Daily Inspiration Quote by Iris Chang

There is a dry, almost defensive humor in Chang’s “Maybe,” a word that undercuts the pomp of an honorary doctorate even as it quietly argues she’s earned it. She’s puncturing the prestige economy that likes to reward intellectual labor with ceremonial credentials after the fact, as if scholarship only counts when a gatekeeping institution stamps it. The line reads like someone refusing to audition for legitimacy while still wanting the record to show she belongs.

The subtext is sharper because Chang wasn’t a cloistered academic; she was a public historian who did her work under the bright, punishing lights of politics, media, and memory. An honorary Ph.D can be a compliment, but it can also feel like an apology: a way for universities to claim proximity to a writer’s impact without extending the protections, resources, or status that come with the real degree. Chang’s joke flips that imbalance. If the doctorate is supposed to certify original research and contribution to knowledge, then the books themselves are the dissertation - peer-reviewed by history’s consequences rather than a committee.

Context matters here because Chang’s career sat at the intersection of archival rigor and cultural warfare, especially around narratives of atrocity and national responsibility. The line suggests both pride and exhaustion: pride in work that meets the highest scholarly bar, exhaustion with having to justify it. It’s a compact critique of how institutions monetize authority while underestimating the intellectual and emotional cost of producing history that actually lands.