Sunday, December 19, 2010

À propos my previous post on the complete withdrawal of state funding from the Humanities in UK Higher Education:

"This scholar, author of inumerable books, spent a good part of the second half of her life fighting to save the Humanities...she brought home the point, again and again, and in all media willing to hold out a microphone to her, that ancient languages were the basis of contemporary ideas, not only those of democracy but the very sense of what it means to be human, and that every “honnête homme” had to study that field to some degree."

Pierre Joris on the Hellenist & Greek scholar, Jacqueline de Romilly who has just passed away aged 97. The complete post is here.
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2 comments:

John B-R said...

Alan, speaking of saving the humanities, etc did you see the article in the Guardian that begins:

"The universities minister, David Willetts, is expected to announce that the cuts, which government sources acknowledge could be up to £400m – 6% of the universities budget – will begin next April, 12 months before the new fees regime begins….By not synchronising the timing of the cuts and the introduction of fees, the government appears to be opening another front in its battle to reform higher education. Some universities have warned they might have to declare bankruptcy because of the cuts, as many would be unlikely to be able to charge the kind of fees that would recoup the money they will no longer receive from the government’"

As Nina Power writes, "Shock doctrine, anyone? It is clear, as the Tory think-tanks have been telling us all along, that this government wants perhaps half the universities in the country to close."

December 19, 2010 at 7:21 PM
Alan Baker said...

Thanks for this John - you got to this article before me. These are extreme policies, and from a government which only won around half of all votes cast (and around 40% of everyone eligible to vote).

I notice the use of the much-abused word "reform".

December 20, 2010 at 12:43 AM

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