BY PATRICK FESSENBECKER It is the time of year again when too many brilliant literature scholars find out that they will not be receiving a tenure-track job, and, as in Jacquelyn Ardam’s eloquent lamentation, that their possibilities for staying in the profession are over. The statistics on the situation are stark. Humanities doctorates are taking…
BY BILL MULLEN The Modern Language Association, one of the largest academic organizations in the world, voted by a margin of 101-93 in the Delegate Assembly in January to support a resolution declaring that the organization would not boycott Israeli Universities. The resolution now goes to a vote of the general membership this week. If…
BY CAPRICE LAWLESS This weekend the Modern Language Association (MLA) is holding its annual conference in Philadelphia. If ever there were a time and place more apropos for teachers of rhetoric to gather, and for rhetoric’s “teachable moment,” it is post-election 2016, in the city where the Declaration of Independence was signed. What is remarkable…
This is a guest post by Richard F. Teichgraeber III, a contributor to the newest issue of the Journal of Academic Freedom. Teichgraeber is professor of history at Tulane University. His most recent book is Building Culture: Studies in the Intellectual History of Industrializing America, 1867-1910. He is completing work on the introduction and annotation of a new…