The Fruits of Interdisciplinarianism

Say that 3 times fast.

Over at Durham in Wonderland, K.C. Johnson explores the intent and assumptions behind a call for fellowship applications from the John Hope Franklin Institute.  His analysis, as usual, is interesting, so read if you're looking for insight into the intersection of the humanities and politics.

Me, I'm more appalled at the intersection of the humanities and illiteracy. Why? Check out the title of the fellowship's theme:

The Alternative Political Imaginaries

Okay, what?  No, really.  What part of speech is "imaginaries" supposed to be in this context? A noun? The second part of a compound subject, the first part of which is "political?" If either, then what the hell is an "imaginary," since we need to define that first before we go around pluralizing it.  Is it someone who imagines alternative politics? Is it an escapee from a Disney team of "Imagineers" who has decided to defect to academia and build Che Guevara-themed tea rooms?  Is it just a really poor pun on "luminaries?"  Evidence that the author may be overfond of absinthe with his or her morning toast?

Read the excerpts over at DIW for further examples of literacy-challenged and unclear prose.

I wandered over to the foundation's website and discovered that the institute was all about being interdisciplinary, transdisciplinary, uber-disciplinary - you get the picture.  Somehow over the past decade the humanities have decided that it's a really good idea to take all their disciplines--some with thousands of years worth of complicated contextualized content--and make gumbo out of it. Gumbo tastes good, it's pretty cheap and filling and a clever way to get rid of leftovers, but you generally don't learn much from it.

Except, apparently, how to turn words into meaningless mushy nonsense.