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The Aims, Methods, and Materials of Research in the Modern Languages and Literatures

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

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Extract

Any Formulation of aims and methods currently adopted in the fields of modern language scholarship in America must of necessity appear too limited to do justice to the ideals of a learned profession and too rigid to reflect the convictions and interests of its individual members. If, nevertheless, such a statement is offered on the following pages, it is motivated by the desire to survey the assets and liabilities of humanistic studies at a time when the very foundations of these studies have been subject to criticism. The philological profession can point to a greater age and to longer traditions than many another specialized occupation. Although some of its pursuits are now considered antiquated or esoteric, its survival through many transformations testifies to the fact that it serves a basic human need.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 67 , Issue 6 , October 1952 , pp. 3 - 37
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1952

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Footnotes

*

This report was formulated by the MLA Committee on Research Activities upon request of the Executive Council (PMLA, June 1948, p. 762). It represents the work (and the not always unanimous opinions) of a group of scholars who were able to meet but seldom during the several years of its preparation; the four main sections in their next to final form were written by Professors Albert H. Marckwardt, Lawton P. G. Peckham, René Wellek, and James Thorpe respectively. Professor Helmut Rehder served as general editor, and the final version was slightly revised while prepared for printing by the Editor of PMLA. The report is not in any sense an official document. It was composed in the hope of clarifying objectives and stimulating fruitful discussions. Interested readers may wish to compare the statement of “The Aims of Literary Study” published in the 1938 Supplement to PMLA (un, 1367-71).—Ed.