Please expand on this, Edmund. I can't understand the concept of there be "no public spherein which to make interventions or extend principles." The Rhode Island State House is about a mile from where I live, I've written many poems about it, I also protest outside it, visit representatives, stand for election myself. I suppose you could say Fish is only talking about academics insofar as they are academics, what they do outside academia is their own business. But this very multiplicity and overlapping of identities may be the heart of the issue: is it useful? is it necessary? do we need a sort of underground resistance instead?
Please expand on your second question too. It seems to me that anyone who has access to print and web publication has a public sphere.
Mairead
On 8/30/07,
Edmund Hardy <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
Mairead wrote:
>This is where I found the views of Stanley Fish, in the US, a few years
>back, objectionable. In my memory, two of his arguments: "As academics, we
>are powerless" (in relation to the war); and "As academics, we should
>concentrate on academic work, not politics."
But in the Fishian view, there is no public sphere in which to make
interventions or extend principles. The idea of politics as a somehow a
public form of discussion and debate in which those who can speak can take
part would be an enlightenment fantasy to him?
E
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