Latest update on Liberty and Power

Date: Apr 23, 2004

Latest update on Liberty and Power

Date: Apr 23, 2004

quote:
Originally posted by: Robert Campbell
"Trying to keep up with everything that needs doing at the end of a Spring semester, I've gotten behind on covering the USM saga, but you can see my latest installment on the Liberty and Power blog at http://hnn.us/blogs/entries/4824.html Robert Campbell"

This is a MUST READ for all on this board. Articulate, exact, and quite impressive. I'm forwarding it to many people who don't spend much time on this Board. Hopefully many of you all will do the same!!!

Thanks, Robert!!!!!!

Date: Apr 23, 2004

quote:
Originally posted by: Robert Campbell
"Trying to keep up with everything that needs doing at the end of a Spring semester, I've gotten behind on covering the USM saga, but you can see my latest installment on the Liberty and Power blog at http://hnn.us/blogs/entries/4824.html Robert Campbell"

Nice job Robert. It makes good reading although I am not sure the Art Department feels exiled -- haven't had a chance to talk to them yet.

Good work. Thanks for the continuing support

Date: Apr 23, 2004

I could have misinterpreted the planned move for the Art Department. If people there turn out to have a different take on it, I'll post a correction.

Back when we had a Provost at Clemson who was an Engineering bigot (1992-1996), he was supposedly scheming to push Nursing and the Social Sciences off the main campus...and it was pretty clear to everyone what that would have meant.

Date: Apr 23, 2004

Robert, that's a really splendid overview of the situation; thanks VERY much for doing so much to call attention to the plight of the good people at USM!

Date: Apr 24, 2004

I've edited the Liberty and Power piece slightly, to reflect the more accurate estimates of total faculty at USM that I found on another thread.

Date: Apr 24, 2004

quote:
Originally posted by: Robert Campbell
"I could have misinterpreted the planned move for the Art Department. If people there turn out to have a different take on it, I'll post a correction. Back when we had a Provost at Clemson who was an Engineering bigot (1992-1996), he was supposedly scheming to push Nursing and the Social Sciences off the main campus...and it was pretty clear to everyone what that would have meant."

Well, I need to amend my caution a bit too. Obviously that the Art Department might like going off campus does not necessarily mean they aren't being exiled, either. But certainly some of the trends (of which this may be one) can be read to appear as though this administration is increasingly looking to centralize its studies in technology, the sciences, business (and its bastard child "economic development") and make them the "flagship" units while deemphasizing Liberal arts, humanities and the arts in ways that are more or less opaque to read for most of the public.

Pretty ironic since some of those units have been traditional strengths of this university. Not to mention (as many of us have written elsewhere) that deemphasizing the humanities is tatamount to gutting the notion of a university "education" -- and is a real disservice to the students of Mississippi.

Once again thanks for your posts and for your willingness to chronicle our little war for the outside world. I have to say, considering what is at stake for educsation in this country, that I am a little stunned that more is not being made of this nationally.

Date: Apr 24, 2004

If the art department did not want to go off campus, who would dare speak up now?

Date: Apr 24, 2004

quote:
Originally posted by: Flash Gordon
"If the art department did not want to go off campus, who would dare speak up now?"

I know the folks over there -- I don't think they'd have miuch trouble speaking out if they didn't like it. It is easy for me to imagine my department if we were moved against our will -- you couldn't shut us up. You might FOOL us, however, so we think that what is happening is good for us.

I just think its mixed: I can see benefits to the department and even to the university in moving downtown. I can also see, if the larger context, the possibility of loss both ways. In a different context (meaning a different administration) in which the arts were clearly more rhetorically enshrined in the university's language about mission and in its official discourse, I'd be less concerned. With this administration . . . it seems all to easy for them to forget about the department they moved downtown.