Are You Disciplined?
by Andi O’Conor
DISCIPLINED MINDS is a radical, disturbing, and provocative
look at professional life. It offers a profound analysis of
the personal struggles for identity and meaning in the lives
of today’s 21 million professionals. The book will shake up
readers, particularly faculty members, graduate students,
and others who participate in academic life. This book represents
critical theory in the best sense of the tradition: it is
a well-written, compelling description of how graduate school,
as well as professional training and practice, help reproduce
social, political, and economic stratification. Luckily, this
book also offers disheartened graduate students, soul-weary
professors, and frustrated professionals a better understanding
of the structural conditions that constrain their professional
work, and ways to combat the conformity that is endemic to
academic life.
Schmidt begins by discussing what he calls “widespread career
burnout” among professionals, the chronic “workaholism,” fatigue,
isolation and depression common among many professionals today.
“Professionals,” he writes, “are not happy campers.” Ironically,
such depression is most likely to hit the most devoted professionals–those
who have been the most deeply involved with their work. “You
can’t burn out if you’ve never been on fire” (pp. 1-2). The
hidden root of this burnout and depression, Schmidt contends,
is the professional’s lack of political control over his or
her creative work.
In addition, the dissonance between the early goals of many
professionals (e.g., to make a difference, to pursue a social
vision, to better oneself and society) and the relative powerlessness
of professional practice creates disillusionment. According
to Schmidt, graduate and professional schools are intellectual
“boot camps” that systematically grind down students’ spirit
and ultimately produce obedient, rather than independent thinkers.
One intriguing aspect of this book is Schmidt’s definition
of the commonly used but rarely defined word, “professional.”
He cautions against confusing the term with “white collar
worker,” and claims that most white collar workers today are
non-professionals. He categorizes lawyers, teachers, counselors,
nurses, doctors, engineers, scientists, professors, actors,
and executives as professionals. He excludes from his definition
of professionals those who hire and fire professionals (e.g.,
upper level-executives) as well as para-professionals such
as clerical workers, paralegals and teachers’ aides.
Schmidt challenges the popular belief that professionals
are independent practitioners, such as self-employed doctors
or lawyers. He writes that the overwhelming majority of professionals
(i.e., 8 out of 9) are salaried employees rather than independent
practitioners. Thus, when writing about professionals, he
has salaried employees in mind. Schmidt also critiques the
widespread belief that today’s professionals embody neutrality.
Schmidt also examines popular misconceptions about professional
work. In the section, “Assignable Curiosity,” he demonstrates
that professionals–university professors in particular–have
much less control over their own research than is generally
thought. He describes how the needs of major corporations
and government agencies drive university research. In particular,
he discusses the profound influence of government grants in
determining what researchers choose to study. Another popular
and powerful notion that Schmidt refutes is the belief that
more highly educated people tend to be more creative, independent,
and liberal.
Graduate School: Cult Indoctrination
One of the most compelling and provocative discussions in
the book is the author’s examination of the experience of
graduate school. In this examination, Schmidt draws parallels
between graduate school programs and cult indoctrination.
Elaborating the thesis that professional schools serve more
to indoctrinate than to teach technical skills, Schmidt details
how graduate students are subjected to crushing reading loads,
mindless grunt work in labs, and mind-numbing tasks of memorization.
Drawing on data from his interviews with graduate students,
Schmidt identifies themes common to both the cult and the
graduate school experience: Schmidt does point out that professional
training is not always like cult indoctrination. For example,
he describes his own graduate experience as a “great and rewarding
time” (p. 219). While acknowledging the positive features
of his graduate study, Schmidt notes that many other students
in his program “emerged looking and acting like broken versions
of their former selves” (p. 219).
The final chapter, “Now or Never,” outlines how professionals
in all fields can maintain a sense of integrity and purpose
within the mainstream workplace. As Schmidt points out, making
a difference and working for social change do not require
one to be employed by a non-profit, reform-oriented organization.
What they do require, however, is that one take a stance as
a “radical professional ” (p.265). Such a professional continually
critiques the social role of the institution and system for
which he or she works. In addition, radical professionals
understand and question their place as workers within a conservative
system, and they refuse to buy into the mystique of the independent,
self-directed professional.
Ultimately, the book succeeds in laying out a strong case
for the radicalization of professionals. Whereas most critical
studies of education focus on social reproduction in elementary
and secondary schools, Schmidt’s analysis examines how these
mechanisms play out in graduate education and induction into
the professional career. However, as with many analyses based
on social reproduction theories, Schmidt’s examination tends
to over-generalize. He does include some examples of student
experiences from other fields, but by basing his observations
largely on just one field (i.e., his own field of physics),
he seems to imply that all graduate education is equally conservative,
demanding of personal compromise, and inhospitable to a diversity
of views.
The book would also benefit from the inclusion of other voices.
I wanted to hear from graduate students in disciplines other
than physics, and I was looking for narratives about resistance.
In particular, I wanted to hear stories from students who
had resisted the system completely and chosen different paths
altogether.
These are minor points, however, compared to the central
weakness of the book, namely Schmidt’s failure to address
questions of methodology. Although he uses powerful examples
presumably collected from interviews with students, Schmidt
never explains how he went about collecting this information.
Despite the fact that the book was intended for a mainstream
audience, the author still should have provided some discussion
of the theoretical framework guiding his work and the methods
used to accomplish it.
Another problem is Schmidt’s inattention to the actual experiences
of practicing professionals–both those who conform and those
who resist. While providing examples of how students resist
conformity in graduate school, he seems to ignore examples
of how currently employed professionals offer resistance.
This important oversight leaves the reader with the impression
that all professionals are hapless cogs in the machinery of
social reproduction.
Despite some significant weaknesses, Disciplined Minds
still offers a powerful analysis of the impact of professional
work on our minds and hearts. Moreover, Schmidt offers concrete
suggestions helpful to fellow travelers who feel trapped by
“the system.” These suggestions enable us to reaffirm
and act upon the original commitment we made to use our life’s
work to promote social good.
