To celebrate turning in final papers we went out to a semi-underground Cuban club and danced to son and reggaeton. Old men sang call and response rumbas outside. The students brought their friends, and the friends said the kind of professor they most dislike is the kind who gets up each day in class and reads from the textbook.
I also disliked this kind of professor, and when we were T.A.’s we were not allowed to give our classes this way. The majority of my lower division students, however, now demand this and the administration seems to agree. There is a professor in the sciences who has been placed on a 100% research assignment because he does not believe class should consist merely of reading aloud from the textbook.
One of the reasons not to become a professor is that unless you land a job in an R1 department (not just an R1 school, and I cannot emphasize this enough; these will be the last departments to feel the full impact of the Corporate Shift), you will again become responsible for teaching courses you taught early on in graduate school – the easy courses they give to new T.A.’s. You will now teach these courses to poorly prepared, poorly behaved, and heavily entitled students. If you are serious about teaching you will be frustrated if your institution employs mostly expendable faculty to teach such courses, and defines teaching such students as satisfying their whims.
There is a very simple solution to the teaching travails I have had this semester: choose a reasonable textbook and write a syllabus which uses the book rather than allows the book to drive and use you. This is the one thing I am not allowed to do. Even in state tuition at the public law schools is high, but I am very close to signing up for the LSAT and/or getting a construction job in New Orleans. Just thinking of these things makes me feel free.
I have repaired my bicycle and I am planting an enormous ginger bush. The bicycle repair shop was in this deeply Black neighborhood, very old fashioned, which I had not realized existed, and going there was an extremely interesting voyage to 1955. The rumberos are practicing in the park and the galleries are open late. The oranges on my trees are almost ready, and their skins carry fragrances of Morocco and Seville.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
Not sure that we have the same system in Oz-Aryia. Less of a hierarchy and nurturing system of patriarchal benevolence. More like, once you’ve done the PhD go and look for a job and fly little birdies fly.
This is protective only of the weaker students and the M.A. instructors. I used to think it was a remnant of the plantation system and so on but now I think it is *also* a harbinger of the corporatized university.
Note: I have slightly modified this post because it sounded too much as if I were railing against individuals and this is not my real point.
Some of the things motivating this all: 1. I resent all the work it will take to modify this particular textbook so that it will work better. It is so impractical and pointless. 2. I resent the way the Board of Supervisors speaks to the faculty. I resent power plays and abuse in general. 3. I am going to a social event this evening I think I’d rather not – that is, I’d prefer a better one. 4. I resent feeling this powerless. 5. Due to travails with this course I have neglected my health this semester and I do not feel at all well – I have atrophying muscles, disturbed sleep, and not enough vitamins! But: if I rail too much I will be falling into the error Reeducation recommended: feeling powerless, and giving too much power to pain.
Yeah, you are probably right there. Another (unrelated) interesting thing I heard about Australian universities is that you should never get your PhD marked in Australia. The problem is that Australian academics suffer from bad self esteem, and therefore overcompensate by nitpicking. The suggestion is that you should get your thesis marked in either Europe or the US, wherein academics are more likely to see the big picture of what you are saying, and mark accordingly.
That’s interesting. An unsubstantiated rumor I’ve heard is that ANU is easy … ? … I have no way of knowing whether this is true, or just malicious. It can’t be as easy as my university.
I suspect that the Australian national characteristic of not being able to see the big picture (bad self esteem through being outcasts of the British) is also relevant to the ANU.
Anyway, I heard what I did from a PhD who was teaching technical thesis writing courses, outside of the direct auspices of University and faculties. He said that he got the highest mark (can’t remember what that is) from two overseas universities, for his thesis. But from an Australian university, he received a resubmit.
So much for academic freedom.
It is interesting reading you, Unsane, and realizing how much Australia does seem to have that colonial inferiority complex.
ABW – yes, isn’t it a shame? I thought I had renounced academic freedom by becoming afraid to discuss not just politics but also history and regular facts in class … now we are asked to give equal time to unscientific theories, and so on. But really, the most severe curtailment of my academic freedom is about really simple curricular decisions.
I’m glad to hear that you got your bike fixed! I couldn’t live without riding around. (There’s snow out now, so I go to the gym and pretend.)
The bicycle is fantastic. It is a 1956 Schwinn with one gear and coaster breaks. Now it even has a light so I can cruise around at night. The janitors saw me leave work late one night and said the next day “wow! you ride so fast!” It’s true, it’s a really fast bike and I do not know how or why.