Author Archives: Robert Frodeman

Franzen vs The Internet: Round Two – The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan – The Daily Beast. More evidence of the mashed up silliness and evil of twitter. Or not.

The academy and its offshoots (eg, NSF) are struggling to come to terms with the ‘accountability moment’ that steadily grows in importance. Accountability is typically about taking count of something. This explains in part the overwhelming urge to turn things … Continue reading →

Research Works Act: Elsevier and politicians back down from open-access threat.. A brief account in slate Magazine, with links.

NPR Tries to Get its Pressthink Right » Pressthink. An interesting post on the new ethics handbook issued by NPR.

Amazing stuff: this year 11% of the incoming freshmen at the University of Washington are Chinese nationals, paying 3 times in-state tuition. International Students Pay Top Dollar at U.S. Colleges – NY Times

Boston Review — Carlos Fraenkel: Citizen Philosophers. Talk about field philosophy!

Imagine: a day without Wikipedia…. Wikipedia to Go Dark on Wednesday to Protest Bills on Web Piracy – NY Times

Anguish Trumps Activism at the MLA – Labor & Work-Life Issues – The Chronicle of Higher Education. A constant drumbeat of this stuff now….

MLA considers radical changes in the dissertation | Inside Higher Ed. We are finally seeing some real movement, in terms of shifting perspectives toward the academy, dissertations, and the humanities. About time.

The Humanities Aren’t Totally Useless After All – The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan – The Daily Beast. Interesting what is good (education and health jobs) and what bad (arts and architecture). The rest fall into the middle….

Iowa: The Meaningless Sideshow Begins | Matt Taibbi | Rolling Stone. Taibbi is gaining a following for his speaking truth to power/clotheless emperor approach to the contemporary political farce.

Philosophers debate meaning of meaning at annual conference – The Washington Post. A slightly smartass account of Andrew Light’s effort to broaden the philosophical conversation….

Professor Kevin Anderson – Climate Change: Going Beyond Dangerous –welcome to the Apocalypse.

“The Philosophy Of Food” – The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan – The Daily Beast.

UC-Berkeley and other ‘public Ivies’ in fiscal peril – The Washington Post.

It’s amazing how often that term is thrown like a brick at one’s head. As a graduate student at the University of Texas at Austin some 30 years ago (could it really have been that long?) I was drummed out … Continue reading →

Numbers that few seem to know….

nsf.gov – News – Video – Myron Gutmann discusses NSF’s future priorities for social science research funding. – US National Science Foundation NSF.

Hitler Reacts to Pepper Spray Meme – YouTube.