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Elizabeth Sandifer

Elizabeth Sandifer created Eruditorum Press. She’s not really sure why she did that, and she apologizes for the inconvenience. She currently writes Last War in Albion, a history of the magical war between Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. She used to write TARDIS Eruditorum, a history of Britain told through the lens of a ropey sci-fi series. She also wrote Neoreaction a Basilisk, writes comics these days, and has ADHD so will probably just randomly write some other shit sooner or later. Support Elizabeth on Patreon.

6 Comments

  1. Froborr
    September 21, 2013 @ 12:14 am

    Increasingly, I'm noticing, it seems that every once-proud profession is in ruins. Is there anything that runaway capitalism hasn't devoured?

    This week there was a mass shooting at Navy Yard, which is about 15 minutes' walk from my apartment. I wrote a thing about about it, which (continuing the primary theme of my blog, which is being a pale shadow of Phil's) owes a pretty obvious debt to the first half of Phil's TV Movie article, but then goes off to do what I hope is its own thing. http://mlpomo.blogspot.com/2013/09/i-have-always-depended-on-kindness-of.html

    Reply

  2. Spacewarp
    September 21, 2013 @ 2:24 am

    As an Englishman, I find such a story so incomprehensible, as to be unable to make any comment on it. If it had happened in some African or Eastern European country then people in the UK would nod sagely and say that yes they do things differently over there.

    But when it comes to the US, we in the UK tend to think of you as essentially just a larger version of us, with a funnier accent and a lot more guns.

    However stories like this show that in some ways the US is as far beyond our understanding as any Middle Eastern country.

    Reply

  3. C.
    September 21, 2013 @ 4:05 am

    Phil, as you're obviously far more up on academic politics than I am: is it feasible at all for adjuncts to create a national union? And then strike right when it hurts the university the most: during finals week or something? Otherwise I just don't see how this situation changes. Adjuncts get paid so poorly now that they have little left to lose.

    Reply

  4. Theonlyspiral
    September 21, 2013 @ 1:38 pm

    I loathe academia. I had a flaming post about abuse of power by administration, and a failure by academics to remain relevant and allied with the people who could support them best – the public.

    But blogger ate it.

    Long and short of it: Academia as an institution has allowed itself to become irrelevant to many people and this has allowed administrations to get away with murder. At this point in my career I just want my Law Degree and to turn my back forever.

    Reply

  5. Mark Pontin
    September 21, 2013 @ 5:12 pm

    I have both UK and US residence, and know both places, and can tell you two things:

    [1] David Cameron and his chums are working hard on behalf of their owners to create the same situation in the UK. So-called elites are pushing their looting programs everywhere.

    [2] The US didn't used to be like this, and parts of it — it's a much bigger country — still aren't, especially if you know how to play the game. As this poor lady unfortunately didn't.

    So don't be so assured about your own situation and so dismissive of the US. In some ways, the rot — and the elite looting — is worse in the UK.

    Reply

  6. Dave
    September 22, 2013 @ 3:57 pm

    I'm just now writing a letter to my school's paper about the necessity of broader campus democracy to counteract administrative bloat and perpetual cycles of construction. In particular I'm addressing student power (arguing along the lines of "tuition funding has replaced state funding and now we have all this debt; it's our money for our education so we should demand a binding voice"), but obviously adequate representation for non-tenured faculty and graduate employees is a huge deal too. They get steamrolled by administrators every damn year…. Currently my school is conducting a presidential search, and for the first time, nobody who isn't administration/tenured is represented on the search committee. Neglect has dulled the edge of my rhetorical abilities, though, so if anybody has any good talking points for this thing I would love to appropriate them 🙂

    Reply

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