Professional Correctness

In recent years the world of literary and cultural studies has been riven by a fierce debate between those who would transform interpretative work so that it directly engages with and influences political issues and those who fear that this would destroy the very essence of literary criticism. In Professional Correctness Stanley Fish contends that neither the hope nor the fear are in fact realizable because, given the structures of power and hierarchy now in place, academic work - and especially literary studies - cannot reach an audience that might use it as the basis for effective political…