Cultural Studies Review

volume 19 number 2 September 2013

http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/index.php/csrj/index
pp. 30713
! K.K. Ruthven 2013

ISSN 1837-8692

book review

Forgetting Richard Hoggart



K.K. RUTHVEN
"#$%&'($)* +, -.&/-$.&


Nichael Bailey, Ben Claike anu }ohn K. Walton
!"#$%&'("#)"* ,)-.(%# /0**(%'1 2 3$#(*0*4 05 /06$
Wiley-Blackwell, Chichestei, West Sussex, 0K anu Naluen, NA, 2u12
ISBN 97814uS19494S
RRP A0$44.9S
Why shoulu people woiking in twenty-fiist centuiy cultuial stuuies feel obligeu to
unueistanu Richaiu Boggait. Piincipally, I suppose, because he institutionaliseu the
umbiella teim they still opeiate unuei when, as a newly appointeu piofessoi of
English liteiatuie, he peisuaueu the 0niveisity of Biimingham to establish in 1964
the veiy fiist Centie foi Contempoiaiy Cultuial Stuuies (CCCS), with himself as
uiiectoi. 0niveisal giatituue foi that initiative, howevei, is moueiateu by misgivings
about what he peisonally contiibuteu to the institutional space he'u cieateu, in
which othei scholais began uoing veiy uiffeient kinus of inteiuisciplinaiy woik
fiom his own. It's commonly acknowleugeu that cultuial stuuies as now piactiseu
uiun't gain momentum until that miuule-class }amaican intellectual he'u appointeu
in 1966 as his ueputy, Stuait Ball, became uiiectoi of the CCCS thiee yeais latei, anu

VOLUME19 NUMBER2 SEP2013 308
stiengtheneu its alliance with New Left politics by incoipoiating Althusseiian
iueology anu uiamscian hegemony into its analytical lexicon.
The complexity of what goes on globally nowauays unuei the bannei of cultuial
stuuies makes it impossible to specify a common oiigin foi that loose feueiation of
vaiyingly commensuiate piactices which constitute this evei-expanuing anu anti-
uisciplinaiy uiscipline. That shoulun't woiiy anybouy peisuaueu by stiuctuialism's
synchionic ciitique of the uiachionic cult of oiigins. Pyiamius of knowleuge uon't
iest on founuations, }ean Piaget aigueu, but aie insteau suspenueu fiom theii
apexes, wheie cutting-euge ieseaicheis specify the piecuisois who legitimate theii
activities.
1
If you'ie woiking on the 708"'0" 299$4 phenomenon, foi instance, you
may think it plausible to acknowleuge Boggait's contiibution to youi intellectual
genealogy. But youi elective lineage will be uiffeient if you'ie investigating
computei waigames, anu uiffeient again if youi ieseaich focuses on mosh-pit
etiquette. This will be woith iemembeiing when the fiftieth anniveisaiy of the CCCS
comes up in 2u14 anu the centenaiy of Boggait's biith in 2u18.
The best-selling book that was to make Boggait chaiiwoithy in Biimingham
was publisheu when I was an unueigiauuate stuuying English language anu
liteiatuie at the 0niveisity of Nanchestei: :.$ !&$& 05 ;)'$%(-41 2&6$-'& 05 <0%=)"*>
?@(&& ;)5$A 8)'. B6$-)(@ ,$5$%$"-$ '0 3C9@)-(')0"& ("# D"'$%'()"E$"'&.
2
I was
enthialleu by its autobiogiaphically viviu evocations of a labouiing-class way of life
not unlike the one I was cuiiently extiicating myself fiom. Thanks to suppoit fiom
his local euucation authoiity, Boggait hau become a scholaiship boy long befoie
Winston Chuichill's most iauical ministei, R.A. Butlei, peisuaueu a Conseivative
goveinment to pass that 1944 Euucation Act which enableu thousanus of labouiing-
class chiluien like me to become scholaiship boys (even if they weie giils) anu to
attenu giammai schools fiee of chaige pioviueu they cleaieu a huiule calleu the
Eleven-Plus examination. Life was easiei foi us than it hau been foi Boggait because
we weie beneficiaiies of the welfaie state establisheu by the 194S Laboui
goveinment.
The only pait of :.$ !&$& 05 ;)'$%(-4 that puzzleu me was its subsequently
famous pages entitleu 'Scholaiship Boy'. (2S8-49) Lougeu in a chaptei on 'the
upiooteu anu the anxious', they iepiesenteu me anu my kinu as an emotionally
uamageu uemogiaphic toin 'between two woilus, the woilus of school anu home'.

K.K. RuthvenForgetting Richard Hoggart 309
(242) None of the aspiiing meiitociats I mingleu with exhibiteu symptoms of that
uisability. The piincipal pioblem faceu at that time by labouiing-class chiluien with
upwaiuly mobile ambitions was not the society they'u come out of but the one they
weie moving into, which was likely to consiuei them 'scum' because that's what W.
Someiset Naugham hau calleu the 'white-collai pioletaiiat' uepicteu in Kingsley
Amis's moie-will-mean-woise novel, ;C-=4 F)E (19S4), who hau 'go|nej to the
univeisities . on a uoveinment giant' not 'to acquiie cultuie but to get a job'.
S

Convinceu in those pie-Beatles uays that I'u neeu to get out to get on, I saiu gooubye
to all that as soon as possible by becoming an assistant lectuiei in New Zealanu.
Boggait, meanwhile, stayeu in Englanu to continue enlightening the euucationally
unueipiivilegeu both uiiectly as a teachei anu wiitei anu inuiiectly thiough his
contiibutions to quangos like the Pilkington Committee on Bioaucasting. Feeling
upiooteu anu anxious uiun't pievent that haiu-woiking scholaiship boy in Leeus
fiom becoming a univeisity piofessoi in Biimingham, an assistant uiiectoi-geneial
of 0NESC0 in Paiis, anu the waiuen of uolusmiths College in the 0niveisity of
Lonuon.
:.$ !&$& 05 ;)'$%(-4 fiames the politics of cultuie much moie peisonally than
those othei founuational texts of Biitish cultuial stuuies, Raymonu Williams's
?C@'C%$ ("# B0-)$'4 GHIJKGLMJ (19S8) anu :.$ ;0"* ,$N0@C')0" (1961), anu E.P.
Thompson's :.$ O(=)"* 05 '.$ D"*@)&. <0%=)"* ?@(&& (196S). Boggait's nostalgia-
fuelleu fascination with the pie-wai labouiing-class noith-of-Englanu cultuie he'u
giown up in contiasteu shaiply with his antipathy to subsequent uevelopments
theie. As a uemobbeu aitilleiy officei employeu in the 0niveisity of Bull's
extiamuial piogiam he coulun't unueistanu why young people tiappeu in postwai
austeiities anu yeaining foi something moie exciting than theii paients' notion of a
nice night out might enjoy the countei-cultuial expeiience of sitting in neon-lit milk-
bais listening to juke-box iecoiuings of Bill Baley anu Bis Comets iocking aiounu
the clock. The intensity of Boggait's little-Englanuei contempt foi the
Ameiicanisation of Biitish youth cultuie was ieminiscent of waitime animosity
towaius those 'ovei-paiu' anu 'ovei-sexeu' Ameiican tioops with seuuctively
Bollywoou accents, whose fiateinisation with English women while 'ovei heie' in
the iun-up to B-Bay was memoiialiseu in thousanus of piegnancies.

VOLUME19 NUMBER2 SEP2013 310
Boggait's juugemental iemaiks on juke-box boys ieveal not only how ill-
equippeu he was at this stage to analyse uispassionately cultuial uevelopments he
uisappioveu of but also the hazaius of basing value juugments on liveu expeiience.
Wholly uepenuable when analysing the insiuious ubiquity of Biitish class-
uistinctions, Boggait's peisonal expeiience was an inauequate guiue thiough the
cultuial upheavals of the 196us. Accultuiateu in a language whose masculine
pionoun eiaseu femaleness by putatively incluuing it, he was unpiepaieu foi the
feminist ievelation that genuei is a ciucial ueteiminant in the piouuction,
ciiculation anu consumption of cultuial phenomena. Nothing in his foimative yeais
piompteu him to notice that theie ain't no black in the 0nion }ack. Anu the only
ouuity in his heteionoimative behavioui has been his lifelong fascination with the
poetiy of W.B. Auuen, which in 19S1 became the subject of his fiist book anu in
2uuS supplieu the title of what he feaieu woulu be his last.
4
Two equally
unanticipateu uevelopments ievealeu the limitations of his piint-centieu notion of
cultuie. 0ne was the tuin to continental anu especially Fiench ciitical theoiy, which
maiginaliseu his own giounuing of cultuial ciitique in the close ieauing of liteiaiy
texts, a methou he'u leaineu fiom Q.B. Leavis's P)-')0" ("# '.$ ,$(#)"* 3C9@)- (19S2)
anu hei husbanu F.R. Leavis's Q$8 R$(%)"*& )" D"*@)&. 30$'%4 (19S2) anu
,$N(@C(')0" (19S6). The othei uevelopment was the publication in 1962 of Naishall
NcLuhan's :.$ SC'$"9$%* S(@(T4, which pieuicteu the uemise of 'typogiaphic man'
in a then emeigent anu now global electionic age. Its multimeuia foims have cieateu
moie uigent agenuas foi cultuial analysts than Boggait's gianu plan foi giving
labouiing-class people what he consiueieu to be theii biithiight: namely, the
oppoitunity to eniich theii lives by ieauing liteiaiy classics, which allegeuly
waiehouse what Natthew Ainolu calleu 'the best that is known anu thought in the
woilu'.
S
That expeiience, Boggait believeu, woulu give eveiybouy the necessaiy
touchstones foi assessing populai cultuie.
By the time Biimingham establisheu its CCCS I'u been teaching canonical
English liteiatuie in New Zealanu since 1961. Bookeu on liteiaiy stuuies in geneial,
anu in those uays on Anglo-Ameiican moueinist poetiy in paiticulai, I'u no uesiie to
paiticipate in what I took to be the complementaiy anu ievolutionaiy enteipiise of
examining populai cultuie as iigoiously as elite cultuie. Peisuauing otheis to take it
seiiously enough to become involveu in it, howevei, wasn't easy. Wags who knew

K.K. RuthvenForgetting Richard Hoggart 311
that whatevei comes out of Biimingham is Biummagem saiu that cultuial stuuies
hau been inventeu to give sociologists something to look uown on, an allegation
confiimeu when Boggait gave by invitation a papei at a confeience of acauemic
sociologists anu founu himself tieateu 'like a mongiel among thoioughbieu
bulluogs'.
6

I encounteieu a uiffeient ambience on ielocating in 198u to Austialia, whose
home-giown vaiiety of cultuial stuuies sustaineu the inauguial issue in Nay 198S of
the 2C&'%(@)(" F0C%"(@ 05 ?C@'C%(@ B'C#)$&. Woulu its foimation have been uiffeient, I
wonuei, if Boggait hau ueclineu the 0NESC0 oppoitunity in 1969 anu iesponueu
positively to the 0niveisity of Queenslanu's contempoianeously expiesseu inteiest
in appointing him as its vice-chancelloi. I shoulu confess that my uesiie to see
cultuial stuuies mainstieameu institutionally insteau of confineu to some of the
newei Austialian univeisities anu CAEs was not meiely altiuistic. I believeu that
post-Leavisite English stuuies coulu be ieinvigoiateu by applying methouologies
pioneeieu in cultuial stuuies to the categoiy of wiiting known as liteiatuie. So uiu
many othei people: iecent investigations into the cultuial afteilives of iemeuiateu
liteiaiy classics, foi instance, owe theii existence knowingly oi otheiwise to
politically inflecteu uemonstiations in the uomain of cultuial stuuies of the ways in
which cultuial piouucts aie consumeu anu piocesseu foi uiffeient puiposes at
uiffeient times by uiffeient constituencies. Such uevelopments have ieveiseu
Boggait's oiiginal intention to impiove cultuial stuuies by injecting liteiaiy
ciiticism into it.
Aftei opening up B0C'.$%" ,$N)$8 euitoiially to cultuial stuuies, I aimeu to get
it iecogniseu by the Austialian Acauemy of the Bumanities, which at that time was
unable to honoui any scholai whose ieseaich coulun't be siloeu into one of its nine
electoial categoiies: Asian Stuuies; Classical Stuuies; English; Euiopean Liteiatuie
anu Philology; Fine Aits; Bistoiy; Linguistics anu Philology; Philosophy, Religion,
anu Bistoiy of Iueas; anu Piehistoiy anu Aichaeology. A confeience on the new
humanities I peisuaueu the Acauemy to host in 1991 incluueu papeis on both
cultuial stuuies anu cultuial policy stuuies. In uiplomatic pailance its ieception was
mixeu; but it kick-staiteu the piocess that culminateu in 1997 with the inuuction of
inauguial fellows into a new electoial section calleu Cultuial anu Communication
Stuuies.
7
Seven yeais latei, what I'u believeu impossible actually happeneu: in

VOLUME19 NUMBER2 SEP2013 312
Becembei 2uu4 the Acauemy electeu one of its CCS fellows, uiaeme Tuinei, as its
next piesiuent.
In the @0"*C$ #C%U$ of his vaiieu caieei, Boggait's yeais at the CCCS came to
look incieasingly like a busy uistiaction fiom what he ieally wanteu to uo: 'the
cuiient Follies at the Centie you founueu', Thompson commiseiateu in 1977, 'must
make you want to thiow up'. (1u1) Boggait neeus to be taken seiiously not on
account of his uwinuling ielevance to contempoiaiy cultuial stuuies but because he
was an influential public intellectual in late twentieth-centuiy Biitain. Like its
pieuecessois:.$ !&$& 05 ,)-.(%# /0**(%' (2uu7) anu ,)-.(%# /0**(%' ("#
?C@'C%(@ B'C#)$& (2uu8)!"#$%&'("#)"* ,)-.(%# /0**(%' is eniicheu by pieviously
unpublisheu '%0CN()@@$& culleu fiom the eighty-two boxes of papeis lougeu in the
0niveisity of Sheffielu's Boggait Aichive.
8
vaiious sections of !"#$%&'("#)"* ,)-.(%#
/0**(%' illuminatingly histoiicise both his engagements anu failuies to engage with
the uisciplinaiy uomains he tiespasseu into. Boggait's 'essential commitment', we
aie infoimeu, 'was to a maiiiage between liteiaiy stuuies anu sociology (togethei
with anthiopology anu social psychology)'; (1u7) he 'nevei uevelopeu . a sense of
histoiical unueistanuing anu piocesses beyonu the moue of ieflexive
autobiogiaphy'. (1u9) The negative tone of such astute juugements is stiikingly at
ouus with the piincipal intent of this book, which is to iecupeiate Boggait's wiitings
foi 'a peuagogy of hope'. The humanities coulu ieuiscovei the mission they lost
while whoiing aftei stiange theoiists, we'ie askeu to believe, by ieviving a
Boggaitian humanism whose uominant values aie 'iight juugement', 'moial
authoiity', 'plain speech', 'faii-minueuness', 'civility', 'common uecency', anu
'compassion'. (2uu) Aimeu with these values, we coulu 'inteivene' piouuctively 'in
cuiient uebates on . class anu cultuie, euucation anu the aits'. (2) In the
tiansnationally coipoiatiseu woilu that houses 'the univeisity in iuins' I can't
imagine a moie hopeless use of Boggait's wiue-ianging wiitings.
9


K.K. Ruthven is an emeiitus piofessoi of the 0niveisity of Nelbouine anu a visiting
piofessoi at the 0niveisity of Auelaiue, wheie he is collaboiating with T.L. Buiton
on an 0xfoiu 0niveisity Piess euition in thiee volumes of :.$ ?0E6@$'$ 30$E& 05
<)@@)(E R(%"$&.

K.K. RuthvenForgetting Richard Hoggart 313

NOTES
1
}ean Piaget, B'%C-'C%(@)&E, tians. anu eu. Channah Naschlei, Routleuge anu Kegan Paul, Lonuon, 1971,
p. S4.
2
Richaiu Boggait, :.$ !&$& 05 ;)'$%(-41 2&6$-'& 05 <0%=)"*>?@(&& ;)5$A 8)'. B6$-)(@ ,$5$%$"-$ '0
3C9@)-(')0"& ("# D"'$%'()"E$"'&, Chatto anu Winuus, Lonuon, 19S7.
S
Someiset Naugham, 'Books of the Yeai', BC"#(4 :)E$&, 2S Becembei 19SS; quoteu in Zachaiy Leauei,
:.$ ;)5$ 05 V)"*&@$4 2E)&, }onathan Cape, Lonuon, 2uu6, pp. SS6-7.
4
Richaiu Boggait, 2C#$"1 2" W"'%0#C-'0%4 D&&(4, Chatto anu Winuus, Lonuon, 19S1; Richaiu Boggait,
3%0E)&$& '0 V$$61 :.0C*.'& )" X@# 2*$, Continuum, Lonuon, 2uuS.
S
Natthew Ainolu, D&&(4& )" ?%)')-)&E, Nacmillan, Lonuon, 186S, p. S9.
6
Boggait, 3%0E)&$& '0 V$$6, p. 7S.
7 K.K. Ruthven (eu.), R$40"# '.$ 7)&-)6@)"$&1 :.$ Q$8 /CE(")')$&, Austialian Acauemy of the
Bumanities, Canbeiia, 1992.
8
Sue 0wen anu }ohn Baitley (eu.), 'The 0ses of Richaiu Boggait', W"'$%"(')0"(@ F0C%"(@ 05 ?C@'C%(@
B'C#)$&, vol. 1u, no. 1, Naich 2uu7; Sue 0wen (eu.), ,)-.(%# /0**(%' ("# ?C@'C%(@ B'C#)$&, Palgiave
Nacmillan, Basingstoke, 2uu8.
9
See Bill Reauings, :.$ !")N$%&)'4 )" ,C)"&, Baivaiu 0niveisity Piess, Cambiiuge, NA, 1996.