Literary Theory Irrelevant

To the editors:

Michel Chaouli (Faculty, March 18) mistakes a political problem for a theoretical one. The fault is not in literary studies, but with literary studies. Academics in this field are not paid to produce anything, are not paid for the content of their work at all. Our society chooses to pay them to do what they do because they are a symbol of knowledge and tradition, regardless of how radical their theories might be. Really, it's only a kind of effete entertainment or, at best, private passion, for them. The truest words I ever heard in an English class were that the purpose of the English department is to help you increase your pleasure in reading. That's really it. Any claims that literary theory plays some ethical role form a chorus of pure wind-baggery which willfully ignores political realities. We don't pay cagers to play basketball behind closed doors, so why should we pay these academics to do something equally inaccessible and pointless? I don't speak out of any ideological grudge and I could care less whether these academics continue to get paid for their self-gratification. But I find the "concerns" raised by Chaouli irresistibly absurd. The academics are a union of tailors trying to knit sewing machines. THOMAS C. MUNRO '97-'99   March 18, 1999