Human Ecology BEYOND DISCIPLINE
Human Ecology DARE TO BE A DISCIPLINE
By Bill Carpenter
By Maxwell G. Coolidge ’05
textbook, Human Ecology, and impart it to our stun the fall of 1972 COA convened as an academic institution with thirty-two students; every issue dents in an orderly way. involved in running a college was on the table, right But I see the faculty as having quite the opposite down to whether we would turn the clocks back mission: never to let human ecology freeze into a to standard time. I think of those first years as the discipline to be known and transmitted by profesBig Bang of human ecology; we were willing to sional human ecologists to passive students. If question all that came before in education, level it anything, the faculty must use all our knowledge of to the ground if necessary and build it over. human ecology to keep it unknown, so that each fall it is as new to us as when we first encountered it. With a visionary challenge, the trustees had taken a brand-new concept—human ecology—and asked Human ecology is not a subject matter. It is a way us to breathe life into it and make it work as a colof apprehending the world through the relations of lege education. They knew and we knew that it things in their ceaseless interaction and change. As wouldn’t be just another academic discipline, but students, if you assume the faculty already knows a complete transvaluation of how we learn. Of the and all you have to do is take notes, if you assume uncountable gifts the trustees have the administration already knows and all you have to do is follow the bestowed on us, the greatest has rules, you will be missing the point been those two words, human and “Human ecology is not a of human ecology, which is your ecology, the zygote of the organism subject matter. It is a way own creative involvement in the that has come to be COA. of apprehending the destiny of your personal education The first handful of faculty spent world through the and of the institution as a whole. a summer thinking and talking and It takes courage for the faculty made a definition, “humans and relations of things in their relation to the environment,” to give up the comfort of mastery their ceaseless interacwhich has kept its focus not on the and see our subjects as unknowns tion and change.” again; and courage for students to things of this world but on the ~ Bill Carpenter give up being disciples and conseparate relationships that hold sumers. In the eyes of human ecolthem together. But a definition is only the skin of ogy, students and faculty are joint an idea, not the heart. It was not till the students partners in this limitless investigation. Faculty came that we truly began this great evolutionary should take on the best qualities of the students— experiment in modifying liberal education to serve a their radicalism and eager openness, and students new millennium. The liberal arts had been formed in should assume the best of the faculty, our wise the Middle Ages to respond to a world that was fixed articulateness and self-confidence, right or wrong. in place while the sun revolved around it. Human In this way we can join against one-way authoritariecology would teach an open, unconstrained, crean learning and keep the Big Bang going in its creative response to a post-Darwinian world that will ative intensity and freedom. never stop changing. You can’t freeze and define What keeps human ecology from being just human ecology; but its mercurial indefinability is the another academic discipline is the deeply personal ideal instrument for understanding and responding encounter each of us has with it, student or teacher. to the world we’re in. And the highest expressions of this encounter are the superhuman achievements of the senior projects, The first students have long since gone forth to because all-out creativity is the only response to the creative life voyages in service to both humans and unanswerable questions that will be asked of you, the environment, while the faculty is still here trying and that you will continue to answer all your lives. to figure out what human ecology is, a task we’ve been chipping at for one score and fifteen years. By now you would think we could take that hairy, anarExcerpted from Carpenter’s speech at COA’s thirtychic tarball we call human ecology, wrap it up in a fifth convocation, September 5, 2007.
studying different phenomena. I recall history faculty spent most of my time at COA in human studies member Todd Little-Siebold’s annoyance at the popclasses but the arts and design curriculum was ularity of Jared Diamond’s book, Guns, Germs, and where I learned the value of discipline. Steel, which sought to explain the Spanish conquest Discipline is a word that has taken on a negative connotation these days. In the world of child rearing of the Americas in terms of material and biological (which I am in the thick of) it has been conflated advantage. A biologist who writes a history book may with the word punishment. In academia it has have a popular following, but his cross-disciplinary become something in need of transcendence. We move cheapens the work of historians who trade in strive to be multi-disciplinary, inter-disciplinary, the in-depth study of specific people and events. trans-, post-, cross-, etc. The result unfortunately is Likewise, any student trying to draw conclusions that many of us forget to be disciplinary in the first about social sciences from something they studied in place. botany class was sure to evoke the ire of my wise Discipline was the last thing I expected to find in (and disciplined) classmate Yaniv Brandvain ’04. my art and music classes. Art and music in my mind If human ecology is to develop as a discipline, we were where people went to “express must guard it against being broadened out of existence by being themselves” and “find their inner “Human ecology is also defined as the study of humans and voice.” in danger of being so their environments. Students who enter Ernie narrowly defined that the Rather than becoming a new and McMullen’s painting classes or John prime activities of the important field of inquiry, human Cooper’s music tutorials with this human ecologist become ecology might merely become just attitude quickly discover otherwise. another interdisciplinary “study” There is no room for fudging in preaching environmenlike the “gender studies” or “ethnic their classes; you paint; you practice. talism and the superioristudies” programs elsewhere. These Cooper and McMullen are not midty of human ecology.” are not fields of inquiry, but rather wives assisting at the birth of your curricula that draw from a number creativity; they are disciplinarians ~ Max Coolidge ’05 of different disciplines and lead the and masters of their fields who student to pre-determined (politically biased) know the difference between beauty and bullshit. conclusions. They expect students to be just as committed to Human ecology is also in danger of being so narmastery as they are. Many teachers, from the elementary to the college rowly defined that the prime activities of the human level, have given up on the idea of discipline. ecologist become preaching environmentalism and Education in this country has shifted from an intellecthe superiority of human ecology. The college has tual model, with a focus on the acquisition and masgotten a lot of good press for its commitments to tery of skills and knowledge, to a psychotherapeutic environmental concerns but it would be a shame if model where feelings, opinions and self-esteem are the college’s educational mission took a back seat to what count. Teachers no longer teach but rather help its non-intellectual pursuits such as signing the Earth students make discoveries and voice opinions. Charter or becoming carbon neutral. Teachers are no longer regarded as masters and stuBoth of these extremes are anti-intellectual pitdents no longer regarded as disciples; in fact the falls. Students, commit your attention to studying the whole notion that the older generation has somefields that interest you the most. The disciplines you thing of value to impart has fallen out of fashion. master, and more importantly the discipline you develop, will last you a lifetime. Discipline involves developing effective, regular study and work habits; it also involves staying within disciplinary bounds. Human knowledge is divided Maxwell Coolidge ’05 and his wife Jennifer (Wahlquist) ’03 live in Orland, Maine. Coolidge into disciplines because it is vast and there are speis a candidate for the Maine State Legislature. cific tools and methods that can be best used for
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