“We are in the midst of a crisis of massive proportions and grave global significance,” Martha Nussbaum begins.[1] No, the danger is not imminent economic collapse or looming environmental disaster. At least we discern such crises, but the worst of all “goes largely unnoticed, like a cancer; a crisis that is likely to be, in the long run, far more damaging to the future of democratic self-government.” Nussbaum’s crisis—I am not making this up—is declining enrollment in university humanities courses. Somewhere, I suppose, a shoemaker envisions the collapse of civilization brought about by the rising price of leather.

Unless we solve Nussbaum’s crisis, democracy, decency, and critical thinking—words she leaves undefined and repeats like a mantra—will all disappear. But to solve a crisis one must identify its cause. So why is it that students are choosing to study economics or chemistry rather than English or French? Nussbaum’s proffered answer, of course, has nothing to do with what literature professors teach or how they teach it.

When I was growing up in the Bronx, the owner of the local Jewish deli, whose meats smelled vaguely rancid and whose bagels seemed to start out already day-old, attributed his failing business to the vulgarization of taste. In much the same way, since I started teaching literature some thirty-five years ago, humanities professors have been attributing declining enrollments to their students’ materialism, careerism, and the philistine desire for profit. As the title of her most recent book indicates, Nussbaum