A MESSAGE FROM PRESIDENT ESTHER L. JONES
As we embark upon the celebration of our 250th anniversary, I wish to take this opportunity to reflect upon the past that gave birth to our Society and the powerful potential of our present moment to shape the enduring legacy we are charged to steward for future generations.
Very early on, the leaders of the fledgling Phi Beta Kappa established scholarship, friendship, and morality—which might be more contemporarily articulated as intellectual achievement, collegiality, and ethical responsibility—as our foundational values. Amid the “innumerable difficulties and stresses” of the American Revolutionary War for independence, the students who founded the Society were imbued with the unmitigated audacity to challenge the limits of the received European modes of education. Alongside the political declaration of independence, a new thought simultaneously took place: the planting of seeds for an intellectual declaration of independence, producing what would later be coined by Phi Beta Kappa member Ralph Waldo Emerson as a distinctly “American Scholar.” A new day was dawning on the emerging nation. Phi Beta Kappa dared to do a new thing, the influence of which would reverberate both within and beyond academia: to pursue and engage in forms of intellectual freedom that constitute the bedrock of our civil democracy.
Over the past 250 years, those foundational values have endured. In practice, these values required a particular kind of intellectual freedom—the freedom to think, question, and debate a broad range of ideas concerning the great challenges of the time. Today, as we reflect on the twin births of America and the Phi Beta Kappa Society, this notion of intellectual freedom invites renewed and deepened reflection. The revolutionary struggle for freedom formed the crucible in which both were shaped, and it continues to hold the heart of our aspirations to pursue the dream of a more perfect union.
Freedom of thought, freedom of expression and debate, freedom of inquiry—these are the pursuits of the curious mind. Not questioning for the sake of questioning alone, but knowing how to formulate a question that compels deep and meaningful contemplation. Entering into sober-minded deliberation and sincere debate, with a full understanding of the gravity of responsibility that accompanies the pursuit. This is a form of inquiry grounded in service to the common good. In our efforts to achieve a more perfect society and, indeed, a more perfect union, we respectfully recall those young, serious-minded scholars who convened in the Raleigh Tavern, daring to propel the nation toward greatness through intellectual engagement as a civic responsibility. This is the legacy that endures today in the many and varied paths our members have the privilege to pursue in the careers and communities we choose to serve and lead.
Throughout this auspicious year in which we celebrate 250 years of honoring the excellence of the curious mind and the fruits of high intellectual achievement, I invite our membership to grapple with a provocation: Does a twin birthing portend a twinned destiny? What more might the curious mind—free to pursue new ideas and efforts—contribute to a nation and a society so desperately in need of those with the capacity to pose productive questions, provoke meaningful exchange, and present viable solutions to the grand challenges of our time?
America owes its greatness in large part to the high standards of academic excellence and achievement of the curious mind, championed by the Phi Beta Kappa Society, and inculcated in every key holder. Boasting over 290 chapters, over 40 active associations, and more than 700,000 members, we are stewards charged to fulfill the dream to “extend the influence of Phi Beta Kappa” and to strive toward the perfection of this grand experiment we call democracy. Like our nation, this Society was not born perfected. The ideals upon which the nation and our Society were founded have demanded constant striving. The times in which they were born and tested demanded it of them; our present time demands it of us still.
And so, on the occasion of our 250th anniversary, I pay tribute to all the curious minds, past and present, who have dared to dream an ideal into existence. The curious mind is not about intellectual indulgence, though it is sufficiently capacious to allow for the serendipitous discoveries that so often arise from speculative wondering, wherever it may lead. The curious mind—characterized by intellectual agility, the embrace of uncertainty, and humility in acknowledging the limits of any single perspective—seeks to earnestly inquire: How might we creatively approach this matter to help advance knowledge in service to the common good?
Now, more than ever, it is time to embrace the originating impulse of our founders, in which the intertwined ambitions of education and its importance for the future of the United States and the opportunities and responsibilities of the educated American combine as a living, vital force shaping the contemporary moment, the legacy we leave behind, and the future world we are responsible for shaping.
The Phi Beta Kappa Society is the uncontested leader of this commitment—not only in this nation but also in the world. Our membership represents the best our nation has to offer. We will not cede the authority of representing the highest achievements in academic excellence, nor the virtuous cycle of ethical leadership it begets. Rather, we boldly embrace that responsibility. As we mark 250 years of intellectual excellence in service to the common good, let us consider the ways in which we may advance the ideals of the Society as a living force, true to our core values, empowered by the curious mind, and imbued with hope for what is possible for us to achieve together. This shall be our legacy for the next 250 years.
Esther L. Jones (ΦBK, Fisk University) is the Associate Dean for Faculty Development in the Office of the Dean of the Faculty at Brown University. She holds a Ph.D. in English, an M.A. in African American & African Studies, and a B.A. in English and Music. Her interdisciplinary research in the field of the medical humanities engages literary, historical, philosophical, and ethical explorations of black women’s health and medicine. She is the author of Medicine and Ethics in Black Women’s Speculative Fiction (2015).