To the faculty of UNC, this is an invitation. We may have no right, but we are asking you to share a bit more of yourselves with us. We would like you to share ideas, evidence, theories and opinions with us through editorial contribution to this and other local and state newspapers.
We ask this because the Triangle, the state and the country need it. The lack of well-formed and informed discourse in today’s media universe, amplified gruesomely in an election year, demonstrates the desperate necessity in this country for proud public and political intellectuals. Those who can read, analyze, write and argue well should do so regularly and loudly. Of course as the editorial board of a print newspaper, we are biased. But, we would prefer academics to contribute to discourse in a manner that eschews the fleeting and ephemeral nature of broadcast media for the considered, permanent and easily transmitted form of print.
We ask for faculty contributions to our print media also because it matches strength to strength. You train to produce strong written content, and we have a strong platform, certainly a stronger platform than you most often currently publish through. While we realize that publication of academic tomes and peer reviewed journal articles is the currency of tenure and promotion, that currency is lowly valued, rightly or wrongly, by the laypersons of the communities you are part of.
If we may tempt you, the editorial form allows you to shed the stylistic shackles and obligatory deployment of obscure conceptual vocabulary de rigueur in academic forums. And even if your pieces inspire hate mail and nasty online comments, for both yourselves and us, most publicity is good publicity.
We look for inspiration to John Dewey, whose level of publication output, regardless of one’s agreement or disagreement with the man, boggles the mind. Even while contributing the kinds of academic work faculty are responsible for, he wrote articles for such popular outlets as The New Republic that solidified his position as an American public intellectual, shaping and enlivening national and even global discourse. We realize that sharing your gifts in this modality might not have direct rewards and we strongly encourage administration to consider looking at this kind of public engagement as contribution to the body of work considered for tenure.
We understand that the pernicious anti-intellectualism that pervades American culture makes it tempting to swim in the protected and familiar waters of academe. Yet we also know our faculty are amazing intellectuals. We humbly ask you to make yourselves public ones too.
