Copyright©1998
The Hanover Review, Inc.

Editorial: The Fishtank, Destroyed

The Deconstruction of Duke English
by Steven Menashi
In 1984, Duke University embarked on an ambitious plan to transform its English Department from “a sleepy backwater that had nothing distinctive about it” into the intellectual powerhouse that would achieve world-class status. Aided by a $200 million university endowment campaign, Stanley Fish proceeded to recruit literary criticism’s biggest stars and stars-to-be. The Duke English Department bounded up the National Research Council rankings, from 27th in the nation to fifth. Last May, however, and external review committee found Duke's once-proud English Department in shambles.

Social Text: Fish's Other Flop
by Christopher Pearson and Benjamin Wallace-Wells
In 1996, Physicist Alan Sokal submitted a fake article to the poststructuralist journal SocialText. After Social Text published the article, Sokal exposed his hoax, setting off a wave of publicity and controversy over post-structuralism. How could a journal with any merit, observers wondered, have published an article of such blatant nonsense laced with big words unless all of its articles were the same gibberish?

Also in this issue:
Podhoretz's Literary Kiss-and-Tell by Jeffrey Hart
Rum, Women, and Song by Benjamin Oren
Love! Valour! Compassion! by Catherine Muscat
Lookin' for Love...All the Wrong Places by Bradford Stanley
The Pathos, The Agons, The Fastbreak by Christian Hummel