Ivory Tower Syndrome

Let me start by saying that this article left me completely ‘mystified’! I just could not read past the language. I like interesting and unusual words but just in the first five pages I read there were several that I have never come across (and that is without counting the Latin ‘inter alia’ – p. 375 – or French ‘reculer pour mieux sauter’ – p. 377 !). What on earth are ‘terminological obfuscations’ (p377) or an ‘ineluctable problem’ (p. 380)? Of course, I am a non-native speaker of English but I have lived in this country for over 20 years, managed to complete an undergraduate course and am currently studying at Masters level. So I don’t think education is the problem. Who is Roberts writing for? As he is talking about educators and teachers being involved in the evaluative process (377/378) it seems to me that he must consider them to form at least part of his ‘audience’. His writing style, however, is highly academic (or is it just the language of someone who has spent too much time in education for the privileged?) and surely I am not the only one to find him difficult to understand?! Even more frustrating than Roberts’ choice of words are some of the sentences he comes out with. Here’s an example:

The model assumes (and since we are talking here about an ideal, we will for the moment take for granted the complete scrupulousness and dedication of all involved at all stages between conception and adoption) that the evaluation process begins not even as late as the moment at which the materials designer types the first plan, but within a short time of the conception of the first germ of an idea for a set of materials for a certain target population of learners, in just the same way as the first flush of elation following an idea for an article, for instance, is soon tempered by doubt and self-questioning. (Roberts, 1996: 377)

I am convinced that I would face criticism, if I came to my tutors with an essay draft that included anything like this. Is Roberts because he is a published author of authority in his field beyond that kind of criticism?

Maybe I am being a bit unfair to question the value of Roberts’ article purely because of his writing style or maybe things have changed since its publication anyway. However, the reason I have chosen to write a post about this article on my blog is that it exemplifies an issue I have with academia in general. In our seminars we are talking about how not only experts’ but teachers’ voices need to be/are starting to be heard more and how teachers should have/are starting to have an impact on educational policy making. If articles like the one by Roberts, however, are still considered to be quintessential reading, then I fear the wisdom of experts is likely to stay in expert circles as his writing style is, in my opinion, pretty incomprehensible to people of average higher education (if such a thing exists?). If experts and practitioners want to share their knowledge and work together in order to improve education, then we need to communicate in a language that we all understand so that communication is not hindered by time-consuming decoding, interpreting by third parties and possibly even second-guessing and so that the meaning of what we say is accessible to as large a number of participants as possible.

Roberts, J T (1996), ‘Demystifying Materials Evaluation’, System 24. No. 3. pp 375-389