"Every few years I agree with something George Will writes. His criticism of academic writing I share with him in spades. In large part it is mindless insider dribble making mountains of minor molehills in a vain attempt to distinguish themselves from other with a an equal lack of intellectual insight. The career determining importance of playing this uninspired games takes time away from real research which would benefit their students. Not all academic writing falls into this category but most academic journals are drowning in this egotistic, masturbatory dribble..
"Chernow’s large readership (and the successes of such non-academic historians as Rick Atkinson, Richard Brookhiser, David McCullough, Nathaniel Philbrick, Jon Meacham, Erik Larson and others) raises a question: Why are so many academic historians comparatively little read? Here is a hint from the menu of presentations at the 2017 meeting of the Organization of American Historians: The titles of 30 included some permutation of the word “circulation” (e.g., “Circulating/Constructing Heterosexuality,” “Circulating Suicide as Social Criticism,” “Circulating Tourism Imaginaries From Below”). Obscurantism enveloped in opacity is the academics’ way of assigning themselves status as members of a closed clerisy indulging in linguistic fads. Princeton historian Sean Wilentz, who is impatient with academics who are vain about being unintelligible, confesses himself mystified by the “circulating” jargon. This speaks well of him."
Hysterical mobs are crudely judging history. One book offers a better way. - The Washington Post
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