Intellectuals, public and otherwise

The role of the scholar, I think, is to collect, interpret and disseminate information and knowledge. In order to do this kind of work, you need to have a certain amount of detachment from the knowledge you’re accumulating and sifting through, you have to have a certain indifference to it. To be an intellectual you have to have passions, commitments and beliefs. I think it’s possible to be both a scholar and an intellectual, but those two sides to your life have to be kept somewhat apart.

- Andrew Reimer

The past week I’ve been reading a bit of Robert Dessaix’s 1998 collection, Speaking Their Minds: Intellectuals and the Public Culture in Australia. It’s an interesting snapshot, being pre-Olympics, pre-centenary of Federation, pre-’History Wars’ and of course pre-9/11. The shock of both Keating’s loss and Hanson’s emergence seem apparent in many contributions, which makes me think again just how long it’s taken the cultural commentariat in this country to keep pace with brisk and intentional changes to the political landscape.

Yesterday Fiona Allon’s post to the csaa-forum was a welcome overview of some important work being done to chart this very recent period of Australian political history. Do read it if you can. (The early article on John Howard is available here.)

It would be nice to see more posts from people who are quietly getting on with doing the work that other diagnosticians of ‘the field of cultural studies’ or ‘the state of Australian politics’ continue to think is missing, but could find if they searched a little further than the usual loud voices.