I was struck by Georgia Tech professor Ian Bogost’s blog rant entitled, “The Turtlenecked Hairshirt” (2010), in which he claims that the perceived problem with “the humanities as a discipline” is more accurately a problem with “its members,” a group he classifies as not only elitist but isolationist. “Humanists,” Bogost writes, “work hard but at all the wrong things,” and later, “Humanism does not deserve no carry the standard for humans, for frankly it despises them” (242). What he means, of course, is that the humanities as a discipline has a long history of aspiring to ideals, of cultivating and policing the museum of great human ideas, keeping out the “common riff raff,” so to speak. We comment on culture, Bogost implies, but we care nothing for effecting change within it; we don’t want to participate in it. Professors and students of humanities, Bogost seems to say, are indulged in some epic mutual masturbation from which nothing meaningful is engendered: “We masticate on culture for the pleasure of praising our own steaming shit.” “We have,” he states rather matter-of-factly, “chosen to be marginal.”
I don’t think he’s wrong—not entirely, at least. It is, I admit, difficult to justify most traditional humanities scholarship in a larger, even global, context. An essay I, for instance, recently wrote on Conrad’s Heart of Darkness—to be published soon in The Conradian—promises to alter, however slightly, the vast landscape of interpretation for what is perhaps the most variously interpreted novella in English literature. It may even be something of a “game changer.” But the game—who plays it? Certainly, the vast majority of those who read—or are forced to read—the novella will never know of my thesis and will never care. In the end, I’m just hoping a very marginalized community of scholars will praise my own little pile of steaming shit.
The Digital Humanities, however, Bogost suggests, may have the power to steer the practitioners of the humanities back to popular humanity: “If there is one reason things ‘digital’ might release humanism from its turtlenecked hairshirt, it is precisely because computing has revealed a world full of things: hairdressers, recipes, pornographers, typefaces, Bible studies, scandals, magnetic disks, rugby players, dereferenced pointers, cardboard void fill, pro-lifers, snowstorms. The digital world is replete. It resists” he tellingly concludes, “any efforts to be colonized by the postcolonialists.”
This “world full of things,” the everyday individuals who inhabit this “world full of things,” this is the subject matter to which Joe Lambert and his team of specialists are most agreeable. Digital Storytelling is a medium that seeks to share “a real world. A world of humans, things, and ideas. A world of the commonplace” (Bogost 242). This is certainly a meaningful connection between Digital Humanities and Digital Storytelling, in that the “Digital” in both functions to effectively seek out and support a wider audience, perhaps even the least common denominator. Perhaps the humanities, after all, should seek what Lambert and company seek every day: “authors mak[ing] sense of their own lives” (Lambert 122). The humanities has always sought to capture and portray human experience; Lambert and Bogost, however, seem to share the belief that “human experience” be more comprehensively defined.
I will admit in closing—in an effort to be perfectly honest—that there is a part of me that embraces the position on the margin Bogost speaks so disparagingly of. And while I do think the humanities needs to embrace the digital to keep the bureaucrats at bay; while I do think the humanities should seek to empower the actual masses of humanity, I also think that—somewhere in a rarely glimpsed ivory tower—scholars of the humanities should remain somewhat removed, theorize, argue, and judge each other’s piles of shit. After all, if the hairdressers and the pornographers and the rugby players have their own privileged and secret places and societies, why can’t we?
Nom de pluot 
I actually really enjoyed this post, it was both clear and amusing. I see your points. I just wonder if maybe academia and its ivory tower could benefit, somehow, from even more content? I mean even very above average intellectuals can only publish on Shakespeare so many times if there are no more plays produced, and Sherman Alexie who has a blog and website with fan interaction is socially relevant today. I tend to think getting stuck in the past is how to die out.
Digital Storytelling certainly comes off as commonplace sometimes, but I think it is important to be open to the new. As Darwin said, the only ones who survive are the adaptable ones. I don’t know if the humanities can exist forever without more content….. Can they keep up with the world? Not sure.
And definitely congrats on your publication!
I believe that the ivory tower view on academia is changing in several ways, but this change is seen in differing ways across disciplines. Although the elitist nature of scholarship should be challenged, I believe it is far more common to see the isolationist perspective perpetuated rather than questioned. I think it is important when approaching any subject to consider the ways in which our work challenges or falls into the patterns set forth within academia. I do also understand your argument that not every piece we write may be applicable in a global context or relevant outside of “the marginal” and maybe this may not always be the goal. I think that scholarship within the humanities must change the way in which scholars position themselves in a societal context and create work conscious of locating themselves.
Ryan: I agree with you, and not just because every deserves their special private place, but also because hairdressers cut hair better than you do, and you niggle Conrad better than do they (of course each of you could be trained to do the other task and join the ranks of the refined). But need it be either/or. Isn’t it interesting to know what hairedressers think of Conrad? Might it be cool for you to write your essay to haidressers and alter their reading of Conrad? Where the points of intersection and the possibilities that arise when we speak and learn both to our communities of insiders and between various communities of insiders?
Honestly, I get very excited when I think about “Hairdressing in Conrad’s HEART OF DARKNESS.” Is such a topic feasible? Maybe, and not only reasonable but potentially eye-opening.
I try to think of myself as the least academic person in the room whenever possible. What’s more, I think this approach really helps me in saying something possibly new about classic works of literature.
Great blog post, it was just as interesting as Bogost’s blog “rant.” Despite the real world connection between DS and DH, I wonder if the humanities would ever embrace it as Bogost suggests. I think that your final sentiment, that “scholars of the humanities should remain somewhat removed, theorize, argue, and judge each other’s piles of shit” is probably the dominant feeling among humanities scholars. Do you think Bogost’s plea for the digital to thrust humanities members into the world fell onto (mostly) deaf ears?
Awesome post. I really like your point about wanting to preserve something of a ivory tower for academics. And the idea of that Lambert and Bogost want “human experience” to be comprehensively defined really gets at my discomfort with the push for digital storytelling. It’s certainly valuable, but, for me at least, so are the incredibly specific, absolutely non-comprehensive looks at the human experience currently produced by many other scholars.
Great post. I’m personally interested in Bogart’s approach to the topic, and more specifically his tone. Honestly, it really turned me off. I don’t necessarily disagree with everything he’s saying, but the way he says it is really off-putting. Nobody wants to feel attacked for what they do, and telling humanists that “we masticate on culture for the pleasure of praising our own steaming shit” doesn’t seem like the best way to convince people to jump on board with him (IMHO). This kind of relates to your most recent blog post about how we present ourselves. What kind of effect can this kind of rant have on people’s impression of Bogart and his ideas?