I know that this blog is read by many people who work in my university system (which will remain unnamed; we all know what it is.) I believe the following will be of interest to them, so listen up.
Today I went to a talk given by the President of our university system (who will remain nameless). He talked about the impending budget cuts. Then there was a Q&A session. People mostly asked vague and meaningless questions, announcing in advance that they expected no answer because “these are philosophical questions that don’t have an answer. So I got up and asked a direct question. (An aside to Americans: seriously, folks, will there come a time when you will wake up and take matters pertaining to your own livelihoods into your own hands or will you navel-gaze and ask philosophical questions while the dirty work of speaking clearly and directly will fall to everybody else? I’m not having a good day, as you can see.)
My question was, and I quote, “Is there a possibility that our university system will eliminate academic programs and departments? And if so, what will happen to the tenured and tenure-track faculty members of those departments?”
There was a lot of flowery admin-speak in response but this is what I gleaned from the President’s response:
1. Yes, academic programs and departments will be eliminated.
2. This will not happen immediately.
3. There will be “productivity measures” (re)introduced aimed at deciding which departments will be eliminated. “Productivity” obviously has fuck-all to do with scholarship and research. Quality of instruction is also of zero interest to anybody.
4. There is time for faculty members to prepare an exit strategy.
5. We will still get to take the students already in our programs to graduation.
6. After that, we can fuck off.
Obviously, this was not said in these words. I’m giving you my reading of the response. As you know, I read and analyze texts for a living, so I stand by my analysis. I believe it’s better to know than not to know.
Clarissa's Blog 
What a foreign professor (well he is US citizen now, but is from elsewhere) said after a recent Senate meeting: “It is obvious that this Senate will never discuss anything concrete. Only I ever raise any issues having to do with money.”
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“What a foreign professor (well he is US citizen now, but is from elsewhere) said after a recent Senate meeting: “It is obvious that this Senate will never discuss anything concrete. Only I ever raise any issues having to do with money.””
– Exactly. The way my American colleagues ask questions is truly Baroque. The questions are so long, flowery, and vague that I never manage to figure out what they are asking. They actually start with saying, “This is more philosophical than practical, and I know that you can’t provide an answer. . .” We have real, specific issues going on. Can the unanswerable philosophical dilemmas be taken someplace else for the moment?
I also love the vagueness of terminology. Do you know how many times people today repeated the phrase, “those at the top”? On the top of what? What does this mean? This vagueness precludes any serious discussion of anything. Why not just say, “Governor Rauner”? That’s his name. We all know that it’s him we are discussing. Let’s refer to him by using his name, shall we?
The rant is not directed at you, Z. I’m angry right now.
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Sounds like a dire situation. But I also have to ask when was an American ever philosophical? I mean expect for Quine? They are the most unphilosophical grouping of people.
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“But I also have to ask when was an American ever philosophical? I mean expect for Quine? They are the most unphilosophical grouping of people.”
– Yes, the philosophical questions that were advanced were not all that profound. 🙂
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I think a very Christian culture cannot be philosophical, or when it is that is only skin deep. If you already know all the answers, you can’t ask legitimate questions.
In any case, I hope things work out better than they seem forecasted to do, but hopefully you will land on your feet in any case.
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“This is more philosophical than practical, and I know that you can’t provide an answer. . .”
This is often a (usually misguided, but still) effort to get information that has been denied already, or raise a general objection. “I know you can’t provide an answer” means “I know you will say you can’t provide an answer, but I want one and I am trying to chip away toward one, obliquely.”
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Every time, a president comes to our campus, I stand up and ask a direct question. Why speak obliquely when you can just say what you need to say?
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“Those at the top” mean various people, or some of various people, and it would be a *great* exercise to abolish this phrase and insist on naming specific names at all times. The governor, and which system administrators, and which administrators on campus, and which faculty, and so on.
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““Those at the top” mean various people, or some of various people, and it would be a *great* exercise to abolish this phrase and insist on naming specific names at all times. The governor, and which system administrators, and which administrators on campus, and which faculty, and so on.”
– Exactly! The governor and the legislators are public figures. They are used to having their names spoken in public. So let’s name them. What is the problem with this approach?
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Because the administrator who is in fact behind whatever it is, could be in the room. People have complex roles and complex connections and many do not find it wise to name all names. In part, they can be speaking in code, assuming everyone knows exactly who they are talking about. The problem is as you say, ultimately this means nobody is accountable for anything. That is why I propose dropping the phrase “those at the top” as a salutary exercise.
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You can speak directly because you are newer than some, or perhaps because you have not also been in meetings with that administrator earlier in the day. A lot of those “I know you cannot provide an answer” people are people who have asked the question earlier in the day, been refused and answer and been fichados, or who are trying to get tenure for people and cannot afford to be hated today, etc. People who speak directly are refreshing when new, and can get things done, but later on are labeled as fringe, so speak directly and are not heard. Some of the “I know you cannot provide an answer” questions are actually more aggressive than they may sound and come from a thicker context than every observer realizes.
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“There will be “productivity measures” (re)introduced aimed at deciding which departments will be eliminated. “Productivity” obviously has fuck-all to do with scholarship and research. Quality of instruction is also of zero interest to anybody.”
Yah. Who needs specialists in Hispanic/Latin American studies.
The US senate has just confirmed the new ambassador to Argentina, Noah Mamet, who has never been to the country and doesn’t speak Spanish but thinks that they make a really good Malbec wine; however, he seems to have acquitted himself well during the senate confirmation hearings.
“In marked contrast to Mamet’s measured responses, (Senate committee members) Menendez and Rubio pontificated — without any evidence — about how Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner takes instructions from Fidel Castro.”
http://fpif.org/cuba-hypocrisy-u-s-senate/
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“The US senate has just confirmed the new ambassador to Argentina, Noah Mamet, who has never been to the country and doesn’t speak Spanish but thinks that they make a really good Malbec wine; however, he seems to have acquitted himself well during the senate confirmation hearings.”
– And as a result we have the really pathetic foreign policy that the whole world can observe with disgusted curiosity.
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\\ “Productivity” obviously has fuck-all to do with scholarship and research. Quality of instruction is also of zero interest to anybody.
Does “productivity” = “number of students”? Or “average salary of former students”?
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Or the number of rich stupid students…
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“Or the number of rich stupid students…”
– The only thing we don’t have are rich students. I think I explained what our student population is like in great detail. Have you heard of Michael Brown? This is who are students are.
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“Does “productivity” = “number of students”? Or “average salary of former students”?”
– Definitely not the salary. It’s the number of credit hours + Majors.
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I am sorry to hear that and hope your department survives the insanity.
Another hope is that Governor Rauner goes home till it’s (fully) implemented, and the next governor would be saner. (In school system, it works like this.)
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Hey, el. Is it you looking me up on academia.edu at this very minute? :-)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
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\\ Hey, el. Is it you looking me up on academia.edu at this very minute? :-)))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))
I did look, yes. 🙂
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“I did look, yes.”
– I was wondering whether there was actually a scholar in Israel interested in my stuff. That page gets visits from many places but never Israel. So I’m curious whether there is anything going on in Hispanic Studies in Israel.
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\\ So I’m curious whether there is anything going on in Hispanic Studies in Israel.
You can try to visit the websites of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem universities (the best ones in Israel and a good international name too). Here in English are departments of Humanities Faculty at tau:
http://humanities.tau.ac.il/site_eng/
I don’t see anything – do you?
I only found something connected to history of Latin America:
http://www1.tau.ac.il/humanities/latin-america/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=14&Itemid=29
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I’m speechless. This is unexpected and absurd. Hope the fools come to their senses.
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This sort of thing is one reason why I’m happy to work in the North of England, not the south – I talk to friends at other universities, where things like this happen, but here, the last open meeting I went to, there was a queue of senior, respected professors with questions based on hard fact demanding to know things like how the President-equivalent justified his pay rise being larger than ours, exactly what was going on with some very creative goal-setting etc.
This is the ‘bloody shovel’* part of the country and it suits me!
* it’s one of those language usage things that I feel like I’ve always known, and don’t know to what extent it’s a family, regional or national thing, but I do know some English people don’t get it, so adding a foot note. People who are too cautious and flowery call a spade a ‘digging implement’, people who are honest and straightforward call a spade ‘a spade’, people who are impolitely direct call a spade a ‘bloody shovel’ – shovel being a more doing-messy-work word for spade in English, and the bloody being either emphatic or linked to the idea of the impolitely-direct person beating the person being addressed around the head with said shovel.
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I’m going to start using “bloody shovel.” I am often too direct for my colleagues. 🙂
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I’m really sorry to hear that there are hard times ahead for your university system. I cannot account for the national passive-aggressive behavior. I abide within alterity — I’m assertive and direct, to a fault, perhaps.
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It would be easier if I didn’t feel so alone on this issue. I’m no alone on the blog but at work I feel like I am.
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Me, too. “Fearless radical with nothing to lose” is what they call me therefore.
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I know exactly what you mean about mealy mouthed faculty members. I am always one of the few to ask direct and difficult questions (even before tenure) at large faculty meetings and other faculty members constantly tell me how “brave” I am. (But I will admit that I’m not the only one who speaks directly: I have a few amazing and articulate colleagues.)
But the thing that really gets me is that there are SO many people who would tell me that ONCE I GET TENURE, I WILL SAY EVERYTHING ON MY MIND. They got tenure, and nothing changed. Wimpy before tenure, wipmy after tenure.
By and large, Americans are a fearful people. I”m not sure why. But it’s an undercurrent with so many of our social problems; kill-happy police, gun fanatacism, simpering faculty. As someone who isn’t fearful, it’s an aspect of my culture that drives me insane.
I am sorry about the changes to your university system. What a tragedy! I would be interested to hear more about the law that prevents professors from doing research?
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“I would be interested to hear more about the law that prevents professors from doing research?”
– It’s a long post and I’m almost finished writing it. Prepare to be shocked. And not in a good way.
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“I come from a place of real violence but I’m not servile and I’m not afraid. And I was exactly like this back there. There are no objective factors making people this way. They choose to be like this because that’s what they want.”
I disagree. There is a threshold point of violence which makes people realize that violence is violence. Otherwise they do not realise it.
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These are people who have led extraordinarily comfortable existences – the most carefree on the planet! – their entire lives. All they know is comfort and abundance. And they sit there shivering in fear – of what? Imaginary monsters under their beds? – while people in really difficult situations and with very difficult pasts have to fight for their rights.
Most of the people at the Michael Brown vigils are immigrants, by the way. Today we had a Mongolian, a Palestinian, an Egyptian, me, etc. Our position here is a lot less secure. Plus we all come from conflict-ridden regions. But we are not the ones afraid.
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Yeah, we third worlders…..
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I’ve never been afraid of conflict. I do think this is one of my Thirde Worlde/Olde Worlde attributes. I’ve usually paid the price though.
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“But the thing that really gets me is that there are SO many people who would tell me that ONCE I GET TENURE, I WILL SAY EVERYTHING ON MY MIND. They got tenure, and nothing changed. Wimpy before tenure, wimpy after tenure.”
Yep. On the fear, I really wonder about it, too. One thing is that this is *not* the land of rugged individualism, as is claimed — it’s a culture of deference. A hypothesis I have is that everyone secretly knows or feels how violent the place is — violence always just below the surface — and they want to avoid arousing it. A third factor or possibility is that it is so very fragmented. One simply does not know whether anyone around one has anywhere near the same assumptions and basic goals as oneself. Most of my colleagues, for instance, do not think the university is what I think it is. You can tell when they refer to department chairs as “bosses,” for instance, although that is a small and synecdochic detail.
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I come from a place of real violence but I’m not servile and I’m not afraid. And I was exactly like this back there. There are no objective factors making people this way. They choose to be like this because that’s what they want.
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That is true of those who always deferred speaking up until after tenure, yes.
On the general fearfulness of US people, I know they are like that but I am not sure it is entirely by choice. I think a lot of them genuinely do not know any better / do not know what it is like not to feel cowed / are not even aware that that is what they are feeling.
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Google “Delaware study” if you want to know how “productivity” is measure
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Partly, this is one of those weird American cultural foibles (like constantly asking each other where they’re from).
In certain formal settings (especially meetings within any kind of bureaucracy) many Americans feel the compulsion to never state anything directly. It’s very similar to the communication strategy described by the therapist Virginia Satir as “computer”.
Paraphrasing from a source: They use language to hide their inner emotions. This is defensive so that no one else knows what they are up to, or what they are thinking.
They are always logical and under control, and do not exhibit any emotions. (A person in this mode) is always dissociated from what is happening.
They employ words as buffers in conversations, not as a means of expressing emotions or propositional content.
They deflect any responsibility, by using words such as “Someone needs to do it” or “It is clear that the time has come in which action must be taken”. They use generalizations and omit references to specific people (especially themselves).
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“They deflect any responsibility, by using words such as “Someone needs to do it” or “It is clear that the time has come in which action must be taken”. They use generalizations and omit references to specific people (especially themselves).”
– In short, all of the things that I happen to detest the most. 🙂
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If it’s any consolation, IME they are greatly relieved (if a little embarassed by) someone who just cuts to the chase and says and asks things as directly as possible. For many of them it’s like a Kabuki drama they can’t break out of….. they’re glad when someone does (which is usually going to be a non-American).
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“If it’s any consolation, IME they are greatly relieved (if a little embarassed by) someone who just cuts to the chase and says and asks things as directly as possible.”
– Yes, I know everybody loves me and finds me refreshing. It would be great if the feeling were more mutual. 🙂
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