In a Chronicle piece in 2003, Stanley Fish wrote that we academics should not use our classes to “save the world.” Rather, we should turn our undergraduates into scholars by transmitting knowledge and teaching them how to evaluate it. In a new book, Save the World on Your Own Time, he again argues that the job of the university — and, by extension, that of the faculty — is not to “transform” students or the larger society, although both might be “transformed” as a consequence of our efforts. Our focus should be academic learning.
As a graduate student, I agreed with Mr. Fish: I was suspicious of those professors who talked of turning their students into “citizens” and “promoting civic engagement.” Where’s the content? I thought. Where are the academic standards? It all seemed a bit too fluffy.
But as a faculty member, I now see the issue differently. In fact, I have discovered that as my students become better scholars, both more knowledgeable and able to reject simplistic formulations, they naturally become better citizens.
I learned that lesson courtesy of the war in Iraq.
I taught a course on the war last winter, seeking only to teach my students some of the fundamentals of scholarship. More specifically I wanted them to learn about war planning, the first phase of the occupation, and Iraqi culture. I also wanted them to learn how to analyze arguments, with the ability to separate stronger arguments from weaker ones. That is not to say that I expected a quiet semester. In fact, I expected fireworks — and my students obliged.
Most of them hated the war, blaming President Bush, large corporations, and lawmakers “who don’t listen to us.” A few self-identified conservatives defended the war’s original purpose and the behavior of American troops. Unsurprisingly, our first week of class resembled cable-television news more than a classroom, as students rehashed familiar charges and countercharges.
Then my students started learning how much they did not know about the war.
I had assigned Thomas E. Ricks’s Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq, 2003 to 2005, as well as articles by journalists, academics, and other experts. Courtesy of Ricks and company, my students discovered their ignorance of prewar policy debates, the occupation, and the culture of Iraq. Gradually they understood that the war in Iraq resisted such simplistic formulations as “Support our troops” or “No blood for oil.”
As my students learned more, they got better at evaluating others’ arguments. We watched cable news and read editorials and campaign statements, dissecting their premises and evaluating their evidence. Not all arguments are created equal, my students learned, and anyone, of any political persuasion, can engage in sophistry.
After spring break, I took them to Washington to interview policy makers on Capitol Hill and at think tanks. Much to my students’ surprise, they learned from Republicans and Democrats alike that there is no quick, painless solution to the war. Whether U.S. troops leave or stay, “it will cost time, blood, and money, possibly even American prestige,” one expert told them. “There are just no easy answers.”
There are no easy answers: My students adopted that as their mantra. After returning from Washington, they moved beyond slogans to a discussion of tradeoffs. No one wanted more casualties, but no one wanted to leave the Iraqis on their own yet; everyone believed that by invading Iraq, the United States had assumed a moral responsibility for its reconstruction. Beyond that point of agreement, however, my students remained frustrated and confused.
I welcomed their confusion. When we began the semester, my students were full of certainty despite their lack of knowledge. Now, with the semester two-thirds complete, they had lost that pseudo-certainty.
Perhaps most surprising, they expressed sympathy for lawmakers and policy makers in Washington. In January my students all held fashionably cynical views about those inside the Beltway: “They” were self-interested; “they” lied to the American people about the war; “they” refused to end a war the public no longer wanted. After meeting those people, my students acknowledged the difficulty of coping with a dissatisfied public and a problematic war. Several also expressed an interest in interning on Capitol Hill or at nonprofit organizations.
Thanks to two budding filmmakers in the class, we captured the students’ transformations on film. The students interviewed one another about how their opinions of the war — and of themselves — had changed. “All I really ever did was say what others had told me, what others think,” one student admitted. “Now I’m not exactly sure what I think — but at least it’s my own.”
More interested in questions than in answers, those freshmen, now sophomores, are ready to do the hard work of acquiring and evaluating knowledge. They are also better citizens. No longer so sure of their positions, they have learned that it’s dangerous to hold an opinion that someone else gave you. They are also less cynical. After seeing some of the decision-making process in Washington, they understand that policy makers are trying to resolve an issue that resists easy answers.
I’ve changed, too. I now see that scholarship and citizenship can complement each other. Teaching students and “saving the world” are not necessarily in conflict. I no longer believe that you can separate “academic education” from “societal transformation.” The former leads directly to the latter. As my students became better scholars, more knowledgeable about the war and capable of an informed critique of the arguments made about it, they were better able to discern more-effective policy choices from less-effective ones. At the same time, my students became more interested in engaging with the civic life of their nation through voting, following the news, even interning in Washington. Academic learning improved their citizenship skills.
I still agree with Stanley Fish on two points: The classroom is no place for political advocacy; it is a place for study, not for proselytizing. And I agree that academic learning comes before anything else. If we fail to challenge our students academically, we risk doing little more than reaffirming their uninformed opinions — a disservice both to our students and to ourselves.
But I cannot agree that transformation of our students or our society lies outside of our job description. Transformation is a natural consequence of our doing our jobs well. If my students offer any guide, good scholars make good citizens — people ready to inquire, to think, and to engage with the world as they find it.
Perhaps that is all to the good, more to be embraced than feared. After all, don’t we want our students to change as a result of what they have learned? Don’t we want them to use what they know to enrich their lives and the lives of others?
I think we do. And next year, when I teach on the war in Iraq again, I’ll be prepared for my students to change what they think and who they are. In fact, I’m counting on it.
Joseph J. Gonzalez is an adjunct assistant professor of history at Appalachian State University, in North Carolina, where he also teaches in the Watauga Global Community (formerly Watauga College).
http://chronicle.com Section: Commentary Volume 55, Issue 4, Page A34