around the Classical Liberal Arts movement, for reasons that have to do with my home institution. There's a lot of reason to sympathize with the aims of CLA, but there's also a lot of reason for concern.

I share the view that universities have ceded decision-making power to professional schools and to utilitarian arguments about skills-training and immediate jobs placement. University leaders are chasing relevancy and reacting to the current crises (AI, democracy, religious conflict) without