Scholasticism as a Scholarly Vice Term: from the Middle Ages to the Twenty-First Century

Abstract

Today, the term “scholasticism” is commonly used to criticize scholars for being nonempirical, dogmatic, and socially irrelevant, or for writing in obscure language. This chapter explores how these different layers of meaning that constitute “scholasticism” as a scholarly vice emerged and evolved over time, from the fifteenth to the twenty-first centuries. This historical analysis shows that the scholarly vice term of “scholasticism” was originally used in theological and philosophical contexts, but eventually extended to academic disciplines as diverse as physics, sociology, economics, law, and botany. In the process, some of the current interpretations of “scholasticism” as a vice term were added, while other original connotations were lost. Remarkably, however, many of the original meanings of “scholasticism” remained intact, providing a fascinating example of the long-term persistence not only of scholarly vice terms, but also of the meanings ascribed to them.