Colleges are usually at the forefront of radical politics [The word “radical” suggests extreme and abrupt change driven by ideological rather than practical concerns. These days there is much more political radicalism on the Far Right than anywhere on the Left], but when it comes to their own privileges they become feudal empires [Loaded language…
AAUP chapters across the country will be tabling, holding teach-ins, lobby days, films screenings, or other activities as part of National Adjunct Walkout Day this Wednesday, February 25. The day, a grassroots effort, is planned to highlight adjunct faculty labor issues and to insist on fair wages and better working conditions. Participating chapters include Aurora…
This post is an addendum to Aaron Barlow’s post on the attacks on Prof. Bebout’s course on “Whiteness,” a post which you should probably read before reading the rest of this post, especially if you are unfamiliar with the controversy. The most obvious irony is, of course, that this sort of virulent response to Prof.…
Lee Bebout, an Assistant Professor at Arizona State University, is teaching a Topics in Critical Theory course this semester. From what I can tell, it’s one of those courses passed around from professor to professor based on a proposed theme for the semester, one generally approved by a departmental committee. Bebout’s theme is “U.S. Race…
I have been chronicling the ever-increasing state budget deficit in Louisiana, Bobby Jindal’s ideologically doctrinaire and ineffectual attempts to find a solution to that deficit that does not involve raising any taxes, and the catastrophic impact that this situation will almost certainly have on Lousiana’s public colleges and universities. This past week Jindal floated another…
[Guest Blogger Ira Allen is an assistant professor of Rhetoric and Composition at the American University of Beirut.] In November of last year, alongside scholars from around the disciplines, I signed an open letter written by philosopher John Protevi. The letter urged Marquette University to support embattled philosophy graduate student Cheryl Abbate and to “take steps…
After my mother died, in cleaning out her house I went through my father’s old books, pulling out the ones that I might find of use in my own writing and teaching. Among those was a dusty paperback of Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner’s 1969 Teaching as a Subversive Activity. I returned to it recently, remembering it from…
John Wilson’s post containing the letter from the national AAUP to the Marquette administration somewhat clarifies several of the issues with McAdams—that is, clarifies the issues without presuming to resolve them. The university’s position has become that McAdams has repeatedly referred to students by name in his personal blog or other public communications–not simply that…