There is not a greater virtue, nor a worse liability, among young scholars at the modern university than insubordination. By "insubordination," I don't mean a reckless disregard for rules and legitimate demands. A student who doesn't turn in his paper on The Canterbury Tales and raises the banner of insubordination is serving a different connotation. The virtuous insubordinate practices what Webster's says it is: "not submitting to authority; disobedient." That is, a disobedience to the customs of authority – a flagrant display of the student's knowledge and precocious ability.
Insubordination is the child of precociousness, although a separate trait. One can be precocious without ever acting outside of the boundaries schools establish for him. The insubordinate is the precocious mind who wants to use his early-developing talents without waiting until he passes the arbitrary mark, in some cases as simple as having a certain accepted degree. In most cases, though, age is the contributing factor. My case is of the most frequent sort, though highly unique.
I am a proud insubordinate at my university – though most people know me as a calm, mature student with a serious, reserved nature. But not the faculty. Even my trusted advisor introduces me as a "precocious brat."
Some of the faculty at my university just might call me some of the juiciest expletives in the world, or they might complain about me to each other. Some respect me, but of a few I am not sure – I imagine someone here hates me (though perhaps I'm just being a self-important insubordinate young man). My outspoken refusal to "act my age" and listen to the supposed wisdom that emanates from the high-polished, MLA-approved corridors of the department has landed me into all sorts of scrapes. I will not be so silly as to fill this space with my complaints, because I do not find them significant and I doubt that they are particularly unique, if the case of Aline Baehler at Vanderbilt is any measure. Dr. Baehler had the misfortune of not getting the chairman of the French department to vote for her hiring. Thus, nearly anything she did at Vanderbilt was thought of as being insubordination.
Of course, Dr. Baehler is an assistant professor. I am a student.
Ideally, precociousness should be accepted without a fight – but few others seem to want that. So, insubordination is the only remedy for the dynamic mind to thrive without accepting the hindrances of the academy. I behave as I do not to make the faculty crazy, or to rack up a number of accomplishments so as to impress the world, but because I have to act according to what is right for me. My mind is in constant motion, and I have to tend to it. I must think, I must write, and I must share my thinking and writing with others. If this means expressing a deeper thought than the professor, or publishing in a refereed journal as an undergraduate, so be it. Because few have done so among the faculty at my college, does not mean I cannot do it.
My accomplishments seem to irk some of the faculty here more than my behavior in class or at functions. Am I to stop because I have edited scholarly papers as a student when someone older than I has never been invited to speak at the Midwest MLA in his life? Am I not to be a creative writer and a critical analyst, because no one else has tried to work in both fields at once? The answer to these questions in a resounding "no." I do not think that I know how to do everything – I am quick to credit my instructors who teach me something new. The conflict arises when someone cannot stand seeing a younger person doing something she can't do. That envy is understandable, but its absence would mean that there would be no insubordination and resentment in the academy – only learning and acceptance of difference.
Insubordination has not always been a conscious goal of mine. Often, I simply ask a question that no one else my age has asked. Then, I'm "insubordinate" when actually I'm in earnest. More frequently than not, what others call insubordination merely amounts to the persistence of a more ambitious person.
Insubordination then is a great virtue in today's academic climate. It is nothing less than the practice advocated by Thomas Jefferson in a letter to John Adams when he asserted that a "natural aristocracy" based on intellect is preferred for governing America's institutions than an aristocracy based on ancestry or wealth. The university would do well to engage Jefferson as well as dryly consider him, as his concept would make for better stewardship of humanity's ideas than the current ways in academia. This is not to oppose the traditional tenure system, which does not pertain to intellectual rank.
So, if an assistant professor or a junior is more ambitious than the department chairman, what of it? The insubordinate is only trying to live up to her own ideal of self, and not trying to implicitly insult the elder professors. To the contrary, the young upstart would not try so hard to play a role in humanity's long debate if she didn't want to improve the college. I know that I publish, write, and strive in order to help my college become a better place for discussion. I want everyone to learn something before I leave – preferably how to deal with a precocious brat.
Until then, let me be insubordinate. Let me follow the advice of Giles Hoggett in Anthony Trollope's The Last Chronicle of Barset: "It's dogged as does it." I can't stop, because I'm in the middle of teaching myself.
August 11, 2000
Michael R. Allen is editor of www.Spintechmag.com.
