LOOK, IT’S ALL CLASS SIGNALING: Growing number of English, writing scholars prioritize social justice, reject ‘standard’ academic English.
Up to the first World War, books that were considered high literature and won awards were the ones that had allusions to Greek and Roman myth, or dropped other historical allusions, casually, into the prose. It was a way of saying “I had an excellent education.” These days excellent education in terms of expensive colleges means Marxism Leninism, so of course awards and admiration goes to the “woke” stories that push “social justice.” It’s a way of screaming “I have an excellent education.”
BUT at least the nineteenth and early twentieth century taught people to write so they could be understood. Now? Well, I’m old enough to have taught some people who are teachers now and I can tell you, it only goes down from here.