MUSINGS OF A WANNABE ACADEMIC

“A combination of timidity born out of careerism and an ignorance born out of overspecialization combine to form a vacuum at the heart of academic life.” – Nietzsche

In 1842, at the age of 24, a young man got his Phd in Greek Philosophy from the University of Jena. He tried for an academic job and found that he was banned from all further career opportunities in the academia. This was because he was a member of the radical “Young Hegelians” Group during his student days. This might have proved to be a blessing in disguise for him and for the world. If not for this ban, he might have very well ended up a non-descript academic in the German university system, not the revolutionary genius who showed a new philosophical direction for humankind to move on to the next higher phase of existence. The name of that young man was Karl Marx.

It is common knowledge that in a country like India, questions like the not-so-glamorous pay and prestige associated with an academic job are linked to broader structural issues. That cannot be debated in this limited space. But what could be debated are questions like, What exactly is a career in academics all about? What are its limitations? What is a social role of an academic? And what for should a young mind prepare itself for before deciding on a career in academics?

Coming to what exactly an academic is supposed to be, the foremost duty of an academic is to strive to give an intellectual justification to human existence per se. This is easier said than explained. A view of Kautilya that echoes in the philosophy of Plato is that an intellectual or a philosopher, which is what an academic is suppose to be, should have the qualities of “Saatva” or a refined spiritual state which transcends the material and social trappings of a normal human existence. But we realize that this remains as yet an utopian state. If an academic wants to overcome the limitations of his career, and become a real intellectual, he should strive to have three dimensions, viz,

1. Academic professional (being in an academic career)

This should be the primary identity of an academic. At the risk of sounding careerist, this dimension is necessary as an academic has to be a part of a formal academic institution involved in the production and the reproduction of knowledge. This is needed for the academic not so much as to fulfill her biological and social needs but for the fact that, being a part of a formal academic system may be the only way to ensure that she remains in appropriate social practice. Off course one might argue that being a part of formal academia was not needed for say, an intellectual like Gandhi. But Gandhi had the advantage of being associated with a mass movement of huge social relevance. Not all of us might be fortunate enough to be in such a meaningful association with a mass movement, that too at such an intense level so as to give us our primary identities.

Within an academic set-up, an academic should strive to transcend narrow disciplinary limitations Disciplines rule by controlling belief systems. They exercise control by defining reality - by devising ontological frameworks and giving guidelines for academic action. The need for conforming to a particular discipline as well as to transcend its confines is a classical dialectic that is the wellspring of all kinds of academic creativity.

2. Organic Intellectual

It was the inspiring Italian Communist Antonio Gramsci, who writing from a Fascist prison cell, coined the word “Organic Intellectual”. An organic intellectual is someone who is an organic part of the masses whose frustrations and aspirations he voices through erudite intellectual forms. For example, Ambedkar, being a Dalit had all rights to claim the mantle of an organic Dalit intellectual. But then, caste need not be the only way an intellectual can claim to represent the masses.

The need for being an organic intellectual arises from the fact that the intellectual source of an academic from which he gets his ideas and inspirations cannot be only a scientific laboratory or a rarefied library or an electronic database of e-journals. It also has to be, as C. Wright Mills, one of the few career academics who had a mass following in America says, one’s own life experience which has to be continually examined and interpreted. In order to maximize one’s own life experiences, it is in the fitness of things if one is able to able to relate to at least a section of the masses at the practical level.

3. Public intellectual

The best example of a public intellectual in the current context would be Noam Chomsky. His academic area is the rather rarified area of Linguistics. But he relates and is able to relate to a general audience across the world in areas as diverse as the future of capitalism or the current nature of neo-imperialism. Say, in an entire academic career, an academic may get to teach a total of about 3000 students. So, the narrow conduits of academic communications may not be adequate if an academic wants to relate to a wider audience. Hence the need to relate to a wider audience through whatever channels that are available like Newspapers, Blogs, Public speeches in any fora etc.

4. A virulent political critique of the existing social system

What this essentially means is that the academic should be also a part-time political activist if the phrase “political-activism” is understood in the broadest sense of the term. The cause of furthering truth is seldom served by conformity in thought. And non-conformity causes conflict. Conflict and struggle is the basis of all social change. Over here, what could be the role of an academic? She should initially facilitate the conflict at the ideational level. She should facilitate the asking of academic and extra-academic questions especially, uncomfortable, probing, conflict-provoking questions like 'Why?' and 'Why not?' rather than comfortable questions like 'How'. This is possible for the academic because the University is a refined cultural space which provides a simulated space for enacting the conflicts of society of whatever nature. And if the academic is both a public as well as an organic intellectual, she can help to take the ideational conflict to the actual world wherein it can get fructified in a productive and practical manner and result in meaningful social change.

This dimension of an academic will bring him into conflict with the existing powers that be, both in the academic system as well as outside. Because of that she may face a danger to both career as well as her person. But then danger and risk are a part of our daily lives. One may die even while crossing the road. It is just a question of taking a higher risk for the sake of being true to one’s own beliefs and value systems.

Maybe all these expectations are too much for a budding academic to shoulder in one short life-time. But then, we live but once and this only life has to be lived in the most meaningful way. Life has a more beautiful meaning than all those hedonistic meanings that assail our senses.