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LAST_INTELLECTUALS
May 3, 2005
"The Last Intellectuals" (1987)
by Russell Jacoby
The thesis is that:
o independent,
o American, My prime example of this
o public, breed is Jane Jacobs, and
o intellectuals it's one of Russell Jacoby's
are an endangered species. prime examples as well.
Jacoby claims that the main JANE_JACOBS
reason for this is that they
have become academics,
voluntarily imprisoned in the
Ivory Tower where they write Or at least, I *think* he
intentionally for an extremely claims this is the *main*
narrow audience, solely reason. He at least strongly
motivated by professional implies that it's a prominent
advancement. reason... I think a close
reading would show that
technically he only claims
This gap in our culture -- that it's the reason that
according to Jacoby -- has he wants to talk about.
been filled thus far by the
aging intellectuals of a It's a problem with
previous generation, and to his style of argument:
some extent by foreign he qualifies things
imports (e.g. the European so carefully, it can be
postmodernists). a little hard to track
exactly what he's saying
Russell Jacoby argues that (though it always *seems*
we need wide-ranging clear).
non-specialized
intellectuals that write And he's one of those
for a general audience: guys with a knack for
discussing possible
"The transmission belt of counter-arguments without
culture -- the ineffable manner quite addressing them --
by which an older generation he just leaves you with
passes along not simply its the *feeling* that they've
knowledge but its dreams and been addressed.
hopes -- is threatened. The
larger culture rests on a INTO_THE_STRAW
decreasing number of aging
intellectuals with no
successors." -- p. 7-8
It's a difficult business,
discussing this sort of VOID
absence of a presence, a
hole in our culture... (And in fact,
it's the very (Excuse?
Jacoby shows first excuse Qualification,
awareness of Jacoby offers Patch,
many -- though up...) Hedge?)
not all -- of
the difficulties.
His thesis depends a lot on
definitions and perceptions,
and there's much room for (And if you think
quibbling and caviling, and I'm going to skip But also, whatever
in fact, it practically the opportunity, you the merits of his
invites such attacks... haven't been paying thesis, whatever
attention.) his omissions,
But I don't think there's this book is a
too much doubt that he's very good
on to *something* here -- historical survey
of 20th century
American
"As intellectuals became academics, intellectuals
they had no need to write in a
public prose; they did not, and Reading it
finally they could not" -- p. 7 continually left
me thinking
things like:
I think the real question,
though is *why* is the "Podhoretz wrote
academic influence so Try this: Note that a book called
pernicious? The idea here as a field matures, "Making It"?
is that an academic switches the quality of Didn't Paul
*entirely* to a specialist introductory texts Goodman write a
audience, but this -- in the subject book called
declines. "Making Do"?
(1) Was not always the case. Goodman must
The text book have been
(2) Is not universal to all industry insists riffing off of
disciplines. on cranking out Podhoretz..."
new books, even
Some fields are more in cases where GOODMAN
welcoming (forgiving?) the old are only
of experts dabbling in in need of minor Why? Not sure.
popularization than revison at most.
others. Best guess:
The new works are 1st eds
inevitably written sell better
with less attention than 2nds,
The disease can not just be and enthusiasm than because a
that the market for independent the originals. student
writing has dried up, there is can get by
also a disease of the academy Possibly this applies with a used
that needs to be accounted for. to academic writing copy of the
in general? When 1st, and
(Jacoby does a field has lost snub the
talk about this confidence in it's latest.
a bit: things own future, when the
have calcified, widespread sentiment
credentials is that it's gotten
matter much more, as far as it can go --
avoiding public
controversy is Then the only players
more important...) left will tend to be
people willing to
accomodate themselves
to an artificial
novelty.
But now let me get down to
the fun stuff -- quibbles
and cavils -- maybe there
are enough of them that they
add up to something...
The worst difficulty, and Not included are:
one that he barely popular science writers
addresses, if at all, is software geeks
that he has a pretty science fiction writers
rigid idea of what counts rock lyricists/critics
as an "intellectual", and talk radio people
if you're not a marxist documentary film-makers
working in the libertarians (and few conservatives)
humanities/social
sciences, it's hard to Some of these categories
make it into his club. he dismisses explicitly,
but rarely for convincing
(But not impossible: reasons.
e.g. Norman Podhoretz
is covered pretty
throughly.)
I spent much of
the 80s mulling
over the I was also a big fan of
libertarian the Whole Earth Review,
publications but I would have to check
"Reason" and to see if some of their
"Liberty", which stable of writers were
would certainly young enough for Jacoby's
seem to qualify as cut-off.
written for (if
not always Kostelanetz
reaching) a lists Stewart
general audience. Brand as a
guy in the
But at least Jacoby does target age
praise the neo-con range.
"Commentary" for being
written more accessibly But why would
than things like "Social you compare it
Text"... to "Social Text"
rather than "The (Jacoby himself
Nation" or publishes in
"Mother Jones"? "The Nation"
now, I don't
know about then.)
He mentions in passing that he's not
including rock lyricists and critics
but doesn't really explain why.
Just to pick one:
And what about:
Brian Eno: leading intellectual
of my generation (T/F)? Lou Reed
Patti Smith
I would say so, though Eno's David Bowie
medium was LPs, linear notes Richard Hell
and interviews with very few David Byrne
published essays/articles (he
didn't publish a book until Lester Bangs
the 90s).
(And... is "Maximum
There's no mention at all of Rock n' Roll" not
the Pacifica radio people I Marxist enough for
grew up listening to -- Jacoby?)
WBAI
Science Fiction writers
evidently don't qualify:
Gregory Benford,
Samuel R. Delany,
Bruce Sterling
The 80s produced some classic works
of popular technical writing:
Stephen Gould, "The Panda's Thumb"
"The Mis-measure of Man"
Stephen Levy, "Hackers"
Tracey Kidder, "The Soul of a New Machine" (Tracey Kidder gets
a mention, at least.)
James Gleick, "Chaos: Making a New Science"
Oh, but that was 1987, same
year as "Last Intellectuals".
Eric Drexler's "The Engines of Creation"
Eric Drexler's work in
particular was very wide-
ranging, including
discussions of the problem Even in the unlikely event
of public decision making that Drexler's discussion
on technical subjects, and of "nanotechnology" were
various ways we might increase proven useless, there
our collective intelligence would still be some very
valuable material in this
book.
Consider that Richard Stallman
was just getting started on some
of his best work during the mid
80s... some of it technical, some Hakim Bey's
of it essays and manifestos. "Temporary Autonomous Zone"
was out in 1985.
In particular he invented the
tremendously creative and ground
breaking legal hack, "the gnu
public license" aka "copyleft".
Are these not intellectuals?
Jacoby says something
dismissive about "software
whizzes" at one point --
In general, the possiblity
that the kind of intellectual Hey! *Real* intellectuals
that he's interested in might are supposed to write
now be besides the point seems about subjects that I
too horrible for him to understand!
contemplate.
Richard Kostelanetz
(in "Whose Last
Intellectuals?",
collected in _Crimes
of Culture_) brings
up still more names,
e.g. James Fallows.
Kostelanetz also
raises the point that
Jacoby skips Buckminster But then, Buckminster
Fuller in his history. Fuller was a pretty
A telling point? terrible writer. Maybe
Jacoby doesn't think he
precisely qualifies as
There's no someone writing for a
mention of Ayn "general" audience.
Rand, either.
Maybe she wasn't
writing for a
specific enough Kostelanetz alludes to
general a work of his own, (Yes, he does
audience. _The End of Intelligent that a lot.)
Or something. Writing_ from 1974,
which he says identifies
a problem Jacoby doesn't
address.
END_OF_INTELLIGENT_WRITING
But, the above is not the only
counter-argument (counter-point)
that could be brought against Jacoby.
In addition to the "Hey you missed
a bunch" argument there is:
o Should we care if a writer is
American? What if thinkers outside
the US were doing a better job of
addressing key issues? Should we
ignore them?
o What if specialization is a
necessary evil? Maybe the real
issues are too hard for the
general audience to follow.
Physicists are not required to
drop quantum mechanics because
most people find it confusing,
why should, say, economists, be
subjected to different rules?
o The academic jobs are drying up.
If the academy is a seductive faustian
bargain, at least it's a bargain that (Kostelanetz
fewer intellectuals have available. makes this
point also.)
o And one last counter-argument of sorts:
Well, maybe that was true back
in 1987, but *now* we've got...
The Internet!
Which brings us to Cosma
Shalizi, who's notebooks
are one of my own picks
for Best of the Web.
I first read "The
Last Intellectuals"
because Shalizi
mentioned it at the
end of one of his That essay has a slightly different
essays. focus: Shalizi asked not where did
the class of intellectuals go, but
who are our *leading* intellectuals.
His question is: why is it so
hard to think of someone
currently alive of the caliber
of Betrand Russell?
This raises another point, though:
Question: do we need stars?
There are people out there
writing op ed pieces, working on If the "transmission belt"
web pages and so on, who are is busted, isn't it more
largely unsung heroes... because few people are
reading the output of these
Can't they act as an an effective writers?
"transmission belt of culture"
even if they're not establishing Imprision 90% of the
big names for us to drop? intellecutals, and the
remaining 10% would still
Would it be okay to overflow the pages.
have an intellectual
movement without the
names of leaders to
attribute it to?
ANARCHY
GRUEN_HILLS_OF_EARTH
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