Corrupted temporalities, ‘cultures of speed’, and the possibility of collegiality

Abstract

This paper describes a neglected aspect of the critique of academic ‘cultures of speed’ offered by Maggie Berg and Barbara Seeler in The Slow Professor. I argue internalisation of the values and imperatives of cultures of speed can encourage the erosion of a range of academic virtues while also facilitating the development of a range of academic vices. I focus on the ways that an internalised ‘psychology of speed’ erodes our capacity to exercise the virtues of intellectual beneficence–excellences of character which advance the intellectual needs of others–by radically distorting our experience of time.