Cutting NSF Is Like Liquidating Your Finest Investment
Look closely at your mobile phone or tablet. Touch-screen technology, speech recognition, digital sound recording and the internet were all developed using […]
The Decline of Public Debates About Higher Education in Britain
Just a few years ago, critical voices could still speak through mainstream media to highlight the dangers of the quickly accelerating commercialisation of academia. These commentators have now been pushed to the margins.
“The author has asked not to be identified in case this further affects his career prospects.”
Many PhD graduates are forced into the troubled world of unemployment while, at the same time, being denied a public voice. How is it that extremely narrow standards of professional legitimacy are used to judge young scholars who simply cannot meet them?
Writing the North Atlantic Bubble: Part 1
Sociology is arguably a global project. Significant approaches to the study of society have been developed in many parts of the world. Yet, students in the North Atlantic world do not learn about these approaches, as textbooks interpret the world in terms of scholars of the region.
What Makes Sociology Textbooks Original?
Currently, textbooks exist at the margins of the Sociology, summarising and recycling extant knowledge while fundamentally lacking in original contributions to sociological enquiry. This doesn’t have to be.
Textbook World
Textbooks now play a crucial role in teaching in the social sciences. Their importance is mirrored by their abundance; there is an enormous variety of textbooks on the most commonly taught subjects. The rise of the ‘textbook industry’ is not necessarily a good thing, though.
The Politics of Dissent
Recently, The Independent published a brief piece on the ‘slave-like’ working conditions of PhD students at UK universities. This sounds dramatic, but it’s hardly news – the problem has been around for years. The question arises why dissent did not emerge earlier and more forcefully.
What Do Higher Education Consumers Want?
The Guardian yesterday published a set of worrying facts. Even though consumers of higher education pay almost three times as much in tuition fees than they did six years ago, face-to-face with lecturers in class has barely increased
The Guardian’s Simon Jenkins is completely wrong.
A response to Sir Simon Jenkins’ article on the value of public universities.
