smart thing to sort of [lead] the discussion...SoItakethis as a sign
that he is really listening. He [is] extremely successful in the way he
describes [his work] and extremely interesting. But it has to do with
a kind of nimbleness of his own mind and his questions and an-
swers.” The classification system used to assess intelligence in this
setting appears to allow for finer gradations and nuances. As we will
see, moral factors combine with intellectual factors to define who is
considered a truly meritorious intellectual.
Elegance and cultural capital. Who better epitomized the virtues of
scholarly elegance than the anthropologist Clifford Geertz? His clas-
sic essay on the Balinese cockfight is often singled out as a particu-
larly felicitous illustration of elegance in the interpretative social sci-
ences.^24 For several respondents, it also illustrates a particular script
for evaluating excellence. An anthropologist, after explaining that
all the proposals she ranked highly were well written, refers to the
cockfight article as “a model of what it is that we do best when we’re
doing what we should do.” She defines her own understanding of ac-
ademic excellence as oriented toward a “kind of perfectionism, try-
ing to get the language right.” Elegance also is often associated with
the display of cultural capital—that is, it is linked to the ability to
demonstrate familiarity with such high-status signals as cultural lit-
eracy.^25 For instance, a French historian says that she appreciates
good writing, which she defines as the ability to express oneself with
“some literacy.” Nearly two-thirds of all respondents mention ele-
gance and display of cultural capital when describing the evaluation
of proposals and applicants (see Table 5.7). There are differences
across disciplinary clusters. Humanists and historians particularly
value elegance and cultural capital, and social scientists give it less
emphasis.^26 About elegance a philosopher says, “I think it’s wonder-
ful. Elegance means clear, not rococo prose, though rococo prose can
be elegant. It means not trying to sound like a social scientist,” which
Recognizing Various Kinds of Excellence / 191