The Rational and the Academy
The academy is defined by rational examination, but the commitment to the rational to the exclusion of other ways of knowing creates profound gaps in our knowledge of both the present and the past.
To describe something by negation locates it in a hierarchy beneath the other, more favoured concept; so the irrational is positioned as inferior to the rational.
The rational is a practical tool, but there are profound and fundamental elements that exist beyond it. These require better definitions and a greater weighting beside rather than below it. I don’t propose definitions here, but rather an exploration of a potential alternative topography for thought and a consideration of some of the implications of the valorisation of the rational within the academy. What I propose is a greater balance of the forms of the real, of experience, of humanness – that is, of the irrational – than the current hierarchy provides.
The rational has a lauded history, but it’s position as above other modes developed over time. We can observe the rational in both ancient Greece and Rome. Aristotle explored the potential for balance between the sacred, the public, and the private. In this early example the rational – in the form of ‘the public’ – is balanced by other factors. Cicero argued that the Romans were the most religious of all peoples, but he was careful to distinguish the practice of religio from superstitio, which is indicative of his pragmatism and implies that a rational approach was beyond religio. In a similar fashion, Seneca drew a distinction between the practices which honoured the gods from those which did not. Much later, the Enlightenment offered a renewed criticism of superstition (formally superstitio) and here we witness the emergence of modern rationalism at the top of the heap among frames of thought in a Western context.
The Romantics rejected the claims of the Enlightenment and we should too – though the form of the rejection needs to be refined. A wholesale abandonment of the rational is neither useful or feasible – it’s an elegant tool that underpins critical discourse. I’m currently using the premises of the rational to advocate for a particular position, so you can assume I’m a fan-woman on some level ;)
Nevertheless, the Romantics are early guides to rethinking the hierarchy of thought-frames. The appeal to the sublime, the claim for the validity of intense feeling, and the importance of the imagination eke out a space for the irrational (that which is experienced but cannot be easily represented by language). There’s cause for a wry smile at this point since it is the imaginative mode that enables rationalists to claim a place above all others. Such a hierarchy is the dream of rational thinkers who imagine that theirs’ is the ‘most reasonable’ way, even when such a belief is a clear result of a feeling. Sensory understanding is our foremost level of experience; it is our first vehicle for forming a frame of understanding. In terms of what we experience, sensation and feeling are the foundations that underpin all frames of thought. There is hope in this: we possess the ability to prioritise the terms by which we frame our perceptions. The rational is one tool among many we can select as part of that frame.
A passing acquaintance beyond our natal culture either in the contemporary or through the study of philosophy, history, literature et al, reveals the inherent difficulty of maintaining the rational on a pedestal beyond other ways. When Cicero acknowledged the pragmatic role that religio could play in a political arena, he offered a rational insight into a world that may have stood largely beyond his comprehension. It is easy to see this in everyday life even today. The rational atheist finds it challenging to see the value in beliefs that stretch beyond the literal. The spiritualist argues on behalf of the mysteries that may lie beyond the everyday. The faithful pursue transcendence predicated on a knowing based on unknowing. Cicero is a pragmatic, rational philosopher. His dismissal of some practices as mere superstitio may be a reflection of his character and inclination. Seneca, offers a similar position to Cicero, weighing acts in terms of their honour to the gods or otherwise. Both writers offer a rational window onto sacred mysteries.
What we lack from ancient Rome is a counter-narrative. If, as Cicero proposes, the Romans are the most religious of all peoples there is likely a reasonable percentage of Romans who would have argued against Cicero’s position on which acts constituted religio and which superstitio. Similar detailed dialogues abound today: Where is the line between church and state? Where should it ought to be? Is there a line between church and state? Everyone has a different perspective. But we are limited when it comes to Rome because Cicero survives with a lauded reputation and in great volume and his respected objectors do not.
That the academy values the rational over others is clear from its evidence-based approach to research. Critical thinking is a honed training in the rational. The peer-view system for publications is a test of the rational. Papers that do not meet the standard are rejected. This is the character of the academy and any would-be entrant is obliged to adhere to the set standard. The rational, in this sense, defines the academy. There are certain consequences, however, if the subject under consideration in an academic paper touches on knowledge and practice beyond the rational. And here the academy finds itself in a bind. So strong is the claim of the rational that to claim value in the imaginative and the feeling is to immediately position yourself outside the academy. The way to exculpate yourself is to adopt a highly rigorous rational line that wallpapers over those things which might be deemed the irrational. Like a miasma, the irrational must be surrounded by a flawless rational argument in order to ensure the academic is not tainted by its pollution. The final paper explores the irrational in a similar fashion to a redacted document which tantalises you with potential secrets but offers only black rectangles of nothing.
How can we explore the imaginative or the feeling using the rational? The simplest answer is that we can’t. No discussion of practice, belief, the imaginative or the feeling through the rational gets us any closer to these drastically distinct and separate frames. The rational approach touches the edges of these other frames but engagement with them often takes the form of rejection. So all goddesses become fertility goddesses because no one bothers to ascribe a female any role beyond biological functionalism. All practices are merely political because to offer a spiritual or feeling interpretation is to out yourself as an impressionist who ought to feel a sense of imposter syndrome. In most cases a priesthood is a career stepping-stone not a vocation. For those priesthoods which require some bodily and personal sacrifice, a convenient narrative of exclusion from mainstream culture can be applied (it’s a foreign cult or there’s no possible political gain here … maybe some symbolic prestige?). Forget the ongoing and onerous duties attached to each priesthood that suggest a meaning beyond the rational – the academy does not have the frame to understand them.
To argue on behalf of the irrational is not just an act that locates you at the fringe of the academy. Even further, it places you at the margins of the patriarchy.
Plato’s hysteria; Soranus’ further exploration of the wandering womb; medieval witchcraft, modern astrology; each lies in the category of ‘woman’. The womb is literally in the female body, an inverted vessel (upended even further by wandering displacement). The hysterical woman gains a companion in the trope of the unmarried crone who lives at the geographic margins until such a time comes that she must be scapegoated to expiate fear. A third sister joins them in the form of the popularly depicted gypsy woman whose third eye gaze is simultaneously desired and mistrusted.
Despite the rational frame of the academy, its irrational heart is revealed structurally through the exclusion and active discouragement of woman seeking entrance to the ivory tower. A system that lauds its rational credentials operates on fear. The cultural correlation between ‘man as rational’ and ‘woman as irrational’ is so deeply felt that the modern university swoons over ancient rational thinkers like Cicero, but writers of fiction, such as Apuleius, are considered niche and only of passing interest to ‘the serious scholar’. So ingrained is the category of woman with the irrational (the feeling and the imaginative) that the moment in my limited academic career that still makes me most livid was when I was encouraged to explore the friendships and conversations between ancient women. As a feminist and an ancient historian, I would do this in an instant if there was, first of all, the extant evidence to make such a study possible within a rational frame (but there isn’t); and second of all, if writing such a paper based on speculation in lieu of evidence, did not immediately frame my work as unintellectual, unscholarly, and exactly what is expected of my mind as it is encased in my seductively lady-like flesh-prison. I’m more than willing to take a stab at a historical novel, but I wouldn’t shop it around on the conference scene or to the journals that act as the gatekeepers of all that is rational (and thus good). What’s more telling is that this advice was offered by the stereotypical voice of the academy: grey-haired and gendered man. I can guarantee you it’s not the advice I’d have been offered if I were a young man daring to become a great thinker in the grand tradition of the Classics.
Rethinking the balance between frames of thought is essential if we want to progress. We already know that people are rarely rational. Try as we might to practice rational thinking – it is learned and, therefore, it is only one path for understanding ourselves in the present and for appreciating the depth of our past. Perhaps the academy cannot bear such a shift because it is so historically committed to the rational. Nonetheless, the gap needs to be recognised. The study of the ancient world solely through a rational frame is a limited vista. A willingness to embrace the irrational and to recognise it in the context of the structure of the academy is a first step to a richer understanding.
