Likewise, she asserts that she does not believe that the cream natu-
rally rises to the top, “because it probably isn’t natural.” Then, elabo-
rating, she adds:
I could imagine that there is such a thing as a project that would
seem to be absolutely excellent according to [some standard], but
at the end of the day, that might not be the one that interests me
more. Or I could also see something that strikes me as being bold
and daring and might not quite have it right yet, but could be do-
ing something that’s so important that I would end up at the end
of the day supporting that. And I don’t think I’m the only person
[who] would do that.Another English professor, when asked whether she believes cream
rises to the top, states, “I think if the cream is sort of the one percent,
that’s probably true. When you’re deciding on [fellowships], you’re
[not] dealing with cream, you’re really dealing with two percent
[milk]. [Laughs.] [You have] a range of proposals and at any given
moment that milk could become cream, but you’re not exactly sure
... It’s always good to be a little more sort of self-conscious and self-
aware and self-questioning when you come into these things. Our
agreement about what constitutes cream, that percentage is very
small.” A third English scholar explains:
One of the things that post-structuralist theory makes us do is
say, “You can’t just say something is good because it won this or
NEH or ACLS,” you have to be a little bit more hardheaded than
that, you have to look at it for what it is...Excellenceiscon-
structed, that’s true, but is it constructed so that anything I de-
clare to be excellent and set a certain criteria is therefore excel-
lence? Well, no. I’ll go back to rigor. Someone who’s just clocking
time isn’t [doing] enough either. [Someone who] has shown someOn Disciplinary Cultures / 71