The jury is still out in the great contest for the most discredited academic organization in America. The contenders are many. The competition is fierce. Almost every discipline in the humanities and social sciences has fielded an impressive team. Anyone who has attended an annual meeting of the College Art Association knows how adept many academic art historians have become at substituting hermetic sermons about race, class, gender, and other items on the agenda of cultural politics for any concern with the substance of art. The American Historical Association has done yeoman’s work as well, often transforming the study of history into an ideological battleground. Ditto professional organizations for anthropology and sociology. And of course “Women’s Studies” and kindred pseudo-disciplines have been producing stunning performers for decades now.

No one questions the obvious commitment to grievance-mongering and obfuscatio ...

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