READ!!!! THINK!!!! ACT!!!!
David C.K. Curry, The Gutting of the Liberal Arts, The Chronicle of Higher Education,
APRIL 8, 2024
Let me spell this out to the Prime Minister, the Premier, the Government Ministers, and all elected representative officials at the three level of governments, and the manipulative-thinking bureaucrats, WE KNOW YOUR DIRTY SECRET.
It is, in fact, an open secret. There are types of personalities you hate, and that is not a too-stronger word.
“You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.”
― Abraham Lincoln
David Curry’s article reveals this truth which publicly demands action. Curry states,
“The template is worth considering, even if it hasn’t yet reached your campus.”
What Curry is referring to are the intellectual cognition histories I have been discussing, on and off the university campuses in Australia. It is no surprise to those who have “eyes to see” and then take action on the visuals. One is reminded of the three monkeys of bureaucracy (the cognition histories in the present):
The three wise monkeys are a Japanese pictorial maxim, embodying the proverbial principle “see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil”. The three monkeys are. Mizaru (見ざる), who sees no evil, covering his eyes. Kikazaru (聞かざる), who hears no evil, covering his ears. Iwazaru (言わざる), who speaks no evil, covering his mouth.
The concept of “realignments” from Curry is a significant case of this “bureaucracy”, or more accurately, the three monkey principle. Scholarly critics come along and demonstrate the critical alignment problems in governance, and the bureaucracy then manipulate a realignment solution which favours the those personal interests of governance against actually resolving the problem.
“The baneful results have included the loss of faculty members’ careers and livelihoods, the cheapening of students’ educations, and the transformation of institutions’ identities.”
It is an open secret. For decades, even as scholars as the apologetic appointees of the university governance, such as (selected examples)…
- Gregory, Helen (1987). Vivant Professores: Distinguished Members of the University of Queensland, 1910-1940, St. Lucia: University of Queensland Library;
- Grawe, Nathan D. (2021). The Agile College: How Institutions Successfully Navigate Demographic Changes, John Hopkins University Press;
- Story, John D. The Spirit of Caledonia in the Formation of the University of Queensland, Emmanuel College;
- Thomis, Malcolm I. (1985). A Place of Light & Learning: The University of Queensland’s first seventy-five years, St. Lucia: University of Queensland Press;
- Willetts, David (2017). A University Education, Oxford University Press…
…get it so wrong…the literature of which tells of this cognitive corruption, in universities, the federal and state government, and mirrored in local governance, is large and cannot be missed (selected examples)…
- Alexander, Fred. (1955). Sydney University And The W.E.A. (1913-1919). The Australian Quarterly, 27(4), 34-56. Retrieved April 29, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/24477368;
- Aronowitz, Stanley and Henry A. Giroux (1991). Postmodern Education: Politics, Culture, and Social Criticism, University of Minnesota Press;
- Clark, William (2006). Academic Charisma and the Origins of the Research University, University of Chicago Press;
- Crotty, Martin (2018) Book Review: No End of a Lesson: Australia’s Unified National System of Higher Education / The Australian Idea of a University, Australian Historical Studies, 49:4, 566-568, DOI: 10.1080/1031461X.2018.1520081;
- Darian-Smith, Kate, and James Waghorne, (2019). The First World War, the Universities and the Professions in Australia 1914-1939. Melbourne University Publishing, Carlton, Victoria, Australia;
- Davis, Glyn (2011). The Boyer Lectures 2010: The Republic of Learning: Higher Education Transforms Australia, Bolinda Publishing;
- Davis, Glyn (2017). The Australian Idea of a University, Melbourne University Press;
- Edmonds, P. (2015). Whither the Universities. In Tilting at Windmills: The literary magazine in Australia, 1968-2012 (pp. 153-154). South Australia: University of Adelaide Press. Retrieved May 1, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/10.20851/j.ctt1sq5wf6.15;
- Emison, Mary (2013). Degrees for a New Generation: Marking the Melbourne Model, University of Melbourne Press;
- Fenn, J., Blandy, D., Arnold, T. J., Lorbach, J., Moore, S., Shepherd, J., & Silberman, L. (2015). Training Community-Engaged Culture Workers at a Public University. The Journal of American Folklore, 128(509), 351–368. https://doi.org/10.5406/jamerfolk.128.509.0351;
- Forsyth, Hannah (2014). A History of the Modern Australian University, New South Publishing;
- Forsyth, Hannah (2014) The Russel Ward case: Academic freedom in Australia during the Cold War, History Australia, 11:3, 31-52, DOI: 10.1080/14490854.2014.11668530;
- Ginn, Geoffrey (2009). ‘Cilento’s Centenary: The Triumph of His Topics’, Queensland Review, 16 (2), 57-72;
- Glanzer, P., Carpenter, J., & Lantinga, N. (2011). Looking for god in the university: Examining trends in Christian higher education. Higher Education, 61(6), 721-755. Retrieved April 28, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/41477837;
- Greenwood, Gordon (1954) The present state of history teaching and research in Australian universities: An estimate, Historical Studies: Australia and New Zealand, 6:23, 324-338, DOI: 10.1080/10314615408595002;
- Harman, G. S., and Australian National University. Research School of Social Sciences. Education Research Unit. Research in the Politics of Education, 1973-1978 : an International Review and Bibliography / [by] Grant Harman. Education Research Unit, Research School of Social Sciences, A.N.U., 1979. State Library of NSW Offsite Storage collect 4pm next weekday T0243104;
- Hart, D. G. (1999). The University Gets Religion: Religious Studies in American Higher Education. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN: 0-8018-6210-8;
- Hayot, Eric (2021). Humanist Reason: A History, An Argument, A Plan, Columbia University Press;
- Henrick, Eureka and David Carment (2023). An ‘Important and Necessary Institution’: A History of the Australian Historical Association, The Australian Historical Association;
- Hill, Catharine B. , Winston, G., & Stephanie A. Boyd. (2005). Affordability: Family Incomes and Net Prices at Highly Selective Private Colleges and Universities. The Journal of Human Resources, 40(4), 769-790. Retrieved June 22, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/4129540;
- Giroux Henry A., and Stanley Aronowitz (1985). Education Under Siege: The Conservative, Liberal and Radical Debate Over Schooling, Routledge;
- Hutchinson, Mark and Bruce Mansfield (1992), Liberality of Opportunity: A History of Macquarie University 1964-1989, North Ryde: Hale & Iremonger;
- Jones, Steven (2022). Universities Under Fire: Hostile Discourses and Integrity Deficits in Higher Education, Palgrave Macmillan;
- Jones, Adrian (2011) Teaching History at University through Communities of Inquiry, Australian Historical Studies, 42:2, 168-193, DOI: 10.1080/1031461X.2010.531747;
- Kronman, Anthony T. (2007) Education End: Why Our Colleges and Universities have Given Up on the Meaning of Life, Yale University Press;
- Macintye, Stuart (2016). Life After Dawkins : The University of Melbourne in the Unified National System of Higher Education, Melbourne University Press;
- Macintyre, Stuart (2014) Book Review: Empire of Scholars: Universities, Networks and the British Academic World, 1850–1939, Australian Historical Studies, 45:1, 145-146, DOI: 10.1080/1031461X.2014.877795;
- Mandler, Peter (2020). The Crisis of the Meritocracy: Britain’s Transition to Mass Education since the Second World War, Oxford University Press;
- Marginson, Simon. (2016). The Dream Is Over: The Crisis of Clark Kerr’s California Idea of Higher Education. Oakland, California: University of California Press. Retrieved June 22, 2020, from www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/j.ctt1kc6k1p;
- Marginson, Simon (2016). Higher Education and the Common Good, Melbourne University Publishing;
- Marginson, Simon (1993). Education and Public Policy in Australia. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge [England] ; Melbourne;
- Mark, Young, (1900). A historical portrait of the new student Left at the University of Queensland : 1966-1972. Microfilm Services Brisbane, Brisbane;
- Murphy, Kate (2018) Book Review: From the Paddock to the Agora: Fifty Years of La Trobe University, Australian Historical Studies, 49:4, 569, DOI: 10.1080/1031461X.2018.1520104;
- Perry, B. (2011). Universities and Cities: Governance, Institutions and Mediation. Built Environment (1978-), 37(3), 244–259. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23290044;
- Pietsch, Tamson (2015). Empire of Scholars : Universities, Networks and the British Academic World, 1850-1939. Manchester University Press, Oxford;
- Pietsch, Tamson (2019) Book Reviews: Life After Dawkins: The University of Melbourne in the Unified National System of Higher Education / Coming of Age: Griffith University in the Unified National System / A New Kid on the Block: The University of South Australia in the Unified National System / Preserving the Past: The University of Sydney and the Unified National System of Higher Education, 1987–96, Australian Historical Studies, 50:1, 146-149, DOI: 10.1080/1031461X.2019.1559450;
- Rasmussen, Carolyn (2015) Book Review: A History of the Modern Australian University, Australian Historical Studies, 46:1, 151-52, DOI: 10.1080/1031461X.2015.992847;
- Reitter, Paul and Chad Wellmon (2021). Permanent Crisis: The Humanities in a Disenchanted Age, The University of Chicago Press;
- Roberts, Jon H. and James Turner (2000). The Sacred and the Secular University, with an Introduction by John F. Wilson. Princeton: Princeton University Press. ISBN: 0-6910-1556-2;
- Salmon, J. H. M. (1962) European history in Australian Universities: Comments on Professor I. Schoffer’s article (Historical Studies, No. 37), Historical Studies: Australia and New Zealand, 10:38, 222-223, DOI: 10.1080/10314616208595225;
- Schöffer, I. (1961) European history in Australian Universities, Historical Studies: Australia and New Zealand, 10:37, 94-99, DOI: 10.1080/10314616108595210;
- Serle, Geoffrey (1971) A survey of honours graduates of the University of Melbourne school of history, 1937–1966, Historical Studies, 15:57, 43-58, DOI: 10.1080/10314617108595456;
- Shermer, Elizabeth (2021). Indentured Students : How Government-Guaranteed Loans Left Generations Drowning in College Debt, Harvard University Press;
- Taylor, Miles and Jill Pellow (2002). Utopian Universities : A Global History of the New Campuses of the 1960s, Bloomsbury Publishing PLC;
- Thomas, Amy, and Hannah Forsyth & Andrew G. Bonnell (2020) ‘The dice are loaded’: history, solidarity and precarity in Australian universities, History Australia, 17:1, 21-39, DOI: 10.1080/14490854.2020.1717350;
- Unnamed (1956) Research theses: Post‐graduate theses in history, political science, etc., held by Australian Universities, Historical Studies: Australia and New Zealand, 7:27, 348-364, DOI: 10.1080/10314615608595077;
- Wright, Claire and Simon Ville (2018) The university tea room: informal public spaces as ideas incubators, History Australia, 15:2, 236-254, DOI: 10.1080/14490854.2018.1443701.
Yes, much of that critical literature is history and we must “out” the mad-brained “critic” who dismisses the history. AT THE VERY LEAST the corruption goes to an attitude of acceptance within the status quo, and dismiss any need for action which will change the policies which impoverished persons’ living, reduce university curriculum, and falsify the understanding of higher education: to quote, “the loss of faculty members’ careers and livelihoods, the cheapening of students’ educations, and the transformation of institutions’ identities.”
To conclude with a quote from Curry:
“The results are no accident….But who decides what the employment needs of the future will be, and which courses will be most relevant? In a humanizing moment, Smith teared up while announcing the cuts. While I have no doubt that her news was genuinely difficult to deliver, it was more difficult to receive.”
We wonder if the political decision-makers understand and if they really care?
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Neville Buch
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