GUIDING PRINCIPLES

Creative expression in all forms is our highest goal

Third, while teaching is our prime directive, creative expression in all forms is our highest goal. I draw no distinction between the creative expression of the artist and the physicist, or the musicologist and the long-distance runner. Or the poet and the computer scientist. Creative expression in all forms is our highest goal. Our objective is to provide a setting in which creative expression can take place, where important new poetry can be written and analyzed, or the work of a minor Jacobean playwright may be evaluated. Where kinship practices of preliterate societies in the Guatemalan highlands may be assessed, or the vortex dynamics of the atmosphere of a distant star. The new molecule, the new minimalist sculpture, the new defensive line formation in Sun Devil Stadium—these are all forms of creative expression, and I hold all forms equal. How could I not, as each are mechanisms through which the human spirit is expressed?

If some among us are elected to membership in the national academies, if others generate streams of revenue from the licensing of a new technology, or if owing to the brilliant performance of the Sun Devils we draw 55,000 fans to every football game, we may all well be pleased, but I would suggest that these are secondary returns to the intrinsic reward of creative expression itself.

As members of an academic community, we live in a privileged setting. In a sense, we are members of a privileged class. I am not suggesting that we live in an ivory tower, but to some extent we are sheltered from the mundane, complicated, and sometimes painful workaday world. In this protected realm, it is our responsibility, it is our job, it is our privilege to be creative. We should take this privilege to heart, and appreciate the extent to which we have assumed a special responsibility to all of society.